Meeting A Troll

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J

Joseph C.

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Meeting A Troll...
I'm back on Twitter.

I can imagine the cries of 'I knew he wouldn't last!' from the Twitterati.
But give me a few minutes of your time and I'll tell you why I'm back and the real truth about exactly why I left in the first place.

In my blog of 12th August entitled 'Walking, Not Running' I talked about my time on Twitter and my basic reasons for leaving. I stand over a lot of what I said. The atmosphere there has changed and there have been negative stories in the media about trolling, etc, for months now. The brand has been damaged and Twitter needs to act fairly swiftly to repair it. At the time of writing that blog, for reasons that will become obvious, I was very sketchy about my own personal experience.

When I left Twitter numerous people thought it was as a result of an overreaction on my behalf. That my departure was a kneejerk reaction to a couple of 'trolling' or 'flaming' incidents or that I was attention seeking. The reality of the situation is that my wife and I were targeted for over 3 years.

It started in July 2009. I'd been on Twitter for over 2 years at that point having joined in May 2007, and I'd never had a problem. My account was followed by a fairly innocuous looking one which I followed back and within 10 minutes I had received a Direct Message (DM) calling me a 'Dirty f*cking Jewish scumbag'. I blocked the account and reported it as spam. The following week it happened again in an identical manner. A new follower, I followed back, received a string of abusive DM's, blocked and reported for spam. Two or three times a week. Sometimes two or three times a day. An almost daily cycle of blocking and reporting and intense verbal abuse. So I made my account private and the problem went away for a short while. There were no problems on Twitter but my Facebook account was hacked, my blog was spammed and my email address was flooded with foulmouthed and disgusting comments & images. Images of corpses and concentration camps and dismembered bodies.
Again, it eased off for a couple of weeks. I relaxed. Thought they'd finally tired of failing to get a reaction from me. Boy, was I wrong.

I didn't mention it to my wife. Didn't see the point of worrying her. But then she joined Twitter to see what it was like and grew to enjoy it. It wouldn't have been immediately obvious to outsiders that we were man and wife. She made the mistake though of changing her profile to state that she was 'The long suffering wife of @LeoTraynor'. Not a good idea. She received a DM stating 'Your husband is scum. A rotten b*stard and you're a wh*re.' She laughed it off. Blocked and reported and then the pattern started again. We got to the point of not accepting new followers at all and then one day my wife received a torrent of abuse via DM and on the timeline that was so vile she's never been on Twitter since - which is a real shame as she has so much to share and is far more interesting than I am.

People kept asking me 'Why you? Why would these guys want to have a go at you?' I couldn't answer them other than it was a couple of random nutters who didn't appreciate my political views or ethnic origins. Or even someone who couldn't solve my cryptic crosswords!

The whole thing escalated in June, July and August this year. I received more and more abuse on the timeline and via DMs. A crossword clue account I'd started (@Leo'sClue) was inundated with abuse too.
Then one day something happened that truly frightened me. I don't scare easily but this was vile.

I received a parcel at my home address. Nothing unusual there - I get a lots of post. I ripped it open and there was a tupperware lunchbox inside full of ashes. There was a note included 'Say hello to your relatives from Auschwitz' I was physically sick.

I was petrified.
They had my address.
I reported it to the authorities and hoped for the best.
Two days later I opened my front door and there was a bunch of dead flowers with my wife's old Twitter username on it. Then that night I recieved a DM. 'You'll get home some day & ur b**ches throat will be cut & ur son will be gone.'
I got on to the authorities again but, polite and sympathetic as they were, there didn't seem much that could be done.
Every night for weeks I lost sleep over it. Listening for noises. Opening the door everday with trepidation. Trying to maintain a semblance of normality and not let my wife or son see that I was dying on the inside. Mortified that they might be in danger because of my big mouth or ancestry.

Then the last straw. I received another tweet, on the public timeline this time 'I hope you die screaming but not until you see me p*ss on ur wife'

I closed my account immediately and swore I'd never go back, in spite of the friends I have there.
I made it clear that I would pursue the troll or trolls and that I would take action. What I didn't say though was that I'd already been pursuing them for weeks and had a very good idea where, if not who, they were.

