This talk of his fame and the lack of his name

Seems whiney and useless and stupid.

An FBI sting – they caught a crime ring -

Exploitable details they hid.

Tom Ryan he’s not, and there is no plot

To fool all of us just for money.

But definitely a guilt-ridden plea

Would come from a pot full of honey.

In searching for glory, ugnazi (his quarry)

Has stepped in a big heap of doo-doo

With minutes of net time, Mir threatens a new crime,

But Who knows what’s left of his crew …

LeRes and the Agents and Jester’s clean cadence

Make all of this story sublime.

I’m trying to work, and even though irked,

It’s worth putting it into rhyme.

II

The essays I gave were built like a wave,

With rich symbolism and more.

But then came a poet and wouldn’t you know it -

My fighting urge called for a war.

Most poets don’t know how to just let it go,

So cling to ridiculous drama.

I don’t cry “Oh noes!” and writhe in death throes

To feel like I conquered the trauma.

“He didn’t praise mine!” would sound like a whine

And desperate begging for credit.

It could have just been it was lost in the din;

Maybe he just hadn’t read it.

If he thought it was crazy, or stupid, or lazy,

I still wouldn’t then care a bit.

Cuz crying, “Unfair! He just didn’t care!”

Makes me a ridiculous twit.

III

If credit is only to make you less lonely -

*sigh* Meaningless then is your quest.

So just do your job; there’s no way to rob

The feeling that you did your best.

Anons don’t decide what LeRes should elide

Or choose what he takes for his honor.

If you force him to bow or act like a sow -

You probably will be a goner.

Protecting a man who has his own plan

Demeans him, revoking his freedom -

By claiming the right to usurp his fight,

So fine! You can sit there and be dumb.

LeRes, he was classy and honest and sassy.

He doesn’t need shit to protect him.

“Ladies take heart, we all did our part.”

But hopefully I won’t dissect him.

IV

Class is a mark (I’ll lay it out stark)

Of maturity, courage, and cunning.

It gets you hot dates and past the locked gates -

So you don’t get caught while you’re running.

The hating sounds jealous and overly zealous,

Hypocrisy-riddled and crass.

It isn’t that classy –it’s brassy and gassy.

If that’s fighting for freedom, I’ll pass.

The hate is frustrating; the loathing is grating.

Goddamn! How I wish they would quit.

But undoubtedly, and for all to see -

The Sagas of Jester were writ.

Accomplishment reigns and breaks through the chains:

It’s no matter how high the bar is.

It’s time now to lurk; I’m returning to work,

For finally I have catharsis.

Disclaimer: I am not in the military. I like the military mostly because of the Military Channel, and an idiosyncratic twist of fate.

I understand that the Supreme Court knows more about the law than I do. I understand that they’ve been doing this longer than I have, and have much better access to advisors than I do.

But “no tangible harm”?! What about the businesses who lose money on military discounts? That’s a serious problem in San Diego. All you have to do is show up at a store in a military uniform and owners will give you a discount. Some don’t even check for IDs because they feel it’s disrespectful. All you have to do is say that you’re in the military and they’ll treat you like royalty.

From what I hear (I’m repeating this accurately, although my source may not have been accurate) the Navy instituted a policy that no one is allowed to wear their uniforms outside the base because of that kind of fraud. They were getting complaints from businesses, so all military personnel had to change out of their uniforms into civilian clothes before going into town.

Again, I don’t know how accurate that is, since my source was not that reliable. But it doesn’t sound overly implausible. If all you have to do to get 10% off of all meals, entertainment, and merchandise is to go to the Army-Navy surplus store, then people are going to do it.

I’ve got a pair of camo pants. I bought them to go paintballing. (Got my ass kicked by a 12 year old. But he ran in terror when he realized he was in the presence of a girl, so I had the last laugh.) So it’s not that hard to acquire the uniform.

It doesn’t sound implausible that businesses would complain to the Navy about it. They’re losing money on those discounts. Military families make up a large percentage of their customer base. Discounts take a pretty significant chunk out of their revenue. Some store owners are so patriotic that they cut the price down all the way to cost.

I remember one guy who proudly said that he would take a loss on a few of his items so military families can afford it. It was the least he could do.

That guy probably checked for military ID. But what about his 18 year old newbie at the register? How often is she going to remember to check for ID? And if the conman is persuasive or aggressive, she would capitulate quickly rather than risk disrespecting the military. Her boss would fire her on the spot for disrespect.

But if she didn’t stand up for herself against a big, angry guy, she would be giving away a product below cost. Her boss would lose money. She would be fired for not following policy even though she was bullied and scared of offending the military.

Tell me how that is “no tangible harm.”

A girl could get fired because someone pretended to be in the military. A boss could lose his business.

And tell me how disrespecting a guy with PTSD is “no tangible harm.” If you piss him off, or make him feel powerless, the PTSD gets worse. Why would a guy who suffered through the horrors of war not be pissed if someone lied about serving? How would that anger not lead to worsening his PTSD?

How would he not feel powerless if all of his suffering was mocked by this conman? PTSD sucks. Sometimes the only way to get through the day is to think about how your suffering meant something, that it was valuable. But if it becomes meaningless and mocked, he loses the one thing that keeps him sane. If he’s got it bad, this could push him over the edge.

How is suicide “no tangible harm”?

This isn’t the same as posting on Match.com that you know how to speak French or that you’re 6’2” and ripped when you’re a 5’11” couch potato. This is commercial and psychological assault. Why is shoplifting wrong, but military discount theft isn’t? Why is involuntary manslaughter wrong, but pushing a PTSD survivor to suicide isn’t?

I’m baffled by this decision. Absolutely baffled. Of all the things to say is protected by free speech, it shouldn’t be the one that’s a crime if it happened against regular people, just not the military.

Spotting the flaw

First off, who is he then? A pod person?

Second, see this post for more about sharing the Jester persona.

Third, what is that good reason? You can’t just come out with crap like this without evidence. If you have a good reason, say it. If it’s good enough to justify a public post, then the reason itself is good enough to post too.

If the reason can’t be posted for security reasons, then it’s not good enough to justify the publicity. Eventually, the reason comes out. Someone will ask for it. Usually it’s the first question. If that question catches you off guard, it means you don’t know what you’re doing.

But, I’ll give the writer the benefit of the doubt and say that he doesn’t want to state the reason for security purposes. The best way to keep a secret is to never tell anyone about it. If they don’t know it’s there, they never ask. So if you don’t think your reasoning should be public, you shouldn’t state that it might exist.

That works for regular people too. If you’re trying to discredit someone, you have to have evidence. If you say your accountant is embezzling, people want to know what led you to believe that. If you say your husband is cheating, he’s going to want to know how you caught him.

Screaming “you’re evil!! I have a good reason!!!!” isn’t enough.

Because if you’re wrong, and your target isn’t evil, your reasoning probably makes you look pretty stupid. It would make you look paranoid, abusive, or guilty of crimes. (How else do you verify embezzlement without police involvement or tipping off the target?)

The reasons will always come out. So if the reasoning shouldn’t be public, the accusation shouldn’t be public either. That dog bites from both ends.

Fixing the flaw

There probably isn’t a reason for this post at all. If there were a reason, it should be easy to talk about it. I have reasons for everything I do, and if someone asked I would tell them specifics immediately.

