Trolling Ethics Debate Thread

[Marvin]

If a professional were to determine that Chris's environment is abusive and ultimately unhealthy (which in my opinion, it totally is,) they could take Chris away from Barb. Not saying it's likely, but it's a power that none of the trolls have.

He's not a child. He can refuse.

 

[Morbid Boredom]

He's not a child. He can refuse.

True. Adult Protective Services are pretty stringent about that, they might also decide it's Senior Abuse -that Chris is abusing Barb.

 

[Kosher Dill]

I wouldn't know, because I have no formal training in abnormal psychology.

Right, but Chris isn't just an "abnormal", he's also a person who's already been pushed about as hard as it's possible to push a person without literally holding a gun to his head.

You're right though, obviously we can't say for certain that there's nothing a professional could do. But I would be very surprised if they managed to accomplish anything.

 

[Le Bateleur]

Well, not "better" results since nobody has really gotten any results at all. But... well, let's put it this way. Do you think there's anything in the Magic Ph.D Bag of Tricks that would motivate Chris as much as the prospect of escaping Barb, marrying a newer, fresher caregiver, and having his daughter? Whatever the professionals try has to be more effective than that.

A therapeutic relationship is facilitative. What the trolls tried to do is push or lure Chris toward a distant goal. What a mental health professional would likely try to do is work with Chris to set and meet smaller goals, moving toward bigger ones as and when he makes progress.

He may never end up in a relationship, or even able to live on his own, but he'd hopefully have a better sense of self-esteem, and a less chaotic life.

 

[warongiygas]

He's not a child. He can refuse.

I guess you're right. Chris is easy to manipulate emotionally, to say the least, and he'll probably run back to mommy until she dies... As long as Barb wants to keep her special little boy, she will; no matter how how miserable he is, how unfulfilled his life is, or how incompetent her constant coddling makes him... It's messed up.

 

[Marvin]

A therapeutic relationship is facilitative. What the trolls tried to do is push or lure Chris toward a distant goal. What a mental health professional would likely try to do is work with Chris to set and meet smaller goals, moving toward bigger ones as and when he makes progress.

Well, trolls sent him to gay events. That's a smaller goal with good results.

Anyway, I think people are arguing about the wrong things. Our goal in trolling Chris is to get laughs, not to help him.

When Chris is helped by trolling, it's because trolls try to push Chris outside of his comfort zone. Chris doing the same things over and over again is boring and unfunny. It just so happens that sometimes (not often, but sometimes) that's a good thing for Chris.

I will say that I don't believe outside help, trolling or professional, can help Chris long term. Chris' life is fundamentally fucked while he lives with Barb.

 

[Holdek]

Well, trolls sent him to gay events. That's a smaller goal with good results.

Anyway, I think people are arguing about the wrong things. Our goal in trolling Chris is to get laughs, not to help him.

Yes, but Thetan has definitely characterized her trolling with Rebekah as an altruistic endeavor.

 

[Atlas 95]

Yes, but Thetan has definitely characterized her trolling with Rebekah as an altruistic endeavor.

It's a similar thing to Jackie, the trolls tried to get Chris to cook for himself or clean up 14BC with the temptation of china.
If Chris didn't do it it was a win because his mental gymnastics to justify getting the reward without the effort would be funny, but if he did then the trolling would just get more complicated AND Chris has ever so slightly improved his life so it's also a win.
Plus frankly any interaction outside of Barb is a positive for Chris IMO, he desperately needs outside input on his life from someone who isn't as corrosive as Barb

 

[Tubular Monkey]

There will always be a few annoying idiots pestering Chris, but major trolling like we saw in the old days does not exist anymore. Now, left alone and unoccupied, Chris's attention turns to disturbing the peace and assault charges. Just about anybody that can really get Chris's ear these days tries to steer him in a more positive direction. The trouble is, you have to have something to tempt him with. He won't behave unless you dangle something shiny in front of him. So it's either manipulate him for his own good, or leave him alone and let him get thrown behind bars. In the words of a someone else, at least we tried!!!!

 

[Holdek]

but if he did then the trolling would just get more complicated AND Chris has ever so slightly improved his life so it's also a win.
Plus frankly any interaction outside of Barb is a positive for Chris IMO, he desperately needs outside input on his life from someone who isn't as corrosive as Barb

Yeah but people shouldn't play Internet psychotherapist when they don't have the credentials. It's a high-wire act.

 

[Atlas 95]

Yeah but people shouldn't play Internet psychotherapist when they don't have the credentials. It's a high-wire act.

Your not wrong, it is kind of risky and there's every chance he'll take the wrong lesson or screw it up somehow
I suppose it comes down to wherever you think its better to have tried something that might not work or have not tried at all because you understand it could very well go wrong

 

[A-№1]

Our goal in trolling Chris is to get laughs, not to help him.

True. But the two are somewhat related.

