Subtle trolling in D&D

[Ominous Gamer]

There has been a certain member that is taking the extra time to break up longish posts, sometimes by multiple posters, and replying to them without keeping the tracking link (the little arrow box by the name in the quote) in the quote.
I understand not copying the tracking information into every quote box if you're replying to specific points, but this user is removing it from the entire post while they nitpick apart the post they are replying to. This usually results in creating a conversation that is mutated and not at all what was originally presented, but since the tracking link was removed it makes it difficult to figure out the context, and the poster, thats being replied to.

Can we agree that taking the extra time to remove the quotation link is an attempt to hamper the flow of the conversation, trollish, and needs to stop?

[Dreadnaught]

I see your point. Though when it's come up in the past, the issue has been that the person in question doesn't actually use the quote function at all. Just scrolls up, copies a part of text and pastes it in quote tags.

[Nessus]

Fry 'em

[Loki]

Can we agree that you constantly calling Lewk a troll is trollish? I think we've established numerous times that he just doesn't use the quote function.

[Ominous Gamer]

so much for keeping names out of it

Can we agree that you constantly calling Lewk a troll is trollish? I think we've established numerous times that he just doesn't use the quote function.

but he does. Its when the discussion starts to pick up and he starts spinning quotes into something thats not at all related to the flow that he starts trolling in this manner.

[Loki]

but he does. Its when the discussion starts to pick up and he starts spinning quotes into something thats not at all related to the flow that he starts trolling in this manner.

Wow, you managed to find one exception. In a vast majority of his posts, he doesn't use the quote function. You whined about this before and this was established before. Why do you care so much? He clearly does it in order to respond to only parts of the posts he considers relevant.

[Ominous Gamer]

Wow, you managed to find one exception. In a vast majority of his posts, he doesn't use the quote function. You whined about this before and this was established before. Why do you care so much? He clearly does it in order to respond to only parts of the posts he considers relevant.

There is more than one example on these boards, I even linked to more than one example in what you quoted.
D&D is supposed to be sorta kinda maybe serious debates and discussions, others have pointed out that his topics are questionable at best, and the way he handles himself in there doesn't help with the discussion part.

He is making an active decision to make it difficult to follow a conversation, as he is obviously aware of the quote button, its uses, and how it works. Everyone else seems more than capable of breaking up quoted posts without cutting out the linkback.

[Loki]

He is making an active decision to make it difficult to follow a conversation, as he is obviously aware of the quote button, its uses, and how it works. Everyone else seems more than capable of breaking up quoted posts without cutting out the linkback.

No, he's not. He responds to the points he considers relevant. If you think he quotes you out of context, say so in the response.

[LittleFuzzy]

Does he sometimes use the quote function? Sure. But not often, usually he does what he has always done, he quotes manually. Which leaves no tracking info. A mannerism driving you nuts isn't trolling, it's you with a very thin skin. *charitably. Uncharitably, it's just another expression of you wanting to persecute Lewk because you don't like/agree with him* We aren't under Atari anymore, so there's no reason to put up with asinine procedural rules like "no double posting." I'm sure as hell not in favor of you dictating how I or anyone else on here quotes.

[Nessus]

But Lewk is a troll, he's all but said it that he only posts because he likes to see liberals squirm in horror. He's just kept around because of some grandfather clause, and because Dread has an obsession about collecting mentally ill posters to gawk at.

[EyeKhan]

But Lewk is a troll, he's all but said it that he only posts because he likes to see liberals squirm in horror. He's just kept around because of some grandfather clause, and because Dread has an obsession about collecting mentally ill posters to gawk at.

Well, to be fair, that's why he keeps you around too.

Note, until this very moment I had no idea those arrows up there did anything.

[Nessus]

Well, to be fair, that's why he keeps you around too.

Yes, well done, that was the joke

[EyeKhan]

Yes, well done, that was the joke

Oh, you were joking?