In July I was approached by a friend, who's basically an IT genius, and he offered some help. He said that he could trace the hackers and trolls for me using perfectly legal technology, which would lead to their IP addresses. I said yes. Then I baited them - I was deliberately more provocative toward them than ever I'd been before.

Holidays intervened. My Twitter account was deactivated but before doing so I posted links to my Google+ account, blog and invited people to contact me on Facebook. I'm delighted that a lot of my lovely friends did. I'm also delighted that The Troll did too.

It transpired that the abuse had emanated from three separate IP addresses in different corners of Ireland. Two of them were public wifi locations but the third....

The third location was the interesting one.

The third location was a friends house.

The Troll was his son. His 17yr old son.

I was gobsmacked.

I spoke to my friend at length. He told me how his son was always glued to his laptop, tablet or smartphone. How he couldn't watch a TV show without tweeting about it simultaneously. About how he'd become engrossed in conspiracy sites. It also became clear that the other two IP addresses had been used by his son.

He was horrified at what his son had done. Horrified, but not surprised. He wanted to call the authorities there and then and turn him in. But I said no.

A couple of days after that conversation I met my friend, his wife and their son in a quiet and discreet location. The son, The Troll who almost driven me mad, was totally unaware that I'd be joining them.

I sat down and ordered a big pot of tea. "Do you still like choc chip cookies?" I asked The Troll and he nodded eagerly, a shadow of the little boy that was flickering across his face.

We had a chat. I told them about my wife and son. I told them about my recent illnesses and bereavements and about the builders having been in. I asked after their business and asked The Troll how college is going. All bright and breezy and a trip down memory lane. Then The Troll's Dad tipped me the wink and I opened my bag and took out my manila folder.

I showed The Troll's mother and father screengrabs and printouts of his handiwork.

I showed them pictures of ashes and dead flowers.

I pointed out that one of the messages my wife received wishing me dead had arrived when I actually was gravely ill.

I told them of how I'd become so paranoid that I genuinely didn't know who to trust anymore.

I told them of nights when I'd walked the rooms, jumping at shadows and crying over the sleeping forms of my family for fear that they would suffer because of me.

Then it happened...

The Troll burst into tears. His dad gently restraining him from leaving the table.

I put my hand on his shoulder and asked him "Why?"

The Troll sat there for a moment and said "I don't know. I don't know. I'm sorry. It was like a game thing."

A game thing.

So, that's what it was...

The Troll's mother said "If you want to call the Garda we'll support you in that. I'm ashamed of him."

I responded: "I'm not criminalizing a 17 year old kid and ruining his future. But I will write about it - and you must all guarantee me that he'll go and see a counsellor about this or I will go legal on you."

Then I got up to leave. I looked The Troll in the eye and said "Stand up."

He stood. I said " Look at me. I'm a middle aged man with a limp and a wheeze and a son and a wife that I love. I'm not just a little avatar of an eye. You're better than this. You have a name of your own. Be proud of it. Don't hide it again and I won't ruin it if you play ball with your parents. Now shake hands."

"I'm sorry." he said, and looked like he meant it. "Thanks for giving me a break dude."

Then we shook on it.

And that is how I came to shake the hand of a troll.
Click to expand...

http://www.traynorseye.com/2012/09/meeting-troll.html

Personally, I would have found it very difficult to restrain myself from turning his head into pulp. I'm not sure it such a good idea to let someone away with that either regardless of how young they are - some people are just born bad.
 
Not sure about the "some people are just born bad" bit, but I too would have had a problem being that restrained.

The main issue is that we have a generation of kids who interact virtually more than they do in the real world, and some of them, as a consequence, have a real problem in distinguishing between reality and their virtual world. Add in that many will have been desensitised to violence from being immersed in a virtual environment where there are no consequences for their actions and you have a recipe for this kind of behaviour.

