Name: Everly Grace Call

Age: 26

I've been writing since I started high school... writing is what helped me get through a lot of hard times. My imagination allowed me to escape my life as a foster child and create something new, even if it wasn't real. I hope that people can enjoy reading my stories as much as I enjoy writing them. :)

SOMETHING AWESOME I FOUND ON THE INTERNET:

DEAR FELLOW READERS AND WRITERS WHOM RESPECT ONE ANOTHER

Flamers exist in all forms on the Internet. While in real life a flamer is usually a derogatory term used to describe homosexuals, the internet ‘flamers’ appear to be oblivious to this ironic duality; which is made even more amusing to the casual observer when they start insulting people for being homosexual. Yes on the internet these, erm, ‘fearsome’ individuals can most often be seen attempting to infuriate, harass, and pester everyday forum goers for their own personal amusement or for the amusement of their fellows who may or may not be observing their work.

This article is to assist you, the everyday person, in the quickest and most effective tactics in dealing with these individuals. These are the battle-tested techniques I have both observed and implemented in order to:
a) better understand ‘flamers’ and how they think
b) turn their own game against them
c) and ultimately destroy their will to continue to post on their target forum.

But Cheesus, what motivates the ‘flamer?’

Good question Timmy!

Any number of things can be the flamers ultimate motive. Most of the time it’s a simple sense of self-satisfaction they get from getting someone so pissed off at what they are saying that they flip out. Other times it could be for ‘recognition’ or to gain ‘rep’ with other groups of internet flamers. Sometimes it’s a ‘troll’ for traffic to the site they hail from. Whatever the motive though, the attack will generally have little variance and can often be extremely predicable.

Here is a list of the most common things flamers will attempt to use against common netizens and the most effective counters to them. This will be presented semi-linearly in order from the beginning to the end of most flamer attacks. Being a creature of habit, the pattern is usually the same for a flamer...

Flamer Tactic #1 – Your soul better belong to Jesus, cuz your ass belongs to me!

A flamer, being mostly an egomaniac who is very eager to make a big splash, will post his initial thread (usually in the wrong forum) claiming how much everyone sucks, and how great he is. Though all flamers go about this in different ways, some being subtler than others, the general message is always the same, they are the big bad flamer and they are here to make you their e-bitch. Sometimes they may hint at being phase one of a much bigger ‘invasion’ in order to seem more intimidating to the denizens of the forum. Other times they may simply pick a few random posters and go to work, most of the time by accusing them of being gay, weak, unable to hold back the flamers alpha-male like prowess.

There’s no one proven counter. Though in general, flamers crave attention and recognition from their allies and enemies alike. They like to be responded to, because that makes them feel like what they are saying is having an effect. Take away the attention they crave and the flamer cannot function. Respond briefly with logic or outright ignore the flamer’s first post. The less attention they get the more likely they are to either up the scale of the attack or leave. Either way, with a level-head and close examination, either outcome only works in your favor. You’re not giving them what they want, and that pisses them off.

Flamer Tactic #2 – You said something dumb months ago, let me remind you of it!

If you replied to the flamers initial thread, or maybe if you didn’t, it doesn’t matter. You’ve pissed him off now, but calling you gay simply may not be enough if the flamer sees you as a threat to his attack. He may dig into the archive of the forum, looking for quotes of yours he can take out of context and use against you. You said you ‘could understand how hard it is to be homosexual’ two years ago? FAG. Anything you’ve said that could even remotely make you look bad will be tossed in your face in order to drive you towards the delicious meltdown that all flamers crave.

This is a tedious tactic to deal with, you can choose to respond with mild apathy (which may cause the attacks to continue) but I recommend finding where you made those quotes or even IF you made them, and showing how the context was manipulated. You show the flamer just has lame tricks and intentional manipulation of facts and he loses yet another tool he can use during the attack.

Flamer Tactic #3 – Your site is unpopular! Here are some charts and graphs to prove it!

The less active the site, the more ‘retarded’ and ‘unworthy’ it is. This, of course, completely disregarding the fact that the flamer signed up to such an unworthy site to attack it. He will list everything from traffic statistics to member count, anything, to prove that your site is an insignificant speck of nothing on the big bad interwebs… so insignificant that he felt necessary to sign up to your site and tell you all about it no less.

The best way to deal with this is to simply ask the ‘flamer’ why he’s wasting his time if the site is so ‘retarded’ or ‘unworthy.’ Keep him talking, allow him to list all his grievances, as the average flamer is expecting you to capitulate under the pressure of his blind ignorance and misunderstanding of his target. The more you bog him down in details and force him to explain himself the more bored and frustrated the flamer becomes that his mighty onslaught isn’t working.

Flamer Tactic #4 – Your site is gay and so are you!

Flamers aren’t a terribly imaginative lot, if they can’t come up with something (or someone) to make fun of they will pick whatever your site is about and use that. If you’re a fishing forum, they’ll make fun of fishing. They will claim it’s boring, and possibly, homosexual. I mean come on ‘fishing rods’… lol how gay amirite? They will claim that everyone on the forum can’t fish worth a damn, possibly due to being cripplingly gay. Same goes for any sports forums. If it’s a team forum, they will claim another team is better. If it’s a goth forum, they will claim everyone there is emo. Whatever your site about you can be certain that, in the flamers mind, your posting there makes you terrible at whatever it is and gay. As a matter of fact most of the time you can be almost certain that you will be called gay at some point during a flamer attack. Perhaps it’s the connotation from their name that compels them to accuse people of being homosexuals all the time, perhaps it’s that deep down they really don’t have anything that clever to say. Either way the flamer has a malfunctioning gaydar and by god will he use it to full effect.

