Category Archives: Trolling

The Druze

ChaoSkeptic, Islam, memes, religion, Trolling


There is a little known sect of Islam called the Druze. They are a small group mostly located in Syria, Lebanon, Israel, and Jordan. Their faith is similar to that of other Ismaili Shi’a Islam with a little bit of Gnostic Unitarianism thrown in for good measure. What makes the Druze interesting though is the number one Pillar of their faith:

1. (Truth in words) Speak the truth to other Druze. However, lying to unbelievers to defend yourself or the community is OK.

That’s right, rule number one of Druzism is that you don’t talk about Druzism. And if you do talk about Druzism, feel free to lie through your teeth about it. This, of course, makes it completely impossible for outsiders (especially anthropologists) to study their religion. As Daniel Dennett put it in Breaking the Spell:

But if it was true, this would create a dilemma for any anthropologist: the usual method of questioning informants would be a hopeless wild-goose chase, and if he made the ultimate sacrifice and converted to Druze himself so as to gain entrance to the inner sanctum, he would have to admit that we on the outside shouldn’t believe his scholarly treatise, What the Druze Really Believe, since it was written by a devout Druze (and everybody knows that the Druze lie).

This naturally leads you to a Liars Paradox: if all Druzes lie about their religion then how do we know that they are telling the truth about their First Pillar? Maybe the Druze have become expertly adept at knowing when to tell the truth and when to tell a lie. They know to mix honest fact in with complete bullshit to constantly befuddle anyone trying to discover what they really believe.

And that seems like an admirable quality to me. Since beliefs are so immutable and silly in the first place why should we treat them so seriously? Lie about your beliefs as often as you can. Completely confuse your friends by telling them you are a Baptist Pagan. Mindfuck your family by saying that you believe every word of both The Urantia Book and Dianetics. Tell them that you believe six impossible things all at the same time! It’s not like they can prove you wrong anyways. Follow the path of apologetics everywhere by coming up with the most twist pretzel logic in the history of man. And tell them that Eris made you do it.

Nazi blogosphere vs Facts (DJ Cain and MC Encyclopedia of World Fascism remix)

Art, Articles by others, blogs, conspiracy, current affairs, Fascism, Humour, Indecision 08, Internet - a series of tubes, music, politics, Tin-foil hats, Trolling, wingnuts, writing, Youtube

Yo back up now and give a brother room
The fuse is lit and Im about to go boom
Mercy mercy mercy me
My life is a cage but on stage Im free

I’ve asked this question before: Suppose the natives in some Western European countries actually start to seriously resisting the organized destruction of their countries, halt mass immigration and reverse Multiculturalism. How will American authorities and media react to this?

Frankly, I wouldn’t be too surprised if they turn out to be actively hostile to native Europeans. That was the case with Clinton and with Bush, who after all supported the continued Islamization of Europe through Turkish membership of the European Union. It will be even worse with Obama, an anti-white Marxist.

As we know, a “Nazi” these days is not one of the many Muslims and their Leftist cheerleaders who shout “Death to Jews! in the streets of Europe; it’s any white person who doesn’t lie down and die on command. If we don’t lie down and die, we must be Nazis. We are after all Europeans.

Gates of Vienna

Fascists in Europe have seen this more recent immigration as a threat to the cultural homogeneity and national traditions of their countries. They have often exploited increases in the numbers of Muslims to claim that they are defending Christianity against Islam. Opposition to immigration has been one of the common threads within various fascist movements, and it is arguable that it plays the same role for such movements today as anti-Semitism did for inter-war Nazism and its imitators.

The Encyclopedia of World Fascism, page 367

JERUSALEM — Even as Barack Obama becomes the 44th president of the United States, anti-Israel professor Rashid Khalidi, whose ties to Obama stirred controversy during the campaign, has stated he could currently communicate with the incoming commander in chief, WND has learned.

Amid concern within the pro-Israel Jewish community, Obama repeatedly had denied he was influenced by Khalidi.

