There are things people just don’t say to each other in real life.
And all the politeness we abide by in “real life” goes out the window when it comes to the anonymity the Internet can give us.
Internet trolls have taken over the Internet in the form of malicious comments on blogs, news stories, and YouTube videos.
For almost no reason at all, these users abuse the anonymity that the Internet offers to harass fellow commenters, as well as content creators. Some only make one comment, while other trolls drag fellow users into a long war of insults.
Something legal is finally being done to combat the trolls. A YouTube user, indignant over focused attacks, is taking legal action against Google in an attempt to find the identity of the troll. Once that identity has been established, the user plans to take that person to court.
While this may seem extreme, the platform must be considered. Many people use YouTube as a place to video blog, which is a highly personal and revealing act. While it is a user’s choice to partake, it is not his or her choice to have to put up with needless, sometimes irrelevant, abusive chatter as response to videos.
YouTube beauty gurus and aspiring singers alike know that trolls will attack anyone for any or no reason at all.
There are sites where the site master diligently edits comments and threads to keep trolls out. But, for the majority of sites on the Internet, there are simply too many people to control comments or feedback entirely.
The amount of users versus the amount of moderators simply can’t compete with the abundance of trolls.
Some people may argue that fighting against trolls is a violation of free speech. While the Constitution is indeed an important part of American life, trolls cross a moral line.
Being malicious and offensive just for the sake of it is morally wrong. Bringing down other people just because you simply can, shouldn’t be in any way connected to free speech.
Have some compassion for your fellow man, or cyber-man, if you will.
If you don’t like a video or disagree entirely with an article, then move on. There is no reason to sit there and create a stir while hurting people.
The Internet does allow for people to express opinions they would otherwise feel uncomfortable expressing. Yet these attention-craving trolls should consider how they would act in real life. While there are exceptions, people tend to be fairly decent.
On the Internet, there is no need to throw out racist, sexist, homophobic or otherwise offensive comments just because you’re under a veil of anonymity. An easier, more fun, and less dangerous way of getting attention is to start a blog with Photoshop images of Tom Selleck.
Annoy the writer at amurrell@asu.edu
