About a year ago, on a post about condoms, someone jumped on my personal blog and left a comment that when I read it, I had no doubt it was from a troll. And I said so.

And I was wrong.

It turned out that the commenter was someone I had met a few times, who had hopped on my blog and left his opinion about what I had written. Not being a regular blog reader or someone who regularly circulates in the blogosphere (as many of the readers of my personal blog are not), the voice of his comment was very different than what I'd grown used to. He is also a different gender than I, a different race, a different age range, and from a different area in the US. All these factors made for a very different voice hitting my blog.

The result being that I had some honest dissension and differing opinion on my hands, and I screwed up in my interpretation and response. He'll probably never come back, despite our resulting email exchange, and I really regret how it went down.

And I'll never rush onto The Troll Train again.

Certainly, trolling is real. The guy who jumped on my blog after the first BlogHer and suggested what I might like to do with a hanger was most certainly a troll, and I deleted his comment.

But I'm convinced that not everyone who looks like a troll and acts like a troll is in fact a troll.

Last week, it being the first week in January or something, I jumped into an online community I've been on the fence about and posted to the forum a question about permissible content and how to deal with questionable content. I woke up, read something that bothered me (again) and was like, I need to just figure this out already!

I'm not going to link to the post because that would be counter to my intent in posting it. But my question was about some sexual content and the resulting thread was highly educational, to say the least. I did get plenty of excellent, thoughtful responses to my question and now feel clearer about the situation there. But other voices in the thread were very challenging.

I've never taken a class in debate, and it's not like I run a feminist blog, and my actual (haphazard) introduction to formal feminist theory and thought was like, maybe, two years ago, so when the thread quickly turned to sexism, I just did the best I could. I tried to be respectful, thoughtful, responsive, honest... But baby, it's a jungle out there!

One person even created a new account to jump on and say something rude to me! Can you imagine? I've only posted one anonymous comment in my entire life. It was totally respectfully worded, but it was on an anti-abortion blog, and I'm honestly just too afraid of those people to risk identifying myself. (And I'm 100% serious about that.)

It was amazing to me how people just declare who you are, what your intent is, and what you're trying to do or say. Literally, just making it up to suit them. That was really strange to me - that suddenly I was an "activist" or "on a mission to make every one believe what I believe." I kept looking behind me at my desk - Are you talking to me?

Activist! That one gave me a chuckle, but I kinda felt bad because there's so many hardworking, real activists who've earned that title.

But back to trolling. Although it was suggested to me that many people in the thread were trolls, and that the odd practice of cherry picking things you've said to try to twist your meaning and trip you up, as opposed to reading with an eye towards actually understanding what you're saying, is part and partial of said trolling, I did choose to give the benefit of the doubt whenever possible and to continue the conversation in a thoughtful and respectful way. The way we do here, really.

And maybe that was innocent and stupid of me. But after the incident with that commenter on my personal blog, I'm just committed to that. I have to assume that people are engaged in the conversation, and that maybe they're just having a difficult time understanding the way I speak, the same way I've had difficulty understanding different voices myself.

The thing about trolling, to me, is that on one hand the intent of it is to cause a stir, and upset. Ignoring someone will ward that off at the pass. But on the other hand, ignoring a troll, or someone you suspect to be a troll, simply sees them not engaged and living to troll again another day with the same talking points and no new information. And you risk pushing away someone who might actually be trying to engage.

OK, so maybe most Maybe Trolls aren't listening anyway. And maybe they don't care to truly consider my words or my perspective, or even take a moment to consider that I'm not who they immediately decided I was, but, ever the optimist, that's who I am. I don't know how else to be, because everything else seems ineffective and closed off. I'm trying to learn to listen and to hear and to respond as effectively and as thoughtfully and as respectively as possible. No matter how someone comes at me.

Sex and relationships. Feminism. Online communication. Talk about stuff we're all still figuring out.

I think that's OK.

~

Related Reading:

How To Keep Hostile Jerks From Taking Over Your Online Community - This is an awesome article from back in May.

Online Survival Guide: 9 Tips for Dealing with Idiots on the Internet - I have much to learn.

PR Relationships:Update on Online Reputation - A PR person talks about how she uses the Internet to manage her relationships

What Wondrous Love Is This? - How communication can heal us.

Matthew Murray and The Dark Side of Support Forums - Support forums have an added challenge.

Contributing editor Liz Rizzo also blogs at Everyday Goddess.