  Maybe fish bashing has become too chic for its own good. And, just maybe, it’s a little bit wrong. Everyone says “don’t tap on the glass”, but perhaps, if it’s done the right way, tapping on the glass can be good for everyone. Let’s face it, clubbing the fish over the head every night and taking their bankroll can be fun at first, but it has to quickly get boring. So what do you do? You play multiple tables to beat up more fish at once.
But, are you really playing poker? Is it even fun anymore? Are you learning anything at all? I guess it really comes down to the old “why do you play poker?” question that has appeared in so many blogs in the past. If your aim in playing poker is to make money (but not be a pro), then just being better than the fishiest of fish is good enough. I would think this gets incredibly boring after a while, and the grind will suck all of the fun out of something that you probably thought was a fun game.
It’s like being the smartest person in middle school. Fun for a while, but as you get older, doesn’t really mean all that much. I don’t really think any of the poker bloggers fall into this category. I would suspect that most of the people that spend any amount of time thinking about (much less writing about) poker are people that want to improve their own play, that enjoy poker for the game that it is, and take advantage of the fish that they find along their journey. There is a drive in most people to find the next conquest, to set up the next challenge. All you have to do is read other blogs or poker forums to see people every day setting up new challenges (usually bankroll related) in their quests to become better poker players.
These are people not content with just picking off the low-level fish, no matter how horrible their play is. These challenges may not be the best way to improve themselves, but it shows that they are at least thinking about ways of getting better, while keeping the game fun for them. And, believe it or not, most of the fish that are out there want to be better players as well, but they probably just don’t have a clue on how to begin. Sure, there are the gamb0000lers out there, willing to play ATC and don’t really care. They have $50 and, damnit, poker is just entertainment to them and they’re gonna have all the fun they can for that $50. They get up and leave the table and don’t really care.
I find it hard to believe that most of the fish out there feel that way. If that was the case, the “poker revolution” would have collapsed by now, with those gamblers burning through their bankrolls long ago. No, there are people that burn through their deposits and then load up again, determined to do better, and to learn more about playing. They’re going about it the wrong way, but they are looking to be educated. Now, I’m not suggesting that we all take pity on the fish and stop beating them. There are no friends at the table.
But I think, at the same rate, smiling at them and saying “Nice hand” when they’ve clearly made a horrible play and paid you off this time does not do either of you well in the long run. Now, this is not to say that you need to take the player aside and teach him all your secrets, but a little knowledge never hurt anyone. I think it’s a much better strategy to extract everything you can from a player, and then leave them a little knowledge at the end. Then, the next time you play against them, they may be a little bit better from what you told them, or from a book you pointed them to, but then again, you should be a little better as well. It reminds me of Toyota, who is one of the leading companies in the world in “continuous improvement” of their manufacturing processes. They regularly invite people from competing companies to come in and tour their facilities.
It is completely unimaginable for a company like GM to do this because, from GM’s perspective, why would you want to give away any of your secrets to people trying to put you out of business? So GM, et al, come in and tour Toyota, take the ideas they think are good and bring them back to incorporate them into their own processes. What they fail to realize, however, is that Toyota is already 3 to 5 iterations further along in the process development, and is still ahead of GM. They still improve their competition by sharing information, and use that as a driver to improve themselves. They stay ahead of the curve by being better than their competition and by sharing things they’ve figured out that other people may have not. So, by all means, become better poker players, for that really is the aim of what we are trying to do (I think).
Build your bankroll, move up in limits, but don’t kill all the fish on your way through. Treat them with a little bit of understanding, a little bit of knowledge and stay ahead of the curve. Everyone will be better in the long run for it. 
