I found it confusing that he still openly identified to be part of the flat Earth group, even outside of his trolling persona. If I pretended to be religious for the purpose of trolling evolutionists, I would never say I was at any point a creationist. Surely Santa Clause at the mall doesn't believe he's Santa Clause, nor would he seriously identify as him, but he trolls kids every year to put a smile on their face. I suppose I found it a bit bizarre to still seriously identify as a flat-earther, and from that, I didn't want to offend.
Well, there's an identity based on belief system and an identity based on group. I took his statement to be that he was part of the group, but not part of the (true) belief system.
If you joined a group of YECs and participated in the community, you might consider yourself a YEC (group member) even though you never truly believed, but only argued and trolled. I do agree that it's a bit bizarre, but knowing many contrarian and troll types this seems a pretty consistent part of their MO.
