No more talking with trolls

I usually don’t comment on public venues on anything controversial (religion and politics come to mind), but something came over me the other day. Likely it was boredom.  I joined a slew of people on a CBC string on Facebook commenting on Rob Ford’s return to the city after rehab.

I opined that he did not look a lot slimmer.  Almost immediately someone accused me of fat shaming.  Oh dear, was I doing that? I reflected briefly, then wrote back to say I was just puzzled: he didn’t look to have dropped as many pant sizes as his brother said. That threw the fat onto the Internet fire:

Well, said the other person, I should look at his face to see the evidence. I did look and did not see a lot of change. However, at this point, I left the conversation, as boredom now seemed a better alternative to engaging in this any further.  I was feeling “trolled.”

Being something of a coward by nature, I thought withdrawing was the intelligent thing to do. Also I was beginning to wonder about my own inner troll. Was I being disingenuous saying I was “puzzled” when really I was “fat shaming” and didn’t want to admit it? I needed to think about this dark side of myself for a while.

However, things on the mini-string I started did not end there, and I had the dubious pleasure of seeing what happened next.

Someone posted a bit of uncomplimentary name-calling: to wit that the mayor was not only sizable but also a liar.  In response, the troll opined that not only was the new commenter fat and ugly, but she had something inappropriate on her chest (not exactly the words he or she used, but decency requires a euphemism).  Well this was a bit off-topic, I thought, deleted the item, and went to the next message in my in-box.

The next thing I knew, into my email popped the next round of chat. Someone else had entered the conversation and had rushed to my defense, saying that calling me fat and old was not at all sporting and was just as bad in its way as fat shaming.

To say I was startled would be putting it mildly. How on earth had the troll accessed my Facebook page!  So much for remaining aloof. Curiosity immediately got the better of me.  

I opened the link provided by Troll and found myself on Facebook looking at an image purportedly of me. But what on earth was I doing in a wading pool – haven’t done that for years, if ever. Then I looked at who was splashing about: a hearty woman of a certain age with a tattoo on her chest. She looked to be having lots of fun.

But the photo was most assuredly not of me. 

Thank goodness. I breathed a hearty sigh of relief:  Troll had not found me.

It turned out that commenter who had rushed to my defense had confused my name with that frolicking woman’s. Having no desire to draw further attention to myself, I did not correct that error!

The next thing I did was to re-check the privacy settings on my FB page and tighten them up. I also deleted my comment, and with it the string of subsequent comments, from the original posting.

I looked up Troll and found a Facebook page with nothing on it: no pictures, posts, nothing except a brief reference to attendance at a high school. There was next to nothing on the Internet as well.

This spooked me; it’s a cruel, mad word out there and I am not going to engage, even briefly, with trolls ever again!