Neil Waytowich was one of the most belligerent and prolific trolls in the Canadian scroll. He spewed profanity laced vitriol at conservative politicians and journalists with energy and time that seemed limitless. He prided himself on being blocked by numerous public figures. His contribution to the often toxic environment of twitter was outstanding.
That is, until his security blanket of anonymity was shed.
Blacklocks.ca discovered and exposed Mr. Waytowich’s true identity and the sudden change in attitude from Neil was nothing short of miraculous.
For whatever reason, Waytowich elected to do a live radio interview with Lynda Steele after having been exposed. The transformation from internet tough guy to a meek and contrite little man was striking.
Give it a listen below:
Quite the transformation eh?
Hey, I am not a sweetheart on social media either. I can be prone to profanity and prone to being an asshole just for the sake of entertaining myself. That is indeed classic trolling and I have been guilty of it.
The difference between myself and Mr. Waytowich though is that I have the balls to be like that under my own name.
I own my comments whether good or bad and deal with the consequences. I have been called all sorts of things and have gotten some pretty choice communications from folks that I have pissed off at times. I have had people try to organize boycotts of my business and I have had people demand that my social media accounts be deleted. These are consequences of both my choice to be abrasive online and to do it under my own name.
Enduring the price to pay for being outspoken online makes it difficult for me to respect pussies such as Waytowich who can only talk tough when remaining hidden. They are the online version of folks who throw bricks through the window in the night.
Some folks have reasons not to want to put their own names out there and they certainly have that right. It is hard to respect or take their postings seriously though, especially when they engage in personal attacks on others from behind their wall of anonymity.
If we want to see more civil behaviour online, we should be encouraging more folks to drop the anonymity.
The anonymous cowards offline are an even more dangerous sort of scumbag.
We saw that in spades as a collection of pussies in Portland hid their identities while they attacked journalist Andy Ngo so viciously that he was hospitalized with a brain hemorrhage.
You can bet that these assholes would never have so viciously attacked an innocent man like that had they been unmasked. Like Waytowich they would have skulked away in cowardice rather than act out when they would have to face the music for their actions.
I know it works up civil libertarians but too damn bad. In nations such as Canada and the USA, there is no reason for protesters to hide their identities. There are no death squads rounding them up in the night and no blacklists.
Lets face it, the shitbags who show up masked, with weapons and helmets at protests are seeking trouble and truly want to hurt people.
Want to see a massive reduction in violence at demonstrations? Unmask them. Like Neil, they will turn into instant pussycats.
Want to take a side in a demonstration? Well, if the demonstrators have the balls to show their faces they likely are on the side of good.
If they hide behind anonymity, they are simply cowards who want to cause damage rather than good.
