A Note On 'Concern Trolling'

Via solopoly.net

A concern troll chimed in today and informed us that our usage of the term ‘concern troll’ wasn’t correct. As we’ve explained over the years, we have our own house definition. Other online forums use the same policy and it is defined by sites like 'Urban Dictionary,' but it's usually like the third definition down and most people don't read that far.

See, the thing is, with a community this large it simply isn’t possible to please everyone all the time, especially when discussing religion and politics from a progressive point of view.

The Christian Left ministry and community is for people who truly WANT to be here. The key word being 'want.' We are not a drive-by page. We aren't a debate page. We're a page and a forum for Christian progressives and their allies. We are a haven for people who have been beat up by The "Christian" Right. Our community is a safe place for people who have had to read those stupid emails all there lives that insult liberals and any politician that isn't a Republican.

All of this being the case, for our purposes a ‘concern troll’ is someone who engages behavior similar to the following example, "I really love your page BUT, I’m really concerned about (blah, blah, blah, blah) that you are doing," or, "(blah, blah, blah, blah) that you are not doing the way I think it should be done." It then devolves into something along the lines of, "You need to take down this post," or "You need to stop doing that. It isn’t very Christian." We could continue with the variants of concern troll statements ad nauseam.

Some critics would call what we have an 'echo chamber.' So be it. We are what we are, and we make no apologies. There are many echo chambers out there these days. Fox "News" is one big one. Besides, everyone has a right to have a haven. Lecturing us is like an abusive partner busting into a battered women's shelter and proclaiming, "This place is nothing but an echo chamber!"

We don't mind if someone imparts friendly knowledge to us about something in a civil manner. There's a big difference between that and concern trolling. If something is a matter of opinion, correcting someone about it is probably concern trolling. People are welcome to share their opinion on any topic as long as they are civil and polite. After that they should move on to the next topic. Their opinion will be noted for everyone to see. We must emphasize this point again, we aren't a debate forum.

Some may not find this policy agreeable to them. They have feel like they are in charge of what we do and we must run the page the way they see fit. Sorry, that isn't going to happen. No one is forced to be here. If our policy isn't agreeable to you, you are invited to go in peace.

Concern trolling is disruptive to the community and ends up crippling online forums to the point of being catatonic and ineffective, basically disabling them carrying out their mission. We’re not going to let that happen here. That’s why we initiated our trolling policy 13 years ago and included our variant of concern trolling. We ask that if you don’t like a post or something we say or do, please scroll on by to the next post. Again, there’s no way we can please all people, all the time. Thanks.

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