This shouldn’t even be a thing, but it is, it’s a big phase right now and it’s never going away. And to be clear, it’s not a one time posting of a nasty comment that’s uncalled for on a video. Channel Trolls dedicate a significant portion of their lives to recurring appearances on the same creators page.
And the conspiracy theorist grifters are NOT having a good time and dealing with it very, very badly. To understand the statistics behind the trend and some of the psychology as well, you have to go back to things like Alex Jones heyday with Sandy Hook.
A large number of real world trolls dedicated their attacks to being keyboard warriors, gaining confidence and a support group with a message that amounted to “it’s ok to bully”. One time trolls would enter conversations and be brutally subjected to counterattacks. Making them sitting ducks for mass reprisal if they weren’t fortunate enough to have made the decision to make a sock puppet and remain somewhat anonymous.
The current population of channel trolls is armed with better knowledge of what’s going on. Like I said about police traffic stops. If you’re wrong and deserve a ticket, 100% of police will give you a ticket. (Slightly less if an empathetic policeman just gives you a warning). If you don’t deserve the ticket, 100% of the bad cops will give you a ticket while the percentage of good cops out there will leave you alone since they’d rather be doing something other than harassing an innocent person. The only way the “all cops are evil” argument holds up is if literally 100% of police are evil. The person with the troll mentality is just more likely to complain about all cops being evil, knowing full well they deserved a speeding ticket.
The conspiracy grift economy is heavily skewed to pro right wing/liberals are evil content. And they fight each other all the time. To the point that throwing their own under a bus and eating the carcass is commonplace. Like McCarthy’s tenure as house speaker kind of loathing your erstwhile allies. Or Rudy Giuliani. Or this:
https://newrepublic.com/post/184729/donald-trump-nick-fuentes-white-supremacists-support
A breakdown of trolls and videos they troll:
Right wing conspiracy: Random trolls who just like being an asshole. Short term troll just pointing out what’s wrong.
Left wing conspiracy: Random trolls, Short term troll.
Non conspiracy content: Random trolls.
And the math gets even worse for them beyond that. A diehard troll loves it when the target fights back. And as soon as a moment of weakness is presented it encourages them even more. The support group, the wolf pack that used to be readily available is mostly gone. Long time fans of a conspiracist that counterattack are fewer in number and ineffective.
A reason can be found in some of the reactions by conspiracy content creators. What they don’t like, despite the bluster to indicate the contrary, is being disrespectful to themselves and their flock. Bear in mind most of them are in it for the money and attention so it’s the flock - the ones that they derive the Patreon subscriptions, super chat donations, and adoring comments from that they care about. If you visit a bar, library, or church for the first time IRL and it’s loaded with assholes you go elsewhere. If you are just starting out in conspiracy content, have a bad trolling experience for the first time you are less likely to come back.
Random trolls love themselves some conspiracy theory channel trolling now. They see the complaints about the flock being disrespected. Moment of weakness number one. Then they see that the content is completely disrespectful. The being wrong on purpose, the targeting of “the other side” is far more common than the “peace and love to my friends” messaging. The long term backfiring of a new breed of channel troll that created by the conspiracists themselves as the bullseye is painted by themselves.
If you don’t want to be labeled as a dumb ass conspiracy theorist on the internet, don’t be a dumb ass conspiracy theorist on the internet. 100% of people with die hard trolling mentality will find you, some of which may find different targets if your audience isn’t fun enough. The 100% of bad cops dealing out tickets. 100% of people that know what’s going on will find you and probably not directly engage, but don’t mind whipping up a little anti-conspiracist sentiment. The good cops that will leave you alone if you settle the fuck down and dial back the crazy. And the people that just want to watch a nice video about the proper way to cut your cat’s hair at home will not pay attention to you and just keep on keeping on. The drivers that aren’t speeding.
But they keep making the same mistakes despite the changing times. Alex Jones’ troubles finally gave a solid indication that going too far wasn’t a great idea for real life trolling. Certainly January 6th showed that real life trolling isn’t a great idea. Online trolling is the safe outlet for trolling somewhat anonymously. And people that boldly disrespect others for attention are the new favorite prey.
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