Sometimes, I ‘m trolled on the Internet. In case you’re not familiar with the term, “Internet troll,” it’s slang for someone who attempts to create discord online with arguments or inflammatory posts for no other purpose than to be disagreeable. While I occasionally am trolled, I have one gentleman who’s been trolling me regularly for over six months. Unlike most, he’s openly admitted that he has an agenda to discredit people like me.
This very dependable, articulate gentleman who trolls me on a particular social media site has stated that his goal is to challenge Christians because of his belief that Christianity is harmful to people. He claims that I’m not really a Christian because I don’t adhere to certain teachings he believes are essential to Christianity. He also insists that Christians can’t be involved in interfaith pursuits. Lastly, he insists that all I’m attempting to do is make money off of people.
When he first began trolling me, I thought he was sincere and wanted to have dialogue. It took me a while, but I realized that this was not the case. Instead, he’s attempting to create discord online. What’s interesting to me about this man is that he’s essentially a fundamentalist. He’s really no different from rigid believers who insist that the belief and experience of others must match their own. If one seriously considers the history of Christianity, it’s very clear that there always been a wide diversity of belief and practice among Christians. Christians have never agreed on key elements of the religion, like baptism or communion, the meaning of salvation, or whether the world is fundamentally good or intrinsically evil. These debates aren’t new. Instead, they cross the span of two millennia. This same kind of diversity of belief and experience is found in every other major religion.
The term “religion” comes from the Latin word religare meaning to bind together. Religion draws people together to share common beliefs and experiences. Religion also binds together within a person a sense of that person’s own beliefs and experiences. Properly, religion isn’t about dogma but about attempting to make coherent sense of experience of life. When religion becomes dogma, then it’s making someone else’s belief and experience one’s own. In other words, dogma isn’t my experience but is someone else’s experience that’s appropriated as true.
I can only assume that the gentleman who routinely trolls me was somehow hurt very deeply by religion or perhaps by a member of the clergy. It’s clear that he’s not able to listen and attend to the experience of others because he’s limited by his own experience and intention to pick arguments to point out what he believes are inconsistencies. Contrary to that, I find that my best opportunities to enrich my life have been to learn from the experience and thoughts of others, including shamans and Native American elders, Hindu yogis, Buddhist roshis, Muslim imans, Jewish rabbis and people with no particular faith or tradition. When we open our hearts to respect and receive the rich experience of others, we have the opportunity to grow in ways we would never expect.
Yes, I am a Christian. I draw a sense of meaning and fulfillment from the teachings of Jesus and do my best to live out those teachings in daily life. But I don’t expect that others should follow that path that’s right for me. Further, I encourage others to follow the path that’s right for them, whether that be through another religion or belief system or no particular belief system. That’s because I contend that people who live with integrity to what is most true within them will lead lives marked by goodness and compassion.
People whose goal is create discord and division, whether in real life or online, have not discovered what it means to live with compassion for themselves or others. Perhaps that’s what makes the term “Internet troll” appropriate.
(Photo credit: betsythedevine via Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA)
I too have been trolled. At first I thought it was a person who was in my camp and we befriended, exchanging stories and email addresses. Something triggered this person to go on the attack. They followed me on every post, every image I posted, every article I posted, their replies were never affirming, always a challenge of some sort and in the beginning I felt it was my duty to allow their expression and allow this to continue, until it too began to affect me. Every time I posted anything, I began to await this person’s challenge and it was stressful. I ended up just blocking them, a simple thing, but it took over a year of this behavior for me to get to that point.
It solved the problem entirely and I felt like I was once again free to be me without having to explain myself or defend my ideas. Like you, I was just sharing for like minded souls, with no attempt to condemn anyone else for their beliefs.
Well after about a year, do you know that this person, must have had so much angst stored up within them that they actually sent me an email regarding one of my posts? They felt that lacking in adversity…they wanted more. I wrote back and again was very loving and caring and really non-judgmental of them or their beliefs…but did point out how needy they must be to have a need to contact me like this about a picture post….Wow…and it was not about me at all, but an Indian guru that they had an exception to.
So, yes, I understand all you say…and with a clear heart….Just block these people who are abusive in order to be that negative force in the life of others and fulfill something within them. It really works!
God Bless You!