In article .com,
"ve3..." wrote:

The number and length of some OT postings seem to be increasing to the
point that some members are contemplating a moderated site. This would
be an unfortunate last step as many of the group have eclectic
backgrounds and their post, although off topic, make for interesting
reading. I think that those OT posts that involve propaganda and
tedious arguments of insidious intent should be discouraged. The best
way to do this is not to answer them in any way. Psychological theory
states that a message that is never responded to will not continue.
Sniping at them, no matter how clever, only rewards the message and
leads to more of the same. I am beginning to think that some of the
authors of these OT post are paid by some agency as part of some
disinformation sceme: otherwise why don't they ply their trade on the
political science or economics sites where they can meet the heavy
hitters? Has anyone noticed similar text on other websites that would
indicate an agitprop operation?

If everyone ignored the nut jobs it would not matter if they kept
posting here or stopped at some point. The nut jobs are not the problem.
The problem is people responding to the nut jobs.

Kill filing is the passive approach, which would be a complete solution
if not for people responding to them.

Complaining about them to their provider to get their accounts
terminated is the aggressive approach.

I would take the aggressive approach but the people that like to torment
the nut jobs would complain that I took away their fun so I stick with
the passive approach.

I found a way to fine tune the kill file so I generally don't see the
Troll OR responses to the Troll. If I toggle the filter off and respond
to the Troll myself my own response along with anyone else will be
killed when I toggle the filter back on. Works great for cleaning up the
news group posts. 99% of the crap is automatically deleted. Only takes a
few seconds to generate a filter for a new Troll. Then just re-filter
the days posts so you only have to see them once and the rest of the
crap goes away.

Get a good news reader with flexible filters and you will be in good
shape despite the nonsense in the news group.

--
Telamon
Ventura, California