There was an article on the local news here a couple of days ago about trying to get kids to spend time outdoors. Some of the observations, and parents comments, were revealing. It seems that many parents would rather their kids were shut in their rooms on a PC than out and about in the "dangerous" world. I hate to think how socially inept the next generation is going to be if this is really the case on a widespread scale.
 
Jeremy Harris said:
There was an article on the local news here a couple of days ago about trying to get kids to spend time outdoors. Some of the observations, and parents comments, were revealing. It seems that many parents would rather their kids were shut in their rooms on a PC than out and about in the "dangerous" world. I hate to think how socially inept the next generation is going to be if this is really the case on a widespread scale.
Click to expand...

Yep, some parents just don't have a clue. Whether it is becoming too attached, too distant or too fearful - the balance is just not there. How many kids do you know that actually walk themselves to school? I remember running home from school at the tender age of four (although my mother wasn't best pleased). I used to regularly walk home on my own at about six. There was another pupil who used to cycle seven or eight kilometres or so and he was between the ages of ten to 12 at the time.

Nowadays, I don't think that occurs at all. This is despite that fact that the world of today in Ireland is a much, much safer place than it was a decade or two ago. If I ever have kids I vow to raise them using the French method.

It will be interesting to see what happens but the thing is that we don't know what online behaviours will continue or cease. Susan Greenfield and others like her continually propose that today's patterns of technological consumption will be carried on into the future. That remains to be seen.

I believe that texting was supposed to cause changes in the appearance of our hands - but texting is gradually becoming a thing of the past even at this stage. It might not even be around in a decade or so as voice recognition takes over. This just shows the difficulty in hypothesising ideas based upon such short timescales.
 
The main issue is that we have a generation of kids who interact virtually more than they do in the real world, and some of them, as a consequence, have a real problem in distinguishing between reality and their virtual world. Add in that many will have been desensitised to violence from being immersed in a virtual environment where there are no consequences for their actions and you have a recipe for this kind of behaviour.
Click to expand...

I'm not even sure that this is the problem in the case above. He started off interacting in the online world but he transferred this to the real world when he started purchasing items and walking over with them to the person's home. This seems to be something a lot more dangerous than just issues of anonymity and identity here.
 
There's a reason I'm not on facebook, and hide behind a dog here. When I buy or sell from members they get my email or my whole address. I'm picky about who.

Man, that kid should be picking up the dogshit and mowing the lawn for that guy till he's about 30. He could have gone down for serious time for that crap.

Really nice job tracking down the moron, who used his home to send that spew. Cops might not have bothered to do a simple check depending on their own politics.
 
dogman said:
There's a reason I'm not on facebook, and hide behind a dog here. When I buy or sell from members they get my email or my whole address. I'm picky about who.

Man, that kid should be picking up the dogshit and mowing the lawn for that guy till he's about 30. He could have gone down for serious time for that crap.

Really nice job tracking down the moron, who used his home to send that spew. Cops might not have bothered to do a simple check depending on their own politics.
Click to expand...

Yep, that's one way to do it. I chose to use my actual name as I don't want to go down the dangerous path of writing stuff I wouldn't say in person.

I'd imagine that it won't be too long before the police in every country has a dedicated unit for these sort of incidents.

I would like to have confirmation that Leo Traynor is genuine as a cursory online check doesn't reveal much. It is a little bit too neat and somewhat unlikely - which is worrying. It is one thing showing restraint if you alone are the victim and I could see myself possibly being the 'bigger man' in that scenario. It would be another thing entirely if it is your loved ones that were being targeted. There are holes that can only be addressed if the author proves to be genuine.
 
I am now leaning towards calling the article bullshit.

Having read both his websites and looked up what others thought it doesn't seem plausible. There are too many inconsistencies - the unlikelihood of Gardai not taking death-threats seriously, the fact that a friend's son would do something so heinous, the muted reaction, the self-aggrandisement and some very odd wording.

Here is one of the better posts questioning the authenticity. However, it is definitely possible to find out someone's location via creating a website that tracks down IP addresses using tracking services - a TD was recently caught trolling in Ireland using such methods.