In an interview with the radical Democracy Now! news network last week, Khalidi expressed hope Obama would alter U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East, talking to “all sides” of the Israeli-Palestinian arena. He also criticized Israel for killing civilians in the Gaza Strip the past few weeks and for leading what he termed a “propaganda campaign” to de-legitimize the Hamas terrorist organization.

World Net Daily

In practice, the term cosmopolitan was applied by interwar fascists chiefly to Marxists, Freemasons, and Jews. In Nazi thinking, Marxism and Freemasonry were themselves part of an international Jewish conspiracy, so that “cosmopolitan” often meant “Jewish.”

The Encyclopedia of World Fascism, page 188

Continue reading Nazi blogosphere vs Facts (DJ Cain and MC Encyclopedia of World Fascism remix) →

FAO Mr Derek Draper

blogs, FAIL, Internet - a series of tubes, politics, Trolling

While all caps may in fact be cruise control for cool, even with cruise control you still have to steer.

Oh LabourList promises to be so much fun.  Not in terms of content, of course, but with personalities like Draper running it, not to mention the automatic managerial reflex of New Labour vs the more democratic, open-minded and accountable attitude of the web, anything to do with the site will result in laughter and hypocrisy.  Its wonderful.

A glossary of terms relating to Discordianism

Discordianism, FAIL, Humour, rant, satire, Trolling

DISCORDIANISM: Like Wicca, it started off as a religion for pot-smoking hippie bums who wanted to pass off their bullshit as a philosophical statement. The key difference was it was full of jokes plagiarized from the Marx brothers. Somewhere along the line, like many obscure things that deserved to stay obscure, it got co-opted by sweaty, anime-downloading computer nerds and has become some stupid inside joke on message boards full of assholes, giving it as much meaning and significance as All Your Base Are Belong To Us.

THE CHURCH OF THE SUBGENIUS: Discordians who get bored of saying “Fnord” and “Hail Eris” and wanted to make up new nonsense phrases and pretend like saying them while giggling was a constructive act of activism.

THE PRINCIPIA DISCORDIA: Between “My First ABCs” and “The Essential Guide to Star Wars Ships” in terms of literary importance

THE BOOK OF THE SUBGENIUS: Like the Principia Discordia, only 100 pages longer, and it costs 20 bucks instead of being able to find it on Google.

THE ILLUMINATUS TRILOGY: A plagiarism of Joyce’s work filled with nerdy pop culture references and pretentious rantng.

SCHR?ñDINGER’S CAT: A plagiarism of Vonnegut’s work filled with nerdy pop culture references and pretentious ranting.

ROBERT ANTON WILSON: A man who has accumulated a small fortune selling plagiarisms of Joyce and Vonnegut filled with nerdy pop culture references with pretentious ranting.

MALACLYPSE THE YOUNGER: Some “wacky” nom de plume of a man who probably wrote The Principia Discordia in a stained tie-dye T-shirt on a bongwater-stained couch while listening to a highly worn LP of Freak Out!, The White Album, or The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. Wasn’t smart enough to copyright his work so probably died alone and penniless on a gutter while clenching a Coke bottle pipe filled with schwag, while his buddy Robert Anton Wilson eats steak for dinner in his dining room.

KERRY THORNLEY/LORD OMAR/A BILLION OTHER STUPID PSEUDONYMS: Wrote ten crazy Xeroxed rants about Libertarianism and thought his friends were agents of the Illuminati, now posthumously considered a genius.

STEVE JACKSON: The poster boy for the official point of transformation of the vast majority (ie: 40) of Discordians changing from hippie slackers to D&D nerds who wish they could have been alive to be hippie slackers like their parents.

FNORD: A word invented to be used in the boring, pointless signatures, “hilarious” spam, and half-hearted graffiti of Discordians. Might have been a slightly funny inside joke between RAW, Thornley, and Malaclypse, but the Internet beat it into the ground like it does everything

23: The fact that that number can sometimes be seen somewhere is proof of an elaborate evil conspiracy/magical cosmic force that protects and strengthens all Discordians

THE BAVARIAN ILLUMINATI: The 19th century version of the Discordians. IE: They had great ideas but we’re too lazy and fuckwitted and unorganized to get anything done so instead they just made a bunch of bullshit. So obviously the Discordian society idolizes them.