[']['ear]

Or correct use of parentheses.

[Ominous Gamer]

A discussion shouldn't have to be (at best) paused, or (at worst) sidetracked to remind the same user over and over again that "X didn't say that". His manipulations were addressed in the last two threads he posted in, and both went off topic after that.

Lewk does this because he appears incapable of actually debating full points with someone else, and would rather see his threads in flames/ruins than admit to something he wasn't trying to advertise/advocate. Aside from trolling, there would be no point to posting.

[Ziggy Stardust]

"Subtle"

I do think it's noteworthy that the gawdawful "taxes..." thread still is in D&D, considering how we banged on about raising the standards on D&D, I question having an ancient brains to the wall dumb as a doorknob chain-e-mail as a serious topic. I mean come on, many other posters would have been told to take a hike and have the thread kicked to GC, but we consider Lewk to be the kind of special you look at all misty eyed and go, "Well, that's our Lewk, whadda you going to do about it?"

* [...] * We aren't under Atari anymore, so there's no reason to put up with asinine procedural rules like "no double posting."

Or correct use of parentheses.

[Crowheart]

Agreed...unsubtle trolling is always more fun..

[Being]

Overt trolling > unsubtle trolling.

[Nessus]

I doubt this forum has any non-liberals in his eyes

[Nessus]

I don't see how I am at some liability to show that Lewkowski was ever a mild-mannered, up-standing member of the community. He was not. He never has been, insofar, as you point out, I have been able to see. He is a bigot, he is a bully and he is a waste of flesh.

However, in this particular instance, I would argue motive. He has, as I said, pointed out several times that he acts in an inflammatory fashion, here and elsewhere, because he enjoys the "ruckus" he causes. Certainly he has seen (I doubt you are arguing he is blind or illiterate!) how much protest, anger and inflammation his posting behaviour causes. He keeps on mis-spelling "then" vs. "than", he keeps on abusing the quote function, time and time again. You may argue he is doing it out of stupidity or laziness, rather than outright malice. But either way, he is disruptive, he is a fool and a belligerent ass. That you choose to nit-pick my complaints in this fashion I cannot ascribe proper motive, but it's in your persnickety nature and I suspect you're somewhat under the same folly as the people who suffer Lewkowski year after year, "well that's Lewk and ain't he a darlin'". It's certainly your right, but make no mistake, I will not suffer your fucking disgraceful accusations on my intelligence just because you saw fit to point out that Lewk is and always has been an ass-hole.

[LittleFuzzy]

I don't see how I am at some liability to show that Lewkowski was ever a mild-mannered, up-standing member of the community. He was not. He never has been, insofar, as you point out, I have been able to see. He is a bigot, he is a bully and he is a waste of flesh.[/qupte]

However, in this particular instance, I would argue motive. He has, as I said, pointed out several times that he acts in an inflammatory fashion, here and elsewhere, because he enjoys the "ruckus" he causes. Certainly he has seen (I doubt you are arguing he is blind or illiterate!) how much protest, anger and inflammation his posting behaviour causes. He keeps on mis-spelling "then" vs. "than", he keeps on abusing the quote function, time and time again. You may argue he is doing it out of stupidity or laziness, rather than outright malice. But either way, he is disruptive, he is a fool and a belligerent ass.

Except he's actually one of the most mild-mannered posters on the board. He has to put up with a tremendous amount of abuse from the many posters on here who don't like him, and he does so with equanimity. He almost never lashes out at another poster, and all you people who refuse to use the ignore function for it's intended purpose have given him plenty of cause over the years. You're demonizing him. You think he has political and social opinions of a bigot, so he must be a bully *hell if I can figure out what social and political opinions make up a bully, considering they definitely come in all stripes* But those don't tell you how he actually treats people. You simply can't TELL that, good or bad, from this purely textual, semi-anonymous, online medium. His behavior on here is the outlier who maintains outrageous visual behaviors. Is he being stubborn in not conforming to your social norms? Sure. Is that deliberate? Quite probably. It could even be baiting, yeah, though it seems to me that maintaining such "outrageous" behavior is more accurately a response to the way everyone attacks him rather than the other way around.

