Citizen Ted, Armchair Anthropologist
Back in the days when it was all fields 'round here, I was a contributor to alt.tasteless. A.T was a newsgroup where you really did have to read the FAQ. If you didn't, and just started posting without getting a feel for the group, what was and wasn't considered on topic, then the consequences could be quite nasty. AT didn't suffer fools gladly and most of the posters could tear you to shreds without much if an effort. Some of the greatest ever flames and put-downs came from A.T.

One of my favourite posters was Citizen Ted who, occasionally, would dust off the Armchair Anthropologist persona and give some hapless newby it with both barrels. Below is one of his shorter dissections. Enjoy

Cheers

Armchair Anthropologist: A Worthless Subject
Author: Citizen Ted
Email: [email protected]
Date: 1998/09/09
Forums: alt.tasteless

In the course of scientific discovery, it is incumbent upon the practitioner to balance wide-ranging data with a carefully discerning eye. One must consider the cost of time/money invested in a search for evidence vs. the necessity of accumulating enough data to satisfy the falsifiability of one's hypothesis.

Thus, a scientist does not move forward and survive the rigors of peer review by rushing to a quick conclusion. Usually, he must be willing to answer all contrary claims with a great firewall of supporting data.

Yet, there are times when a subject's disposition is so self-evident, one need only verify a few contrary possibilities and a solid conclusion can be safely proclaimed.

Such is the case with Bat!Girl ([email protected]), a pestilent little teenager with neither a Clue nor a Desire to gain one.

She is a textbook case of the standard "Enfánt Terriblé". Whereas even her high school cohorts have gone on to begin emotional maturation,she has been left behind as a discarded misfit with no discernable talents or distinction.

It is the concensus of the staff here at ArmAnthro that the subject is indeed a teen female who only recently gained access to the Internet. The staff here were so bored by her every post, they opted to forego direct quotes in order to employ some brevity and lend credence to our conclusions above:

"The subject responds with childish cynicism in every post, indicating an inability or unwillingness to comprehend the subjects of the threads she invades. She engages in miscapitalization in some oafish salute to what she thinks the medium is all about. (One cannot discard the influence of MTV chat videos and high school vernacular).

"The subject portends to be reactionary, when in fact her transparent pose is so opaque to the staff as to be laughable. This juvenile behavior is wide-spread in both primate and human populations, but only when the behavior is noted and quantified can it be regarded as being so annoying and unintelligent."

We feel the subject is unworthy of further scrutiny, despite the brevity of the data collection process. We include the following single quote as evidence, along with the tell-tale ticker-tape of groups posted:

In [email protected], [email protected] wrote:

tHe foRmat of WhIcH i poSt is prOper. iF yOu dOn't liKe the wAy i tyPe thAts yOur fUckiNg prObLEM.

And now, the groups to which she posts:

209 alt.teens
24 alt.tv.days-of-our-lives
8 alt.fan.kate-winslet
5 alt.tasteless
3 alt.politics.white-power
1 alt.gothic.music
1 alt.parents-teens
1 soc.culture.usa

Few comments could make the case clearer. But I'll try anyway:

Bat!Girl is, by any measure, a nauseating little teenage twit whose ability to socialize and grasp simple concepts places her somewhere in the orangutan family (pongo pygmaeus) of primates. Whereas chimps and gorillas can make lasting social contracts and maintain an ability to foster reciprocal relationships via communicative adeptness, the subject shows none such talents or tendencies and seems to behave more along the less-evolved line of solitary apes and their proto-simian ancestors.

This failure to ingratiate oneself through stupidity and oafish self-aggrandizement is embarrassing for the subject and nauseating to the staff.

We see no reason for any quarter to be given the subject on her
head-long leap out of the gene pool.

As ever,

- TR
- chief investigator, Armchair Anthropologist.
( Legless Mister Stabby - shanks for the memory, Thu 19 May 2011, 13:01, 4 replies)

Daily Fail
I have taken to commenting on the stories on the Daily Mail website. I post what I consider to be reasonable opinions, that I think 99% of the population would agree with. Nothing radical, just normal comments. All just to see how many "down arrows" I get.

Thing is, I think most of the people posting the utterly outragious, would make Hilter go "Ooo, careful now", insane opinions are trolls doing so to see how many positive votes their stupid comnnets can get.
(ScousersPet, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:52, 7 replies)

Tonay
Tonay was a troll who signed up as b3ta board member so they could troll the frontpage. As soon as they managed to get an image FP'ed they edited the images so the frontpage was full of pictures of Sarah Michelle Gellar, if I recall correctly. It was up for a bit before anyone noticed, which was nice(I think the changes were made at the weekend). The rest of the time they spent insulting about other people's work and generally being rather unpleasant, (which probably would have flagged them up as troll sooner anywhere else) until they got banned.

