There is actually a distinct writing style that is meant to provoke, closely related to trolling, and should be recognized. Suppose I were writing a rant about

There is actually a distinct writing style that is meant to provoke, closely related to trolling, and should be recognized. Suppose I were writing a rant about obesity being unhealthy and visually jarring. I then decide, for comedic dramatic flair, to write "fat people should be eradicated from the gene pool," knowing full well it will anger the reader—who in turn cluelessly gets angry. I'd argue that that doesn't make me deplorable, it makes the joke on the reader. In the grand scheme of things, my gene pool comment obviously isn't serious, even if the rest of my rant is. Being provoked by people trying to provoke you is the conversational version of slipping on a banana peel, and is itself funny, albeit only ever so slightly.