[Discussion] The Inconceivable Power of Trolls in Social Media

This is a follow-on to the nearly two year old topic "Trouble at the Kool-Aid Point." The intention is to provide a place to discuss the unreasonable power social media trolls have over women and minorities, with a primary focus on video games (though other examples are certainly welcome).

Phubarrh wrote:

Speaking of Gamergate? https://www.sacbee.com/news/state/ca...

I'm constantly horrified to find out the terrible things they accuse their opponents of doing are the sins that they themselves are committing. I'd prefer to believe that they were just made up out of thin air because I don't want such horrible things to happen to anyone...but so often the right-wing gadflies turn out to describing their own sins. The accusation as confessional. Bleh.

Perfect example of internalized misogyny.
Sickening really. Poor kids.

Gremlin wrote:
Phubarrh wrote:

Speaking of Gamergate? https://www.sacbee.com/news/state/ca...

I'm constantly horrified to find out the terrible things they accuse their opponents of doing are the sins that they themselves are committing. I'd prefer to believe that they were just made up out of thin air because I don't want such horrible things to happen to anyone...but so often the right-wing gadflies turn out to describing their own sins. The accusation as confessional. Bleh.

It's really quite commonplace. I get accused a lot of various things, mainly because I'm kind of an ass in real life, too. But the accusations are weird. Like, I get accused of being "addicted to Coke." I'm ambivalent to soda at best, and I prefer clear soda. I get accused of being addicted to coffee. I like the flavor but caffeine doesn't affect me in any potent manner. I can forget to drink one and not notice. I get accused of liking particular women who I find mildly off-putting. I get accused of liking men. I get accused of wanting this or that or some other thing, some of which I find extremely bizarre. No, sir, I don't actually think about sticking my fingers into elevator slots. That is a strangely specific desire to be accusing me of having.

In all of these cases, without exception, the speaker turned out to want the thing they're accusing me of wanting. It's classic projection.

So, Mandy Morbid (ex-GF to ZSS) just posted the abuse she suffered at his hands.

CW - Abuse. Much abuse.

https://m.facebook.com/amandapatrici...

mudbunny wrote:

So, Mandy Morbid (ex-GF to ZSS) just posted the abuse she suffered at his hands.

CW - Abuse. Much abuse.

https://m.facebook.com/amandapatrici...

Jesus Christ. I guess I shouldn't be surprised.

EDIT: The old P&C thread is like poo.

I knew he had done very bad things. For years now I've been avoiding everything he was involved in, and I regret that before I found out I once bought one of the RPG products that he worked on.

And now it's apparent that he's done even worse things than I knew about. Yikes.

f*cking hell. I was warned he was bad news but that....yeah, I kinda regret backing a Kickstarter thing he was involved with now a while back. Welp. Live and learn, he's 100% on the boycott list now for sure.

mudbunny wrote:

So, Mandy Morbid (ex-GF to ZSS) just posted the abuse she suffered at his hands.

CW - Abuse. Much abuse.

https://m.facebook.com/amandapatrici...

I’d say that almost belongs in the feminism thread. It’s textbook domestic abuse with victim grooming, marital rape, gaslighting, the work. And a good deal of rape culture thrown in. All too familiar.

I had never heard of Zach Smith before, the only game-related thing I found was directing something for The Escapist (big surprise there on the choice of outlet). Should I have heard of him?

He's a pretty big name in tabletop RPG design (especially in the OSR side of things). I believe he's done a lot of stuff for Lamentations of the Flame Princess(?) which doesn't surprise me as that seems to be a very pro-gore, pro-grimdark RPG system with a lot of violence towards women in it's artwork. He was also consulted for some of the changes in 5e D&D I think? Might have been an earlier version I'm not sure. It might even have been the stuff about inclusive gender and sexuality in character creation, i seem to recall there was a mini gamergate style hubbub about that at the time? Could be wrong.

He's also been part of the porn industry i think (the escapist thing was him and a bunch of porn stars - including Mandy I think - playing Dungeons and Dragons)

He did a couple of things I actually really liked, including Maze of the Blue Medusa which is - if i'm honest - an incredible, weird megadungeon set inside a pocket dimension within a magical painting. (Although that was a joint production with another guy who afaik is not toxic). It's still a fantastic book but i feel it would require a lot of editing to remove zak's "voice" from it's descriptions and encounters.

