Yeee
See, now the issue with Blocky isn't that he's maliciously sitting behind a keyboard typing away thinking of ways to annoy all of us and make CW shittier. I do believe he is a real person with real views, and he does occasionally make valid points.
The reason he is a problem, and why I feel he needs to be banned again, is that he doesn't post here to talk or discuss cricket. He doesn't even post here to dominate the discourse in the forum. He posts here simply to evoke a response. It's really that simple.
Let me explain.
This is how it works.
> Blocky enters a thread
> He posts a view/statement/belief. Sometimes as a stand alone post, sometimes as a reply to what someone else said.
> People read this post
> People engage with this post
And this is where it all starts. When someone engages with him.
Since Blocky doesn't post here to discuss cricket, he isn't open to having his views changed or learning something new. Since he is here to get a response, he tries to hammer his points down your throats, and to make you so mad you respond to him. That's why his posting has all the classic ****-posting traits:
> Denial of facts and making stuff up
> Stat manipulation to suit an argument
> Poor logic/rationality
A well thought out, coherent argument doesn't get a response. It gets likes, and the odd 'AWTA', and everyone agrees with it and appreciates the poster and moves on.
But a ****** argument, that gets a response.
Not all of Blockys views and arguments are ****. He makes some valid points. Because he is a real person with real views and thoughts. But his good points don't get any traction, because as above people just nod their head and move along. His ****** ones, however, do. (He would describe them as 'controversial', when in reality they are ****) And that's why he chooses to go on and on about those ones in particular. Not because deep in his heart he genuinely believes them to be true and he wants to convince us all, but because these are the views that evoke responses, and that's his endgame. It's why he'll keep using the tricks above, no matter how often they are pointed out to him. There is no room for debate with a coherent argument. But there is room for debate in a ****** one.
So when someone replies to his ****** viewpoint, that's when the fun begins for Blocky. He now has you on his hook. And it doesn't matter how brilliantly you dissect his argument or prove him wrong. He won't change his mind. And he won't shut up. Because conceding you are wrong means ending the discussion, and thus ending the responses. Refusing to concede makes it go on and on.
But you could just ignore him when you realise he is being obtuse. And that's why Blocky has developed the following traits in his posting:
> Refusal to concede he is wrong when he is proven wrong; but instead glossing over it
> Condescending/Obnoxious/passive aggressive tone
> Length of posts - you reply with one line, he'll reply with 5. You reply with a paragraph, he'll respond with three.
> Nitpicking on even the tiniest factual mistake in you reply - even though he has ignored all of his own mistakes
> Changing of goalposts
By doing all this, he annoys and irritates whoever is arguing with him at the time, and usually successfully incites a reply from the person he is arguing with. It's easier to annoy a polite nice quiet guy who is wrong. It's a lot harder to ignore a guy who posts like Blocky does. He pisses off people so much that they have to reply to him.
Holding ****** viewpoints, on Cricketweb, is fine, as long as you are open to being corrected when facts/logic emerge. We all have had ****** views and have conceded them over time. Even dearly held ones. Holding ****** views isn't why we hate Blocky. It's holding on to them in face of facts/logic/evidence that bothers us. It's the stubbornness. It's his tone of posting. It's all the traits i mentioned above.
Its why, inevitably, after pages and pages of ****, someone or the other snaps, calls him a ****, and the whole thread goes to **** as posters forget the topic on hand and become bullies/counter-trolls. Everything is ruined, everything becomes about Blocky, and Blocky wins and basks in his glory.
The logical solution to all this is to just ignore Blocky, isn't it? Don't feed the troll. Ignore him. When deprived of responses, he will go away. Right?
Well yes. And that's what I keep telling you all to do, but you all don't do.
And to be fair, it's hard to ignore Blocky. Part 2 of why he is a troll and why he must be banned is how good he is at getting people to respond. Not just because of posting style, but because of his persistence and sheer volume of posts.
This is the second layer of Blocky's brilliance. He doesn't let things go. He will keeping picking on that loose thread of the unsettled argument (and it's only unsettled because whoever was arguing with him refused to concede to him). You'll see him bring up the same, tired, refuted arguments and viewpoints time and time again. He will never gives it a rest. He keeps flogging the dead horse. He doesn't tire. And again, you never see him harping on and on about something we all agree with. It's just the ones that we don't disagree with. The 'controvesial' viewpoints. The ones he knows will evoke a response.
Not only that, but he will reply to every post that is loosely connected to what he wants to talk about.
And boy does Blocky want to talk about a lot of things. He combines his persistence with a lot of posts. He posts at an incredibly high volume. He tries to dominate the forum with his presence. Every thread, every subforum. There isn't a topic on Earth that Blocky doesn't have a viewpoint on that he is willing to argue to the death for. He casts his net far and wide. Because, as I said, his intent is to get a response. Not just to share his opinion on thoughts on everything no matter how wrong or uninformed or unfounded. It's to get a response. You won't find one thread where he hasn't made a post with the intent of provoking a reply.
He will chase people for a fight too - he will quote anyone and everyone's post and reply in a way to incite a response. Eventually some people bite.
He keeps fishing. He keeps finding new members to respond to him. He keeps old fights going on and on and on. Even if the other debater has quit. Slowly and steadily he sucks everyone on the forum into a debate with him. He keeps evoking responses.
But he's smart. He knows when its gone too far, then he drops it for a bit. He starts on something new. He adheres to mod warnings, but doesn't drop any of the tricks I've listed above. The whole forum basically turns to **** because of him, and then he plays victim because technically he isn't breaking any rules. We're all just ganging up on him. He's just trying to talk cricket and we're all getting mean and personal and nasty.
But he's the one that posts here just for responses. He enjoys it. Look at our VM convo on my wall prior to his last banning:
He confessed to deriving joy from antagonising people and getting them to respond. And I'm sorry, but isn't that the literal definition of a troll?
Why yes, yes it is.
Nothing in his demeanour or his habits has changed between his ban and now. He hasn't done a WindiesWeathers and returned as a poster who has ditched the habits of old that caused us all to hate him. He still has those exact same habits. And he has them for a reason.
He. Wants. A. Response.
So when he plays victim, it is actually quite ironic. This isn't all of us just shitting on him because of his history; this isn't a community who is hellbent on bullying a guy who isn't actually doing anything wrong. This is a group of people behaving exactly the way he wants us too, and I bet you he's loving every moment of it. He loves we want him banned. He loves us insulting him. He loves the fights and direness. I bet you he loves the attention from this thread, as NZT pointed out. Because all he wants is a response.
Now I have called for his ban. Over and over. But I don't think it's happening. Instead of getting banned, the Mods are just telling us to 'Cut it Out'.
And, to be absolutely fair to them, they have a point.
Every time any one of you ****s engages with him, you make him happy.
Any time any one of you enters an argument with him, you validate his posting and his general existence on this forum.
You aren't going to convince him that he's wrong. You aren't going to change his mind. You aren't going to have a polite, respectful, adult discussion with him in the same way that you can have with basically anyone else on this forum.
You just end up ruining all the threads for everybody who has to sit and scroll and sift through all the nonsense that he posts. You ruin it for everyone who has to read posts calling him a **** or posting memes or making passive aggressive snide remarks for easy likes. I know I am guilty of this too and that I joked about Blocky being good for the likes economy, but seriously, enough is enough. You all should know better.
So yea. Stop being ****s. Stop feeding the troll.
And if you absolutely must reply to Blocky, then please use this thread from here on out, and keep all the **** out of the other threads so we can enjoy those.
Thank you.