It’s not hard. I just wait a few more minutes to check my decisions against the context. That’s how I know if my beliefs and decisions are relevant to the situation instead of an after-the-fact justification.

If I’ve done something, it means I’ve already done the work. It’s in the front of my mind so I have no problem remembering or talking about the context that led to my decision. If it takes more than 30 seconds to answer, it means that’s the first time the question was asked.

So, the trick to fixing this flaw is asking questions about the relevance of the belief. Relevance is about what fits into the context and what helps you get to where you’re going. But that means you have to know what the context is and where you’re trying to go with your plan.

So the plan here is

• maybe to assuage conscience
  • “I do not like calling you out like this, but for securities sake I feel I must.”
• maybe to gain fame or power
  • “Either way… it’s time to play Lets Make a Deal.”
• maybe to assign a source to an inexplicable feeling of betrayal
  • “You told me on many occasions”

Most likely, it was just a response to the last post Jester made about who he is and what he does but the writer had nothing else to say. Maybe it was about wanting to be loved and not knowing how to get it. (From this post) Maybe it was something else, and if I hear a good reason, I would give him the benefit of the doubt.

But what’s the context?

I have a feeling, based on a couple of tweets, that people believe Jester’s writing style changed. That change proves he’s not the same person.

Well then, I’m a poet. I can tell you almost anything you want to know about poetic style, tone, and personal expression. (What was this one, Sugar?)

The Elusive Counterexample

Yes, Jester’s style has changed over 2.5 years. That’s what happens when you write for that long – you get better. It’s not rocket science. We like to think of artists as being born fully formed, and every piece created the same as the one before. But they aren’t.

Michelangelo destroyed his early works so that people would think his masterpieces magically appeared. But they didn’t. He improved over time just like everybody else.

Picasso went through phases. Some artists like to change things up just to see what happens. That’s part of the experimental process.

If you want to talk about significant changes in his writing style, look at the tweets before and after he started his blog. There’s a significant shift towards a more rhythmic style and a coalescing of his catch phrases. He stumbled around in the beginning until settling on the most rhythmic ones. After starting the blog, the rhythm became more pronounced.

That’s what happens when you switch from writing 140 characters to pages of blog text. You have more opportunities to write, so you get better faster.

Lately, I’d say for the past month or so, he’s shifted away from that rhythm. He’s taken a more aggressive, annoyed tone. You know what happened in the last month? Somebody attacked his favorite charity. Then he attacked them back and it turned out they were a massive credit card fraud ring.

Anyone would be aggressive and annoyed over that.

You know what else happened in the past few months? Trolls have gained strength and frequency. That shit is draining on everyone, even people who know how to handle themselves. Everyone gets burned out. Everyone gets tired of hearing crap all the time. And everyone has moments where they wonder if they really should be putting in that much effort for so little reward.

He keeps going despite it all. But that doesn’t mean he’s not allowed to be tired. It’s impossible to keep going at the same level every day without a break. He doesn’t become a different person because he needs a nap.

He’s not a saint. He’s not required to keep his anger hidden, and he’s not required to continue on like nothing bad ever happened to him. Yes, his writing style has changed. It’s because he is, believe it or not, a human being.

Writing styles change when you get mad. They change when you practice. They change when you get tired. They change when something happens in your life that causes you to rethink how you choose to express yourself.

That’s normal.

People are like a river. You never step in the same river twice, but it doesn’t magically disappear. The banks don’t shift randomly or spontaneously. It’s just that the individual water molecules flow from high ground to low ground, so you never touch the same molecules again.

If you go back to the river you played in as a child, it will still be there when you’re an adult. (Unless it’s been hit by global warming, then who knows.) The banks will be in roughly the same place. Parts will be eroded. Parts will be silted up. Sometimes a new side stream will appear and take hold after a particularly wet season.

But you don’t rename the river every time a part of the bank erodes away.

And with people, the banks containing the personality are still there. They shift over time and new things appear. But it’s still the same core. It’s only the individual details that change.

When you look at the minute details and ignore the big picture, it looks like every day is a unique, completely original experience. But it isn’t. It’s just minor variations on one theme.

Otherwise you would have to say that a 31-49 year old adult dies and is reincarnated as a (31-49 year)+1day old adult with new memories that color new decision making strategies every single day.

Minor variations happen. It’s not significant.

The secret to becoming a good writer

I study writing because I love it. And I study beautiful characters because I love beauty. Perhaps I am Holden Caulfield and impaled on beauty. Or perhaps I’m just an odd girl who thinks too much. But from an outsider and a trained writer, this is ridiculous.

If you want to get into debates about writing styles, read examples of good style until you pass out because you were too busy to eat. If you want to talk about changes in writing style, write until your fingers cramp.

And if you want to talk about how personality is expressed through writing, and that change is meaningful, study people and yourself until the ugliness of the world hurts so bad you can barely breathe, and then find a way to create beauty out of that ugliness.

Because if you don’t do that, people who actually did will have no respect for you or your so-called expertise.

We can tell when you haven’t put in the work.

http://pastebin.com/7MezBSFU definitely worth a read. It’s strikingly rhythmic.

He says that he’s a relatively normal guy. But when you look at what he’s done, it’s pretty obvious that he isn’t. His work isn’t normal. His reaction to trolls isn’t normal. His writing style isn’t even normal.

(Maybe this is just my reaction to it because I was reading Robert William Service immediately before. I was trying to work on a thing about SEALs and dealing with fear but I needed a jump start. SEAL language is a little dry and bummed me out.)

When I read his piece, I thought it had an obvious and beautiful rhythm to it. It’s hypnotic.

But the most hypnotic thing is his inexplicable humility. He doesn’t brag about his work. He just does it. He doesn’t gloat over his wins. He just wins. Even when he’s responding to trolls, he doesn’t take the myriad opportunities to rub his skill in their faces.

He just states the facts and moves on.

I find it unfathomable that people think this piece was egotistic, or that Jester himself is a paragon of narcissism. There’s a lot of evidence of his humility. It isn’t just that he says “I’m a relatively normal guy” or “err… thanks…I guess” when people praise him. It’s that it’s a foundational part of his writing style and tactics. It looks like he lives and breathes humility.

True humility is what happens when you know what goals you want to achieve, how to get them, and do what it takes to succeed. Then you decide not to talk about it. Egotism is what happens when you can’t get what you want any other way. I find it hard to believe that Jester has trouble getting what he wants.

Most of the whining about his ego sounds like jealousy. Humility is a hard concept to understand and most people don’t quite get the hang of it.

Some people have to show it by repeating “I’m just a guy” ad nauseam. Some people have to show it by letting people walk all over them. But with him, it  appears out of this rhythmic, hypnotic quality that permeates his speech.

Like music, the beauty is in the space between the notes. He doesn’t fill in those spaces by asking for accolades or praise. He doesn’t fill up the dead time between tango downs by reminding people of his past performances. He just lets the silent spaces be silent.

He tweets about taking out jihadist sites, but then he leaves a space for people to do what they’re going to do with it. He tweets about taking out UG Nazi, but leaves space for them to sweat.

Even when he’s tweeting about the trolls, he leaves a space for other people to step in – like when he asks for medical professionals to help one of the trolls that constantly harass him.

It seems like there’s always something left unsaid or left hanging for the audience to fill in. Like he’s offering a gift for the audience to play with. (Again, I might think this only because I was reading poetry today. Sometimes it’s hard to separate influences from facts.)

