Name calling, bullying (forms of systematic harassment) and attempting to instill feelings of social isolation in a target are documented techniques employed by intelligence agencies in both online and offline discourse manipulation / information warfare.

You can read up more here if you are curious: https://www.statewatch.org/media/documents/news/2015/jun/beh...

Many of the attacks against djb line up quite nicely with "discredit" operational objectives.