THE POEE: 12 members strong.

THE DISCORDIAN SOCIETY: 18 members strong.

WWW.PRINCIPIADISCORDIA.COM: An expensive domain name that somebody pays for solely to host a 60-page book that can be found for a yardsale at 25 cents, or in it’s entirity on the first 13 pages of a Google search. In other word, a nerd who felt the obligation to make a site that wasn’t about what bands they like or how similar to Hitler Bush is.

ERISIANS: Discordians who insist on being called something else to be difficult

ERIS/DISCORDIA: There is a disagreement among Discordians and Erisians as to her nature. Discordians think she’s a cartoon character with magic powers who help them out and who they fantasize to while masturbating, (that is, when they’re too lazy to open up their porn folder or turn to the Dryad page of the D&D Monster Manual) Erisians think the same thing although they sprinkle it with some Taoist metaphysical stuff.

OPERATION MINDFUCK: A way to make the world a better place that apparently involves trolling conservative communities, writing notes on bathroom walls, making up little pieces of paper that say “LOL U R TEH POPE” and being too afraid to hand them out to people, and contemplating all of these brilliant ideas on a message board and being too lazy to do any of them.

JAKE: Like a mindfuck except more childish, if that’s possible

WWW.POEE.CO.UK: A website with a professional-looking appearance and informative content. This makes it’s owner Syntapgjax, a Fake Discordian, since obviously the definition of “Discordian” is “someone who can’t get their shit together”

FAKE DISCORDIAN: A term thrown around a lot for practitioners of a religion that embraces ontological freedom and equality. It’s actually a redundant term.

“WE DISCORDIANS MUST STICK APART”: An excuse for not having your shit together

CHAOS MAGIC: If Wicca is people who need an authority figure to give their minds permission to use magic adopting books form Barnes and Noble as such, than Chaos Magic is the same, only with Google and Alice in Wonderland.

ZENARCHY: A term used by Discordians who have to pretend they’re too enlightened to use terms like “Anarchist” to describe their political belief, so they use a term that sounds deep but is actually an unfunny portmanteau, like “Zenarchist” so they can pretend they’re too cool for politics.

THE LAW OF FIVES: An important lesson in epistemological relativism becomes an inside joke among people who make stupid polls on the Internet to waste their lives away

COPYRITE/KOPYRIGHT/KOPYRITE/COPYLEFT/KOPYLEFT: A term that’s obviously Discordian because of the lame pun. Spawned Wikipedia, which is what sexless nerds use as an authoritative source of knowledge, in the same way imperialist intellectual elitists used the Britannica.

DISCORDIAN SAINT: Someone who the government hasn’t forced to take their meds yet

THE PRINCIPIA DISCORDIA.COM FORUMS: Where you can read jokers bickering like the cast of MASH towards the end of the show and pretending that they’re better than 95 percent of DeadJournal users somehow. Also full of long, drawn out, pointless rants that just reiterate the same uninsightful points. Discordians are nerds who don’t have enough sex.

Why Discordia is more relevant in 2008 – Discussion

current affairs, debate, Discordianism, Humour, Internet - a series of tubes, Law and Disorder, Law of Fives, media culture, Occult, Operation:Mindfuck, personal, politics, slack, society, Technology, terrorism, Trolling, war

Ripped this discussion, built on Cram’s earlier post and musings, from the forum.  Enjoy.

LMNO:  Because so far, nothing else seems to be working.  Because Discordia is about models, not absolutes.

Baron von Hoopla:  Bingo.

Cramulus: [to LMNO] that’s a great angle.  Could you expand on that a bit?

GA:  I don’t know about more relevant, because I wasn’t around 50 years ago.  It seems to me that the Cold War was in pretty dire need of some lightheartedness, even more than our current War on Terror.