Trying to get Chris to do something stupid or even harmful, even if he does it, isn't particularly funny. It's like the Gail scripters. Also nothing we could get Chris to do could possibly be more amusing or insane than the stupid shit he comes up with all on his own. On the other hand, trying to convince Chris to do the right thing for a change, and then watching him do his own stupid pig headed thing anyway because he can't be bothered to listen to reason… is hilarious. And if ever by some miracle Chris does actually pay attention for once and doesn't fuck up, well that trolls the a-logs and weens, so it's win-win.

tl;dr: Trying to get Chris to succeed, even unsuccessfully, yields more laughs than trying to get him to fail.

 

[Flowers For Sonichu]

I love how this thread's hardly seen any discussion since we found out about our hero jailing himself. I think a lot of misgivings that some people had are probably gone now.

Not really, this thread was started years after he tried to run a person over with a car. We all know Chris is a terrible person. But, it's what Marvin said. There's a huge difference between dressing up in a pickle suit/making parodies of his work and watching him chimp out as a result and digging through his garbage/pretending you're his real life acquaintances in order to tell him he's a piece of shit in some misguided attempt to "help" him

 

[RagtimeRoastBeefy]

Not really, this thread was started years after he tried to run a person over with a car. We all know Chris is a terrible person. But, it's what Marvin said. There's a huge difference between dressing up in a pickle suit/making parodies of his work and watching him chimp out as a result and digging through his garbage/pretending you're his real life acquaintances in order to tell him he's a piece of shit in some misguided attempt to "help" him

Yeah the attempt to add "consequence" to Chris' behaviour through pretending to be an outraged friend "reacting" to his past is a worthless endevour. Chris already is dealing with the "consequences" of his behaviour every day, and by dealing with it I mean inevitably blaming people he wronged. The same thing happens when trolls impersonate friends or relations from the past honestly. He goes to the same coping mechanism. He isn't gonna learn from a fake highschool gal pal being outraged by shecameforcwc.jpg any more than He did frim a real Meghan getting angry about the same picture. That's unfortunately how Chris deals with shit, we aren't going to be able to change that. And lo and behold he's taking the blarms attack the same way. How many times are people gonna try to shame him out of that before they realize its ineffective? In my opinion the funniest things come from Chris being nuts on his own and from things that are so absurd that honestly a person with even the slightest sense of humor about themselves could laugh at. Ie liquid and pickle suit

 

[Morbid Boredom]

Not really, this thread was started years after he tried to run a person over with a car. We all know Chris is a terrible person. But, it's what Marvin said. There's a huge difference between dressing up in a pickle suit/making parodies of his work and watching him chimp out as a result and digging through his garbage/pretending you're his real life acquaintances in order to tell him he's a piece of shit in some misguided attempt to "help" him

This. No one is going to round up boyfriend-free girls for Chris's inspection at Heartschwitz. We're all aware of Chris's shortcomings.

 

[P-Logic]

Is Skyraider still pretending to be Chris's young cousin?

 

[Kosher Dill]

Is Skyraider still pretending to be Chris's young cousin?

If you mean "Savannah", I don't think that was him, and the guy who was doing that stopped a long time ago.

 

[P-Logic]

If you mean "Savannah", I don't think that was him, and the guy who was doing that stopped a long time ago.

No, I mean more recently.

 

[Morbid Boredom]

If you mean "Savannah", I don't think that was him, and the guy who was doing that stopped a long time ago.

Good. God, that was Creepy.

I know there are complaints about splitting hairs, but I'm comfortable with trolls impersonating famous people. Shigeru Miyamoto has all sorts of gatekeepers insulating him from nobodies seeking his attention. That didn't even need a "saga", it could have ended at "Holy crap, Chris really believes important people care what he has to say."

People who genuinely wish to cut Chris out of their lives deserve to be left alone. Especially people who had nothing to do with Chris -like the cousin he's interacted with for maybe a few hours in his life. Even Mimms should be left alone, despite the fact he engaged the early trolls.

 

[kakyouin]

Part of me doesn't like it at all--he's a 30-something-year-old man who should be left to live his life in peace, and anything that disrupts that peace should be entirely his own doing. Without mentioning Bluespike (that speaks for itself), the things Jackie wanted him to do in videos (especially public ones) were downright humiliating, and the 'date' he had set up which had him drive all the way to Ohio was cruel. He's not a good person, but that doesn't mean that you need to go that far just to say "haha, Chris is dumb, look what he did for me". We know he's not the smartest, but those were just a few of the things taking it too far.

On the other hand, the more normal personas, the ones trying not to date him or be cruel to him, just treating him normally like any other normal person would, are nice. He has no real friends as far as I know, and I imagine all the socializing he has comes from his mom and Facebook. Giving him someone to talk to who isn't downright malicious or looking for anything in return is kind of nice. He doesn't really deserve it, but it's a nice gesture--even if it's for the wrong reasons. However, I don't think it'll do any good for Chris--even if he never learns that they're trolls, he'll still never take the lessons they try to teach him to heart. I don't really remember it ever working in the past (though if it did, please correct me. I really want to be wrong and know he's learned something.)