The trolls have always been among us.

The internet simply gives them the opportunity to behave in boarish ways that in the real world would likely get their punk asses kicked.

This board is rife with them. They are as much a part of the human circus as most fundamentally decent people.

Usually they are just immature kids trying to work out their anger on others.

The alternative approach is to write on boards where your true identity is known to all players.

Suddenly the trolls vanish because they are then responsible for their words, and like I say, very few of that type are anything but cowards.

Of course then, general public cannot play, so you miss the vox populi, too.

What writing to the internet has taught me, aside from the real posts that some people have written that have made me question my own values (thanks by the way for that), is that the percentage of creeps I share the planet with is larger than real life lead me to believe.

A sad thing to learn, I'll admit, but really the net was probably the only way I could ever have learned such a valuable lesson.

The probability that someone is going to yank my chain in real life in the vile ways that trolls try to here, is rather remote, to be candid.