The following bits of advice are based on real-life cases, examples taken from observing actual Pagan organizations trying to deal with trolls - and, usually, failing.

By far the most important and useful way to deal with trolls is to insure the organization's members understand the issues and know what to look for. Have workshops and discussions on trollspotting and trollhandling. Perhaps run an annual refresher course on the subject. You want the organization's members to recognize trolls and trollish scams. If and when a troll gets in and starts operating, you want the critter to be recognized.

Even so, education is not enough. You need ways to get rid of them.

In organizations, the usual method of getting rid of a troll is to file an ethics complaint. Before you join or start up any Pagan organization larger than a single Coven, be certain there's a procedure for handling ethics violations. Sooner or later, a troll will target someone in your organization. You will need a way to deal with it. If you don't have a procedure, you're really asking for trouble.

You must have rules and procedures for ejecting people for defamation of character, for unethical activities inconsistent with the goals of the organization, and for violation of the organization's rules. The organization must be willing to exercise those provisions, and to actually eject people who really need it.

Trolls have two common ways of getting around the complaint process. The first is to abuse the process by filing a complaint themselves, against someone they wish to target. The second way is to foul up the process when a complaint is filed against them. There have to be protections against both of these possibilities.

Any system for handling complaints must include safeguards, because trolls are very good at manipulating rules. In most cases, a complaint will be filed by someone who feels he or she has been harmed by the person named in the complaint. Emotions are bound to run high, and regardless of which side of the matter they're on, trolls will do their best to play on those emotions. This is why any procedure must have strict rules, carefully followed. Strict procedures are harder to manipulate. So make sure your complaint process takes all this into account.

Here is an example of a complaint process which should work pretty well. Adapt it to your organization's needs. Even if your organization is a one-time affair, or gets together only once a year - say, a festival planning committee or some such - you should have procedures ready in case you need them. Draft a general description of your process, and keep it handy, for use in whatever organization you form.

1. Filing a complaint.  A member of the organization may file a written ethics complaint against another member. The complaint must specifically state what actions are being complained about, and must provide details (what exactly happened, where, when, who was present, and so on). The complaint must also include a brief explanation of why the particular action should be of concern to the organization.


2. Preliminary hearing.  The complaint is given a preliminary hearing by the organization's governing board. The board needs to determine whether the complained-about action really does represent a violation of the organization's ethics rules, and whether the accuser has provided or can provide reasonable evidence or testimony showing events to have actually occurred as described. If the complaint does not describe unethical actions, or if the accusations appear to be unsupportable, the complaint is dismissed. Otherwise:


3. Complaint Processing.  A small panel (three or four people) is appointed to process the complaint. This panel is charged with delivering a copy of the complaint to the person accused, and then obtaining a written response from that person, within a firm and set time frame. Thirty days is a good maximum period for the panel to do its work. During this time, other written testimony or documentation can also be provided to the panel by either party, subject to the "Rules of Evidence", which are described below.


4. Replies.  If the person accused refuses to submit a reply within the allotted time, the complaint is declared proven by default. Otherwise, at the end of that time, all of the written evidence is distributed to the organization's governing board. The board is given a specified period - two weeks is probably sufficient - to read and become familiar with the evidence.


5. Resolution.  At the next regularly-scheduled meeting of the organization's governing board, the complaint is considered in detail. Both sides may present witnesses and additional testimony, subject again to the "Rules of Evidence". If the accused refuses to participate, the complaint is declared proven by default. Otherwise, the board takes a vote (according to whatever voting procedures the organization uses) to determine whether the complaint has been proven.


6. Consequences.  If the complaint has been declared proven, some level of sanction needs to be imposed on the person named in the complaint. Sanctions can range from limitations of certain privileges up to ejection from the organization, with ejection being the default.


7. Clean-up.  The organization's governing board should examine any evidence which the processing panel had ruled irrelevant. It should also provide for support for any of the troll's victims.

Trolls love to distract complaint procedures by bringing in all kinds of irrelevant details or imagined slights from months - or years - before. Don't let this happen. The panel processing the complaint should accept all written testimony presented to it, but should declare irrelevant anything which doesn't directly apply to the matters dealt with in the complaint. Any testimony deemed irrelevant should still be available to the governing board, to insure nothing was withheld improperly. At the governing board's official hearing (step 5 above), there should be a chairperson who is empowered to rule whether any further evidence (oral or written) is improper or inadmissible.

