Trolls on the Flip Side

Dan Riehl (Riehl World View) has a few excellent posts on why Sarah Palin's decision to step down as Governor of Alaska is a sign of weakness including Why It's Time To Move Beyond Sarah Palin and Fund On Palin, July 7, 2009.  But you would think that Mr. Riehl had brutally murdered kittens by the ferocity of some of the comments on his posts.

During the election last year, bloggers who criticized Obama often found themselves being harassed by one or more from a legion of trolls, attacking the messenger of such posts. In few instances the commenters weren't trolls, and had substantive arguments (the definition of someone who isn't a troll), all in all, however, these things got nasty.

I think Mr. Riehl, despite a near-decade long establishment of conservative creds and substantive writing, has found himself the recipient of the Right side's equivalent... by being critical of Sarah Palin.

Mr. Riehl has not attacked Palin's family. He's posted his thoughtful and fact-based opinions about Palin's inferiority as a presidential candidate for 2012 (while still leaving open election wins in the longer term).

I had a troll-like comment on one of my posts criticizing Palin.

While I do not think that the trolls on the Right are an organized band of paid commenters (as they often were when they attacked people who criticized Obama), it is just as inappropriate.

Most of us who watched the blogosphere last year became familiar with "Paul-bots", who, like the paid Obama-supporting trolls, seemed to spend their days scouring the Internet, looking for anyone who had the audacity to question Ron Paul's fitness for office or doubt his sure victory.  The comments became all too familiar, as the substance of their comments seemed to come from some sort of "Comment Response Playbook."  These commenters seldom provided original refutations (with counter evidence).  They just regurgitated their candidate's talking points and used pejoratives to attack the messengers.

I don't think the Paul-bots knew they sounded so ridiculous, as most were merely simpletons who had swallowed the Paul Kool-Aid (or more accurately Kook-Aid).  Most appeared to be young (in their 20s) and had no previous election-participation experience (and, therefore, no historical mindedness when it came to elections). In that sense, they were cute (and I don't mean that to be disparaging).  They were innocent and invigorated, and if it was in Ron Paul where they found the need and desire to participate politically, that isn't a bad thing (if it means that their participation will be a life-long one, and not a flash in the pan).  They found the "community" they were a part of giving them a sense of belonging and purpose, something they seemed to be longing for.

That said, that sense of belonging and "higher purpose" is a dangerous thing.  It is cult-like behavior, as they clustered like seals against a common enemy (the enemy being anyone who didn't share their collective views about Ron Paul).  An individual supporting Ron Paul was not a bad thing at all, but an individual who sets aside reason and a willingness to hear thoughtful opinions and criticism, is no longer thinking like an individual.  They've become a cult member.

While I wouldn't put the Paul-bots in the same camp as those who, in the 1930s, found themselves similarly carried away by the charismatic Adolf Hitler, the behavior was the same, even if the candidates weren't comparable from an evil-quotient perspective.

Paul-bots were certain that their hero was going to defy Washington pundit projections, and sweep the election.  Anyone who said otherwise "would soon find out" just how wrong they were.

With the above, my purpose is to provide examples and to illustrate just how passionate people can be, while still being wrong.  The Internet can exacerbate these things, giving someone a sense of a large numbers of supporters (but they forget that the Internet is a dipstick measurement and the electorate is vast). Finding "thousands" of people with similar views on the Internet does not translate into "millions" of voters for your side. Passion can be a good thing, but it can quickly dissolve into fanaticism, justifying (to themselves) a kind of moral conviction to behave badly.

This should be a lesson for all who wish to go on the attack when anyone on the Right shares an negative opinion on Mrs. Palin's credibility as a candidate in 2012.  More accurately, a reminder to bloggers who find themselves on the receiving end of swarm-like personal attacks.

Cultism and fervor for one's political Messiah will morph into attack of anyone who doesn't join in the Kool-Aid drinking, regardless of the ideological aisle.

Attacks of the messenger are always bad form and they become counterproductive.  If a candidate, regardless of how substantive and qualified they may be, has cult-like followers who behave badly and loudly, their bad behavior reflects negatively on the candidate.

As I said above, comments, in order not to be considered troll-like, must be substantive and not contain personal attacks.  The argument can be fierce, but the focus must be on the argument itself, not personal attacks on the individual who expressed an opinion.

This is going to get ugly, as Mr. Riehl has discovered.  Sarah Palin is the standard-bearer for a group of Americans who believe they have been marginalized (and victimized).  Not all Americans support Sarah Palin for those reasons, but many do, and the decent folks are going to be out-shouted by the Sarah cult members. Criticizing their hero will result in all kinds of improper and rude behavior.