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thomblake comments on Babies and Bunnies: A Caution About Evo-Psych - Less Wrong
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Edit: this comment has been rewritten; please see wnoise's comment below for original context.
I feel that the topic of gender identity is not as important as this discussion and others like it on LW seem to make it. In a text based environment, using pseudonyms, we are genderless until we reveal ourselves. And unless we intend to employ mating signals between posters here, it has little relevance even after it has been revealed.
I have operated for years in communities where the gender of participants is highly relevant, but where there were taboos against attempts to discover true genders (online, text-based roleplaying). In such environments, I've developed a severe lack of concern for the topic at large, and instead read what the person has to say and contribute without a gender filter. Many times, I don't even read the name of a poster except as a pattern that allows me to place the comment in context with those around it.
Alicorn's focus on gender identity has, several times now, generated very large discussion threads and at least one top level post. I do not understand why this is accepted by the rest of the LW community as important and relevant to the topic of rationality.
Questions of appropriate standards for our community are on-topic to a limited extent. If you disagree, please refrain from making comments like this one, on pain of contradiction.
As pointed out by Kevin, this discussion has been had several times before on LW, and community norms should have already been established, in which case continued large threads on the topic are likely unproductive.
I also do not see why contradiction should be painful.
I can't tell if you meant this humorously, so I'll take it as a serious statement of confusion...
"On pain of X" is an idiom in English which roughly means, "or else you will experience X", where X is something bad.
example
I would categorize it as 10 percent humor, 60 percent temporary interest in the vague threat implied by the "don't do this... or else" definition and why that context was appropriate when applied to the topic of contradiction, and 30 percent etymological interest, as I have "on pain of death" as the most-associated thought when hearing the phrase (Google agrees, with that as the top suggestion to complete "on pain of"), and was curious as to how the permutation may have originated.
ETA: I disagree with the sentiment that contradiction is a negative, undesirable, or potentially painful event; instead, I view it as an opportunity to update maps, assuming that the contradiction is supported by the weight of the evidence.
"Pain" in this expression means "penalty". Though I haven't looked it up to confirm, I'm pretty confident the word "pain" itself comes from Latin poena via French peine, meaning just that.
(The first time I heard this idiom, the phrase was "on pain of imprisonment".)