apply some of writing-coach's suggestions to "Don't Negotiate"

diff --git a/content/drafts/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md b/content/drafts/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
index a04a24e..5f87b4e 100644 (file)
--- a/content/drafts/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
+++ b/content/drafts/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
@@ -20,9 +20,9 @@ There's this slogan meant to illustrate a principle in game theory: "Don't negot
 
 ----
 
-New ideas are constantly being invented and talked about in the world; some of them catch on, and spread, and spawn entire subcultures and political movements. Given that ideas vary, replicate themselves (from mind to mind, by means of speech or writing), and moreover, _aren't equally good_ at replicating themselves, it can be useful to [think of the spread of ideas as an _evolutionary_ process](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memetics): the winning ideas are not necessarily the ones that are true or useful, but rather the ones that are _better at replicating themselves_. 
+New ideas are constantly being invented and talked about in the world; some of them catch on, and spread, and spawn entire subcultures and political movements. Given that ideas vary, replicate themselves (from mind to mind, by means of speech or writing), and moreover, _aren't equally good_ at replicating themselves, it can be useful to think of the spread of ideas as an _evolutionary_ process. This is the study of [memetics](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memetics): the winning ideas are not necessarily the ones that are true or useful, but rather the ones that are _better at replicating themselves_. 
 
-True and useful ideas certainly have a selective advantage insofar as humans care about usefulness (I'm going to go out on a limb here and just say outright that humans don't care about truth), but there can be other features of an idea that convey a selective advantage in memetic competition: for example, an [appeal to (alleged) consequences of accepting the idea](/2017/Jan/and-yet-none-more-blameable/). This is the reason so many religions prominently feature promises and threats of divine reward or punishment: "Believe X and you'll be rewarded; believe not-X and you'll be sorry" is _more memetically fit_ than "It happens to be the case that X, but this has no particular further implications," because the former proposition creates incentives for propogating itself that the latter does not. It doesn't _matter_ that the rewards and punishments don't actually exist—
+True and useful ideas certainly have a selective advantage insofar as humans care about usefulness, but there can be other features of an idea that convey a selective advantage in memetic competition: for example, an [appeal to (alleged) consequences of accepting the idea](/2017/Jan/and-yet-none-more-blameable/). This is the reason so many religions prominently feature promises and threats of divine reward or punishment: "Believe X and you'll be rewarded; believe not-X and you'll be sorry" is _more memetically fit_ than "It happens to be the case that X, but this has no particular further implications," because the former proposition creates incentives for propogating itself that the latter does not. It doesn't _matter_ that the rewards and punishments don't actually exist—
 
 (at least, _I_ don't think they exist, because I am not a carrier of the X religion meme)
 
@@ -48,14 +48,14 @@ So, there's a thing about me, possibly even _the_ thing about me, where there is
 
 There's a word in the psychology literature for the beautiful feeling at the center of my life: _autogynephilia_ ("love of oneself as a woman"), coined in the context of a theory that it represented one of two distinct etiologies for male-to-female transsexualism. This theory didn't seem to be the standard mainstream view, and, I learned, people get really mad at you when you mention it in a comment section, so for a long time [I self-identified with the _word_](/2017/Feb/a-beacon-through-the-darkness-or-getting-it-right-the-first-time/) "autogynephilia", but assumed that the associated _theory_ was false. _I_ wasn't one of those people who were _actually trans_; I was just, you know, one of those guys who are [pointedly insistent on](/2017/Dec/a-common-misunderstanding-or-the-spirit-of-the-staircase-24-january-2009/) not being _proud_ of the fact that they're guys. (And who dimly, privately suspect that this may somehow be causally related to their obsessive masturbation fantasies about being magically transformed into a woman.)
 