Quote:
We had a chat. I told them about my wife and son. I told them about my recent illnesses and bereavements and about the builders having been in. I asked after their business and asked The Troll how college is going. All bright and breezy and a trip down memory lane. Then The Troll's Dad tipped me the wink and I opened my bag and took out my manila folder.
Wierd wording, told "them" about my wife and son. If he's friends with the father shouldn't the wife know this? It should be "I told him"

Quote:
I showed The Troll's mother and father screengrabs and printouts of his handiwork.

I showed them pictures of ashes and dead flowers.

I pointed out that one of the messages my wife received wishing me dead had arrived when I actually was gravely ill.
Wouldn't the parents have already seen this to have such a meeting? Especially the father? Leaving that aside this is the first time being gravely ill was mentioned. Sympathy parade!
Click to expand...

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=80941651&postcount=68
 
Whether that story is true is not the point, there is no question that the internet is the end of the world. I mentioned that someone on here recently linked to a thread on a motorbike forum where some guy posted about cutting his fingers off by trying to apply chain lube with a cloth on a moving chain, and one of the first posts was "Aren't you a stupid motherfucker". Just a few days ago, a guy on a motorised stink bike died here, and I took an interest because at first it wasn't clear if it was electric or not. I looked up a local forum which had the details, and keeping in mind the guy just died that day, there were posts about how because he was wearing no helmet there should be no sympathy at all for him - and someone pointed out to the idiot that posted that he would like to see him go to the guy's funeral and talk that way in front of his family that way.

There was a story a while ago about a guy in the US who's 16 year old daughter stole his car and had an accident and died, the photos of her dying in the car were somehow leaked to the internet by a cop, and some trolls got hold of the photo (of her drawing her lasts breaths and all f&cked up), and started emailing to him with messages like "Help me daddy! Help me! I am not dead yet!"...

People haven't got any worse, but the internet now lets them have a free international communication method. I always say the internet is going to deliver us true representative transparent democracies and will be a genuine and real mirror for what we are.... what an awful terrifying thought....
 
"In my humble opinion" as if opinions is a privilige not a right, articles like these whether real or fake are created to incite fear to oppress opinions that are detrimental to the greedy people that wanna keeping turning profit with their bad products and services :lol:

The internet gave the 99% a new freedom of expression and the vampires need a new form of oppression like "I know where you live and I'll getcha"..

..same thing that Gene Simmons and his fed buddies did by crucifying that lady who downloaded a dozen crappy pop songs. Same thing that all these fear-based manufactured musicians had been doing for ages, it's all one big system of mind control. :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:
 
:lol: :lol: :lol: And you know who fell for these fear tactics? The religious families and their teenage headbanger/stoner/acid-head kids who dared themselves and each other to drop that acid to scare the shit out of themselves, and each other and their parents, by playing records backwards and staring at scary album covers while listening to negative music and lyrics. The punchline here is, those teenage demons paid their parent's hard earned money on manufactured bands and their crap music and concerts, just to turn around and give their parents a heart attack. :( That's not teenage rebellion, that's one big system of mind control :twisted: :twisted: :twisted:

Rock and roll used to be fun music but money turns everything to shite.. and now the vampires are trying to do that to the internet.
 
The internet gave the 99% a new freedom of expression and the vampires need a new form of oppression like "I know where you live and I'll getcha"..
Click to expand...

Did you read the article? I must have read the wrong link.

I didn't know we were having a conversation about piracy, I thought it was about the tendency that the anonymous and disproportionate power/soapbox that the internet gives people is having on the tenets of basic civility between people. I must have missed the bit in the article where the dirty jew got together with Metalica to sick his lawyers on the poor innocent son who done nothing wrong but give the corporate shilling jew his desserts and the 'information' wot he needed....

Oh hang on Deejay, I get it now, it is a thread about douchebag trolls.... sorry, I am a bit slow on the uptake sometimes.... :)
 
Philistine said:
Oh hang on Deejay, I get it now, it is a thread about douchebag trolls.... sorry, I am a bit slow on the uptake sometimes.... :)
Click to expand...