That’s how humility works. Humility lives in the space between the accomplishments – where you don’t say anything; you just let it rest while you move on to the next one.

The hardest part of humility is accepting the idea that if you never tell people what you’ve done, they never know. People aren’t psychic. They don’t guess. And they often don’t give the benefit of the doubt. So if you need to convince someone to help you with something, or love you, or just know you exist, you have to say something about your accomplishments.

If you never say anything, most people assume you never did anything with your life. Harsh, but true.

So I’m not surprised that Jester can walk down the street without raising any flags. If it never occurs to people that he might be different, they’ll never ask or assume anything about him. Nobody walks up to a random guy to ask if he’s an ex-military superhacker and if his bowtie is really a camera.

So humility isn’t really that much fun when you think about it. You have to accept that people will assume you’re too lazy and stupid to accomplish anything, or not acknowledge your presence at all, simply because you didn’t come out and say it. But if you do say it, your bragging makes you look boorish, rude, and arrogant.

It’s soul crushing to know that you’ve done amazing work but people will assume the worst about you no matter what.

I’m not sure I know how to resolve that contradiction. Again, that’s what I was already working on and coming up short until Jester posted something. (Seriously, if I didn’t know better I would think there was some freaky ESP shit going on. I started this piece about 10 minutes before he announced a teaser for his post and almost gave up because I had nothing.)

I haven’t really seen clues about how Jester deals with the contradiction. And I haven’t seen clues about how SEALs deal with it either, from the piece I’m working on right now. One of my muses says that SEALs are supposed to be incredibly humble, but I haven’t gotten anywhere with figuring out how to do it without brutal hazings.

It seems like it should be possible to develop humility in a kinder, gentler way than spraying glue on someone’s genitals (true story) but I haven’t figured out what that is. Creating a rhythm of notes and rests seems like the easy way to look like you’ve figured it out. I’m not sure that artificially creating a rhythm is exactly the same as humility, but as long as it looks reasonably close, most people will accept it.

This is one of those things that nobody knows how to describe or teach, but everyone knows when it’s not there.

The theory – “There are many people in the hacker scene who feel that @cubespherical may himself be Jester and this may be an elaborate ruse to get his enemies to send him money”

Spotting the flaw

It probably is common to develop elaborate ops to take down a site. I’m sure there are plenty of obstacles to overcome to do that. I don’t know what they are. But I do know that coding a website is a pain in the ass. You have to think about all the dumbass things you would really rather not think about in order to prevent problems.

So I can see how hacking is an elaborate endeavor. However, human plans aren’t as elaborate as computer code. It’s because we ignore the most unlikely scenarios that computers don’t know to ignore. Our plans don’t require the command “do continue breathing while working on the op” like a computer does.

The flaw is assuming that Jester is a computer, or that solving computer problems are exactly like solving human problems. They aren’t.

If you tell a person to do something vague, they’ll start guessing what you want. Sometimes they guess right. Sometimes they guess what you really should have asked for. Sometimes they guess horribly, mind-blowingly wrong. Computers don’t guess.

They also don’t forget what you said 20 minutes ago. If the plan is too complex, people will leave out the half that doesn’t sound fun, easy, or comprehensible.

There’s a reason why people don’t have elaborate plans. It’s because they don’t work. And there’s a reason why Rube Goldberg machines are funny. It’s because people intuitively know how absurd it is to have 300 steps to pop a balloon.

It’s a miracle when those things work at all.

Fixing the flaw

Jester’s ops are remarkably elegant and simple. There’s a beautiful Zen quality to his work. It’s poetic.

So if I need to assign credit for an op to Jester, I would look first for how Zen-like it is. If it isn’t Zen, it isn’t Jester. That’s not something you can just turn off after you have it. Zen masters make mistakes, but they make Zen influenced mistakes. Trolling himself and then deleting his own account isn’t Zen.

Deleting his own account to encourage a troll doesn’t sound Zen at first glance, but Zen is never single layered.

He thought he would get something out of it. (Not rocket science) He says that it was a bad idea, but being wrong doesn’t mean there wasn’t a reason. It also doesn’t mean his reasoning wasn’t Zen. It means it backfired.

I think he wanted to show that he took the troll seriously. That would make the troll cocky enough to pwn himself. Or make someone else cocky enough to stick his neck out. He consistently uses that strategy and usually it works. Reusing an effective plan is Zen.

I think he underestimated the amount of chaos that would ensue. That sounds Zen to me. When you understand simplicity, you err towards simplicity.

The context has changed. Anonymous hasn’t given public ransom demands before. Change in context requires reassessment of strategy. Is there a more convincing way to remove all doubt that he believed the story and takes less effort than deactivating an account?

Maybe, maybe not.

Maybe he was looking for information about the culture of his supporters and detractors. Maybe he wanted to explore some profound truth about the human condition. Maybe he was just bored and watching people scurry around in chaos amuses him. That sounds Zen. Sadistic, but still Zen.

It isn’t always rainbows and kittens. Sometimes it’s an old dude smacking you with a stick to force an insight.

He could have said that this was a stupid idea to make people more comfortable, or to keep them occupied with thinking how dumb he is, rather than anticipating his next move. That sounds pretty Zen, and not at all out of character.

It could also be that he is, in fact, a human being. It could have been a whim. Sometimes things sound like a good idea at the time for no apparent reason. I’m going with the first option – he wanted to show the troll he was taking it seriously and thought it would turn out better than it did.

That’s pretty much exactly what he said. Sometimes you have to take people at their word when it makes the most sense and takes less effort than all the other options. Even brilliant strategists are kinda lazy once in a while.

(That’s what makes them brilliant. Dumbasses slog through the swamp; geniuses find the shortcut)

It sounds like a dumb idea to deactivate the accounts, but you can’t know exactly how dumb an idea is until after it beats the crap out of you. And some things sound like a dumbass move in the beginning but become incredibly beautiful after they work.

Like relativity theory or quantum mechanics.

The Elusive Counterexample

If he wanted money, he would just ask for it. He posts about Wounded Warriors relatively often. He posted something about getting them to sell wrist bands with his name and doxed identities. People are willing to buy them.

If he wanted people to donate, he could have just said “Hey guys, I’m working on an expensive project. Does anyone want to help out? You can donate to my bitcoin wallet. Plz RT” Using average nonprofit donation rates and amounts, he’d get about $30,000 from one 20-tweet campaign.

That’s the Zen way for Jester to get money. He doesn’t need to jump through hoops. He doesn’t need gimmicks or guerilla marketing. He doesn’t need flash because he has substance.

People use gimmicks because they’re scared. He’s not scared. They use gimmicks because they can’t think of anything better. He can think of something better. And people use gimmicks because it’s impossible to break through apathy of the modern world without something big. He’s already broken through.

People love him, his work, and would be willing to spare a few dollars if they thought it would help him take out more jihadists. His people would have donated. They would have retweeted. Some might have even started fundraising drives of their own.

If he really needed money, he would have just asked. His world would not collapse. He’s not that neurotic.

But he hasn’t asked. He’s stated clearly that he doesn’t ask. The Zen thing is to stay consistent.

Take home message

1. Computers aren’t people and people aren’t computers
2. There’s no Zen switch – once you have it, you don’t lose it without major life changes
3. Giving people the benefit of the doubt makes confusing acts easier to understand
4. Sometimes Zen looks pretty stupid before it fully unfolds into something beautiful
   1. However, even Zen masters make mistakes
5. You don’t need gimmicks if you have substance and resources

Other posts in this series

What’s with the elaborate ruse fetish?