The b3ta account was deleted and normality resumed. If you do a google search for +b3ta and +tonay, you can even find the trolling forum from whence they emerged. I had to search for it 'cos I thought I might have dreamt it.

Edit: He/she was also responsible for this: www.consolecity.com/forum/showthread.php?t=84298 which is actually quite clever. Same Buffy references as well.
( Smallbrainfield, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:49, 2 replies)

Couldn't we just post an open invite
to /talk /b/ & the worst of slashdot/buzzfeed instead?
Honestly - trolling stories as a qotw, wtf do you guys expect?
(Misery McUglywife an attention seeking sociopathic fuckstain., Thu 19 May 2011, 12:49, 1 reply)

The word "Troll" does not appear to be in the bible.
A bit or Trolling-in-real-life... I was out in the local town centre with a couple of friends, standing in an area or the centre called Charter Place.

Whilst waiting for one of the guys who had popped into one of the shops, we were idly listening to someone well-known to the town centre - the gentleman who, come rain or shine would stand around and preach the supposed "Word of God". Without fail he would be there to tell us all how we would go to hell unless we let Jesus into our lives.

"I see evil wherever I go, and so do you all but you do not notice! By following the Word, you will see, and you can stop evil coming into your lives and save yourselves! Does anyone here know the source of this evil? Do any of you know where this evil is coming from?"

"Luton?" called out my mate.

The man turned bright red and shouted back "NO, NOT LUTON!!!" and went on a vigorous rant on how the young people of society do not take God seriously.
( theoriginalsteve <this space intentionally left blank>, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:47, Reply)

I used to post on Usenet in the late 90s.
As part of a group that called ourselves the 'haters' and our sole mission to join various groups and just troll relentlessly. But, I would never resort to insults and would keep it calm and made sure everything was proof-read before being posted (because there are always the grammar Nazis). That act of keeping calm and not insulting is the best weapon in a troll's arsenal. That and a good vocabulary, it just serves to wind them up all the more, digging away until they break and post lots of insults with the caps lock on. At which point, you called 'TILT!' and then moved on elsewhere.

Now I think about it, we were just cunts really, nothing more. Winding up Americans was the best though.
( sandettie light vessel automatic New Twitter - @bollocksreally, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:41, 6 replies)

I didn't know it but I dated a troll once
She'd lost her front teeth in an bike accident. The nice dentist fixed it with a couple of fake gnashers glued to the teeth either side.
She gobbled me down when I came over her bridge.
(TitanLX, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:41, 1 reply)

Wardrobe trolls
When I was about 8ish, my imagination fuelled by Point Horror tales, I used to terrify my little brother with stories about how the troll in his wardrobe would crawl out and eat him while he was asleep. (This was many years pre-Monster's Inc - the royalties cheque must have got lost in the post.) It got to the stage where I'd convinced him that the only way for him to be truly safe was by turning the lights off, knocking 3 times on the wardrobe door, spinning round three times, and saying "I'm not afraid of the trolls in the dark!" three times before getting into bed as fast as possible. After a couple of weeks he was doing this every night

Those of you with siblings can probably see where this is going.

One night, the second after he'd finished the final, "I'm not afraid...", I leapt out of the wardrobe wearing my glow-in-the-dark Spiderman pyjamas, a sheet tied round my neck (as a cape obviously - all wardrobe trolls wear capes!) and a Leonardo (turtle not Renaissance painter/inventor) face mask roaring my head off.


20 years on, my brother swears to this day that he's never been more scared in his life.


He screamed - very loudly - for a long time, and my parents quickly arrived on the scene. It didn't take Poirot to figure out what had happened - my brother was curled up in a ball on the floor bawling his eyes out, I was standing (dressed very dashingly IMHO) in front of the now open wardrobe looking guilty as sin.

Mum went to comfort my brother and eventually calmed him down. Dad found the whole thing quite amusing right up until the point he realised my brother had literally shat himself, on the carpet, by treading in it.



Epilogue:
The next morning was Sunday. I was grounded, my brother was still slightly traumatised. After breakfast, Mum sent me upstairs to spend the morning tidying my room.

