Journal Journal: Apparently, some people are Gifts From God(tm). Apparently. 2
It all started when someone felt compelled to drop this gem of a troll into the Slashdot submission bin. Michael, ever hoping to demonstrate his savvy and iniative to the readers he cares so much about, decided he may try to justify his ridiculous "editor" title by combining three stories in one.
So far, so good. I actually quite liked the article because I always like to see original angles on existing topics--skewed to hell or not. The resulting discussion at +3, where I browse, was also quite interesting. I had no gripe with the thread at all.
Just with this TWR fellow. He comes out with a definition of terrorism that I took a certain professional exception to. I'm a pedantic bastard, and particularly picky about definitions since I'm a writer studying to be a journalist. I couldn't tell you for sure if it was just me being pedantic, or whether it was this guy's attitude that got to me, but I think it was the attitude.
So anyway, I checked the replies beneath my current threshold to see if anyone had strongly rebutted him, but the only person who'd said anything was the infamous Dr Spork...who'd just told him to shut the fuck up. So I wrote this post in response, echoing the sentiment but first consolidating it with evidence. In hindsight it would have been perhaps better not to fall to temptation, but what's done is done. It's not like me to direct language like that toward anyone.
I think you can get the picture from here on. It becomes an increasingly one-sided debate, with TWR constantly avoiding the actual question by focusing on needless side issues and, ultimately, doing nothing more than demonstrating his complete lack of any kind of logical viewpoint on either the real question or the side issues he was expounding on. Sadly, I don't believe he even realised how incredibly contradictory the logic he was trying to employ was until I pointed it out.
He ignored this too, of course. I had become quite tired of the whole affair by this stage, for it was obvious I was neither going to win--despite being in a virtually unassailable position that I had quite soundly demonstrated--nor garner an admission of defeat from this arrogant and unbalanced individual. Indeed, he continued to harp on after trivialities, demonstrating quite easily his superior knowledge of the Bible in what turned out to be a telling experiment examining his posting technique. When he had an argument, he made it; though in the most obnoxious and conceited manner possible. When he did not, however, he would gnaw at anything else he could find rather than simply conceding defeat. I suppose it's hard to gracefully admit you're wrong when you originally say things like "horseshit" to the original (and correct) post. Having done some research on this fine fellow, I had come to the conclusion I wasn't the only person he considered inferior; apparently nearly everyone on Slashdot is in this position. This poor fellow is stupid too, and I'm sure many others if I could only search through all 707 of his comments to date.
Consistently, he demonstrates a belief that he is better than others. He demonstrates lack of respect and disdain, purporting to know more than anyone else, yet there is consistent evidence to suggest that this is not only an unfounded belief, but one that flies in the face of all evidence that is before his own eyes. Perhaps he is unable to deal with the fact that, despite all his knowledge, he still has only subjective opinions. Perhaps he can't handle being less intelligent or less insightful than others. Who knows. I find him frustrating at worst, amusing at best, but mostly I just feel a bit sorry for him. It is quite annoying, though, that his rude and usually partly-right-at-best posts get modded up as much as they do.
