I hit a blank on this, too. Like many things in behaviour, I imagine there is a cocktail of causes.

There is a decent amount of brilliance in some of it. And some sheer audacity. For example, in the thread where ForestHillier welcomes back exfhpat they even pointed out the earlier sockpuppet detection. (i.e. “…funny thing was that someone even accused me of being you…”).

I do admire how they remained at large on this forum, apart from a few whistleblowers, for nearly a year. I heard Barcar blowing the whistle but didn’t focus and then forgot about it. It then got washed away in the steady stream of threads that got created since then.

I feel that we have before us, if you care to explore, a masterclass in a certain type of sockpuppetry.

I’m very intrigued about what need was being met by Ex FH Pat/ForestHillier/exfhpat creating different on-line personas.
In this case, I wonder if they know?

Since yesterday afternoon when this was exposed, I’ve found myself sometimes sitting back, staring into space and pondering.