It just seems relevant to me because I personally had (have?) a problem with taking things far to seriously.  And because many of the people around me have concepts like ‘mandatory’ and ‘forbidden’ and apply them to things that are really optional.

I makes me sad when people tell me that things like religion are to important to joke about, or old propaganda posters too offensive.  It bothers me when I get suspended from school or hauled before Loss Prevention for reasons like “I know that this is just a misunderstanding, but we must follow procedure.”  It hurts when I look around my infosphere and see nothing but advertisements, especially when those ads are meant to make people feel bad about themselves.

The world is ruled by an endless morass of strictures and convention, and no one wants to take responsibility for them.  People are perfectly content to let the train follow its own momentum down the tracks, even though they don’t like where it is or where it is going, because this is Policy, it’s what Everyone (the everyone in “everyone knows that…”) has Decided.  Rules and traditions might be annoying, but it’s Not In Our Power to do anything about them.

LMNO:  In today’s so-called “Information Age”, most of us are constantly bombarded with stuff.  Perhaps not with ideas, so much as pure input.  While for the most part this input is pretty much bias-neutral, an increasing amount of it is being supplied by people who have an angle.  What’s more, to get through to the growing population of Jaded Couch-Dwelling Fuckheads, there has been a new approach of making the stuff more-or-less self referential, as in, “we know you know we’re trying to manipulate you.  See how cool that makes us?”

So, what do you do when you are flooded by 50,000 points of view?  The old way was to have Rules and Tradition and Procedure and Black and White. To take that stuff and cram it into a narrow worldview, distorting what little information you actually notice.  Which only serves to hold you back, slow you down, and shut you up.

Our way, the Discordian way, is to make Temporary Models, make new Game Rules, to grab hold of the stuff and ride it out, making connections as you see them.  You do your best not to have your views manipulated by stuff, and you do your best not to manipulate stuff to fit your views.  Which serves to keep you on the Edge of What’s Going On.

At least, that’s the general idea.

Continue reading Why Discordia is more relevant in 2008 – Discussion →

Troll for McCain, win valuable prizes

forums, Indecision 08, Internet - a series of tubes, Trolling

No, really.

The Washington Post has the info:

Spread John McCain’s official talking points around the Web — and you could win valuable prizes!

That, in essence, is the McCain campaign’s pitch to supporters to join its new online effort, one that combines the features of “AstroTurf” campaigning with the sort of customer-loyalty programs offered by airlines, hotel chains, restaurants and the occasional daily newspaper.

On McCain’s Web site, visitors are invited to “Spread the Word” about the presumptive Republican nominee by sending campaign-supplied comments to blogs and Web sites under the visitor’s screen name. The site offers sample comments (“John McCain has a comprehensive economic plan . . .”) and a list of dozens of suggested destinations, conveniently broken down into “conservative,” “liberal,” “moderate” and “other” categories. Just cut and paste.

Activists and political operatives have used volunteers or paid staff to seed radio call-in shows or letters-to-the-editor pages for years, typically without disclosing the caller or letter writer’s connection to a candidate or cause. Like the fake grass for which the practice is named, such AstroTurf messages look as though they come from the grass roots but are ersatz.

McCain’s campaign has taken the same idea and given it an Internet-era twist. It also has taken the concept one step further.

People who sign up for McCain’s program receive reward points each time they place a favorable comment on one of the listed Web sites (subject to verification by McCain’s webmasters). The points can be traded for prizes, such as books autographed by McCain, preferred seating at campaign events, even a ride with the candidate on his bus, known as the Straight Talk Express, according to campaign spokesman Brian Rogers.

“Anytime you’re getting supporters activated into online communities or taking other actions to spread the word, that’s a win,” Rogers says.

Trolls on the internet, oh my!

Articles by others, Humour, media culture, personal, Technology, Trolling

I suppose I better mention it, since people will be wondering why I didn’t if I don’t.

