Privacy on MSE

coolcait

Re the posts made by paulineb, I had a completely different take on the thread she referred to.

There were certainly comments along the lines that the troll(s) probably loved the attention - talk about rewarding bad behaviour! - and I agree with those comments.

However, as I saw it, the comments about the avatar photo/amount of personal information shared were motivated by concern rather than blame.

Something along the lines of:

- the troll(s)' behaviour is unpleasant, uncalled for, and possibly disturbing

- don't 'feed' them, by giving them so much discussion time

- but, given the disturbing - even slightly obsessive - nature of their pursuit of you, is it wise/safe for you to leave so much information which could identify you in real life?

The point which was never made explicitly was "bad enough to be followed and harassed on an internet site. And you're describing a level of persistence and obsession which is beyond the usual world of trolldom. Do you want to risk it spilling over into real-life, because you have made yourself easily identifiable?"