The simple trick to deal with fear

Your way takes an hour, mine takes 40 seconds

How to choose between two opposing sides

Some people aren’t that dumb

How to make people love you

Accusations of fraud aren’t really that bad

How to create a legacy

How to deal with being wrong

How to create freedom

Social Engineering isn’t that hard

How to fit in without losing your soul

Haters gotta hate, poets gotta poetate

The easiest way for Jester-doxers to be heroes

Serenity soundbites

1. More isn’t always better
2. Notice your first reaction to the story
3. When in doubt, take it out
4. Take out the thing you put in to manipulate people
5. Elaborate designs showcase your fear
6. There’s a simple trick to dealing with fear

The logic

People want to listen to intriguing stories.

People believe authority figures.

If you don’t want someone to see something, make them look somewhere else.

These things are good; therefore more of them are better.

Elaborate plans have lots of these things.

Therefore elaborate plans are better than simple plans.

The flaw here is assuming more is always better; it isn’t. The more stuff you have, the more opportunities that something will go wrong. Anything that can go wrong will. And anything that involves a lot of people can go sideways in an instant.

Too many distractions increase the chances that one will contradict another. Too much intrigue overwhelms and exhausts the audience. Too many authoritative things increase the chance that you’ll look pompous and boring. Or people will start questioning why you need to work so hard to prove your claim. Or it’ll waste time you should have spent with something useful.

Going overboard with intriguing distractions or authoritative proof hurts the argument more than it helps. But people add more stuff than they need because of fear.

Simplicity = terrifying

Simple plans are brave. They assume failure at the beginning and go ahead anyway. They make sure there’s a way to get back to the goal using the stuff they already have.

Elaborate plans assume success and abandon hope when the first details don’t work.  They shove in newfangled details because there’s no confidence in the original. Or they do it to escape the ghosts of failure. Like the Winchester Mystery House.

Sometimes those details would work if you just pushed a little harder. Sometimes they work with other people, but not the first one you asked. Sometimes they work with the person you want to ask, but not on that day. But elaborate plans don’t trust that, so they try something else.

Simple plans don’t have something else. There’s no trick up your sleeve or magic incantation to make people do what you want. It’s just you and the bare hope of success.

That’s terrifying.

Elaborate plans at least give you something to keep your mind off it for a while. Or they distract other people from your fear. Because if people are looking at X, they’re not looking at Y. And if they’re looking at lots of stuff, they’re more likely to believe one of those things.

Law of large numbers, and all that.

Simple plans don’t look authoritative. They don’t have fancy tools and confusing jargon that only an expert would know how to wield – thus existence of the tool is proof of expertise. They don’t force people to believe through 3 hour explanations of flowcharts and powerpoint slides.

Elaborate plans always have something to do, somewhere to be, something to say. But that’s mistaking motion for action. It’s mistaking speech for meaning. Because when you start looking at what action and meaning are, you realize that you have no idea what you’re doing, where you’re going, or how you’re going to keep the world from falling apart.

It’s terrifying.

Simple plans don’t let you ignore the terror. That’s why normal people don’t use them.  And that’s why we say that people who do use them are master strategists. It takes a lot of guts and awareness to pull off a simple plan.

What’s your first reaction to this story?

I have a story about competitive flower arranging. (Because I’m that kind of girl) My arrangement was a minimalist Japanese design, but everyone else in the show gave ornate, overpowering designs. I was terrified when I saw the monstrosities I was up against. I knew I was going to lose.

I thought I didn’t get the memo about what the judges were looking for. I thought it would look like I was lazy, or didn’t want to win. I thought I would look abnormal and everyone would hate me. So I put a geisha hair ornament in to spice it up. I had nowhere to put it, so I just laid it on the table.

It looked weird and the colors clashed.

I wanted to show the judges that I was conforming to the norm of ornateness, but I also wanted them to see my minimalist design esthetic. I agonized over that for about an hour. (Because I’m that kind of girl)

One of the Flower Show Dowagers saw my panic and came over. She put her arm around me and cooed “Sweetie pie, it’s taking a long time, isn’t it?” When she really meant “if it takes this long to make a decision, it means you don’t know what you’re doing.” (FSDs have a knack for beating the shit out of you in the nicest way possible.)

Then she said “when in doubt, take it out.” That’s good advice, but painfully unhelpful when you don’t know what to take out.

For my flower arrangements, it was always the thing that conformed to popularity but had no business being there. I put it in to make the judges think I listened to the prompt even though I went in a different direction. Or it was the new and exciting thing I couldn’t bear to part with, but distracted from the rest of the piece.

They were the things I put in to force people to react the way I wanted. (Because I’m that kind of girl) The plan was to win first place. I needed to convince them to give it to me. So I put in elements that I thought would convince them. (Anyone who doesn’t use that strategy wins contests by accident, nepotism, or blackmail.)

I agonized over taking out the bad elements because they represented something I was afraid to lose – like intrigue, authority, or conformity. If I gave them up, I would lose my authority to command the judges to give me the prize. I couldn’t win, so I would lose. But there’s a flaw – those judges were chosen because they know how to spot bullshit.

A bad design element is impossible to ignore and detracts from the entire piece.

An element exists either to improve the design or to distract from something bad.

A bad element does not improve the design, therefore it distracts from something bad.

It was a contest; the only bad thing there was fear of losing.

Therefore the element was a distraction from the fear of losing.

Judges know that and aren’t distracted; otherwise they wouldn’t be given the honor of judging.

Therefore, it would be impossible for the judges to not see my fear of losing if I left in a bad element.

Judges aren’t psychic. If they don’t see something pointing to fear, they don’t magically know. If they never saw the offending ornament, they have no choice but to assume I never intended to put it there. They would never know it existed at all. But if they do see it, they know exactly what it means.

The thing to take out was always the one that showcased my fear. But in taking it out, I had to confront the fear, accept that I was taking a step towards failure, and go ahead anyway.

This story had a happy ending – I won 1st place because the minimalist design was good in and of itself. But it was better without the clashing ornament.

Dealing with fear

Simplicity means taking out all the things that sound cool but really shouldn’t be there. Like geisha hair ornaments, or assuming Jester is exactly the same as everyone else, or that he’s less intelligent than the people trolling him, or that the world is a comforting, easy place to live.

Harsh, but true.

The easiest way to get through the fear is to carry on regardless. Sometimes things aren’t as terrible as they seem in your head. It’s not the end of the world to lose a flower arranging contest. It’s also not the end of the world to admit that Jester might not be as dumb as people want him to be.

His intelligence doesn’t make anyone else smarter or dumber, just like the other flower arrangements didn’t make my geisha ornament look better or worse within my own design. The ornament clashed, and nothing on the other side of the room was going to fix that. The design was an entity entirely unto itself.

So are you. It seems like Jester’s existence makes you look dumber in comparison, but it’s a false comparison. Intelligence, like design, is judged based on individual merits, not outside forces.

You don’t suddenly lose information because you’re standing next to someone with more. You don’t gain information because you’re standing next to someone with less. You have exactly the same amount of information in your head as you did before because nothing inside you changed.

