Newbies on the board may not have come across Inquisitor or their style of posting before. We can assure you that we get a lot of it here and we're quite used to it. The methodology is quite easy to recognize, but for newbies I thought I would describe it here, so they can better understand how such people operate.
The first point to make is that you can use Zephan or Inquisitor's techniques with any subject whatsoever against any opponent whatsoever.
Let's take the origin of early 19th century Estonian knitting patterns as an example...
Firstly accuse your opponent of being obviously ignorant:
"That you can call Parnovsky an expert make you sound stupid to anyone who knows anything on this subject." or "You show absolutely no knowledge of this at all and you're just beginning to sound like an idiot - anyone can cut and paste a comment on haarttinnasa. When will you post YOUR definition of a plain stitch? I predict never - because you effectively have no mind of your in these matters."
Sound familiar in tone and technique? See how easy it is to do this
without actually knowing anything about the subject, other than one or two key terms which can be dropped in to the post.
Secondly, pick up on ANY point you can in your opponent's post, but ensure you do not make any substantive statement yourself, because if you do you will leave yourself open to the same attack:
Read your post again. You say "huovista is not known until 1830, so we can date this later huovistinaa to perhaps 1850." You reveal your total prejudice you dumazz and you're too blind to even see it! Just because huovista is not known doesn't mean it didn't exist. What a loser! Saying "later huovistinaa" just shows how blindly prejudiced you are - you already believe huovistinaa to be what you are trying to prove. Take a logic course!
Again, I'm sure the tone and technique are familiar.
Thirdly, refuse to make any substantive statement, insisting that this is your opponent's role, and hoping that you can appear authoritative by taking the high ground.
You're the one claiming that plain stitch is different in Estonia - but you cannot or will not even define it. PROVE to me that you know what you're talking about, then I might have time for a discussion. But until you can demonstrate that you even know the basic concepts, I have to assume your just a blindly prejudiced ignorant dumazz.
See? And the cool thing is - if the opponent responds with a defintion, they have effectively conceded that it is their role to provide it. Now you're on the high ground and you can take full advantage of it. You can now play the master card of demanding some sort of "authoritative" position from your opponent - especially if this can be done in an area where there is no appropriate codifying body - science, logic, knitting etc - so much the better. If they provide a definition, you demand a better one.
"That's YOUR definition? It's pathetic. It has been refuted more times than you could possibly know. Show me ONE official definition that agrees with you and I'll consider replying."
From now on it's plain sailing. You have shown nothing of your hand - not even that you have no hand to show, but you have attacked your opponent in four areas from which they cannot hit back without using your own techniques.
How to respond to this? Well, the first thing may actually be to dance a little with such a correspondent. They may not be intentionally mendacious. We have seen this with quite a few posters over the years, who do eventually get on track and post substantively. They start off with virulent, demanding posts, then settle down into more reasoned argument when they realize that they are not getting anywhere, and that their opponents may actually have some interesting things to say- even if we disagree with every word.
But let's assume the pattern just continues. This is where we are with Inquisitor.
You can ignore the troll - which is fine, and perhaps the best course if you feel there is a danger you might stoop to their tactics through frustration.
To a certain extent you can wait for the troll to trip up, which they will do. Zephan, hilariously, got muddled over "burden of proof." However, because they never have to post anything substantive this can be a long wait. The more they merely respond, rather than initiating, the less chance there is.
You can also wait for them to be banned - most often because they just resort to a stream of insubstantial and insulting posts. Remember, their key motivation is to show their cleverness compared to others - they will attempt this from the first post by referring to the foolishness of others - but eventually they have to make this point more and more insistently and in the long run will just be reduced to one or two totally content-free insulting posts. At that point it is farewell. This course is inevitable if the response to their posts is calm, reasoned and substantiated. Their response to measured reason, and substantiation, is as visceral as that of a vampire to garlic.
Finally, you can call their bluff. This can work extremely well, if the troll gets over confident. Remember the example of Zephan, whose credibility vanished as soon as he declared himself to be "an expert in evidence." From that point on, it was downhill all the way, because every post revealed that claim to have been a totally empty boast. Calling their bluff can be pretty easy, but it requires discipline - and the cooperation of other posters. At it's simplest it is the equivalent of saying: we know we have a lot to learn, we know our knowledge is imperfect in some of these areas, can you take an example and post something that will enlighten us? For example, what is the most important issue in 19th century Estonian knitwear? Chances are you will never hear from them again - the one thing they dare not do is put their head above the parapet.
So be patient. Read the troll's posts, learn from their techniques, laugh at their vanity, and wait.
- was he convicted or found liable? In a civil case in the US, can one be found guilty? Was this just a slip-up (we all make them) or am I missing something?
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