Of Internet Trolls and Stupid Insecurities

A first for me!  I’ve experienced, or have been the victim of, my first internet troll (or so I think).

It’s only been in the last year or so that I’ve become aware of such an animal as the internet troll, my first introduction probably coming from an internet video blogger by the name of Jay Smooth, who rocks, by the way.  My particular troll posted a comment in response to a blog entry about my fancy smoking jacket several weeks after the entry had been published.  Because I deleted it almost immediately, I couldn’t remember exactly how it was phrased, but it was a single sentence, only half of which I understood, the other half making reference to a group or a subject that was incomprehensible to me.  The half I did understand said, simply, fuck you.

Then I started thinking that I wanted to know or wanted to remember what the rest of that little missive said–and I found a way to retrieve the comment from my trash.  See where this is going?  Already I had given too much attention or psychic energy to this supposed troll. Here’s the message in its unedited entirety: “Fuck you all Forex bustards.”

Okay.

A little research revealed that Forex is an on-line service to help people trade on the U.S. Commodity Exchange, or, in laymen’s terms, The Stock Market. I don’t know what it has to do with smoking jackets. I am not a member or a participant in Forex.  I had no knowledge of such an entity before I received this vitriolic comment post.  I am completely innocent of being associated with it in any way, shape, or form.  So what’s up with this guy? Or gal?  –I’d never want to assume the gender of my particular troll, but I assume he’s most likely a male.

I thought, first, this is a message accidentally sent to the wrong audience.  But that couldn’t be, because in order to post a comment on someone’s blog, you’ve got to be looking at their blog page, yes, and clicking your mouse or whatever it is you’re using as a clicker right there on the “leave a comment” button, right? So it seems to me this had to be a deliberate effort to send a message directly to my blog page. I am not a Forex bustard.  I repeat it, sir.  I am not a Forex bustard.  I don’t know what a bustard is. Ultimately, I don’t even know if I have, in reality, been the victim of a troll, or rather, the victim of stupid insecurities caused by some stupid program that sends spam to blogsites.

I could figure this whole thing out in several different ways.  I could be insulted and hurt because someone has cursed at me and called me a bustard  right to my blog page face.  And I could be angry that I invested so much energy in defending myself against an undeserved abuse by researching Forex and bustards and writing a blog entry about all of that. Or, I could be angry at myself for any insecurities I have that would lead to hurt feelings about a stupid comment that has no real relevant content related to me or anything else I may have written in a blog entry. I could be disappointed in myself for not calling it quits immediately after I trashed the comment the first time.  And if it is a spam and not a troll message, I could just feel silly, generally speaking, because everyone knows there’s absolutely nothing personal about a spam, annoying as they are.

Or

I could be thankful.  I could be thankful, because this troll or this spammer has taught me a few things: one, that there is a trading company called Forex; two, that there are fake companies defrauding people in the name of Forex; three, sometimes spam is difficult to distinguish from trolling; and four, I am way more hypersensitive than I thought I was or ever should be.  But ultimately, this troll or this spammer has initiated and then inspired my 40th blog entry, and for that I am thankful.