There are five important areas to watch for in judging the admissibility of evidence:

• Focus.  Both written and oral testimony must pertain to the actual matters dealt with in the complaint. Don't allow irrelevancies to distract you from the matter at hand.


• Verification.  Hearsay and unnamed sources are disallowed. In general, limit a person's testimony to things which that person actually saw or participated in. It's okay for a witness to describe things he or she was told; but be sure to find out who did the telling, and verify it with the person named. Trolls love to say things like, "Well, someone told me Zelda did this and that. No, I can't say who told me about it, because I promised to keep their name in confidence." If a witness is unwilling to provide the source of testimony, then the testimony itself should be disallowed.


• Specificity.  Insist on examples and specifics. If a witness says, "Edgar was mean and hurtful," demand specific examples of Edgar being mean and hurtful - if it's relevant to the complaint. (If it isn't relevant to the complaint, ignore it.) If there are no details to be had, such statements are meaningless and inadmissible.


• Manipulation.  Whether accusing someone else, or defending themselves, trolls appeal almost exclusively to emotion and will do everything they can to get you angry at the other party. Disallow attempts at emotional manipulation. Concentrate on what actually happened.


• Attacks.  Trolls will frequently respond with an assault on their accusers, charging senseless malice or spite or jealousy. Trolls have even been known to use the existence of the complaint itself as evidence of malice against them! If someone named in a complaint wants to charge malice against the accuser, let them; but make that a separate complaint, to be handled after the current complaint is resolved. Don't let such charges disrupt the processing of the original complaint. Further, simple name-calling is disallowed; trolls like to defend themselves by insisting the accusers are just being petty or "mean-spirited," or by characterizing the other party with violent and ugly labels. Namecalling should be taken as evidence of slander on the part of the namecaller.

If either the accuser or the person accused insists on violating these rules repeatedly, it should weigh heavily against them in considering the final results of the complaint.

This commentary is numbered in parallel to the steps in the procedure above.

1. Filing a complaint.  Ethics complaints (as contrasted with, say, embezzlement or other lawbreaking) are always a bit problematic, for a number of reasons:
   • They seldom involve obvious or direct violation of an organization's rules or procedures.
   
   
   • Ethics can be fairly individual, and an act which one person considers to be unethical may be seen as reasonable by someone else.
   
   
   • Things which one organization might consider unethical might not be seen as unethical by some other organization.
   
   
   • In the heat of the moment, someone may feel wronged, but may really need just to calm down.
   
   
   • There are occasional misunderstandings which get blown out of proportion.
   
   

   On the other hand, genuine unethical acts should not be tolerated, particularly not by a spiritual or religious organization. All this is why a complaint must describe specific actions in detail, and why an explanation must be provided for why the organization should consider the complaint at all. The organization's constitution and bylaws should list some general guidelines and examples of actions it will not tolerate, and it should also make plain that the guidelines and examples are not exhaustive.

2. Preliminary hearing.  The complaint must be about actions, not motivations. Trolls will often accuse other people of doing something which is really pretty reasonable, but claim it was done for ugly or sinister motives. But if an act is not unethical in and of itself, then it's not unethical. And unless a person can prove possession of infallible psychic powers, any intimation of someone else's state of mind is irrelevant.

   As examples: one troll complained about being kicked out of a Coven, alleging all manner of petty or ugly motivations on the part of the Coven Leaders. Another troll bitterly complained about not having been given certain material relating to the Coven's Oathbound Tradition. Yet Coven Leaders are, in fact, empowered (even required!) to make exactly these sorts of decisions. Ejecting someone from a Coven is not an ethics offense, and neither is handing out or refusing to distribute Oathbound materials.

   Trolls have viciously criticized other people for the way they said "Good morning," or for the kind of birthday parties they throw. If the act specified in a complaint is not, in itself, a violation of the organization's ethics guidelines, then the complaint should be dismissed as being frivolous. Don't try to crawl into anyone else's head to determine motive, and don't let an alleged motive be the basis for an ethics violation.



3. Complaint Processing.  Make sure there is more than one person involved in handling and processing ethics complaints. If this responsibility falls upon one person alone, that person will be targeted for a troll's manipulative schemes.

   Picture this scenario: Marv realizes Zelda has been spreading false rumors and otherwise engaging in generally destructive behavior. So Marv files a complaint, and Edgar is the person appointed to do the paperwork and such. Zelda immediately cozies up to Edgar, and insists Marv's charges are founded merely on petty personal disagreements. In order to protect poor Zelda, Edgar loses the paperwork and manages to stall the process in every way he can. Meanwhile, Zelda continues her behind-the-scenes attack on Marv.