-Moving to "Portland" in 2016 and meeting some _very interesting_ people there led me to do some more reading—Kay Brown's blog [_On the Science of Changing Sex_](https://sillyolme.wordpress.com/), Anne Lawrence's monograph [_Men Trapped in Men's Bodies: Narratives of Autogynephilic Transsexualism_](http://www.annelawrence.com/mtimb.html), Imogen Binnie's novel [_Nevada_](https://www.dailydot.com/irl/nevada-imogen-binnie-transgender/) (this item is reverse-scored)—and I eventually concluded that, no, wait, actually the theory looks _correct_, and I _do_ have the same underlying psychological condition that leads people to transition. That, in fact, my story up to now may even be _typical_ of trans women who transition in their thirties, right up to the ["Oh, I just want to _experiment_ with hormones, I'm not actually going to _transition_" phase](/2017/Jan/the-line-in-the-sand-or-my-slippery-slope-anchoring-action-plan/) (although I [still think](/2017/Sep/hormones-day-156-developments-doubts-and-pulling-the-plug-or-putting-the-cis-in-decision/) I'm smarter than that).
-
-(If you only have time to read one paper, I recommend Lawrence 2017 ["Autogynephilia and the Typology of Male-to-Female Transsexualism: Concepts and Controversies."](http://www.annelawrence.com/autogynephilia_&_MtF_typology.html))
+Moving to "Portland" in 2016 and meeting some _very interesting_ people there led me to do some more reading—Kay Brown's blog [_On the Science of Changing Sex_](https://sillyolme.wordpress.com/), Anne Lawrence's monograph [_Men Trapped in Men's Bodies: Narratives of Autogynephilic Transsexualism_](http://www.annelawrence.com/mtimb.html), Imogen Binnie's novel [_Nevada_](https://www.dailydot.com/irl/nevada-imogen-binnie-transgender/) (this item is reverse-scored)—and I eventually concluded that, no, wait, actually the theory looks _correct_, and I _do_ have the same underlying psychological condition that leads people to transition. That, in fact, my story up to now may even be _typical_ of trans women who transition in their thirties, right up to the ["Oh, I just want to _experiment_ with hormones, I'm not actually going to _transition_" phase](/2017/Jan/the-line-in-the-sand-or-my-slippery-slope-anchoring-action-plan/) (although I'm [not currently proceeding further](/2017/Sep/hormones-day-156-developments-doubts-and-pulling-the-plug-or-putting-the-cis-in-decision/)).
 
 This is _really important information_! This is _not_ the thing someone should have to piece together themselves at age 28. This is the sort of thing that should just be in the standard sex-ed books, that boys having these kinds of feelings can read at age 15 and immediately say, "Ah, I'm in the same taxon as lesbian trans women, and heterosexual crossdressers, and guys who have these fantasies but don't do anything about them in particular, and bigender people who are on low-dose hormones and choose how to 'present' in different social venues; I wonder which of these strategies is best for me given my exact circumstances?"
 
 So, while I realize that a lot of people have strong feelings about this topic, and I wanted to be sensitive to that, I also want to promote this theory, because I want people to have accurate information about the underlying psychological condition, so they can make the best [choices](http://unremediatedgender.space/2017/Dec/lesser-known-demand-curves/) about what to do about it, whereas people might make poorer choices in a regime where everyone had to figure things out for themselves in an environment full of misinformation about "gender identity."
 
+----
+
 Let me tell you about the moment I stopped wanting to be sensitive—the moment of liberating clarity when I resolved the tension between being a good person and the attendant requirement to pretend to be stupid by deciding not to be a good person anymore.
 
 I was arguing about all this with a (cis, male) acquaintance over instant messaging, who I'll call "Kevin."
@@ -82,7 +82,7 @@ I understand that for people who have _already_ built up a self-image around the
 
 But people dealing with gender dysphoria who haven't already transitioned deserve accurate information! [...] this, _this_ is _personal_.
 
-If being a good person means submitting to social pressure aimed at getting me to _shut up and stop thinking_ about the true nature of the beautiful feeling at the center of my life for _twenty-five fucking years_ (!?), then I have _no interest_ in being a good person.
+If being a good person means submitting to social pressure aimed at getting me to _shut up and stop thinking_ about the true nature of the beautiful feeling at the center of my life for _twenty-five years_ (!?), then I have _no interest_ in being a good person.
 
 I'm certainly not _trying_ to say things that will hurt people—_least_ of all people who are mostly just like me but read different books in a different order and are living out a pretty decent approximation of _my wildest fantasy_.