As I went into my room, as usual, all the sheets were now on the floor. But when I went to pick them up they leapt up in the air at me going "Rarrrrggghhhhh!"

To this day I swear I have never been so scared in my life. I shrieked, in not a particularly manly fashion, and turned to run out of the room. In my panic I tripped over some of the many other items on the floor and fell headfirst into my bedside table.

When Mum arrived, I was sitting on the floor, blood streaming down my face, looking stunned. Dad was sheepishly comforting me, still holding onto the sheet.

She said nothing, just went to get the car out of the garage for what was one of many trips to Casualty me and my brother made in our childhood.
(Milo Minderbinder, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:41, 14 replies)

Pre-internet
in primary school. Me and my friend who I've trolled all my life are sitting at the desk in front of teachers. He's trying to count in twos up to thirty. I begin 82, 12, 42, 99, 92, 14,17 etc... Until Mr. F screams FUCK YOU DAZ!!!! FUCKING STOP FUCKING SAYING NUMBERS!!!!!111!!11!

At which point he was whipped from his seat and taken to the principles office.

Magic.
( dazbrilliantwhites has been meaning to change this..., Thu 19 May 2011, 12:21, Reply)

Well...Yep
It was a couple of years ago, I'd been shopping in Manchester and had just got the train back to Stockport, as most people will get in most city centres, I had been offered a lot of the leaflets about how god thinks we're scum and we're all going to burn. I have a tendency to stick these in my pocket rather than just chuck them in a bin, this is the first time one came in handy.

I got off the train, and near the station is a set of steps leading to the bus station, as usual, at the top is a group of chavs (Scallys, scum etc etc etc. One of the lads in the group, probably no more than 14 years old, looks at me and exclaims "Oh. My. God"

Naturally, I pull out the leaflet, hand it to him, and explain "I'll tell you a thing or two about god"

I leave, he's speechless. VICTORY.
(annhialus hasn't had an accident since, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:18, 2 replies)

A miscarried troll
I was on a forum when someone mentioned trolling the Sean Hannity forums. As a commie who isn't a complete zealot I thought it might be fun to go and ingratiate myself with people on the forum until outing myself to the shock and horror of all their members (they're a bunch of evangelical neo-con skid-stains). After registering with the site I was informed that it would take 24 hours before I could post, and they would e-mail me to tell me as such.

I never got the e-mail. The paranoid part of me thinks they hunted down my IP and found my true nature, coathanging my identity before it could blossom into a beautiful baby troll.
( clockworkrat has nice pants, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:15, 3 replies)

*adjusts ignore settings*
come on then Rory, say hello to the nice people
( emvee cruor deo cruoris, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:10, 21 replies)

One more while I think of it
I'm a member of a boardgame website and it's frequented by a lot of Americans. They are far too easy to wind up when you call them 'precious' or ask them to not take things so seriously. I swear, it's like a moving rag to a bull.
( Funkenschlag still likes dogs more than cats, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:08, 4 replies)

Agnosticism FTW.

( Je suis un vagabond is an unfunny, up your own arse middle class knob, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:06, 4 replies)

Real life Trolling
I'm regarded as something of a troll in the road in which I live by the 'youths' that frequent the area on their way to under-age drinking or window smashing, whatever it is that the troglodytes 'round here do for 'fun'. Anyway, this reputation has arisen from a long-standing attitude of 'not taking any nonsense'. The latest example of which occurred when, after walking my dogs a group of young mouth breathers asked me "Do those dogs bite?", not wishing to engage in conversation I went for a curt "Yeah." The little bum stain decided bravado was called for. "Well, if those dogs bite me I'll snap its fuggin' neck!"

This did not sit well with me.

I stopped suddenly and turned slowly toward him, glaring. Any semblance of bravery evaporated and he blurted out a quick "Sorry, sorry, I'm sorry!" as he darted over a nearby wall. "Yeah, you should be." I replied and walked off.
( Funkenschlag still likes dogs more than cats, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:06, 6 replies)

I am currently engaging in a lovely spot of scam-baiting.
A naughty man is advertising on the internet and alleging he is representing the company i work in recruitment for. I emailed to ask for a job, and was immediately offered a position that I have no experience in, on a salary of £6000 per month. Amazing! Despite the fact that i have completed their 'application' form giving our company name and address as my current employer, he seems very keen for me to go to America for an interview. All he needs is my passport details, and money up front for my visa and documents. What could go wrong?