To my shame i've also backed another product of his (and a few other people as well i guess) on kickstarter last year before i learned quite how much of a douchebag he was. I figure its too late to cancel out now, but given this revelation, i've mailed them asking to at least make sure my name is not included in any kickstarter backer "thank you" credits or the like.

Maq had mentioned previously that he has been in trouble before, by obsessively sealioning anyone who had even the slightest criticism about him or his work and setting his (sizeable) fan-base - a lot of whom are from 4-chan and the like, of course - on to them. A couple of women in particular have had complaints about his harassment (verbal, online stuff) for years but he's always twisted it around to make them sound like the obsessive crazy ones, mainly because he's clearly used Mandy to legitimise himself and help him sound like the victim.

Wow, thanks for making the effort of writing a great and expansive reply! Much obliged milady *tips hat*

My experience with ZS has been him as a GG-esque troll on social media, but if you want to add it to the feminism thread, go for it. It’s not my place to add things to that thread.

So. Sealioning. I had to look this up.

How to handle a troll ... and neuter a sea lion

I am continually surprised by the ways in which people can look to hurt or subdue one another. Such subcategories of trolling. Honestly. The human race.

Alas. We have people utilising these tactics to shut down what, or whom, they don't want to see, nor want anyone else to see. We have people throwing out accusations of these tactics to shut down what, or whom, they don't want to see, nor want anyone else to see. This seems to have become the default way to conduct oneself online.

Commenter From Article wrote:

Most importantly, don't dismiss legitimate challenge or criticism as trolling. It's a lazy way to avoid having to confront your own mistakes, biases and ignorance.

Avoidance. This is what we subsequently have. I see few actual discussions taking place. Little back and forth. The point of a discussion forum is all but lost. A blog site with comments disabled would suit better.

Challenge is not inherently negative. Criticism need not be frowned upon. Curiosity may not and need not necessarily be labelled as either. Questions can be what topple the unworthy, and their views, whilst simultaneously elevating the worthy, and their views. Discussion can bolster education and understanding. Querying biases and reasoning can broaden horizons. It's possible to be on the same page whilst bouncing differing approaches off one another, or attempt to visualise where the other has stood and thus their why.

I feel displaced from time with these views. It's all conflict now.

It's difficult to navigate the online space in this climate. I'm beginning to view most everyone who I do not have prior knowledge of, and even select few of those, as not worth the effort, not worth the risk. Trolls were trouble enough. Add those whom the ill-minded warped to be continually defensive and accusatory and it becomes utterly confusing, and exhausting.

I used to believe that communication could heal almost anything. Perhaps I still do. What do we do when people stop communicating, though? When it's a hardline that cannot be queried? Miss a beat once if you dare? The simple answer is mirror the ignorance. Live and let live. That can be difficult when you're born curious and feel things entirely too much.

Unproductive. - Certis

Ugh

RnRClown wrote:

I used to believe that communication could heal almost anything.

Given the word salad that you wrote, I find this hilarious.

RnRClown,

I would start by saying that the Internet has never been great for "debate". It maybe was always a really poor idea next to talking to someone in person or over the phone. A lot of what's happening online is that we're learning as we go along what works as "debate" and what's literally just trolling (the point of this thread) or seen as trolling, intended or not.

Secondly, there are groups of people who have found ways to effectively voice the inequities of society in such a way as they've convinced many of us that these things aren't up for "debate".

If this doesn't seem interesting to you then you probably need to find other places to discuss the things you think you can't discuss online. Seriously.

Some things are less up for contestation right now. I think that's okay, personally. We've collectively decided (correctly in my opinion) that the right to debate isn't worth the right to inflict pain on people. Specifically marginalized people.

The Internet fails at a lot of things, but it's hugely successful right now for putting a light on historic injustices. If you think those historic injustices should be up for contestation simply for the sake of a good debate then you're probably not going to like many corners of the current Internet.

