Thanks for joining the conversation.

sean

I think there are two broad groupings of trolls. The first (perhaps the largest) is obtaining some kind of gratification from their activities. They’re pushing some kind of viewpoint, or they are trying to damage something they do not like, or they are deriving amusement from the pain they cause. This group can be effectively dealt with by ignoring. If you ignore them, you cut off their gratification, they will move on to some other place where they can get the attention they crave.

However, I believe there is a second group of trolls: the psychopathic trolls. They’re not as common, but far more intractible, because they lack normal social empathy. These people cannot understand (and never will understand) that they are doing anything wrong. Since they do not experience an emotional engagement with the community, they are unable to connect the statements they make with the mayhem that ensues.

For them, only removal will work. These are the ones for which authentication and access denial are necessary.

Everything else you mention: Values, Principles, Consistency, Respect and Courtesy, are necessary for and effective with the “other” 99.99 per cent of community members.

But psychopathic trolls are intractible: they canot reform, they cannot be cured, because they lack the ability to understand that they have done anything wrong.

So I agree with you: you get to the stage where you either lose the troll or lose the community. Who was it said that “one person’s freedom ends at the point of another person’s jaw”? The psychopathic troll is like any other kind of psychopath: if you give them the freedom to kill, they will!

Fortunately, they are extremely rare. But that does not allow us the luxury of failing to protect our communities from them.

Well done!