According to the Twin Cities’ leftysphere and mainstream media:
- Writing thousands, maybe tens of thousands, of abusive and harassing tweets about people you disagree with, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, including over “work” hours? Not stalking.
- Claiming on a large conversation thread on Twitter that someone has been convicted of driving while intoxicated? Not Stalking. (OK, it’s legally more like defamation, but it’s part of the previous bullet).
- Leaving dozens, maybe hundreds, of Google-turds all around the web under a transparent sock-puppet ID (whose source is trivially easy to trace), and setting up a sock-puppet website about an embarassing incident (naturally, with the parts that aren’t embarassing carefully excised away for the perp’s enjoyment) under a false but drearily transparent sock-puppet ID, with the help of a “source” who should have known better (and does, today), and engaging in this behavior against many, many people under many, many monkers and doing that and much, much more with such demented abandon that when something bad did finally happen, he felt the need to make sure people knew it really really wasn’t him who was responsible, this time: Good heavens, no – not Stalking, silly wingnut.
- Going to a public building, with intentions publicly displayed under one’s own name, with a clearly-stated express intent well within the bounds of free speech, and obeying the rules – including the ones about “threatening people” – and doing it while carrying a baby and hauling a stroller: “Stalking”
I’ve always tried to treat people the way I’d like to be treated. Seriously, I do – I mean, a good chunk of the Twin Cities left think that “Expressing any sort of conservative opinion” is a form of assault, but beyond that I do try to keep things on the up and up.
But I have had about enough.
On the one hand, it would be best to ignore the Troll.
On the other hand, when the Troll is is as determined as this troll is not to be ignored, he wins by distracting his victims from their day to day life and livelihood by harrassing them endlessly (from the Wiki entry on Trolls “… is the same as playing chess with a pigeon: the pigeon defecates on the table, drop (sic) the pieces and simply flys away, claiming victory.”) it’s time to take appropriate measures to stop the harrassment.
Maybe it’s time to put the Troll and the sponsor of his trolling (and institutions hate when they hear the sound of lawyers winding their clocks with billable hours) on notice that the time has come for the harrassment to stop. To paraphrase the late Rick James, “like cocaine, treble damages are a helluva drug”. (Although, based on recent six-figure-settlements with fired employees, public institutions don’t seem to give a crap what they do with Other Peoples -taxpayers- Money.)
You know a lot (one’s too many and fifteen’s not enough) of lawyers, maybe it’s time to respond to the Troll and his sponsor with those two words everyone hates to hear -“Lawyer Up”. A letter from a lawyer can be a low cost ‘shot across the bow’ that brings people to their senses in a dispute.
Seflores is correct about sending a letter from a lawyer, but don’t send it to the troll send it to his sponsoring agency/co-conspirator (UofM) insisting that they desist in sponsoring and publishing through their servers and IP network the hate filled defamatory tweets, emails etc.
On the other hand the troll has a taxpayer paid retirement package valued in excess of $2 million – it wouldn’t hurt to whittle away a serious percentage of it.
also FOIA requests for any projects at the Minnesota Supercomputer Institute that the troll might be working on would likely reveal his time sheets which if any of the tweets coincide would make the US govt an active sponsoring party and also worth of a letter or two. If the UofM thinks some of its ongoing grants might be jeopardized by the troll’s behavior they may become much more motivated to deal with him effectively.
Kel,
Hmmm.
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
And I repeat, Hmmm.
Thanks.
MBerg
At the very least, demand that he be suspended without pay for at least a month and a review of his entire work product for the last year!
If you look through the posted CVs of the other Associate Professors among the LM&P/Research Faculty staff (http://pathology.umn.edu/about/faculty/home.html ) its striking how little the troll has accomplished compared to his peers – he’s got to be an academic embarrassment to the UofM (not the sort of staff you publicly advertise to recruit students). But he’s got tenure so he can sit on the corner of the Mayo bldg and fling poo at passersby without more than mild remonstrances coming his way by return.
I also hear that rumor has it said Tr0ll likes to watch and download porn whenever he isn’t jerking it on Twitter. Its only a rumor I’ve heard though, but believeable nonetheless. Hold on I’m getting a call from Kaler…
Stalking…..imgaine if a conservative male literally stalked a liberal female the way that wacko has been stalking Congresswoman Bachmann. Going so far as advertising a service where he will drive other haters to her house, childrens school, and Bachmann family workplaces.
Or the way that “journalist” stalked Palin by literally becoming her neighbor. The reason mainly, when was the last time you saw an attractive female politician that was a democrat? Seriously
PoD, Gov Jennifer Granholm?