True Capitalist Radio vs Bronies

The guy deserves to rot in prison. Not just have "Anti-Social Probation".

 

I find the whole Jail time system somewhat... ineffective.

Yes, it is good for appeasing the need for vengeance many people have, but does it really help society in the least?
No, not at all.

Instead of having a rehabilitated, productive member of society, we have to pay for them sitting twiddling their thumbs, waiting until they can get get out, after which there is an 80% chance they will do whatever it is they did again.

A much more... cruel, yet much more effective punishment would be to have the person stand in a populated area once per month for an hour, holding a sign that tells the world that his words killed a child, or that he drove drunk and destroyed a family, or whatever other crime they have commited. Let them have to write a letter of apology every week to whoever suffered because of their misdoings, let him have to put a picture of the deceased in his wallet, and whatever else it takes to make them never forget what they have done.

All the while, they stay a productive member of society, paying for their own existence, giving back to the government they wronged with their deeds in their taxes.

This may not be as pleasant for those seeking revenge, true, but the point of governments punishing for crimes is not to exact revenge. It is to make sure no crimes will happen after.

 

That is the price of idiocy, ignorance, and incompetance. The 3 I's.
People should know you killed someone with your words. People should know you destroyed a family while drunk.
The Jail System does need to be revised. It needs to have therapy, and Psychologist meetups every week/day.
But people have a right to know. I don't want to be sitting across someone who killed a family with his drunk driving at a restaurant or something like that.
/overexaggeration

 

All in all, I think that bronies should not troll him. His radio/podcast thingy has some good moments, and he may be troll baiting to an extent, but after listening to a few more episodes, I am sincerely worried about his health. From what i can tell, he must be 30+. And all of that yelling/coughing fits cannot be good for him. Maybe I'm just a very worrisome brony that should deal with it, but some times people just go to far with their trolling. If bronies as a whole stop bothering him, he MAY (probably not) change his opinion slowly over time. Yet as many have said above me, most of the people pony trolling him are probably not bronies.

 

Wow. I didn't suspect i t to go this long and have this many views.

 

@DanSze, I read your entire post, and I do agree with one of the things you've said, which is the following:

Other than that, I think the idea of considering trolling a "sport" is funny. It's no sport. It's just people trying to antagonize. That's all it is. Battle of wit? What wit? I see no wit when someone trolls. Ghost is not witty. The trolls that troll him are not witty. To be honest, when I listen in, I laugh at all the nonsense I'm hearing. Not only from Ghost, but to be honest, several of the trolls' attempts are weak. Even the ones that are good, they may be funny, but I'd never call it "witty." I've even found myself agreeing with Ghost on couple of occasions when it comes to a troll that fails miserably.

As for your "not winning" argument: I disagree with two of those you mentioned:

• Posting on a forum: If it's trolling, or posting in general, okay, but if you're having a serious debate about something, then, sure, someone can win. It doesn't mean they necessarily will, but it's possible.
• Waiting for a bus: You can win at this. It's called "not missing the bus."

But I understand where your coming from about posts being deleted or said poster banned. As for the bus argument, I think of this:

Spoiler: Trollbus

Sorry, DanSze, but I don't think we're going to ever see eye-to-eye on this issue. I simply don't think there's a strong enough argument to defend trolling. I really tried to understand it from your perspective. I really did, but the defense, overall, seems rather weak. That's not your fault though. If anyone else tried it, I'd probably claim the same. I've never been a troll, so I don't think I could understand it beyond the perspective of just trying to upset someone else for a laugh. Despite my lack of trolling experience, even I was able to recognize after a while that Ghost is "baiting." But to that I still say "Who cares?"

I hope there's no hard feelings between us. I certainly don't hold any against you. You at least admitted that there's a boundary between what's trolling and what's over-the-line, and I respect you for that.

 

@ePONYmous

Well, it seems that we agree to disagree.

However, both because I feel wrong just posting the above line with no continuation, and because it seems like it needs clarification, I have to say the following about trolling being a battle.

Every style of fighting has it's illegal moves and low-blows, most of which, after many years of practice and generations of discussion and perfection. Trolling in the form we know it as, however, is something that only one generation of Internet users has grown up around, and as such has no real rules set, not to mention that there can really be no rule set for something as unofficial as trolling. So, it falls upon each of us to build our own set of rules, our own Bushido, so to speak, and to uphold it.

For some, the code they make demands victory at all costs. Sadly, this is many of those that would call themselves trolls.

For me, true trolling has much akin to formalized debates, although with less rules in terms of format.

What it all boils down to, really, is that each person should have their own definition as to what trolling is, and therein lies the beauty of the concept. Each troll has their own style, and is different from the rest.

In the end, I guess it piqued my interest that someone can argue that trolls misrepresent the brony community and cause incorrect assumptions at the same time that they would generalize something as abstract, as diverse, as trolling.

 

I may be unusual and it may be due to my history of being bullied, but I find intentionally trying to make other people feel bad, despicable evil behaviour.