And expertise in one area doesn’t mean total world domination. It’s reasonable to assume I know more about microbiology than Jester does. (Maybe not. Maybe he took classes in bioterrorism. I only had one) That doesn’t make me smarter overall, or better at anything other than telling cool stories about zombie ants and magnetic bacteria.

There’s no way to compare microbiology to computer programming, just like there’s no way to compare an ornate flower arrangement to a minimalist one. They each have to be assessed by themselves, on the solidity of their own achievements. So it doesn’t hurt my soul to know that Jester is better than me at something.

Comparing the two indicates an overarching fear of losing something. But you don’t lose intelligence unless you have a neurological disaster. I realize that a tweet can make someone feel stupid, but that’s not a stroke. That’s the realization that you’re not the smartest person out of 7 billion people in this world.

You’ll live.

Making the pain stop

It only hurts when he’s better at something you care about; for me, that’s social engineering. I can look at it as a way to learn from him, or a reason to sulk under the covers about how much I suck. Guess which one I chose. It actually isn’t that hard.

You just admit that he’s not a Wild and Windy Typhoonigator determined to suck the intelligence out of you. And even if he were, he doesn’t have a magic brain-sucking ray gun.

Dealing with fear is hard, and no one can really tell you how to do it. There are thousands of witty quotes about how action is the best remedy for fear. If you just get up and start going, it doesn’t look so bad anymore.

But that’s painfully unhelpful when you’re too paralyzed to think straight, or if something new comes in after you start, or if you’re halfway through and still afraid. When that happens, ask yourself why you care so damn much.

The world doesn’t end if someone doesn’t like a flower arrangement. It’s just something pretty to look at, or something to make someone else feel comfortable, or a way to get status in a group you care about. It’s a prop used to get something you want. Everyone is in competition with someone, and everyone is a judge of something.

If your first response to this example was “why the hell would she care about a stupid flower show? That’s nothing to be afraid of!” or “what’s the big deal? If the ornament doesn’t belong there, just take it out” or “who cares what FSDs think?” then you have the ability to free yourself from fear.

All you have to do is see how your problem is a judged flower arrangement, and then tell yourself that you’re whatever kind of girl you thought I was. (I’m actually this kind of girl *huggles*)

Most of life is flower arrangements. People just use different kinds of flowers.

Other posts in this series

What’s with the elaborate ruse fetish?

The simple trick to deal with fear

Your way takes an hour, mine takes 40 seconds

How to choose between two opposing sides

Some people aren’t that dumb

How to make people love you

Accusations of fraud aren’t really that bad

How to create a legacy

How to deal with being wrong

How to create freedom

Social Engineering isn’t that hard

How to fit in without losing your soul

Haters gotta hate, poets gotta poetate

The easiest way for Jester-doxers to be heroes

The theory - Jester has been doxed by a new troll, as someone other than Tom Ryan. “Occam’s Razor narrows it down to two scenarios.”

Spotting the flaw

Scenario 1 = the troll is Jester. Scenario 2 = the troll is Jester. Sweetie, that’s only one scenario. *cuddly-wuddlies*

(Side note: guess who loves elaborate plans and brags about it all day, every day? Sociopaths. Trolling yourself is extremely common on sociopath blogs. And nowhere else. And it’s only the stupid ones because the smart ones are too lazy/ skilled to do that. Not saying anything, you know. I’m sure that could mean anything.)

Other than that, Occam’s razor appears too late to be useful in this argument. The simplest solution is best, or the one with the least amount of effort is best. Using it should be simple too. It’s easiest to use this while you’re telling the story, not after you have two convoluted stories.

It takes a lot of effort for a guy to set up a new Twitter account, troll himself, delete his own blog and Twitter account, then come back and say “my bad.”

He would have to radically change his strategy, with no warning or awareness of the consequences. He would have to plan the strategy and execute it. Then he would have to recover from it afterwards. (More about that in this post)

That’s not simple.

It’s more likely that Jester was going about his daily business, yet another troll came along, and Jester had an unforced error. Occam’s razor, if correctly applied here, would say that Jester was, in fact, a human being.

He was probably bored. Bored people do stupid shit. Or he was distracted and didn’t put as much thought into it as he should have. Distracted people make mistakes. Or he was drunk. Drunk logic is ridiculous and often regrettable under the harsh light of sobriety.

That’s simple.

It’s also possible that he didn’t make an unforced error. The end result was a greater conspiracy theory that consumed the entire Anonyverse. Occam’s razor here says he wanted that result.

There’s any number of reasons for that. But it’s probably not trying to cover up something. That requires Jester psychically divining the appearance of the troll so that he could have an op to cover up (that would be best covered up by chaos) at the exact moment the troll appeared. Occam’s razor says you should eliminate the story that depends solely on magical powers. That’s the whole purpose of the rule.

It’s probably not covering up the Tom Ryan thing because it hasn’t bothered him before. Occam’s razor says that if he hasn’t been bothered previously, and nothing has changed, he’s not going to be bothered now.

The ops he’s already working on could fit into a cover up plan. That would be the Team Poison thing, the continued attacks of jihadist sites, and whatever else he’s got cooking that no one knows about. It’s reasonable to think he would try to play the hand he’s been dealt, and he’s already been dealt a lot of conspiracy theories. So he could have been trying to use it as a tool.

Occam’s razor says no, though.

Master strategists like Jester know how to use the tools they have. That’s why they’re called masters. Chaos can be a tool, but only if he put something in there to make sure it went the right way. I didn’t see anything that looked like funneling people towards a specific objective.

The Libyan psy-op did create chaos, and did funnel people toward a specific objective using a communication method they would believe. Xerxes creates chaos in website accessibility and drives people to abandon their sites. (It’s not magic. It’s frustration. He’s explained Saladin before; he just didn’t use the name when he said it.)

If he knows that chaos is a tool and uses it successfully, he’s not going to magically forget he was able to do that. If he needed to use chaos as a tool again, he would use it strategically.

So Occam’s razor says you should eliminate scenarios that require a master using a tool in the most complicated and unhelpful way possible, or magically forgetting something integral to his work.

He might have wanted information that only comes from observing. Or he’s sadistic and liked watching the chaos. Occam’s razor says getting information or entertainment are simple goals achieved by simple means so they would be accepted.

More elaborate, but still simple.

But now I have two simple scenarios and no way to choose between them. Occam’s razor doesn’t help me anymore because both are simple enough to qualify as valid under this rule. I need completely new information in order to choose between the two.

Even though there are two scenarios here, there’s only one explanation for what happened – it was business as usual for both Jester and the troll. Scenario 2 just ascribes more intention to Jester’s actions, or paints him as a more mythical figure for not making a mistake.

The only way to choose between them is to ask Jester. He said publicly it was an unforced error. If it was deliberate, he wouldn’t admit it because that would give away too much of his strategy. Both scenarios have the same response, thus there’s no way to choose between them.

It’s a dead end, so the argument’s over. The only thing left is to accept that some things are fundamentally unknowable and move on with your life. Occam’s razor says sometimes this is the only way to keep your sanity.

Fixing the flaw

Occam’s razor isn’t really built for choosing between two things. It’s for assessing the likelihood of one thing at a time. When I used it, I put it at the end of each claim – the unforced error, the cover up, the Tom Ryan thing, and the sadism.

Each one of those claims was assessed individually and eliminated or accepted based on its own simplicity. I didn’t compare the Tom Ryan thing to information gathering to see which one of those was simpler. I compared each one to the context of the situation.