That you choose to nit-pick my complaints in this fashion I cannot ascribe proper motive, but it's in your persnickety nature and I suspect you're somewhat under the same folly as the people who suffer Lewkowski year after year, "well that's Lewk and ain't he a darlin'". It's certainly your right, but make no mistake, I will not suffer your fucking disgraceful accusations on my intelligence just because you saw fit to point out that Lewk is and always has been an ass-hole.

I'm not nit-picking so much as stating my strong objections. I do have a persnickety nature, but this falls to my strong opinion that you don't try and change people. You live and let live. If something bugs you that much, forums have this very useful feature called "Ignore." If you refuse to make use of perfectly useful tools provided for this exact purpose, well then you can take your sensitivities and shove them where the sun don't shine. As for my "fucking disgraceful accusations", you opened with Are you sleeping with him behind HomeSchooler2398234983er983249342's back? and ended with your mannerisms are foreign and your thoughts opaque to my barbaric, non-God-fearing mind, so you can go fuck yourself sideways you close-minded little shit.

[Illusions]

You think he has political and social opinions of a bigot ... But those don't tell you how he actually treats people.

To clarify this a bit, we don't think he's a bigot, we know he is a bigot based on his interactions with us here. That and its getting pretty tiresome that people keep throwing up some magical divide between the internet and the rest of the world away from the keyboard. Last time I checked we are people, the other posters here are people, and his posting here is an action, so yes, his interactions with us do tell us how he actually treats people. His posting suddenly doesn't become a non-action because its done on the internet, and we don't suddenly become non-people because we're interacting over the internet. I also extremely dislike this idea that thoughts and actions are completely divorced from one another. That somehow someone who doesn't think like a bigot nor act like one is equivalent to a person who thinks like the worst bigot imaginable, but doesn't put these thoughts into action, simply because they both don't act like bigots. At best, the person who thinks like a bigot, but doesn't physically act like one, is slightly better than the person who thinks like a bigot and acts like one.

[Loki]

To clarify this a bit, we don't think he's a bigot, we know he is a bigot based on his interactions with us here. That and its getting pretty tiresome that people keep throwing up some magical divide between the internet and the rest of the world away from the keyboard. Last time I checked we are people, the other posters here are people, and his posting here is an action, so yes, his interactions with us do tell us how he actually treats people. His posting suddenly doesn't become a non-action because its done on the internet, and we don't suddenly become non-people because we're interacting over the internet. I also extremely dislike this idea that thoughts and actions are completely divorced from one another. That somehow someone who doesn't think like a bigot nor act like one is equivalent to a person who thinks like the worst bigot imaginable, but doesn't put these thoughts into action, simply because they both don't act like bigots. At best, the person who thinks like a bigot, but doesn't physically act like one, is slightly better than the person who thinks like a bigot and acts like one.

I didn't realize that having "inappropriate" views is now considered a form of trolling, while apparently insulting said person is perfectly fine. I think some people are so used to only interacting to people who think, look, and talk like them, that they have become completely intolerant to people who are in any way different.

[Illusions]

I didn't realize that having "inappropriate" views is now considered a form of trolling, while apparently insulting said person is perfectly fine. I think some people are so used to only interacting to people who think, look, and talk like them, that they have become completely intolerant to people who are in any way different.

I don't claim he's trolling, and that wasn't the purpose of that post. My objection was to Fuzzy trying to claim that Lewk isn't a bigot, or at least try to dance around it.

[EyeKhan]

I didn't realize that having "inappropriate" views is now considered a form of trolling, while apparently insulting said person is perfectly fine. I think some people are so used to only interacting to people who think, look, and talk like them, that they have become completely intolerant to people who are in any way different.

