When trolls take over a Forum... don't you hate that

[Pickles]

Mods do pretty good here and not very many members or guests have ever stooped into personal attacks on anyone here. I would like to think that is maturity X3

One of my favorite specialty forums in last two years has pretty much chased away the people that were the ones to question and has 80% trolls.
I miss the original forum badly and have not found another close enough to switch to.
It is also where I have met my first mean Canadians. I ..lel.. never met a Canadian that wasn't a laid back type of social progressive (do not confuse with SJW. I mean humane, environmentalist, social program supporting, live and let live types. I found most polite except 2 from Quebec. Okay they were polite just snarky arses) until I joined that forum in 2012.

Equivalent is if this forum was taken over by married average 30 year old couples that think age gaps are a perverted deviation and are free and easy with insults. It would no longer serve it's specialty function and have less and less regulars that are the actual focus of the mission/specialty.

Have any of you had a forum you like to frequent that went down from that kind of thing?
How long before you gave it up rather than be part of the flame war?

[Slow Worm]

I've known both cyclists and public transport users forums be wrecked by motoring fanatics who seem to hate those who prefer any other form of transport. Several cycling groups on Usenet had to convert to being proactively moderated because of them.

SW

[Pickles]

Seriously? Lawl. People who hate cycling are joining cycling forums to say they hate cycling?
What on earth is up with the internet this decade

[SummerBob]

If you think forums are bad you should try YouTube.

I've seen some of the most vile attacks waged in YouTube comments, peppered with profanity and names like "retard". It's unbelievable.

What gets me even more is that this happens in Christian videos by people who identify as "Christians".

There are several videos out there on controversial Christian topics like marriage in Heaven and universal salvation where these "comment wars" are particularly prevalent. Their language is from the gutter. You wouldn't expect it from people of faith.

[Slow Worm]

Seriously?... People who hate cycling are joining cycling forums to say they hate cycling? What on earth ...

Not 'hate cycling' as in would simply dislike doing it themselves: they hate anyone cycling, or more often hate anyone cycling as a means of transport (some have no objection to purely recreational cycling on forest trails, etc, esp. if the bicycle used is transported there by car). The pests on bus/rail user fora are much the same. They are presumably motivated by status anxieties, in which case their behaviour is explicable even if silly and annoying.

I imagine they start from a combination of feeling they have insufficient status and the belief that they derive status from car ownership and use. That status is dependent upon other people admiring their car ownership/use. They then reason that those who choose other modes of travel may well not particularly admire cars (or they would be using them). That perceived non-admiring is then seen as a threat to the affected individual's status, leading to an aggressive reaction. I sometimes wonder if some are covert viral marketers from the motor industry, who have a rational motive for denigrating any alternative to car travel.

I suspect apparently gratuitous hostility to vegetarians has a similar source, derived from a perception that meat is a high-status food, and so a belief that vegetarians are failing to deliver the respect the hostile individual believes they are entitled to receive for eating it.

SW

[SummerBob]

It could be that some of the "hate cycling" people are motorists who get annoyed by bicyclists on the road.

[Pickles]

Ya , I know some people get hostile over cherished subject.
It is just the extremity of finding the place where the thing you hate is to attack it instead of minding business is both ridiculously funny and rather scary.
This mindset can lead to dangerous actions (stalking, terrorism, roadrage) imo.