Why Indulge Hatred?

A recurring theme with the comment system here is that more often than not, if you're a fan of something and you say something positive in a related article about that something, you'll receive a lot of agrees and bubble ups. And this is perfectly fine.

What I don't understand is when people agree with an obvious troll. This has happened on negative articles pertaining to any of the big three console manufacturers. When the PSN hack attack occurred, this spurred a number of trolls who would repeat the phrases "It only does offline" or "You get what you pay for." Juvenile to say the least, but the general consensus was that they were right, and maybe they were. But why the blue hell would you give agrees and bubbles to trolls who notoriously spews hatred toward Sony on ANY related article? This happened a LOT, not just on N4G, but on other websites as well with characters who were notable trolls having nothing short of a hey day with all of the news regarding the hack attack.

The issue is even more prevalent on Nintendo articles right now, with a number of trolls occasionally getting MORE agrees than disagrees (sometimes even getting bubbles back that were previously removed) on Nintendo articles that are more negatively received than others. Are people really so thick that they feel the need to agree with someone whose criticisms are not even all that serious or honest to begin with? Trolls are to incite arguments by making outrageous or inflammatory statements. At what point did it become acceptable to use this to stroke one's own ego?

I'd like to stress a point in particular and if I could write it in bold, I would; If you don't like something a company is doing then you are more than within your right to criticize it. But why would you ever indulge a troll who spews hatred all of the time?

Unless you're ignorant of said troll's behavior, I'm not sure I see where the justification is. It's bad enough that honest users can hardly engage in mature debate within this community, but do we really need to be indulging trolls too?

The next to time an article that pops up about a company that is not your favorite and portrays them in a negative light, think very carefully about how you approach it, despite your base. You could be a big Xbox fanatic who does not like Sony consoles. Maybe you're a Sony fan with no interest in Nintendo. Maybe you prefer to stick to Nintendo products, or maybe you have a combination of the three. Whatever the case may be, it's okay to have your opinions and criticisms, but don't indulge trolls just because they're saying something you happen to agree with.

There's one age old tactic that typically works that even I admittedly fail to do at times; ignore them, don't feed the trolls.

[maniacmayhem]

There's a a thin line with the definition of troll on this site. You say anything that is less than praise for a particular console and you are automatically branded a troll.

I wouldn't worry too much on the whole agree/disagree feature since it does not determine if you lose a bubble or not. Which in my opinion is useless since it serves no real purpose.

[BanBrother]

Correct. And if you call out a troll, you get disagrees. Happens to me all he time (depending on what console the troll 'belongs' to - I won't say which one as it is irrelevant).

But, at tbe end of the day, who cares? Go to any other website, and they aren't one tenth as bad as N4G. This site is basically the joke of the internet when it comes to gaming, as there are no fans, just fanboys.

[TopDudeMan]

I've been called a troll once or twice just for telling the truth.

[admiralvic]

Personally I've never liked the Agree / Disagree system, since you can be rude, troll, spread hate, but do it with straight up facts and STILL get disagrees. On the other hand, you can still do the same things on a topic people WANT to hate with lies and get a bunch of agrees.

I rather see a like / dislike system, since thats how most people treat it and it wouldn't make it seem like people support said ideology.

[Captain Tuttle]

Why wouldn't you just be civilized and and use straight up facts? Why would you "be rude, troll and spread hate"?

[admiralvic]

@ Captain Tuttle

I don't know, the situation called for it? It was just meant to be a contrast to people getting agrees for the same thing with untrue information in a topic where people are angry.

[SilentNegotiator]

"The issue is even more prevalent on Nintendo articles right now"
Of course you turned this into an issue of Nintendo being the victim....

There's a reason that Nintendo is getting a lot of criticism ("hatred") right now. SOME people just can't separate what is "hatred" and what is criticism. What we get in response is people "not wanting" AAA games and comparisons to systems that have NEVER had a month of sales as low as Wii U's latest (or 'better' yet, using Vita as a cop-out for Wii U).

