Anonymous is as anonymous does

"Anonymous is as anonymous does." By Anonymous.

In today's mail at the Woodland Record, I received an anonymous letter. It was securely "scotch-taped," even the cut-out address "label" had a double-dose of the sticky stuff. Obviously, some secret was inside.

Enclosed was a pink "Fax Cover Page" that was not signed. It was sent anonymously to me, and I assume sent anonymously to the others listed on page: The superintendent of the Woodland Joint Unified School District and the board of trustees. The letter urged the recipients to contact the Woodland Police Department with a certain case number and instructed us to read something that was enclosed.

With the pink letter were four pages of comments (30 total) made under an article at DailyDemocrat.com. All comments had a handle (pseudonym) because that's the way you have to do it at that Web site. On this blog, you can just choose to comment as "anonymous" for whatever reason you have. (See "Why bloggers remain anonymous" that I posted on Oct. 27, 2007.) Regardless, all commenters under that article are essentially anonymous – except for "Bob," perhaps.

The comments have been removed, probably due to one (and others like it) that prompted the self-proclaimed "Intelligent" to post this:

"The posting above is very mean-spirited and the Daily Democrat should not be allowing such posts. I don't know the man but I know that he probably deserves better than to be assailed by anonymous posters. Woodland has always loved its anonymous posting forums whether it was 'Sound Off' in the old Daily Democrat or that stupid Woodland Journal blog site where the truly inept go to feed. If you want to accuse someone of something at the very least you should put your real name and stand up like a man."

That's funny. The commenter said, "You should put your real name and stand up like a man." Wait... wasn't that posted by "Intelligent?" Sure, we all know her! She's very smart. Do as I say, not what I do.

There are many reasons why bloggers remain anonymous, or use a handle, but the bottom line is anonymous bloggers are hiding in some form or fashion. And that wouldn't be so bad if what the anonymous blogger did wasn't shady. By shady, I mean acting like a troll – loosely defined as an anonymous person who intentionally disrupts discussions. Generally trolls are known to disrupt conversations as a joke – but I include purposefully talking off-point to discredit other commenters with personal attacks.

On this blog, myself and The Realist decided to moderate comments because there were too many anonymous comments made that were off-topic, were lies, or were just plain vicious. (Our "hits" actually have decreased after we did this, probably because it's not as entertaining without all the trolls.) But even before we began moderating, I began attempting to snuff out trolls in two ways: 1) Use facts and research, rather than hearsay while "discussing," and 2) Call them out for what they said - ironically translated as "name-calling" by the anonymous, faceless clones who have already taken stabs at me or others in the string. The anonymous bloggers can dish it out, but they can't take "counter-trolling." And THAT is my entertainment.

Obviously, most comments really don't need a handle to be understood in its context. However, there are times when it would help the discussion if readers knew something about the commenter to avoid assumptions about authority, knowledge, experience or lack thereof. I find it especially discourteous that even a morsel of effort isn't given to help readers track who is saying what - it takes a split second to add a handle to your comments. If your comment isn't worth that effort, then don't expect others to value what you say.

Again, I truly understand why bloggers remain anonymous. However... here at the "stupid Woodland Journal blog site where the truly inept go to feed," just be prepared how your veil of secrecy might be interpreted. Anonymous is as anonymous does.

(And to the anonymous sender of the pink letter... I'll just let you figure out what to do with your information. I don't know why you provided just a case number and not a copy of the report - why should I go to the trouble of fetching that?)