at the wire tweaks, and publish "Don't Negotiate"

diff --git a/content/drafts/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md b/content/2018/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
similarity index 91%
rename from content/drafts/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
rename to content/2018/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
index a8d7055..63cf3d3 100644 (file)
--- a/content/drafts/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
+++ b/content/2018/dont-negotiate-with-terrorist-memeplexes.md
@@ -1,8 +1,7 @@
 Title: Don't Negotiate With Terrorist Memeplexes
-Date: 2020-01-01 
+Date: 2018-01-23 09:30
 Category: commentary
 Tags: cathartic, discourse, epistemic horror
-Status: draft
 
 > It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,  
 >  For fear they should succumb and go astray;  
@@ -34,7 +33,7 @@ Here's one: "You are a member of marginalized identity group Y; anyone who notic
 
 A human who has accepted—who has been _taken hostage by_—this idea, will feel genuine pain and distress whenever anyone notices facts that could be construed to call the narrative into question. And so the human's friends, who love and care about them, will dutifully make sure to _pretend not to notice_ any inconvenient facts, and socially punish anyone who doesn't _pretend not to notice_, in order to avoid hurting their friend.
 
-Just like they would pay the ransom if their friend was kidnapped by terrorists.
+Just like they would pay the ransom if their friend were kidnapped by terrorists.
 
 And with no one willing to mention any inconvenient facts for fear of being socially punished, the meme spreads.
 
@@ -60,9 +59,9 @@ I wanted to be sensitive to that, but I also want to promote this theory, becaus
 
 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 over instant messaging about all this with a (cis, male) acquaintance.
+I was arguing about all this over instant messaging with a (cis, male) acquaintance.
 
-I said, We should understand the underlying psychological phenomenon _first_, _then_ decide on quality-of-life interventions based on the facts.
+I said, People should understand the underlying psychological phenomenon _first_, _then_ decide on quality-of-life interventions based on the facts.
 
 He said that the quality-of-life interventions available from that seem small relative to the harm caused by insisting that late-transition trans women aren't real women, that the right time to consider confronting this would be after the culture war over trans rights is safely out of the Overton window, probably in 25 to 30 years.
 
@@ -82,11 +81,11 @@ It _felt like_ I was talking to an AI designed to maximize the number of trans p
 
 The Orwellian horror here is not, of course, that someone in my extended social circle has opinions I disagree with.
 
-The Orwellian horror is that, had we been arguing in public, I didn't feel confident that my incredibly smart and incredibly epistemologically sophisticated extended social circle would back me up and affirm that I wasn't wrong to want to talk about it (even if people might disagree about the facts). That, for educated liberals in the Current Year, appearing non-transphobic is more important than defending basic tenets of sanity that should hardly need to be stated, let alone defended, like _Words should mean things_, or _Knowledge is better than ignorance_.
+The Orwellian horror is that I didn't feel confident that, had we been arguing in public, my incredibly smart and incredibly epistemologically sophisticated extended social circle would back me up and affirm that I wasn't wrong to want to talk about it (even if people might disagree about the facts). That, to educated liberals in the Current Year, the injunctive to avoid saying anything that could be construed as transphobic is genuinely more important than defending basic tenets of sanity that should hardly need to be stated, let alone defended, like _Words should mean things_, or _Knowledge is better than ignorance_.
 
 Obviously I'm totally in favor of trans _people_ having access to the hormones and surgeries that they want, and having their preferred pronouns respected. That's just individual freedom and basic politeness.
 
-But 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.
+But _my life_ is not hate speech. 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_.