Occam’s razor is meant for the scenario creation phase, not the elimination phase. Reasoning:  it’s faster and easier to do it right the first time.

You have to spend time and energy creating a convoluted explanation for a given event. The more convoluted, the more time it takes. So, let’s say it takes 10 minutes to write out convoluted scenario 1. That’s 10 minutes you don’t get back. If you need scenario 2 because scenario 1 is wrong, you just spent 10 minutes on a worthless endeavor.

If scenario 2 takes another 10 minutes to write, you just spent 20 minutes on this. Now you have to choose between these two scenarios.

That means all the evidence you used in creating scenario 1 and 2 isn’t useful anymore. If it were useful, it would have been obvious that one was better, so you wouldn’t be stuck with a choice.

Since there are two equally plausible scenarios you have to come up with something completely new to distinguish between them. This new thing has to:

1. Be true
2. Support one scenario
3. Destroy support for the other one

#3 is pretty important. If you’re eliminating something, you have to say that one of your facts is less important, less true, or less relevant so you’re allowed to ignore it. Otherwise you have to leave it in and let it tangle up everything, like when your mom makes you include your baby sister in your No Girls Allowed club.

Finding that new thing requires research. That takes a lot more time. So let’s say 40 minutes of reading. This entire thing would take an hour before you get to use Occam’s razor if you chose to start with convoluted stories.

My way took 40 seconds.

Take home message

1. If two scenarios are the same, there’s no choice between them
2. It helps to think about what real people do in real situations
3. If you do it right the first time, you move on with your life faster
4. Occam’s razor is made for comparing one thing to the context, not two things to each other
5. The elimination phase requires more information than you currently have
   1. If it didn’t, you wouldn’t have an elimination phase

Other posts in this series

What’s with the elaborate ruse fetish?

The simple trick to deal with fear

Your way takes an hour, mine takes 40 seconds

How to choose between two opposing sides

Some people aren’t that dumb

How to make people love you

Accusations of fraud aren’t really that bad

How to create a legacy

How to deal with being wrong

How to create freedom

Social Engineering isn’t that hard

How to fit in without losing your soul

Haters gotta hate, poets gotta poetate

The easiest way for Jester-doxers to be heroes

Serenity soundbites

1. People have a right to enjoy their lives in their own way, even if other people disagree
2. Freedom means letting people make the wrong decisions
3. Sometimes you have to play go along, get along
4. It’s not when someone believes they have a right they don’t actually have
5. When choosing between two opposing sides, you have to ignore something
6. When assessing value, you have to know stuff about all sides, not just the one you want
7. Don’t choose the side that requires impossible assumptions
8. Don’t choose the side that advertises your fear

The story

I was at a wedding once. It was one of those things – you know you have to be there to keep up appearances, but would really rather do anything else. So I kept to myself, smiled and nodded when people’s trajectories bounced off my position, but otherwise said nothing.

I like watching from a distance – like a cat on a rooftop, surveying my territory. It’s serene.

But then, a woman adopted me. She seemed like a nice lady, although oddly enthusiastic about making sure no one’s thoughts had space to explore the nether regions. I smiled politely and chatted for a few minutes. No harm, no foul.

Then it was time to throw the bouquet. Being single at a wedding doesn’t bother me – being the only single lady on stage to perform an odd ritual that exposes an idiosyncratic and unexplainable flaw bothers me.

But I played along because what else was I supposed to do? Stamp my feet like a petulant child? The nice lady pulled me onto the floor and positioned me just so. The bouquet hit me in the head, so I guess she’s had some experience with that.

She thought I wasn’t enjoying the party, and it made her feel bad. If she spent the whole time thinking about how sad and lonely I was, she would be miserable on what should have been a happy day. When I tried to explain to her that I was fine, she thought my entertainment strategies were sadly misguided.

Inexplicably, getting beaned with plastic flowers proved that I was having a good time, and thus allowed her to enjoy the rest of the party.

The explanation

Freedom is what happens when people accept that other people have a right to make the wrong decisions. She didn’t want to give me the freedom to enjoy the party in my own way. That’s wrong. But that also means I can’t tell her she’s wrong. She was trying to enjoy the party in her own way. That means I would destroy her freedom if I asked her to stop.

Sometimes you have to stand up for your rights, but it isn’t every single time. It’s when you get a greater reward for the effort you have to put in. If their drive to force you to submit is stronger than your refusal, you’ll submit. But if your refusal is stronger, you won’t. If you want something more, you’ll give up a right to get that higher valued thing.

I was willing to give her the freedom to enjoy the party, because I knew that it would needlessly hurt her to be a petulant wallflower. In doing that, I had to sacrifice my own comfort and enjoyment. And safety. Plastic flowers aren’t the softest projectiles. (OW!)

It’s hard to say that I had a greater right to enjoy the party than she did. Why would my enjoyment be worth more than hers? Everyone always has the right to say “you’re not the boss of me!!!” but civilized people forgo that right in order to create a stable society. It’s how we manage to keep from killing each other.

There seems to be a hot debate about whether or not Jester is right to tell jihadists what they can and cannot do on his internet. But that means saying jihadists have the right to kill people, like Charles Manson shouldn’t be in jail because he only told people what to do.

Like it’s not bad if it’s only words, no matter what those words mean or what happens after the talking is over or what would’ve happened if those words never existed. Like “go to club X at 11pm and detonate the bomb you create with this manual” has the same meaning and result as “I think I’m going to adopt a kitten today.”

That’s a little stupid.

Yeah, people have the right to say what they want, but those rights have to be balanced with other people’s rights. Why is a jihadist’s right to kill people worth more than a soccer mom’s right to be alive?

There has to be a balance

1. What’s in opposition?
2. Where’s the support for each side?
3. What would you have to do to ignore one of them?
4. Which force is stronger?
5. What seems like a contradiction?
6. How do you eliminate the contradiction?

Filling that out for the wedding example:

1. What’s in opposition?
   1. My right to self-determination vs. her right to enjoy the party
2. Where’s the support for each side?
   1. It was a wedding, not a gulag – we both had the right to feel that way
   2. I wanted my right just as much as she wanted her right
3. What would you have to do to ignore one of them?
   1. Assume one of us doesn’t have that right
   2. Assume one of us doesn’t want that right
   3. Assume one of us doesn’t exist
4. Which force is stronger?
   1. Her persistence to engage me in the party was stronger than my persistence to refuse
5. What seems like a contradiction?
   1. She wants me to be happy, but I was already happy and now I’m not
6. How do you eliminate the contradiction?
   1. Find something to be happy about in whatever she wants
   2. Convince her that I was already happy

At some point, you have to choose one extreme or the other. You can’t just sit around doing absolutely nothing. Doing nothing is still a choice. So in order to create the simplest plan here, I admitted that her drive to control me was stronger than my drive to avoid people.

Then I had to choose which part to ignore. I went with 3b – not wanting the right anymore. I still had the right; I just wanted peace and reputation more. To eliminate the contradiction, I chose 6a – find something else to be happy about. Peace and reputation made me happy. So I chose her side and suffered the consequences.

It’s the same structure for the jihadists – except the answer is 3a – not having the right at all. Blind craving doesn’t give them the right to kill people. And eliminating the contradiction is 6b – convincing them that killing people isn’t actually as holy as they believe it is.

