I was trolled once. Well not once, probably more times than I care to remember. Apart from writing this blog, completing my masters degree, and rehashing my CV over and over again; I am also the Shrewsbury Town football writer for Shropshire Live. The year was 2017, and I was called “Copy and Paste Hillback” along with a number of obscenities, too foul to publish. I’ll hold my hands up and admit the accusations were hurtful, demoralising, but most importantly; factually incorrect. And if you’ve ever met a journalist, contrary to popular belief, we hate things that are factually incorrect. I have not copied and pasted anything since my GCSE days, when I used an extract of Wikipedia to illustrate the condensation process. And yes I did fail. What the troll failed to realise, is that journalists often include quotes in news articles from other sources, with the proviso that they attribute them to their original ‘birth’ so to speak.
I tried to explain this to the geezer that cowardly hides behind a cloak of anonymity, but sadly 140 characters did not suffice. So I mentally laughed it off, whilst surreptitiously reaching for the Kleenex, and convincing myself that what this man was saying amounted to utter rubbish. He also called me a “lanky streak of p***” – not very original, but when you’re that uneducated I guess it’s a good shot. But most importantly I took action. I pressed the ‘block’ button, a beautiful concept that filled me with delight. Then I realised there were a few more, and I kept blocking, until all I had left was positive comments to massage my writers ego, and some constructive criticism to remind me that I’m far from emulating Shakespeare.
However, I understand that the issue for MP’s is completely different. They must receive thousands of the most heinous messages, ranging from xenophobic to sexist and even death threats. And it would be extremely time consuming to block thousands of accounts. The harsh reality of social media, is that if you put yourself out there, it is expected that some delinquent keyboard warrior will act like Mike Tyson, when in fact they still have their tea put on the table at 5pm by mommy and daddy. Whilst I am in no way insinuating that this is acceptable conduct, how can banning trolls from voting be the answer?
Firstly, how on earth would this be implemented? The internet giants have a hard time clamping down on terrorists and other criminals. Therefore, I cannot envisage them spending time working with the government in order to expose anonymous accounts.
However, the issue at hand is very simple to resolve. Don’t ban trolls from voting, and here are five reasons why:
- This is a democratic country, and even morons should be given the chance to vote.
- These people are that thick, there is a strong likelihood they are unable to tell the time, and will therefore, not realise it’s voting day.
- At every election it’s either the Tories or Labour that are given the keys to Number 10, so a few extra idiots that vote will not make a difference.
- See my previous blog post – interview with Owen Winter. We need Proportional Representation!
- I realise that number three and number four were exactly the same points reworded.
Follow me on Twitter, troll me if you like! @RyanHillback
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