2 cents: You're far more a troll than Lewk. Oh, he trolls, but not like you do.

[LittleFuzzy]

To clarify this a bit, we don't think he's a bigot, we know he is a bigot based on his interactions with us here. That and its getting pretty tiresome that people keep throwing up some magical divide between the internet and the rest of the world away from the keyboard. Last time I checked we are people, the other posters here are people, and his posting here is an action, so yes, his interactions with us do tell us how he actually treats people. His posting suddenly doesn't become a non-action because its done on the internet, and we don't suddenly become non-people because we're interacting over the internet. I also extremely dislike this idea that thoughts and actions are completely divorced from one another. That somehow someone who doesn't think like a bigot nor act like one is equivalent to a person who thinks like the worst bigot imaginable, but doesn't put these thoughts into action, simply because they both don't act like bigots. At best, the person who thinks like a bigot, but doesn't physically act like one, is slightly better than the person who thinks like a bigot and acts like one.

Fair enough. Ok, let's go by how he treats people on here. He's opinionated, but he's even-tempered. He takes a lot of flak but doesn't dish any out. As a personal matter he has a religious-based objection to homosexuality but doesn't bring it up unless someone else does, supports same-sex unions, and thinks Don't Ask Don't Tell is moronic. He doesn't think someone smoking dope is an issue that concerns him. He strongly supports self and home-defense, even to the point of lethality, and when broadly castigated for this evinced a strong tendency to demonstrate that belief in increasingly tasteless circumstances. His politics are highly partisan, expressing in abstract an ideology of government minimalism which he did not always follow through on solidly when it came to real politics.

Where does any of this look like the bullying Nessus has alleged? For that matter, please tell me where in his posting history that he taken any opinions we consider bigoted and spoken of making them policy, of trying to force the rest of society to share his views?

Do I think Lewk is really happy that someone was strangled over a tube of toothpaste? No, I don't. Nor do I think he was horrified. I doubt many of us were really horrified by that story, whatever intellectual gloss we assumed for our visible reactions. It was presented to us in a relatively neutral account, leached of most emotional content by the textual journalistic medium. Lewk probably did feel good about several accounts of lethal home defense though. He's publicly judged for that, frequently, by people on here, who find his opinions distasteful, but he mostly doesn't take the time to publicly judge others for what he feels to be distasteful.

So who is being intolerant, really? Who is actually treating people badly, in the only sphere we can see, which you allege tells us how people behave in all spheres of life? By your standard*, Lewk is a saint among monsters. He's a bigot who doesn't actually treat people in accordance with his personal opinions, while most posters on here are bigots who do treat people in accordance with their intolerance.

*And I'll note that apparently, in strict discordance with the many claims of a morally relativistic world by most of Lewk's attackers, that apparently "bigotry" is binary and all-encompassing, that apparently we do live in a morally objective world and that objective standard is set by intolerance, which we all display.

Except possibly for Nessus. She might actually maintain a morally relativist albeit dystopian viewpoint. It can be hard to tell, since as far as she's concerned all the relative points are bad ones. The world is constructed tautologically where if her negative view of something is wrong, that only means things are worse than she thought.

[Illusions]

Ok, let's go by how he treats people on here. He's opinionated, but he's even-tempered. He takes a lot of flak but doesn't dish any out.

Well first off there is the liberals/elitists thing, of which he classes quite a few of us, so while I wouldn't say he dishes out insults of the colorful sort other posters are capable of, he still makes an attempt at belittling or casting people in a poor light. As for even-tempered, which would you prefer seeing more in public, a man ranting about hateful things with anger in his voice, or a man ranting about hateful things who was even-tempered?

As a personal matter he has a religious-based objection to homosexuality but doesn't bring it up unless someone else does, supports same-sex unions, and thinks Don't Ask Don't Tell is moronic. He doesn't think someone smoking dope is an issue that concerns him. He strongly supports self and home-defense, even to the point of lethality, and when broadly castigated for this evinced a strong tendency to demonstrate that belief in increasingly tasteless circumstances. His politics are highly partisan, expressing in abstract an ideology of government minimalism which he did not always follow through on solidly when it came to real politics.

