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Viliam_Bur comments on Guardians of the Gene Pool - Less Wrong
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Is that an actual question, or an oblique way of suggesting that the thesis of "Well tended gardens die by pacifism" is promoting a form of Truth-Guardianism, and therefore contradicts the thesis of "Guardians of the Truth", and therefore perhaps both theses are flawed?
If it's the latter: yes, yes, very clever.
Assuming charitably that it's the former, my two cents about how they relate:
WTGDBF predicts that where local community norms N1 differ from global norms N2 there's a tendency for N2 to displace N1 whenever the local community interacts with the larger world, and suggests that if I consider N1 superior to N2 I have a moral responsibility to counteract this tendency, which sometimes requires violating N2.
GOTT suggests that certain norms which involve punishing attempts to challenge or question certain ideas regardless of how novel, well-formed, or carefully reasoned those challenges/questions are, are bad for communities that embrace them, despite being well-protected from outside norms.
Combining the two suggests that when I choose to defend my local community norms against corruption by outside norms, I also have a moral responsibility to be right about the superiority of my community's norms.
There is some difference between group ideas and group norms, although sometimes these two overlap. There is also a difference between challenging group ideas, and breaking group norms.
An example of a group idea: "It is reasonable to give million dollars to an organization that will freeze your head when you die, because someone might scan your brain and make a machine simulation of you, and it will be really you."
An example of a group norm: "We should refrain from political examples, personal attacks, irrational arguments, etc."
An example of challenging a group idea: "I think the machine simulation is not really you. Even if it is 'alive', it is a new life form; and your old self is dead."
An example of breaking group norms: "This is so stupid!!! I guess you have also voted for [political party]!"
Sometimes these two things can be confused. For example it can be a group norm to never challenge group ideas (or to limit challenging them to ways that have no chance to succeed). This should not happen. On the other hand, it is also very frequent to obviously break group norms and then complain about group's intolerance to challenging its ideas -- this is a typical pattern for many internet trolls, and the community should be able to recognize it.
An example: "Cryonics does not work, f*** you!" "Downvoted for swearing." "You just downvote me because I disagree with you, f*** you!"
Yes, agreed with all of this. Though as you suggest, the two can overlap. "Give million dollars to an organization that will freeze your head when you die" can become a group norm, and "refrain from political examples, personal attacks, irrational arguments, etc." can be a group idea. And as you say, it is common for one to be confused for the other, sometimes deliberately for rhetorical effect.
Also sometimes the group's norms are as problematic as its ideas; e.g. KKK, Nazis.
But usually the norms are not too bad, it's just the ideas that are ridiculous (moderate religion in a nutshell). So it definitely makes sense to make a distinction for practical purposes.