Some signs that you are dealing with a troll:
A troll argues in bad faith, and will move the goalposts.
A troll claims something offensive was satire and “you just didn’t get it.”
A troll, when confronted with contradictory information, always doubles down. A troll often begins their trolling with stating obviously false information, straight-up factually incorrect nonsense.
Winning an argument is more important to a troll than anything else. For example, many people hang out in the comments to connect with others. “You like (weird thing)? I like (weird thing) too! Let’s be best friends.” Or something along those lines. It happens all the time on GM, and it’s great. Trolls aren’t so into that.
Confrontation IS the entertainment for the troll.
Trolls have an antagonistic/overly simplistic view of GM commenters. For example, a troll will start by referring to GM commenters with an epithet like, “you people, libtards, liberals, idiots” and go on to say something like, “are so stupid, just don’t get it for x, y, z reasons.” Trolls are sarcastic towards all other commenters in general and seem view themselves as exceptions to the rule of people who comment on GM.
Trolls are hostile towards the GM commentariat specifically. Trolls are not the people who say “I wish (child molester) would die in a fire.” There’s a difference between hostility toward the subject of the story - who is not present in the comments - and hostility directed toward the people who will be reading the comments.
Trolls seem oddly angry about something, and not necessarily the subject at hand.
Trolls want to provoke rather than anything else like educate, entertain, inform, get something off their chest, tell a joke, find like-minded others, etc.
Trolls often have an unfamiliar username and avatar. One problem with the Kinja commenting system is that it seems like the SAME FIVE TROLLS keep popping up again and again under different names. I don’t think there’s any good way to fix this problem without blocking specific IP addresses, and there are good reasons not to do that.
Another way to identify a troll is if there are multiple other comments accusing that commentor of being a troll. GM commenters are a sharp bunch and they will frequently do the heaving lifting for me. Sometimes I have to show pending comments to see these, though.
One way to quickly rule out trolling is if the commenter says something like, “I messed up, sorry.” “Whoops, my bad.” “Wow, I was totally off on that one.” A person who can admit their mistake without getting defensive is automatically not a troll. And in fact, a person who can admit a mistake without getting defensive is a treasure and if you’re single, you should ask that person to marry you. I’m not sure I can do that, even. But I’m working on it!
To summarize:
A troll can be identified by their unfamiliar username/avatar posting multiple “you people” type hostile comments on a thread, and they will doubles down when confronted and will not let anything go.
There are problems with this definition already. For example, more advanced trolls will concede a few minor points. This is a great way to keep people arguing the main issue with them. I fall for this one ALL THE TIME.
And I think there are commenters who claim to be trolls when they’re really just idiots. It may make them feel less stupid for stating incorrect information.
Also, I’m still trying to sort out some of the finer shadings of troll. Is a troll the same thing as a partisan ideologue - someone who advocates for a particular position, regardless of the topic at hand? Is a troll the same thing as a garden-variety asshole?