Despite the fact that I enquired whether my previous conviction for money-laundering and trading illegally in endangered species (which has, sadly, left me unable to obtain any visa for the US or Australia) would affect my chances, and the somewhat startling revelation that I was born on a Boeing 747 over the Gulf of Mexico and lived with my grandmother from the age of five after my parents attempted to sell me to a circus, the company are VERY keen to employ me.

I'm now sorting out the final details with him before I go for the reveal. Well, it passes the time.

UPDATE: well, i've just responded to an email asking me to complete a questionnaire:

Dear Fred (I hope you are not insulted by me calling you Fred - but you seem a friendly man)

I am afraid I cannot open the questionnaire from your email. Please, understand that I really do want this job (despite my lack of experience and crippling autism - regarding this, please confirm that there will be no red lifeboats on board as if I see any form of transport that is red, I have to hop seven times on each foot and fear this may alarm your guests) and have already packed my swimsuit and a packed lunch in anticipation of my new life at sea.

Please, kindly resend the questionnaire so that we can arrange my interview in America. I have never been to America before - can we eat 'chilli dogs' and go to the top of the World Trade Center? How exciting!!

I look forward to hearing from you.

with all the blessings that Jesus may offer the sinners,

Janet Aylia


i wonder if he'll reply?

UPDATED UPDATE: i have an appointment letter! now, do i carry on with this, or hit 'em with a cease and desist?
( janet aylia y'all motherfuckers need jesus, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:01, 14 replies)

I used to post on a politics site that several years ago was quite good.
There were a handful of obvious trolls, who repeatedly posted illogical nonsense, took offense at everyone else, and insisted that nobody was allowed to post statements that they disagreed with.
Strangely enough, as time went by, it became clear that none of these people were trolling. They were just very, very stupid. And dedicated.
( Dr Preference AjcuiVd289, Thu 19 May 2011, 12:00, 4 replies)

I have a great joke
about Alzheimer's...
( scarpe We Stole Bikes, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:57, 3 replies)

They have a cave troll

(TheManWithThePlan cussed your mum on, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:57, 5 replies)

Star Trek
Pretty much the only trolling i did was signing up for an oh so serious Star Trek forum and posting as many messages about how good the story arcs in Babylon 5 were*.
The admin contacted me and threatened to kick me off i didn't want to talk about Trek.
So i relinquished.... Then posted about how superior Xwings were when compared to TIE fighters.
Got bored after that.
*This has the advantage of being trolly and uber geeky
(andythepieman Is surfing the waves of indifference on, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:57, Reply)

Phone Troll
I always take unsolicited telephone sales calls. I am always polite, express interest in the products or services being sold and generally act like a lovely customer. Sadly, I am quite hard of hearing, have a very poor memory, suffer from congenital stupidity and did I mention not having a good memory? Due to these health issues, it will often take many, many, many repeated attempts before I understand even simple concepts. Sometimes, to the general embarrassment of all concerned, I will need the same sentence to be repeated ten or more times before it sinks into my thick skull. When we ultimately, normally after more than 30-minutes later, get to the point were I have to hand over my bank details, to secure whatever great service is being offered, I generally get very confused about my bank provider. It's not been unknown for me to confuse the barcode on a can of coke for my account number. One nice gentleman was VERY frustrated at my 28-digit account number. He made me get my cheque book, explained where to get the account number from, and was quite upset that it had the same 28-digit number I'd already given him. I did explain, patiently, that it was a very BIG chequebook...

This is why I'm signed up to the Telephone Preference Service. It's not to protect ME and to save ME any wasted time. No, no, no. I have altruistically signed up to TPS to protect the poor telesales industry from having to deal with my fuckpiggery. If they opt to ignore TPS and illegally call me anyway ... well, it's hardly my fault is it?
( Linbox has a serious dunk habit, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:57, 1 reply)

Awaits
first post referencing Billy Goats.

oh, wait, this IS the first post referencing Billy Goats.

Awaits second.
( scarpe We Stole Bikes, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:56, 2 replies)

!


This is my mortal enemy.
( The Mock Turtle ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:56, Reply)

-------------------------------------------------------->
This
( The Mock Turtle ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:55, Reply)

*Gets popcorn and awaits /talk to arrive.*

( The Mock Turtle ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:55, Reply)

Sod off
and stop bullying me. Wahhhhhh
( The Mock Turtle ™ --- Thinks you are a cunt, on, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:54, Reply)

FIRST
YAY
(andythepieman Is surfing the waves of indifference on, Thu 19 May 2011, 11:51, 5 replies)