   More than one Pagan organization has been torn apart under circumstances like this. Once they've taken sides, the people processing complaints have been known to edit, distort, withhold, or solicit evidence in order to prove or to disprove the claims of one side or the other.

   Some of these dangers can be lessened by having a small group of people - three or four, beyond that it gets clumsy - who are jointly responsible for making sure the complaint process proceeds properly. They can each serve as reality checks for the others. The responsibilities of this small panel must be carefully defined and limited. They should have particular dates by which responses and evidence must be filed, and they must operate in the open with no hidden agendas or secret investigations.

   If given too free a hand, they will be too easily distracted from their duties. The amount of time given for them to do their work must be long enough for it to be accomplished, but not so long as to invite stalling or manipulation. If the panel does not perform its duties properly and in a timely manner, there should be stiff consequences, such as immediate and automatic revocation of organizational membership for the members of the panel.



4. Replies.  Someone accused of an ethics violation should not be allowed to stall the process merely by refusing to cooperate. Trolls are good at coming up with reasons why they can't attend meetings, or don't have time to respond. Don't let this slow things down. Organizations have been known to grind to a halt under this kind of manipulation.

   Now, if a complaint is filed by a troll, the target may want to refuse, on principle, to grace it with a response. But if the processing panel keeps things calm and steady, there's no need for such a drastic reaction. A reasonable procedure can offer sufficient protections to allow someone falsely accused to respond to false accusations with a minimum of pain and inconvenience.

   Of course, someone can choose to resign from the organization rather than respond to a complaint, in which case the matter would be dropped. But if a response is simply not forthcoming - even if excuses are made - the governing board should assume the worst, and unceremoniously revoke the membership of the person named in the complaint. (There may be exceptions to this, but they'd have to be pretty extreme - such as if the person named is in a coma.)



5. Resolution.  Detailed consideration of the complaint should take place at a regularly-scheduled meeting. This makes it harder to manipulate the process by holding special sessions in which one party or the other is excluded. It eliminates excuses about either party not knowing when or where the meeting was going to take place, or not having sufficient warning. It avoids the atmosphere of panic which seems inevitably to accompany special sessions and emergency meetings. You want the whole process to be carried out very matter-of-factly, which makes it harder for a troll to play on the emotions of the participants.

   In determining whether the complaint has been proven, rely on the believability of the evidence and the credibility of the sources. Remember: you're not going to be incarcerating anyone, or depriving anyone of life, limb, or property. At most, the organization will be able to restrict someone's membership benefits, or curtail someone's membership in the organization. This is not the end of the world, so don't be afraid to exercise these options if the complaint seems to be reasonably proven.

   Frequently, an ethics complaint will come down to the word of one person (or small group) against that of another. Ask yourself: whose story seems to hold together best? Who gains by lying? The stories trolls tell will frequently seem to be missing something, or to not quite make sense. Actions will be alleged all out of proportion to the supposed provocation.

   One dispute revolved around the claim of Person "A" that Person "B" had provided an Initiation of a specific type several years before. "B" denied having done so. "A" insisted "B" was just mad about an argument they'd had involving literary preferences. It's not clear why anyone would believe "A's" story; "B" has nothing to lose either way, whereas "A's" version is classic trollish misdirection into motive rather than action, a very typical trollish invention where the supposed motivation has no reasonable relationship either to the alleged actions or to the real issues.



6. Consequences.  Generally, an organization will want to have both more and less severe consequences for unethical actions, beginning with a restriction of privileges, up to and including revocation of membership. If a complaint is considered to have been proven, it may be desirable to have a second vote to determine the seriousness of the response. But trolls have been known to foul up this process as well. Even if found guilty, a troll can sometimes walk away with no consequences whatever, merely by preventing that final vote. The default should be ejection from the organization; possible votes should provide for lesser levels of sanction, but should not be able to reduce the sanction to zero. That way, there is no incentive for a troll to interfere with or postpone this vote.


7. Clean-up.  Finally, after all is said and done, the governing board should examine any evidence which the processing panel had ruled to be irrelevant. If anything improper is found in the panel's rulings, the board's decision from steps 5) and 6) can be reconsidered. This holds true in general as well; if more information on the matter later becomes available, any decision can be rescinded. That's the nice thing about not depriving anyone of life or limb; any errors made can actually be corrected. So don't be afraid to proceed, and don't hesitate to take the actions which seem to be necessary and appropriate.