I have watched people get pleasure out of making other people miserable, I do not get it. Why is it pleasurable to make others live miserable?

This is one of the reason I love MLP so much, it teaches basic corny morals that have been forgotten about by most people.

 

If done right, you can bail some folks out troll baiting. Despite the growing uses of the internet, many people still "fall prey" to trolls. Troll baiting is still trolling just in a different light. Try to think of trolling as bullying.

The only comparison I can really make here is real life experience back from middle school. Everything was great my sixth and seventh grade year but when I hit eighth grade, that year was terrible for me. I got bumped up into the advanced class and left my other classmates for new ones. I was also bullied for about half that year. I had friends from the other class that I saw from time to time but not as often as I would have liked. One day at lunch, I was on my way out of the bathroom when one of my then current classmates who was a big antagonist of mine came running in and bashed into me. He was ready to start going at it but one of my previous classmates walked in who had quite the reputation. He saw what was going on and starting shoving the other guy against the wall threatening him. It was over before it started thankfully.

Long story short, sometimes meeting force with force can stop something before it becomes major which is what I try to do when I'm "trolling". There's nothing better than getting another troll mad.

 

Trolling causes nothing but pain, and people laugh at that pain because they find it entertaining, even if it is feigned or real.


Trolling should not be defended, end of subject. It may be fun, and can help you out at times... but trolling makes you seem like a flank, and quite frankly, trolling is downright despicable.
It's akin to bullying and manipulation, two of my least liked things in life.
I'm with ePONYmous here.

 

@ibage, If you're trying to defend trolling, this line makes the argument fall apart immediately:

I abhor bullying, and I do sorta think of trolling as the online analog to bullying.

I agree that sometimes force is the only option available, but I don't think that's an appropriate analogy here. There is no physical threat— well, normally. If it ever got that far then that's beyond "trolling" in my opinion. To me, what you've described is what I call "acceptable force." However, with trolling, I do not see anything acceptable about it. I will confess that my feelings about trolling Ghost have vacillated throughout the weeks. If you read some of my older posts about it, it gives off the impression that I felt Ghost deserves the trolling he gets. When I read my older posts on the issue, I feel disgusted with myself that I wrote that.

You see, in your situation, the force was applied in your defense. However, with the troll situation, are they really defending anyone? Are they trolling Ghost for some noble cause? Are they doing it because he's racist, sexist and homophobic? Or are they just doing it for "lulz"?

Even if they're doing it for a noble cause, which I have my doubts but I could be wrong, that's still not the same thing. It's not like they're suddenly silencing Ghost. The situation isn't mitigated in any way. It's not like one day Ghost is going to wake up and say, "I love bronies! I'm not going to make racist, sexist or homophobic jokes anymore! I'm going to be, for once in my life, an actual nice guy!" Please spare me the defenses for trolls.

DanSze and I already agreed to disagree. So if there's anyone else that's on here that has some sorta passionate view for trolling, just accept that you're not going to convince me otherwise and just agree to disagree with me. I'm not going to hold it against you guys. I'm a brony. I'll love and tolerate.

 

^this. Where were you on my days of 4Chan...

 

It seems that people still make the connection between trolling and making people mad.

I gave up on that definition long ago, once I realized that trolling, like any part of life, is much less simple than simply someone bullying someone else.

Do I gain pleasure from making someone feel worse? No, rather the opposite. I find the "original" or "First Generation" trolls that spawned the concept to be things I shall not name due to disliking being banned. Ironically, it is those very trolls that caused my becoming what I am, since the only thing that can fight words and twisted logic is more of the same, as sad as that may be.

As for manipulation, everybody manipulates everybody all the time. That is how we humans, as a race, function. No one will do what you want them to do, when you want them to do it, and how you want it to be done for you without a reason. It is sad, but there is no true altruism in the world, even if it seems like there is. Sometimes, it seems altruistic, but it is really the person's sense of honor clawing at them from the inside. Other times, it is for "that warm, fuzzy feeling". In any case, one would never progress without some sort of manipulation of others.

You manipulate people when you buy your food, playing on their want for money, at the same times as they use your want for food to further their needs.
You manipulate others when you post an article on this very forum, propagating an idea that others may not have had otherwise. Likewise, you are being manipulated with every word you read, forming pearls of opinions around the grit of the words you see, opinions that may or may not have changed.
You are manipulated by My Little Pony to change your ideals to the ones shown in the show.

Nothing is a simple as it seems, and I don't see why trolling should be the exception on which we have a binary view or good or bad.

[EDIT] Confound my stubborness, why do you drive me to keep posting?

 

Fair enough.

 

Tomorrow is Baller Friday. I ask everypony to call during Radio Graffiti and play the Ghostbusters theme song. PLEASE!!!

 

[youtube]gvdf5n-zI14[/youtube]

 

is Ghost gonna do one on Friday? Hes been getting angry with the Engineer for taking the show them him?

 

Back on topic, It amuses me how many people are blind to obvious trollbait.