Comment by anigbrowl

I really think people can distinguish between a formal accusation and snark.

Now, I agree that in febrile political environments it's better not to rely on sarcasm and satire for communication because it imposes extra cognitive overhead and is subject to misinterpretation, but at the same time 'found the [negative stereotype]' is such a common joke format in American popular culture that it would be foolish to take it literally. It's like objecting to a 'knock knock' joke by complaining that the person is lying about being on the other side of a door.

And putting trolls and their critics on the same level is fundamentally foolish, and a much worse example of feeding trolls. It means attacking the critics for paying the trolls back in their own coin, which inevitably leads to a ratchet effect in favor of the trolls. There's good evidence that being rude to trolls is the most effective way for an online community to maintain itself: https://arxiv.org/abs/1803.03697