Yes, I have read the New York Times article on internet trolling. And firstly, is it just me, or is really fucking embarassing when you have someone writing an article when:

a) they really don’t have a clue what they are talking about, and
b) the topic is removed entirely from its natural environment and dissected in the sterile lab of the mainstream media?

Its not just me, I hope.

So anyway, yes, I was alerted to this article by a compatriot troll, Ten Ton Mantis. And now I have finally read through it. The above quibbles above, I’d just like to make some minor points:

  • Trolls existed before /b/. The first paragraph implies otherwise.
  • /b/ is not the be all and end all of trolling. In fact, in the last couple of years, it has been downright embarassing.
  • At least you mentioned Usenet. Thank fucking god. However, the naive-noob tactic was just one of many used back in the day, and really only an entry level tactic. alt.syntax.tactical, for example, favour the longer term, infiltration and sockpuppet approach.
  • Lulz is not how trolls “keep score”. Its an abstract concept, and a massively overused word, when considered against actual instances of lulz. It can be excuse, justification or result, as well.
  • The troll got it dead on. Article over, amirite?
  • Um…Anonymous and the trolls were one and the same, at least originally. I understand there was a something of a split between the /i/nsurgents and moralfags, but lets be honest, for the most part, its the same people who took part in both.
  • The fact that anonymous communications allow for people to be more sociopathic is not new nor interesting. Learn2sociology, plz.
  • Jason Fortuny is a fun guy, but he doesn’t speak for me.
  • You probably got suckered by one troll or another in the course of your research. Live with it son.
  • Not all trolls are emotional fuckups. Some of the most extreme ones probably are, but I wouldn’t generalize, or imply in the way you did.
  • Sometimes trolls are social hackers, its true. And literal ones as well. Anyway, the point is, sometimes they illustrate things people tend to overlook, either in their social interactions online, how they present themselves, the amount of information they give out. Something like that. Better to get burned for it by a jerk with an inappropriate sense of humour than by the next Ted Bundy. Its not always a perfect justification, and sometimes a line should be drawn, yes, but thats a very grey area and another debate.
  • Don’t take it all so seriously is pretty much the message I try to relate as well. Sometimes the internet is useful for important stuff, but 99% of it is going to leave a very poor and shallow cultural legacy. I like to think I am doing my bit for people who think “OMFG MY MOM WONT BUY ME A FURSUIT FOR MY BIRTHDAY” or having their “artwork” criticized is a crime against humanity. Twits with no perspective and big mouths are far too numerous.
  • Weev was trolling you dude. He does have a point though, about certain bloggers. Those few suckup artists who the media like to go crawling to in order to pretend that they are keeping up with the new internet culture and soliciting feedback from voices that would normally be excluded. Like Iain Dale for example. Real fucking excluded, isn’t he? Lets try a single mother blogger who is working while trying to raise her three kids. Oh, thats right, people like that don’t have time to blog. And even when some people in some part of the world where dangerous and interesting things are happening (such as Iraq) people would rather get their views from the likes of Charles fucking Johnson than someone who actually lives there. Because, God forbid, they may contradict the media narrative.
  • I like this Kate chick. She has style. Kate, if you’re reading…well, you know how to get in touch, I’m sure.
  • Hatred? I wouldn’t go that far…of course, I would expect a MSM hack from somewhere like the NYT to give that line. But I wouldn’t try to look too deeply into a troll’s motivation. Mine, for example, the above aside, comes from my trickster and showy personality. I like to be the centre of the attention, and yet at the same time, display certain ambiguity. There are also certain people I like to upset, and if you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you can probably guess what type they are.
  • I would say trolls are the internet. The interesting parts at least. Just as pirates where the ones who innovated much of our modern world, economy and culture (where would commercial radio be without pirate stations? What about the US government, who stole patented technologies throughout the 18th century?) trolls push the boundaries and in doing so create new online realities. The internet may not be so much the Wild West as a number of armed enclaves among a sea of anarchy. Sure, if you stick to places like Myspace or Facebook or your politically chosen network of blogs you’ll be mostly safe…aside from the occasional raider. But in other areas, the only things that exist, from your identity upwards, are those you choose to invent. That anarchy, while terrifying to some, is also a lab for inventing, tampering with and altering all number of social events and processes.
  • Those state legislators are idiots. You can’t police the net, at least not in the way you hope to. Hell, people cant even stop copyright infringement, and “Spartacus actions” among legally threatened bloggers are frequent. Try it with people who know how to conceal their identity and enjoy games where the roles and characters are not as substansial as they may appear, and you’re entering a policing nightmare.
  • Precisely. The law is not your hug-box. I am not responsible for your hurt feelings. I’m sure you could do something more productive with money spent on trying to police jerks on the net, such as nearly catching Bin Laden and then letting him go in order to justify the invasion of Iraq Iran.
  • Fortuny is right. OpenID and similar schemes for multiple site IDs are doomed to failure because so long as you can get more than one account, you are back where you started. So you either charge for everything, and create a gated community (urgh), or you don’t take everything so seriously. Pretty simple, really.
  • Fortuny’s morals are not everyones. Again, there are different motivations.
  • What a delightfully hopeful note to end your article on. It still doesnt change the 99% of the net which is different, however.