Trolls, exactly.glad you now understand that I'm not talking about the article and that I'm talking about articles like those that incite fear in order to oppress billions of opinions on the internet. :mrgreen:
 
Philistine said:
Oh hang on Deejay, I get it now, it is a thread about douchebag trolls.... sorry, I am a bit slow on the uptake sometimes.... :)
Click to expand...

Absolutely classic............... :wink:

Getting back on topic, I doubt the internet has changed basic human behaviour. There have always been bullies and people lacking empathy for others, all the internet has done is give them a global, rather than local, playground and removed pretty much any limits on behaviour that may exist in a face-to-face confrontation.

When I was at school a bully could, at most, have an impact on a dozen or so other kids, all of whom would be fairly local, which would act to moderate bullying behaviour to some degree, as there had to be some fear of retribution.

The internet has meant that bullies and similar minded morons now have most of the world open for their amusement, largely free from any form of retribution. The cross-cultural behavioural impact has been significant, too, with the very direct approach that some societies take in conversation being adopted almost universally and adding to the miscreants armoury, making their tactics more effective against those in countries where communication is normally somewhat less direct.

Bullies and trolls share the same general attributes, though, social aggression, mockery, lying, being manipulative or using inflammatory language in order to do nothing other than provoke. I strongly suspect that trolls are, like bullies, socially inadequate individuals who resent or envy others who they perceive to have attributes they wish they had.
 
I agree Jeremy, that was my point about how the internet will truly deliver us the democracy and social mirror that we always thought we wanted, but when it comes, it is so much more awful than we even feared.

What you say about bullys - I have mates who are teachers and they explain to me that if you think of that poor kid who in our day got mocked and taunted all day - at least he got to go home at night - and maybe got the odd toilet roll thrown around his front yard, but nowadays these poor kids get home and face 24/7 of social media and email harrasment.

Anyone who reads any post I have ever made on this forum knows I am no shrinking violet, and a total libertarian, and someone who totally distrusts (and often at a personal cost) authority. But what I don't like is the way the internet is causing a normative change about what is acceptable treatment of another human being (I am talking about human decency and respect and trust, the kinds of things that underpin community whether it be real or online).

I once knew of this total assface who said that if a fellow human posted about his cancer diagnosis on a public forum, then he deserved to have that claim challenged.

Which was strange for someone who seemed to passionately believe in the liberation that the internet will bring.

Liberation only has value if it gives you freedom in a world worth living in. The guy who made a heartfelt and moving confession about something personal in a place he considered "a community" (what a dickhead huh?) probably did so expecting that maybe he was amongst people who care about him (which he was - because he is an extremely generous funny guy), and that maybe by sharing difficult things in his life in a meaningful and open way that he was contributing to the shared human experience. God forbid that the internet might connect us at great efficiency but still maintain the basic tennets of human care and tenderness. No screw that, it should just be about photos of cats with captions, guys getting their balls nailed to boards, and a place for me to download as much free pirated IP as I can cram into my increasingly meaningless and debased life.
 
Philistine said:
I agree Jeremy, that was my point about how the internet will truly deliver us the democracy and social mirror that we always thought we wanted, but when it comes, it is so much more awful than we even feared.

What you say about bullys - I have mates who are teachers and they explain to me that if you think of that poor kid who in our day got mocked and taunted all day - at least he got to go home at night - and maybe got the odd toilet roll thrown around his front yard, but nowadays these poor kids get home and face 24/7 of social media and email harrasment.

Anyone who reads any post I have ever made on this forum knows I am no shrinking violet, and a total libertarian, and someone who totally distrusts (and often at a personal cost) authority. But what I don't like is the way the internet is causing a normative change about what is acceptable treatment of another human being (I am talking about human decency and respect and trust, the kinds of things that underpin community whether it be real or online).

I once knew of this total assface who said that if a fellow human posted about his cancer diagnosis on a public forum, then he deserved to have that claim challenged.