Or just taking out their communication channels. Totally easier.

Opposing theories

Filling that out for choosing two opposing explanations:

• What’s in opposition?
  • Jester trolled himself vs. Jester didn’t troll himself
• Where’s the support for each side?
  • Trolling himself
    • Jester is a skilled social engineer
    • He’s not above doing something questionable to get what he wants
    • Anonymous might pull a stunt like that to get attention
  • Not trolling himself
    • Jester is consistent
    • His attacks are elegant and simple
    • He’s smart enough to know that he doesn’t need stunts if he has 32,000 fans
• What would you have to do to ignore one of them?
  • Trolling himself
    • Assume that things are business as usual
    • Assume that Jester is smart and sane
    • Assume that he has NOT had a neurological disaster that impairs his judgment
  • Not trolling himself
    • Jester suddenly changed strategies for no apparent reason
    • Jester lost his Zen quality
    • Jester needed something he couldn’t get without a massive conspiracy theory or the ones already in effect
• Which force is stronger?
  • Inertia is stronger than capriciousness – business as usual wins
• What seems like a contradiction?
  • Anonymous thinks Jester is a dumbass, but they would have to assume he isn’t
• How do you eliminate the contradiction?
  • Find evidence that Jester isn’t a dumbass
  • Believe that evidence

The answer seems obvious when it’s written out like this. But resolving the contradiction is always the hard part. If you really don’t want to believe that Jester’s as smart as people think he is, there’s nothing in the world that can make you believe. If you see no value in accepting his intelligence, but see tremendous value in saying how stupid he is, there’s no compelling reason to change your mind.

The easiest way to assess value is to just write out the pros and cons. Simplistic, but these things don’t have to be hard. The hard part is getting off your ass and doing it. It’s a lot easier to look for someone to say “it’s ok, no one else knows the answer either” and curl up under the covers.

Except some people do know the answer. You just look at the situation, write out the good things and the bad things, figure out the ratio, and act accordingly. (Wait, where have I heard that?)

It helps to think of the real life events that ensue after you make a decision, both for and against, before you actually make it. (I know, rocket science, right? But for some reason people don’t do that.)

In my wedding example, I valued getting along with people over the inevitable hysteria had I refused a polite, yet firm invitation to join the party. I would look like a complete idiot, so doing my own thing wasn’t as valuable to me in that situation. In most other situations, it’s very valuable.

But that means all situations have to be taken individually. It seems so much easier to believe in one thing forever and ever. Except that usually means you have to assume someone doesn’t exist, or that people had strokes without noticing.

Just saying.

Other posts in this series

What’s with the elaborate ruse fetish?

The simple trick to deal with fear

Your way takes an hour, mine takes 40 seconds

How to choose between two opposing sides

Some people aren’t that dumb

How to make people love you

Accusations of fraud aren’t really that bad

How to create a legacy

How to deal with being wrong

How to create freedom

Social Engineering isn’t that hard

How to fit in without losing your soul

Haters gotta hate, poets gotta poetate

The easiest way for Jester-doxers to be heroes

The theory – “According to @cubespherical, the explanation is, incredibly, low tech. Recently, @cubespherical bumped into a mutual acquaintance of @th3j35t3r’s real life identity. When his name was brought up in conversation, the third party slipped up and linked this identity to Jester.”

Spotting the flaw

The flaw here is the assumption that Jester’s friends are normal. Jester isn’t normal; he’s brilliant. He probably has brilliant friends. Or he has people he puts up with because they’re extremely loyal. (Or brilliant and loyal, and thus super-duper with sprinkles on top unlikely to spill the beans)

[Or no friends at all because he’s That Kind of Guy]

Other people have diverse categories of friends – basketball friends, mommy and me friends, work friends, friends of friends, etc. I think he only has brilliant and loyal. Or, at least, only those people are able to link his real life identity to the Jester persona.

His brilliant friends would have enough situational awareness to catch someone sniffing for clues about Jester’s identity. They would be smart enough to know they shouldn’t talk about him to people with 9 year grudges. Randomly aggressive bar brawlers aren’t that intriguing to smart people, so given a choice of loyalty, they would choose Jester.

So they aren’t likely to intentionally or accidentally say anything.

His not so brilliant, yet incredibly loyal, friends wouldn’t say anything either. They’re not slugs; they know that words mean things. Even if the troll was a friend, they would value loyalty over idle chit chat. Loyalty has to be earned and proved, and that means it’s a stronger friendship than random dudes he plays basketball with.

It seems weird to assume this guy would tell his basketball buddies that jihadists want to kill him. That doesn’t sound natural. There has to be a script – actual spoken words that make sense in context – in order to transmit information.

Does he say “dude, that was a foul. If you do that one more time, I’m going to tell the jihadists that you’re actually me”? What about “ohhh, nothing but net! Just like that time I tango downed a jihadist website!”?

Just saying.

He’s a better social engineer than I am. You don’t get to that level by ignoring it completely. He doesn’t tell his deep, dark secrets to the guy who happens to think he doesn’t suck.

But normal people do. It’s not always easy to make friends. It’s not always easy to keep the friends you have. It’s not always easy to tell who your friends are or if they’ll still be your friend if something bad happens.

During the chaos, Jester found out that some of his supporters weren’t actually supporters. Even masters can’t know everything.

Normal people stay friends with people who have grudges against mutual friends. Normal people tell secrets to people who aren’t really their friends. Those friends tell the secrets to random people because it never occurs to them to keep it a secret. It would occur to Jester’s friends to keep his identity a secret.

Normal people have normal friends. High performing people have high performing friends.

Fixing the flaw

I would doubt any story based on the idea that Jester is exactly like every other person out there. He’s clearly not. He’s fallible, but he’s smart enough to take care of himself. He has human needs and desires, but he’s pretty good at restraining himself where other people wouldn’t. He can’t see everything, but he looks for it whenever he can. There’s evidence on his blog and his tweets to support that.

I can’t imagine how a guy could make such a convincing woman without that kind of awareness. Not saying that women are more aware than men, just that men pretending to be women have to work at it. A man who makes a more convincing woman than me is pretty damn good.

(And no, I’m not going to forget that I was out done by a dude. Oh, I guess maybe I do make a convincing woman …*mad at Jester*)

Smart people aren’t Bigfoot. Some of them, believe it or not, do exist.

The graph of intelligence is a bell shaped curve. There’s a reason for that. There are people at the tail ends of the bell; otherwise, the graph would look different. There aren’t many, but “not many” doesn’t mean “none at all.”

Someone has to be at the thin end of the curve – Jester’s a good candidate. He’s smart enough to know where to find other people like him. He’s charming enough to make those people love him. So if he has friends, they’re going to be in roughly the same place on the curve. Which means they aren’t average.

You can’t say someone acts exactly like an average person if they’ve already shown that they don’t.

Take home message

1. Smart people don’t tell dangerous secrets to randomly aggressive people
2. Loyal people don’t tell dangerous secrets to anyone
3. Social engineering experts don’t tell secrets to guys who happen to think they don’t suck
4. Normal people sometimes value quantity over quality in friendships
5. Don’t assume someone is average when they’ve clearly shown that they aren’t

Other posts in this series

What’s with the elaborate ruse fetish?