[zerocrossing]

I keep repeating this but I'll say it again since it's valid to this discussion, Im not a fan of any of the big 3, Im a consumer 1st and foremost, if I see a product that appeals to me I'll purchase it, if I don't like something I just assume it's not for me and move on, I don't criticise and hate it just because Im not the target demographic.

I can't honestly see why so many people are hating on Nintendo, if people don't like them then they probably aren't even trying to to appeal you.

All I keep hearing about is Nintendo rehashing their IPs and making gimmicky controllers, well if people don't like them don't purchase anything from them, Nintendo still have a huge fan following so they must be doing something right, if they're not hurting anything you care about why hate them for just doing what they do?

[SilentNegotiator]

Then you don't understand that people criticize a product when they WANT it to get better?

[zerocrossing]

I understand people will criticise something when they have legitimate concerns such as what you said.

But honestly for the most part we just get notorious trolls outright bashing Nintendo on any article that represents them in a negative light, and like a bunch of morons people actually agree with the tripe they are spewing... It's mind boggling and needs to stop.

Anyway if you want Nintendo to improve then Im definitely with you on that.

[rainslacker]

Put Nintendo aside for a moment.

Every console gets this. Doesn't matter which one, or for how long it's been out.

If I read the blog right, I believe he's saying that allowing these people to come in and effect your preferences towards a system in such a way, all while responding to their criticisms with a highly defensive attitude is just encouraging this type of behavior to continue from the "trolls".

If someone has a criticism, you should read what they have to say. Address what they have to say in a respectful and meaningful manner. Allow discussion to thrive, and hopefully make your case to that person, or those that may be reading that have a similar criticism. If those people are stealth trollers, it's very hard for them to respond in kind, because you haven't taken the bait, but instead forced the discussion back on them.

Is someone is blatantly trolling, then mark them as such and move on. Don't be sucked in, because doing so only empowers trolls to continue with their idiocy. Trolls have a funny habit of disappearing when their "opinions" bear no fruit, and the only reason they do it is to get a rise out of the community to fulfill their own self-worth. Don't feed into that, and the issue resolves itself.

If you see a troll, just make a comment that says "don't feed the trolls" and move on. If enough people start doing it, it will become more apparent to people who aren't accustomed to this kind of behavior. I know this because I did it on a forum I used to run, and within a month the demeanor among it's users changed dramatically.

[PopRocks359]

@SilentNegotiator

"Of course you turned this into an issue of Nintendo being the victim..."

Even though I started this entire piece by citing an example of Sony being the ones victimized. Right now YOU are the one twisting this blog which was neutral to all of the companies. Good show.

Any time I cited the Vita's low sales was in response to people calling the Wii U a "flop" and a "failure" for low sales in a single month as oppose to the Vita's low performance over the course of an entire year. That is not a cop out, that is a legitimate point showcasing hypocrisy in someone's argument.

Seriously, are you even capable of forming a discussion without somehow attempting to make the original poster look bad? The last few times you've responded to me, you have either insulted me in some way or have blatantly taken my words out of context to falsely strengthen your base. You're either a really bitter fanboy or just really terrible at debating without resorting to fanboy-esque behavior.

[smashcrashbash]

@ SilentNegotiator.You see that is where you are wrong. Constructive criticism is different then just whining and constantly repeating the same sentence or statement over and over again.You see that is where people get it wrong . There is a fine line between criticism and just plain ignorant trollish behavior.If i say 'You know I hope Sony's security on the PS4 is better this time around.I wouldn't want what happened before to happen again and ruin our fun and mess Sony up again'. That is a talking critically about the PS4 and being constructive and polite so we can have a conversation. But if you say.I bet Sony's PS4 is going to have crappy security this time around.I swear if it happens again I am going to Microsoft and if any Sony fanboys disagree they are a bunch of idiots to think Sony will ever get it right'. You see people on N4G think that is constructive criticism.