Which was strange for someone who seemed to passionately believe in the liberation that the internet will bring.

Liberation only has value if it gives you freedom in a world worth living in. The guy who made a heartfelt and moving confession about something personal in a place he considered "a community" (what a dickhead huh?) probably did so expecting that maybe he was amongst people who care about him (which he was - because he is an extremely generous funny guy), and that maybe by sharing difficult things in his life in a meaningful and open way that he was contributing to the shared human experience. God forbid that the internet might connect us at great efficiency but still maintain the basic tennets of human care and tenderness. No screw that, it should just be about photos of cats with captions, guys getting their balls nailed to boards, and a place for me to download as much free pirated IP as I can cram into my increasingly meaningless and debased life.
Click to expand...

obligated, not challenged

your hell bent on twisting my words. where's Knocksy? I'm sure he'll be thrilled to know he has a new troll that joined his lynchmob, who's next? the word bro-mide swims in me head lol, bro, you get a membership gift of high quality toilet paper!

trust? on the internet? really? LOL!

"what I don't like is the way the internet is causing a normative change about what is acceptable treatment of another human being"

..so skepticism is unacceptable? BA-A-A-A-A-AA, MOOOOO, lol! now we know where yer head is at. I know plenty of jackasses who consider themselves men-of-science yet believe everything they're told no-questions-asked, perfect targets for sympathy scams used on the elderly.
Philistine said:
download as much free pirated IP as I can cram into my increasingly meaningless and debased life.
Click to expand...
There you go kiddies, if phere doesn't work, then try ridicule, or shame, or mockery, or demotion to 1mw (or ohm), or.. whipoutthepaycheckstub, or blackmail, anything! Opinions aren't tolerated here, troll on.

Seriously, free flow of quality information is like aquaponics, the internet is our ticket to human growth and evolution and pronto, but there are way too many squirely critters mucking things up just so they can get their nut$, oh but we're PEAK-INFO, right? as wonderful as the internet is and what it can be, sadly it also opens up the doors for the creepy-crawlies, trolls, corrupted engineers, and yer all steering this ship Earth full-steam-ahead straight to hell. :?
 
I am not lynching you DJ, I am just suggesting that there is an important chasm between celebrating the freedoms of the internet and failing to show some basic civility and respect - hell, there but for the grace bla bla go I.....

trust? on the internet? really? LOL!
Click to expand...

See, you could have just responded with that, and it would have been a 10/10 post.

I am going to get that put on a shirt - and you should make it your avatar:

 
Based on my personal definitions*, "Meeting a Troll" claims to be about trolling, when it is actually describing harassment; and the whole piece may be a hoax.

*My personal definitions:

  • Troll(ing): provocation for self-gratification (no effect = no fun)
    Harassment: focused antisocial behavior (this act is for you)
    Hoax(ing): misinformation for fun and/or profit (you can fool all of the people some of the time)


Accordingly, bullies are harassers (control through violence/threats), trolls are more sophisticated provocateurs (control through systematic stimulus/response ).
 
And this hasn't been moved to OTD yet?..wow..ok...

I figured that was proof you got a lb of anal..."lbofrectalpenetration"..maybe. :lol: Bastard. 8)
 
TylerDurden said:
Based on my personal definitions*, "Meeting a Troll" claims to be about trolling, when it is actually describing harassment; and the whole piece may be a hoax.

*My personal definitions:

  • Troll(ing): provocation for self-gratification (no effect = no fun)
    Harassment: focused antisocial behavior (this act is for you)
    Hoax(ing): misinformation for fun and/or profit (you can fool all of the people some of the time)


Accordingly, bullies are harassers (control through violence/threats), trolls are more sophisticated provocateurs (control through systematic stimulus/response ).
Click to expand...

I was thinking about bullying earlier today and came across this website. It is very good and gives some pointers for spotting bullying behaviour. Although I'm not sure that 'as miserable as sin' should be considered a characteristic. :mrgreen:

http://www.bullyonline.org/workbully/serial.htm
 
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