RnRClown, you linked to article that described what you're engaged in here very well.

Sea lioning

Sea lioning is the process of killing with dogged kindness and manufactured ignorance by asking questions, then turning on the victim in an instant. “In this, the perpetrator endlessly nitpicks and relentlessly pursues the topic, but oh so very politely and, when the target finally gets annoyed and retaliates, the sea lion takes on the wronged victim of abuse role,” says Hardaker.

You have a habit of doing this when you're challenged. Rather than seeming to take it in you bemoan the state of discourse and take the role of a victim being shouted down by people you simply disagree with.

The main problem as I see it is most of the topics engaged in on D&D (and the wider internet) are deep issues like trauma, rape culture, abuse, misogyny, etc. Trying to have a rational, linear "debate" about these issues ignores the deep, emotional resonance they have for people affected by them directly. It also tends to hand wave or minimize harm in favor of keeping it at arms length and focused on how they reflect on men (ie yourself). That viewpoint may not feel like it's dangerous or harmful, but the world is largely made up of people who'd rather turn a blind eye to harm than engage with it or risk too much of themselves or their own comfortable worldview.

So yes, I don't think you'll find yourself feeling great engaging on these topics. You're not supposed to. No one does. But it's necessary and important so we don't just wax on hypothetically about things or try to create some theoretical middle ground where there is none. What's lost when we say "no one can handle criticism" is that's usually a response to being criticized and not being able to handle it.

I say this as someone who struggles a great deal at times taking in criticism. It's a long, painful process but it's worth it.

*mod*

So since you're going to use other threads to bemoan the state of discourse after proving you can't swim in these waters yet, I'd rather you refrained from participating in D&D topics for two months starting today.

pyxistyx wrote:

He was also consulted for some of the changes in 5e D&D I think? Might have been an earlier version I'm not sure. It might even have been the stuff about inclusive gender and sexuality in character creation, i seem to recall there was a mini gamergate style hubbub about that at the time? Could be wrong.

The gender diversity in 5E thing was somewhat unrelated but did happen at the same time.

At the time ZakS was already known for bad-faith argumentation, harassing people, and so on. He was accused of being toxic in various ways and mobilized an army of harassers to support him--you can find a lot of people posting in support of him in ways that, in the context of this new information, were clearly directly or indirectly orchestrated by him. He was permanently banned from RPG.net in 2013 for, quote "A whole lot of things". He's banned on a lot of other sites, too. His long history of being nasty to people was actively buried by his army of witting and unwitting supporters and sock puppets, and there were persistent reports of him doing worse things from people who were afraid to publicly identify themselves out of fear of that mob. He also had a habit of accusing other people of the behavior he was doing himself, which is why you'll see references to "witch hunts" from his defenders. Even in 2013 he was keeping company with other verifiably toxic people.

He drove people away from RPGs--we lost a lot of good designers and players because of him.

(I also suspect that he makes sock puppet accounts to make false accusations against himself so his defenders can easily debunk them, but I don't have any direct evidence of that, just long-running patterns around his posts.)

Edit: as it turns out, other people have documented him mixing up his sock puppet accounts and various other forms of nasty harassment. I hope that RPG publishers will take steps to repudiate their prior involvement with him.

He showed up here at some point.. maybe a little after the peak of GG stuff? He apparently likes to google himself. He was ejected after Not Very Long At All.

I am glad Mandy has gotten out of that situation. Abusive relationships are... rough to disentangle from. And even if she had written the defense of him that it now turns out he wrote himself and attributed to her, it all felt very much like "oh no" back when that was going on.

Well, Google is nuking Google Plus from orbit, so that should wipe out some of the toxic side of OSR.

Maybe the conversation has moved on, but it's taken me a couple of days of things rattling around in my head to get any kind of handle on it, and I'm still not sure it's a fully formed thought and there's other stuff on my mind, but it's probably the best I can come up with:

The problem people have with 'debating' these issues isn't that people are being 'rational' about them. It's that you're on the wrong side of the issue--simple as that. Because if you're on the wrong side of an issue, no one cares why you're there.

