Target Endorse Their Own Facebook Troll

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Rarely is trolling any kind of force for good, but every once in a while one emerges from under the Reddit bridge or the 4chan cave and decides to go after people who actually deserve to be ridiculed. So it was with Mike Melgaard, who last week created a false Facebook account in order to help Target say the things they probably wanted to say, but couldn't.

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Last week the news broke that Target had removed the gender separation from children's products, so rather than there being a 'boy's toys' and 'girl's toys' section, there was just a 'toys' section. Most people didn't bat an eye, while others praised the decision.

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Some other people, who I would charitably describe as 'idiots', went on an all-out attack against target for pandering to political correctness, or something. Judging from the comments it seems like most them didn't even really know what they were angry about, but dammit, they were angry about something and it was definitely all Target's fault.

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As you might expect, most of the anger ended up on the shopping chain's Facebook wall, but before long something else started happening. As each new complaint arrived, an account which appeared to be Target's customer service profile would reply, but not politely. This was Melgaard's doing. The account he created carried the name 'Ask ForHelp' and used the Target emblem for the profile picture. The responses Melgaard posted were also worded in customer service speak, albeit without any sense of tact. Melgaard got away with this for over 16 hours before the account was finally taken down.

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In their initial statement, Target seemed less than pleased that Melgaard had come rushing to their aid, stating that he was clearly "not speaking on behalf of Target". However, on Thursday the store chain posted an image of two troll dolls (see top) with the description "Remember when Trolls were the kings of the world? Woo hoo! They're back and only at Target stores." There's a slim chance that this was a massive coincidence, but I'm pretty sure it wasn't. Melgaard clearly thinks the same, since he posted a comment on the photo from his personal account expressing his gratitude.

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The fact that in this day and age people are genuinely getting upset about this kind of thing is more than a little bit depressing and even if Melgaard hadn't waded in, Target still would have likely just ignored the complaints and carried on, quite rightly. The fact that someone saw the situation unfolding and decided to inject some humour into it just helps to illustrate what a ridiculous situation it really was. Sometimes people need to be undermined, and that's when you need a troll.

Callum Davies

Callum is a film school graduate who is now making a name for himself as a journalist and content writer. His vices include flat whites and 90s hip-hop. Follow him @CallumAtSMF

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