I think that is all I really have to say. I probably shouldn’t have had a couple of beers while writing this either, but oh well, too late to worry about that now.

I think I may be in love…

Articles by others, Lulz, Trolling

And that is not something I say lightly. But then again, its not every day I find a cam-whoring, ex-stripper, who trolls for cash…and so, having done so, I find her somewhat fascinating.

For those of you who don’t have a finger on the pulse of mainstream/left-wing blogging in the UK, I am talking of the delectable Ruth Fowler. She of Comment is Free infamy. Over the last week or so, she has pretty much managed to wind up much of the UK left wing blogosphere. Well, at least the parts of it I have visited.

And when you look at some of her articles, it is not hard to see why she has caused such a stir. Here are a few selected articles and their subtitles, links provided.

The antichrist for feminists

There I was, thinking I was just making a quick buck, when all the time I was illustrating that feminism is about choice

Club rules
Lefties are supposed to be the nice ones. But increasingly, liberals are just puritanical hypocrites

Flab isn’t fab
You don’t get fat by accident. Eating so much requires Olympic-class stamina and athleticism

And imagine lobbing these into the sort of people who frequent the Guardian for anything except entertainment. Well, actually you don’t even have to, just read the comments below the article. Yeah, precisely, its hilarious and designed to do only 2 things:

wind people up
get her name better known (for her book)

And of course, it does help that Ms Fowler is not only getting paid to troll, which is enough to earn my respect, and is fairly intelligent and well-read, which catches my interest. She is also quite the looker. Here is one of the more…work safe pictures from her site (although most of them are fairly tasteful, so if your employers have a liberal policy, feel free to sneak a look).

Yeah, precisely. I shall have to watch her future articles very closely, I think. I love a trouble-maker, especially of her potential.

Clergy to the Freaks

Aneristic Delusion, children of Eris, debate, Discordianism, FAIL, forums, Trolling, Uncategorized

It’s a strange, chaotic world out there. It’s incomprehensibly huge and also so tiny it’s like your own personal cell. It’s miraculously beautiful and suicidally ugly. It’s both claustrophobically overcrowded and desolately lonely.

 

There are a lot of people – in this case I’ll use that nebulous “us” – who use weirdness, humor, and insanity as a means of coping. Perhaps lunacy allows some to achieve a sort of homeostasis, an equilibrium with the ubiquitious dynamics and pressures of modern living.

 

Over at the PD Forums we had a debacle yesterday. One of our newer members, Daruko, had a sort of “internet breakdown” when confronted by some opposition. It was both funny and hard to watch. The guy in question is a 25-year old father of two, who is “in dire need of some sillyness in his life.”

 

Somebody asked Tim Leary what to do after they had Turned On. He said, “Find the others.” And then they show up at our door.

 

Continue reading Clergy to the Freaks →