Where does any of this look like the bullying Nessus has alleged? For that matter, please tell me where in his posting history that he taken any opinions we consider bigoted and spoken of making them policy, of trying to force the rest of society to share his views?

I don't think Lewk wishes to be a bully, but does not mind, or is even happy if his chosen policies have the effect of enabling bullies to prosper (especially if they bully groups of people Lewk doesn't like). He has voiced numerous times that he finds it humerous if a non-violent, law-abiding, anti-war protester or "hippie" gets their face bashed in or the shit beaten out of them by an opposing crowd or the police. If a restaurant decides to not serve certain people, he is not angered or disgusted, he's completely fine with it. He approves of his home defense and personal security ideas because it allows people to kill other people he does not like.

Do I think Lewk is really happy that someone was strangled over a tube of toothpaste? No, I don't.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Until you come up with some, the numerous threads expressing joy and bestowing the title of hero upon these people seems to be evidence contrary to your claim.

Nor do I think he was horrified. I doubt many of us were really horrified by that story, whatever intellectual gloss we assumed for our visible reactions.

Yet I don't think any of us were overjoyed or happy about the outcome.

He's publicly judged for that, frequently, by people on here, who find his opinions distasteful, but he mostly doesn't take the time to publicly judge others for what he feels to be distasteful.

Oh, you mean how he doesn't judge others for what he feels to be distasteful by labeling them liberals or elitists? We just had an instance of this with him remarking about Tear.

So who is being intolerant, really? Who is actually treating people badly, in the only sphere we can see, which you allege tells us how people behave in all spheres of life?

I never alleged any such thing, I just wished to point out that thoughts are equally as telling about a person as their actions.

By your standard*, Lewk is a saint among monsters. He's a bigot who doesn't actually treat people in accordance with his personal opinions, while most posters on here are bigots who do treat people in accordance with their intolerance.

Like I've outlined above it doesn't really make him a saint. He would be delighted if someone else treated others in accordance with his personal opinions, he would perhaps even champion them as we've seen with his posts about people killing thieves.

*And I'll note that apparently, in strict discordance with the many claims of a morally relativistic world by most of Lewk's attackers, that apparently "bigotry" is binary and all-encompassing, that apparently we do live in a morally objective world and that objective standard is set by intolerance, which we all display.

Yes, but we all display different amounts of intolerance, and intolerance doesn't always have a negative effect upon society (consider intolerance towards rape, murder, etc.). Lewk is pretty egregious in this case though. Lewk is also the only poster who has displayed that he will not change his mind in regards to his intolerance and bigotry.

[Wraith]

... so you can go fuck yourself sideways you close-minded little shit.

*mod-cough*

[Wraith]

I'll admit to not usually reading his posts (and I don't know why the rest of you do), but I don't think he's really trying to start fights. From what I've seen, the accusation of him being a bully is especially wrong - as far as I can tell it's more that everyone else bullies him for having beliefs so far from the forum norm, and he usually doesn't seem to do anything about it. I'll give you disruptive though. But if you think he's intentionally trolling, please report him when he does it.

For anyone thinking of doing it, please don't dig back trying to find things you can report; there's a poorly defined statute of limitations here.

I don't think he's reading this subforum, so I'll try to poke him about the quote button.

[Nessus]

A bully without back-up is still a bully; a lot of Lewkowski's arguments boil down to trying to shame people for the way they think and behave, one is not a proper American (read: a human being) unless one subscribes to the ideals Lewkowski holds near and dear. That he does not get any positive feed-back, or rather the opposite, simply means his bull-shit is recognized for what it is. But so long as we're analyzing his behaviour, it is simply silly to claim he is not abusive because his abuse does not garner popular support.