Think about it: no matter how 'emotional' your opposition is, it's not like anyone's going to say "oh, well, your hatred for me is very emotionally engaged and not rationally detached, so it's okay." It's not that opposition based on 'reason' is bad and opposition based on 'emotion' is good. It's that opposition is bad, and 'reason' doesn't justify opposition any more than emotions do.

(additional thought)

What's also confusing is that these discussions sure do *look* like debates. They're not all just subjective stories. They're full of facts and figures and arguments supported with evidence.

One case on here always comes to mind for me when these sorts of conversations come up. Someone who had both personal experience with a certain kind of violence and professional experience trying to prevent it said something about the issue, and what they said was 100% wrong. It wasn't a matter of subjective viewpoints, it was a matter of facts that you could literally cite to. It was a case where they were even arguing for the vulnerable to have *fewer* rights--totally disempowering them--so that the authorities charged with guarding the vulnerable could have more power.

So what do you do in a case where someone is 100% factually wrong? Where the only 'judgement call' is whether fighting this single, relatively unimportant dispute with this particular strategy, a strategy that's not only factually wrong, but will make it harder to win much more important issues in the future? Where it's not a case of "better safe than sorry" because the authorities are FAR from perfect, because if there was ever a case of "the process is punishment" this is one of them, even for a possible victim? Where all indications are that the other person is perfectly willing to have the 'debate'?

I just deleted everything I'd written. It wasn't worth it.

*mod*

cheeze, I'm having trouble parsing what you're trying to say, but it does seem to be a tangent talking about how we talk about how we talk about things. Whatever broad strokes you may try to apply, there's always going to be exceptions and endless "what about-isms" which go nowhere.

So best to move on, please.

Certis wrote:

*mod*

cheeze, I'm having trouble parsing what you're trying to say, but it does seem to be a tangent talking about how we talk about how we talk about things. Whatever broad strokes you may try to apply, there's always going to be exceptions and endless "what about-isms" which go nowhere.

So best to move on, please.

Sure--no problem. I'll just say that however many "talking"s are involved, at the end of that construction, it should be about real people, making the world a better place, and figuring out how one's single, solitary life--the only life one ever gets to lead--fits into it all.

Future!

Researchers believe they have identified the prime driver for a startling rise in the number of people who think the Earth is flat: Google’s video-sharing site, YouTube.

Their suspicion was raised when they attended the world’s largest gatherings of Flat Earthers at the movement’s annual conference in Raleigh, North Carolina, in 2017, and then in Denver, Colorado, last year.

Interviews with 30 attendees revealed a pattern in the stories people told about how they came to be convinced that the Earth was not a large round rock spinning through space but a large flat disc doing much the same thing.

Of the 30, all but one said they had not considered the Earth to be flat two years ago but changed their minds after watching videos promoting conspiracy theories on YouTube. “The only person who didn’t say this was there with his daughter and his son-in-law and they had seen it on YouTube and told him about it,” said Asheley Landrum, who led the research at Texas Tech University.

The interviews revealed that most had been watching videos about other conspiracies, with alternative takes on 9/11, the Sandy Hook school shooting and whether Nasa really went to the moon, when YouTube offered up Flat Earth videos for them to watch next.

Some said they watched the videos only in order to debunk them but soon found themselves won over by the material.

Landrum said one of the most popular Flat Earth videos, “200 proofs Earth is not a spinning ball” appears to be effective because it offers arguments that appeal to so many mindsets, from biblical literalists and conspiracy theorists to those of a more scientific bent.

One way or another, the interviewees found themselves believers and before long were asking “where is the curve?” and “why is the horizon always at eye level?”

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Last month, the YouTube star Shane Dawson uploaded his new project: a 104-minute documentary, “Conspiracy Theories With Shane Dawson.”

In the video, set to a spooky instrumental soundtrack, Mr. Dawson unspooled a series of far-fetched hypotheses. Among them: that iPhones secretly record their owners’ every utterance; that popular children’s TV shows contain subliminal messages urging children to commit suicide; that the recent string of deadly wildfires in California was set on purpose, either by homeowners looking to collect insurance money or by the military using a type of high-powered laser called a “directed energy weapon.”

