Why We Should Talk (Or Respond) to Trolls

I write on a variety of blogs, and often run across the same trolls on them under many different names.  You can tell they are the same because of several things:  they are always spouting the same propaganda and lies; they use the same writing style; they are not imaginative in anyway; and they are hateful in their responses when you call them out on their lies.  Now there is a part of me that says the simplest solution is just to ignore them, but apparently they are too dense to get it that they are not worth responding to in writing.  So I figure that it is better to address them head on, which is often the most frustrating part of my day.

So, you may ask, why bother?  I sometimes wonder that myself, but it all comes back to the same answer:  the only way to fight ignorance is with knowledge and facts.  I seriously doubt if I would ever change the mind of one of these trolls, as they are usually close-minded and unwilling to consider any opinion but their own, but other people read what is written, and those minds are open to learning.  When you or I respond to a troll, we may not educate them (although there is always hope that they will learn something), but rather we educate those who are reading what you write and seeing the falsity of the postings of the trolls.  Sometimes it is like preaching to a choir, but sometimes, just sometimes, it is providing new insights or new information or new ideas that lead to better discussions on blogs.

In a country whose education system is in the tank, and who is not showing any great effort to change our public education system, it becomes just as important for us as citizens to not only spread the facts through good journalistic efforts, but also through the dissemination of facts through our postings.  We become the final line of defense in the spreading of honest truth, not the kind of truth spewed by the likes of FOX News and their pundits or CNN or MSNBC (although they try to stay relatively close to the truth).  We become the teachers of facts and disseminate knowledge through our interactions on blogs and through various news sites.  It is imperative that we address trolls within these venues to make sure that facts and truth become the norm, not the garbage spewed by trolls who are ignorant of either of these things because they prefer ignorance to reality.

It is time to address the trolls on Alternet and on all other sites that publish honest journalism.  It is time to send these trolls back under the bridges where they prefer to live apparently – the bridges of ignorance, arrogance, war-mongering, oil dependency, racial hatred, ethnic bigotry, climate change denial, and corporate schooling for drones.  Those who blog on these sites and refuse to address the postings of trolls fail to bring their lies to light and as such allow them to stand.  And as Karl Rove has shown us over the early years of this century – when you say a lie often enough, people begin to think it is the truth.  WE MUST NEVER LET THAT BE OUR WAY – RESPOND TO THE TROLLS AND SHUT DOWN THE LIE MACHINE NOW!