Another factor in the clean-up, to be discussed later, is giving support to people who've been harmed by the troll.

Trolls have ways of responding to complaints against them. They also sometimes file complaints of their own, against innocent victims. Here are some warnings, and some ways to handle some of the situations which can come up.

When a troll files an ethics complaint, it's usually baseless, unsupported by evidence, irrelevant to the organization and its purposes, or centered around the imagined motives of the complaint's target. That's why the suggested procedure includes a way of considering the appropriateness of a complaint before the process itself gets started, so frivolous complaints can be dismissed. (From then on, the person who filed such a complaint should be watched for further signs of trollhood.) In considering any complaint, carefully distinguish between non-issues and genuine ethics violations. Trolls are very good at making other people's most innocent actions or decisions seem scandalous and sinister.

This is vital: Examine behavior, NOT alleged motives. If an act itself is not an ethics violation, then it's not a valid complaint.

But in general, trolls are not really very likely to file ethics complaints. If evidence is demanded, it's usually difficult to prove someone committed an unethical act if they didn't really commit one. If you're looking at actions rather than imagined motives, it's difficult to prove that an ethical act was unethical; it's even harder to prove an unethical act took place at all if no such act ever really happened.

On the other hand, trolls do have imaginative ways of defending themselves from ethics charges made against them. The two most common methods are to countercharge simple malice on the part of the accuser, or to play with the rules for processing ethics complaints. Don't let either of these things happen.

When a complaint is filed against a troll, the troll's initial reaction will probably be to insist the complaint was filed just because the accuser is "mean." In most cases, an ethics charge against a troll will be made by a person whom the troll has been targeting with rumors and innuendo, someone the troll has been attacking for several months already. Thus, the troll will have no shortage of examples of the accuser doing or saying things the troll objected to, even things the troll had to make up. Almost invariably, the troll will insist the complaint was made because of some silly personal disagreement, and will try to present the whole thing as a manifestation of the accuser's malice and pettiness. Don't be distracted by this detour into motivation. The real issue is the alleged unethical actions on the part of the person accused. Unethical acts are still unethical, even if the accuser is supposed to be making an accusation for the wrong reasons.

Do not allow the process to get sidetracked into an accusation against the person who filed the complaint. If that person is acting with malice or other unethical motives, any good complaint-handling process will a) find the accused innocent, and b) provide evidence for a counter-complaint afterwards. Deal with one issue at a time, and do that well and fairly.

Be sure to stick to the timetables and procedures which are established for dealing with complaints. Carefully-constructed procedures and an atmosphere of impartiality will go a long way toward protecting everyone. Don't allow a troll to call special sessions, postpone meetings, instigate investigations into the motives of the other party, or interfere with other business of the organization while the complaint is being processed. Such ploys can not only prevent proper action from being taken against the troll, they can also destroy the organization itself.

In a typical case, a troll's official response to a complaint can consist of a violent series of threats and demands for the complaint to be withdrawn, along with voluminous innuendoes and slanders against the accuser. Such violent and angry reactions and attempts to derail the process should set off big alarm bells indicating the presence of a particularly nasty troll. The processing panel should insist all the more on following the established procedures strictly and without variation.

This is one sort of case, by the way, in which testimony which is irrelevant to the complaint itself should actually be admitted - though not in the way the troll intends. Threats, demands, slander, and name-calling should be taken as evidence of further unethical actions on the part of the person making them. After all, threats, slanders, and so forth are usually considered unethical, no? Indeed, a reaction like this is itself a rather blatant ethics violation, and it provides its own ironclad proof. The evidence of slander and namecalling is suddenly right there, in the official record! Anyone so abusing the testimony process should immediately be ejected from the organization without fanfare or appeal.

Sometimes, a well-meaning person will insist it'd be too cruel to eject someone. Shouldn't we just forgive and forget? Shouldn't we move past this petty bickering and get on to What We're Really Here For? Indeed we should; but we needn't allow trolls to damage us while we do it. The whole point is to treat everyone in ways appropriate to who and what they are, with love and trust. Though it may be cruel to refuse to tolerate the presence of a rabid mongoose in your house - particularly in the middle of winter - letting it stay would be even more damaging to yourself and to your loved ones. The Rede's injunction to "Harm None" includes you.

If you allow a troll to remain within your organization, unchecked, you'll have to devote increasing amounts of time to cleaning up after the darn thing, which will most certainly interfere with What We're Really Here For.