This is actually a fairly simple thing to deal with. All you have to do is point out that what they are saying is obviously contrary to what the site is about. After that, if the site is about a specific hobby or interest, get the flamer to explain why you’re bad at it or why it’s stupid. Chances are, the flamer, when given the chance to talk, will make his ignorance apparent, which makes it easy to pick apart whatever meek insults they come up with.

Flamer Tactic #5 - Help! Help! I’m being oppressed!

Flamers are used to posting amidst their own kind, most of the time, and as a result they become far too accustomed to the rules of the sites they call home. Being not very observant or smart they incorrectly assume that any site that has rules should treat them as an exception no matter what they say, do, or post. If an administrator removes a picture they post of a member of the forum with his head cropped on to a picture of gay sex (this is much more common then you may believe, flamers seem obsessed with homosexuality… I wonder why) and that admin deletes it or dumps the thread, the flamer will go into a tailspin of accusations of abuse and censorship, acting as if they are being oppressed and are the only thing that can save the site they are flaming from the nazi-regime of their own mods and admins (who in most cases are people who they know and trust). Being a very egocentric lot the flamer assumes that his complaints will rouse the forum (which he was insulting before the supposed oppression occured) to overthrow their oppressors.

This is by far the most ignorant and pointless thing a flamer can do, and generally will mark the end of their presence on the forum. The flamer will assume that because they were ‘censored’ what they were saying was too truthful or too damaging to the site’s ‘rep’ and that rather then enforcing the clearly stated rules of the forum, the admins did it out of rage. They will mention this a lot. A whole lot. They will generally stick around only to berate the admins for being ‘cowards’ who ‘hide behind their administration panels.’ They will accuse the forum of being weak to need rules. The reason behind this, being of course, that the flamer is not very creative. Much like a caveman, the flamer is confused and enraged by things he is not used to or does not understand. If a site doesn’t allow pornographic images and removes them from one of his flames, the flamer doesn’t get that it was even-handed rule enforcement. Instead of trying to find another way, within the rules, to frustrate and annoy people on the site, the flamer doesn’t bother. As a mater of fact 99 of the time the flamer won’t even bother to read the rules, no matter how clearly labeled or how often they are referenced. A flamer thinks he is above the law, always. Any enforcement of the rules is abuse and censorship. Anyone who agrees with a mod openly about it is a homosexual who is probably having gay sex gaily with that mod, because they are gay.

The most effective way to shut a flamer up when they hop on the ‘help I’m being oppressed!’ train is to simply point out that they are posting on a privately owned website. Just like going into someone’s house and shitting on the couch will get you thrown out, going on to someone else’s website and doing the equivalent will get you the boot.

You may have to repeat this several times for the flamer to understand no one cares about his supposed ‘plight.’ In most cases when that sinks in the flamer will either leave or start breaking the rules on purpose in order to get banned so he can claim he won from another site.

Flamer Tactic #6 – It was all a part of my master plan!

When backed into a corner, the flamer will become more belligerent. The attack isn’t working out like they wanted it to! These people aren’t letting him bog the site down in gay jokes and claims of ownage! What to do? Abort! Abort! Red Alert! Awooooooogggaaaa!

The flamer, seeing his attack is failing will write massive columns of text directed at anyone and everyone, trying to provoke the meltdown he so desired. His posts may lose substance as his confidence waivers, either way it’s clear the flamer cannot go on like this. So when you can’t overtly ‘pwn’ the site, you can just claim you did! Digging deep into his ancient sack of tricks the flamer will claim that he did all of this ON PURPOSE. That’s right, it was all part of his masterful scheme to expose the truth! He was a freedom fighter, fighting against oppression and rules! Getting deleted, edited, whatever, was all on purpose to show you big gay homos the truth that your pals who run the site are nothing more then drooling Stalin wannabes!

Typically when the tactics get more desperate and poorly concocted you can counter them more easily. All you have to do is point out all the flamer has done is insult random members and site policy since he arrived, and there was no attempt to join and contribute. Let them know, that YOU know, that they joined only to insult the site without any motive, you can even ham it up and pretend to be offended by this. A flamers greatest enemies are himself and his inability to keep his mouth shut. All you have to do is get him talking by pretending to be offended. Often this will make him admit to pissing you off on purpose, with no small sense of self-satisfaction. This will prove his ‘this was all part of my master plan’ ploy untrue by proxy, and once you inform him of this the flamer may meltdown and leave in a huff, but not before the ever-popular final post…

Flamer Tactic #7 – You can’t fire me, I quit!

Your site is stupid and gay, filled with fags who oppressed with unholy rules! I r flamer! I R angry! Why won’t you get mad at me! WHY? YOU BASTARDS! The flamer will have lost all composure by this point, he may break down and spam gay sex all over the site, he may stick to his ‘i’m leaving’ thread and reply to it till an admin bans him out of pity. The confused and angry flamer will claim he’s won. If you ignore him? He has won. If you ban him? He has won. If you mock him? He’s won. His self-assured claims of victory are his last mental refuge. A flamer talks big so much that when he fails to deliver it makes him look incompetent and weak, the average person wouldn’t care, but to a flamer he needs to look good to other people. He wants to be accepted and told he’s funny and tough. When he’s not accepted and re-assured, in the face of total defeat, the flamer will try to convince others that he’s beaten them. In reality it looks more like he’s trying to convince himself.

At this point you can step back and admire your work, or you can be cruel and explain how you forced the flamer into his pathetic defeat. Either way it’s over, at least until the next flamer shows up...