Also repeating the same point constantly or simply making statements like 'Whatever system or game sucks' is seen whining and trolling.So just because you critize something doesn't necessarily mean that you want it to get better. If you did you would critize it properly and not behave in the ways I spoke of with clear constructive reasons for you opinions.

So in short I think most people are fine with constructive criticism but the kind of 'criticism' N4G seems to think is appropriate for a conversation is not appreciated.People who are smart can easily tell the difference between pure hatred and actual concern for the subject being mentioned. For example people who talk about Sony not revealing the console talk about how they wish they could have seen the physical case but people who talk about invisible consoles and how the PS4 doesn't really exist are not being critical or are concerned about the PS4 but are there to cause chaos not try and make things better.I mean the kind of 'criticism' I see on N4G, is that how they behave in real life? If so they must always be in a arguments and getting punched in the face. I think many people do not know the difference between being obnoxious and being critical of something

[Outside_ofthe_Box]

***"Why Indulge Hatred?"***

The same reason why people submit flamebait articles.

[rainslacker]

I'm going to assume by troll, you mean the obvious ones who will make some inflammatory comment which usually has nothing to do with the article, or twists the title or article in such a way to make their opinion seem right with no real substance to said comment.

This really isn't exclusive to any one system, and while Nintendo has gotten a lot lately, over the course of this generation, and every previous one, every other system has gotten it as well. Nintendo is just the hot topic right now. Before the Wii U release, Vita was the hot topic. Such is the way of our community.

The only way to really get rid of trolls, or at least lessen their impact, is to get people to stop responding to them. Look at any of Mika's posts and you will see that the first comment of almost every article was filled with a troll comment, followed by way too many responses that is just killed the discussion(from yourself included I believe), as most people don't read down that far into an article. Sometimes it's very easy to get pulled in like that, and I daresay that we have all been guilty of it. All that being said, indulging the trolls happens whether you agree with them or not. "Don't feed the trolls", is a very old saying on the internet, it just hasn't worked, and likely never will.

I don't personally take issue with trolls, as they are just that. The bigger problem I see is that those with valid criticisms, whether being a fan of that system/game/dev/publisher/what ever or not, often get lumped into the troll or fan boy category. It's pretty rare to get an actual point/counter-point discussion going on with people who can address the actual comment in question in a intelligent and respectful manner. In fact I think there are only about 6-7 people on here who I've managed to do so with with any regularity.

What's sad, is that when you finally do get one of these discussions going, you can quickly run out of bubbles, which stops the discussion dead and the topic dies quickly as opposed to being discussed for as long as it takes to come to a consensus, or an agreement to disagree. What's even sadder is that to fix that, you are welcoming every troll to chime in as often as they like hijacking the thread.

[TuxedoMoon]

Conflicting opinions cause issues. That's how it is. If I said that Dark Souls was over rated (and meant it), I'll get a bunch of dislike immediately and probably be labelled a troll. It's really hard to tell who is trolling and who isn't trolling sometimes. Most of the time it' obvious, short post saying "______ sucks!" and that's it.

A simple answer would be that people just like being trolls. Anonymity can bring out the worse in people.

[rainslacker]

True. Usually if you have a criticism it's best to qualify that statement as much as possible. The written word, particularly on the internet, doesn't have the same connotations that you can get from a real spoken conversation.

Doing so respectfully and intelligently, all while making it known that it is your opinion and not just hating, goes a lot further than a short sentence with no context as to how you feel.

I think that's why I tend to have such long posts, because if I'm going to take the time to write something, I want to make it clear what I'm trying to say.

[Automatic79]

I feel the criticism on Nintendo, specifically the WIIU is premature. The system only has 5 months. I have always believed in letting a system marinate. If Nintendo by this time next year has not learned from the post launch slowed down and does not provide a solid year of gaming then we can all start to have a reason to voice our opinion.