I have played games online since there have been games to play online. I will never be the one to pick a petty argument because it ultimately does not serve any goal I might have. It does not increase my enjoyment (I can enrage people in real life, there's no sport when it's a stranger), it does not make me more likely to win, I won't win friends or anything else.
I recognize that while I might be pretty good at games I choose to play for long periods, there are always people better (or worse) than me. The scoreboard at the end of the match tells the story better than childish name calling might. I'm more than aware enough to know when I achieved victory through circustance or luck and when I actually had to work for it. I can distngiush between skill and strategy and cheating without effort and I expect the rest of the world can too if they want to be honest with themselves.
It is people who feel it necessary to voice their disapproval of the actions of others in a fashion that is inherently non-constructive (being a jerk is more likely to encourage the behavior you want to stop after all) that ensure I rarely put my headset on when in a game with strangers. They add absolutely nothing to the game, they add nothing to the discussion and seek and are therefore uttery unworthy of my or anyone else's attention.
Of course, there are effective uses for trolling. Trolling is, after all, defined quite simply as making a comment designed to cause an emotional reaction of some sort. When one asserts that, because I killed them with a rocket launcher I must be gay, I respond with a classic troll line by pointing out that apparantly enjoying the company of men does not stop me from besting them. Trolling is little more than the internet's version of sarcasm, which other media have demonstrated can be used constructively (satire and wit, as seen in classical authors like Voltaire or Jonathan Swift) or non-constructively (attempting to engage a senile old man in a debate regarding the inherent morality of advocating fewer restrictions on firearms). The trouble is, people on the internet have an especially hard time distinguishing between the two, and often when someone thinks they're being clever, they just look like an empty-headed douchebag instead.