The simple trick to deal with fear

Your way takes an hour, mine takes 40 seconds

How to choose between two opposing sides

Some people aren’t that dumb

How to make people love you

Accusations of fraud aren’t really that bad

How to create a legacy

How to deal with being wrong

How to create freedom

Social Engineering isn’t that hard

How to fit in without losing your soul

Haters gotta hate, poets gotta poetate

The easiest way for Jester-doxers to be heroes

Serenity soundbites

1. If you want something and get it, you feel loved. If you don’t, you don’t.
2. Power requires an act, an accomplice, and an enticement
3. Conformity is about proving the ability to love and be loved
4. Nonconformity risks losing your friends and proving that you don’t deserve new ones
5. Intimacy combines opposing concepts and it’s your job to not explode under the pressure

The logic

I have a feeling these conspiracy theories get repeated, and plausible alternatives get ignored, because of a need to be loved and not a lack of intelligence. Even smart people do stupid things in the name of love.

Love = getting what you want.

Getting what you want = someone has to give it to you.

If someone gives something to you, it’s because you convinced them to.

It’s easier to convince predictable people.

Predictable = you know what someone wants and how they’ll react to your request.

People who conform to norms = predictable.

People who don’t conform to norms = unpredictable.

Thus it’s easier to get something from a conformist and harder to get something from a nonconformist.

So conforming proves that you’re willing to love and be loved.

Not conforming proves that you’re unwilling to love and be loved.

Conformity = elaborate

Elaborate = hiding fear

Intimacy = getting what you want without asking = simple

Without asking = letting people scrutinize and remember all the things that make you different

Intimacy = nonconformity = simple = terrifying

Love

Love is about getting what you want. If you want to be loved, and you are, then you got what you wanted. If you didn’t get what you wanted, then it’s not love. It’s you pretending, or making the best of a bad situation, or not knowing what you want.

Semantics, maybe. But it’s a helpful way to start breaking down a complicated concept.

I find a lot of people upset over the idea of ascribing anything as base and dirty as “a want” to something as spiritual and emotional as love. Like saying “I want to cuddle now” is gauche. If you want a cuddle, then you get it, you feel loved. If you don’t, you don’t. It’s not hard.

I think the problem arises in the details. Some people want things other people don’t want. Some people want things other people say they shouldn’t want. Some people secretly want those things but don’t want to be criticized for it. Some things have stereotypes or symbols attached to them but aren’t necessarily evil in and of themselves.

Some people want healthy things that they truly deserve, but their partner doesn’t want to give them, so the partner tries to convince them to stop wanting that thing.

Like money, sex, or power.

Convincing people

Having power can make you feel loved, even if people say you shouldn’t enjoy power, or that some people abuse power, or that the symbols of power are dirty. But it isn’t dirty. It’s the natural method for convincing someone to give you the things that make you feel loved. Some people just don’t know how to do it effectively, so it turns into something terrible.

Saying that power is always dirty because some people abuse it is like saying fire hoses should be outlawed because they were used to suppress rioters in the civil rights movement. The fire hoses weren’t the problem. The people wielding them on innocent protesters were the problem. Power is just a tool, and can be used to attack people or to make them feel better.

In order to get it, there has to be a specific act and a person to do it– there’s no such thing as power in a vacuum. Power that isn’t used is like the money in a forgotten bank account.

So that means you have to decide what that specific act is.

1. Who do you want power over?
2. What do you want them to do?
3. What do they want in return?

This is the same for loyalty. You have to decide what you want (act of loyalty – like keeping a secret), who you want to give it to you (friends), and then give them a reason to do it. The only difference between earning loyalty and power is that people generally see loyalty as good, and power as bad. Except when loyalty to the Nazis makes you kill people. Or when people use power to create equality, like Martin Luther King.

I guess there’s an unequal amount of good and bad in most things, right?

Creating power

So, how would conspiracy theories create power in this situation?

1. Who do you want power over?
   1. The chaos of an uncertain world
   2. Jester
   3. Friends
2. What do you want them to do?
   1. Become more understandable and easier to live in
   2. Admit defeat
   3. Form a stronger friendship
3. What do they want in return?
   1. The world doesn’t want anything from you
   2. Jester wants to not be annoyed
   3. Friends want a stronger friendship

In this scenario, there’s only one sure way to get power – building a stronger friendship with people who also believe in the conspiracy theory. It’s unlikely that Jester would give up just because people whined at him.

But I think if someone offered him a legitimate opportunity to no longer be annoyed by this, he would give a diplomatically vague admission of defeat and move on. However, that means an enforceable promise to leave him alone.

That seems to defeat the purpose of the conspiracy theory. The whole point is to talk to people about it, and you can’t have something to talk about if you agree to leave your Muse alone. The whole point of talking to people is to create a space where you can get what you want without looking like a complete jackass.

Conformity

Conformity is being predictable so that people can ask for things without coercion. Conformists look at the norm to make decisions for them, so everyone else can look at those norms too. Everyone else can use those standard responses to plan a strategy to get what they want.

If you change yourself to make predictions easier – so that others don’t have to learn anything – it’s easier for them to feel loved. When you admit that someone else can tell you what to do because it makes them feel better, you prove that you’re willing to love and be loved. It’s harder on you, but there’s a certain amount of honor in sacrifice.

Nonconformists aren’t predictable. It’s hard to plan a strategy to make them happy if the wants change capriciously. It’s a little selfish because they don’t sacrifice anything for you – they do what they want and don’t care about your reaction. And it’s hard to give things to people if you constantly wonder if they’ll abandon you.

Conformists don’t abandon people – they stay with the status quo for as long as they possibly can. Nonconformists abandon the things that aren’t working when they think there’s something better beyond the status quo.

Nonconforming means you take a huge risk that your friends won’t follow when you leave the norm behind. It means you might not be able to make new friends because you’ve shown that you’re unlovable. So if you abandon the conspiracy theory for the truth, you risk losing your friends without being able to make new ones.

If the status quo was “we’re friends” and it isn’t working anymore, a nonconformist will just leave. A conformist will stick it out even though it sucks because change is against their nature. It will always suck at some point. No relationship is perfect, so conformity proves the ability to accept imperfections and still maintain the friendship.

Conforming to the rules of the group proves that you’re willing to stick it out even if things get hard. It proves you’re loyal. It proves you’re able to love someone by showing them how to convince you to do stuff. You show them how to do that through long, drawn out conversations – like conspiracy theories.

In conforming, and having those long, drawn out conversations, you allow people to scrutinize your actions and remember things you would rather they forgot. You no longer blend into the crowd – so you’re forced into nonconformity and face the threat of being seen as unlovable.

But in trying to escape the threat, people contort themselves into ridiculously complex facades of what might be accepted, but never is. It’s unbelievably elaborate. It’s a lot simpler to accept that idiosyncrasies happen and there’s no point in showcasing all the places where you’re afraid.

That’s why intimacy is so damn terrifying. You have to combine opposing concepts – conformity and nonconformity, elaborateness and simplicity, fear and fearlessness – without exploding.

Other posts in this series

What’s with the elaborate ruse fetish?

The simple trick to deal with fear

Your way takes an hour, mine takes 40 seconds

How to choose between two opposing sides

Some people aren’t that dumb

How to make people love you

Accusations of fraud aren’t really that bad

How to create a legacy

How to deal with being wrong

How to create freedom

Social Engineering isn’t that hard

How to fit in without losing your soul

Haters gotta hate, poets gotta poetate

The easiest way for Jester-doxers to be heroes