The kind of trust I'm talking about is trust in honest discourse. If I don't trust that others on a forum will engage with me honestly, then I am less likely to engage with them honestly. As a consequence, the overall discussion on the forum degrades.
I don't strictly disagree, but imo you're trying to generalize a personal preference for discussion styles into general observations, by using normative and inflammatory (is "inflammatory" like "trollish"?) terms like "poison" and "degrades", as opposed to "I don't like".
But when a community has set a precedent and an expectation for trust and respectful discussion, it is poisoning and degrading that community to come in and disrupt it intentionally for your own amusement. If you dump toxic waste into a pool, you've poisoned the pool, accusing the fish of just not liking it doesn't work.
He appears to be arguing that it's bad even when the community doesn't have that precedent/expectation, though (my examples were of communities where various varieties of "trolling" are expected/normal, like SA's FYAD, and 4chan's /b/). Plus, ecosystems are complex; Slashdot's is a bit of a mix. You can't napalm the "intruders" and accuse everyone burnt by napalm of just not liking it!
Out of genuine curiosity, how would you define "honest discourse"?
Online forums are, by definition, right there on the 'net along with Google and Wikipedia and other resources, so flat-out misrepresentation of facts seems somewhat difficult. If somebody chooses to be irrational, they are readily identified as such, right? So where does honesty fit in all this?
Every time I have seen (or heard in person), "I would like to participate in and read honest discussion", it has been someone who turned around and accused anyone who disagreed of "trolling" or of being "close-minded". I have found it a waste of time arguing with them, if it hadn't been the general topic of this thread, I would have just ignored the comment entirely.
Honest discourse is when both parties are willing to work to understand each other, and not just trying to "win." Both parties default to the most reasonable interpretation of what the other says - having all of the facts available doesn't help much if you spend most of your time clarifying what you're trying to say.