None of this was fact-based, of course, and some of the theories seemed more like jokey urban legends than serious accusations. Still, his fans ate it up. The video has gotten more than 30 million views, a hit even by Mr. Dawson’s standards. A follow-up has drawn more than 20 million views and started a public feud with Chuck E. Cheese’s, the restaurant chain, which was forced to deny claims that it recycles customers’ uneaten pizza slices into new pizzas.

Mr. Dawson’s conspiracy series arrived at a particularly awkward moment for YouTube, which has been reckoning with the vast troves of misinformation and extreme content on its platform.

In late January, the company announced that it was changing its recommendations algorithm to reduce the spread of “borderline content and content that could misinform users in harmful ways.” It cited, as examples, “videos promoting a phony miracle cure for a serious illness, claiming the earth is flat or making blatantly false claims about historic events like 9/11.”

Mr. Dawson, whose real name is Shane Lee Yaw, has more than 20 million subscribers and a devoted teenage fan base. He has built his lucrative career by, among other talents, understanding what kinds of content plays well on YouTube.

For years, that meant conspiracy theories — lots and lots of them, all delivered with the same wide-eyed credulity. In a 2016 video, he wondered aloud if the first Apollo moon landing was staged by NASA. (“It’s a theory,” he said, “but, I mean, all the evidence is not looking good.”) In 2017, he discussed the false theory that the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, were a hoax. (“I know it’s crazy,” he said, “but just look at some of these videos.”) And last year, he devoted a segment of a video to flat-earth theory, which he concluded “kind of makes sense.”

In fairness, Mr. Dawson is a far cry from partisan cranks like Alex Jones, the Infowars founder, who was barred by YouTube and other social networks last year for hate speech. Most of Mr. Dawson’s videos have nothing to do with conspiracies, and many are harmless entertainment.

But the popularity of Mr. Dawson’s conspiracy theories illuminates the challenge YouTube faces in cleaning up misinformation. On Facebook, Twitter and other social platforms, the biggest influencers largely got famous somewhere else (politics, TV, sports) and have other vectors of accountability. But YouTube’s stars are primarily homegrown, and many feel — not entirely unreasonably — that after years of encouraging them to build their audiences with viral stunts and baseless rumor-mongering, the platform is now changing the rules on them.

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Facebook is aggressively being used by anti-vaccination advocates to target pregnant women with sponsored advertisements to spread false information and conspiracy theories as the US battles a climbing measles outbreak.

A sponsored ad found by Quartz journalist Jeremy Merrill shows the anti-vaccination organisation Stop Mandatory Vaccination targeting women ages 20 to 60 who have expressed interest in pregnancy living in the state of Washington – where the governor recently declared a state of emergency over the measles outbreak.

Nearly 50 children and young adults in Clark County, Washington have become sickened by the disease since January.

According to the CDC, there have been over 100 instances of measles since January – more than the entire year of 2016, when there were only 86. So far, nearly every child who has gotten ill is un-vaccinated.

Prederick wrote:

Future!
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IMAGE(https://i.imgur.com/BOcsiBw.png)

IMAGE(https://thumbs.gfycat.com/UnevenFloweryBonobo-max-1mb.gif)

A spokesperson for Google, Facebook, and Twitter had this to say in response:

So, those of you that follow the Zak S story, Wizards of the Coast put out a statement.

To all D&D fans,

We spent the last week listening and learning from the D&D community.

Zak Smith, along with many others, was engaged by Wizards to provide feedback on D&D Next, the playtest which evolved into D&D fifth edition. We have not contracted with him since, and regret our choice to do so in 2014. Because of that, we are removing Zak’s credit from future physical printings and digital versions of the Player’s Handbook.

We applaud how the D&D community supports one another and fully support the planned Dungeon Masters Guild bundle raising funds to donate to RAINN (Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network). The bundle is live now and we will be amplifying it going forward!

We are grateful to be a part of this wonderful community, and we thank you for your passion. We remain committed to working with and learning from you, the D&D community. You may always share your comments and thoughts with us on our social media platforms and we are setting up an email address to receive feedback more directly.

Sincerely,
The D&D Team