The Tragedy of the Commons

Updated again - see bottom...

Author's note: This may get long and it is serious so if you don't want to deal with that here is the jist of the post: if you are mean, go away and stay away because you probably aren't welcome here.

These days I have been thinking a lot about blogging and the code of conduct around blogging. The blog world, to me at least, is a world that is based on the a premise of a common space where people post about anything they want. It isn't a physical location, it is a virtual location. There are resources we share and places we visit. The resources are the obvious: A database that stores our blogs, the ability to have word verification on some blogs, that ability to remain anonymous or use your own blog name when leaving comments, etc.... Then there are less tangible resources: syntax, common courtesy, grammar. In many ways we police ourselves. I personally don't visit many overtly religious blogs, I don't visit many conservative blogs, I don't visit many republican blogs. The blogs that I read that fall into one of these categories are well written, they inspire thought and when I comment I am respectful of the administrator of the blog. Why do I do this? Because I would hope that when they visit my blog they treat my blog the same way. I mostly go to blogs that I can relate to.
I am not a stay at home mom.
I am not a dad.
I am not single.
I am not a great grandmother.
I am not going through a divorce.
I am not the mother of boys or twins.
I am not religious (actually, I am a devout Unitarian Universalist with strong atheist leanings but I was raised that way and never grew out of it because it works for me).
What I like about these blogs is that they touch me, I appreciate them and their stories. Sometimes I don't agree with them or their work habits or their parenting or their religious beliefs or their politics but I respond in a constructive way. Or I offer my view and why I feel that way.
Or I.JUST.KEEP.MY.MOUTH.SHUT.
I do this because I feel there is a limited resource of the blogger commons and that resource is manners. Blog trolls do not understand manners. Or they understand them and choose to ignore them. I believe that is the definition of a sociopath. I don't think I am a sociopath and I don't want to be perceived as a sociopath so I am polite (or sarcastic as all get out but not rude).

Recently I had to delete a comment because the commenter was remarkably rude. I started blogging in January and this was the first time I had to do this. I commented what I did and why. This person emailed me a treatise on why I am evil (I am paraphrasing). She wanted me to post her email about why I am evil. I sent her a one line response that politely declined the honor. She then posted it on her blog, which is where it belonged. Two people have commented on her post since then and she responded with a 500 word response to one comment and a 1400 word response to the other comment. She then started going through my past posts and started commenting on those. I did what a sane person would do at this point: I ignored her. There are people who are not reasonable, and she seemed like one of these people. So I talked with a few people I respect a lot and they agreed. Ignore her. Best course of action. This is really hard for me because I was raised Unitarian and I was taught to look for common ground, find the kinship and build bridges. I was also raised by an amazing pragmatist, she taught me to keep poisonous people away from you. Ignoring the troll would be the only way to do this. I found no serenity in the situation but I knew I had to do this because it truly was the best course of action.
One commenter (who happens to be one of my best friends ever) noticed that the troll was going through my old posts and left a comment in the same ilk as my troll's comments (although not as long winded). The troll didn't like this and the troll went to her blog and left a really ugly comment thinking she, the troll, was anonymous. Except this troll doesn't understand some things about the internet because she hasn't been doing this very long:
1. IP addresses are public data.
2. There is technology that allows to see where people are coming from. It is legal. It is free.

I knew my troll was visiting my site multiple times a day because I tracked her comment against her IP address. Then I just tracked her IP address. Totally legal. I can even publish this IP address because it is public. So when she commented on my friend's site we knew immediately that the comment was left from the same exact IP address as my troll. I was now sharing a troll.
Needless to say things disintegrated from this point. And now one of my favorite blogs, one of my favorite bloggers, one of my best friends in the world, has dismantled her blog. Because one person is poisonous, the troll's self righteous behavior is hateful and petty. She may have had made good points at some point but they were completely lost by her scurrilous commenting. A beautiful common area has been destroyed by a selfish person.
The tragedy of the commons in a modern day environment comes to fruition.

This whole situation has left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I want to feel like I can welcome many different people with different beliefs and backgrounds. Hell, my family reads this blog and they are all republican and we love eachother and respect our differences. Some of my friends are devoutly religious - one is an Episcopal priest - and they read this blog. I am even friends with Yankees fans. But if you can't be polite, if you can't give constructive criticism, if you can't add your opinion in a respectful way then GO AWAY!
I am not kidding. You are not welcome. Divisive I can dig, ugly verbage I cannot abide with.
Moreover, why bother coming here if you are going to get into such a lather that you have to be ugly? Just go away. If you really feel you cannot express yourself constructively but you absolutely feel you must say something then please know I will dump your comments.

Say what you mean.
Mean what you say.
Don't say it mean.

Update - Everyone, thank you for the comments. All are apprciated. The post denegrating me that I mention in this post has been removed, I assume by the person who posted it. I am not sure what the reason was but I am appreciative that it was removed. All I really wanted was my name removed, the rest was her opinion to post as she saw fit. But I will take it.
I hope I can put this behind me and that Kara starts posting again. And, I have found about ten new blogs that I am reading and enjoying from all this (some are even conservative! Shocking, I know!).