That said, good advice. Mediocre readers are mediocre writers. The reverse is not necessarily true. I've met many fantasy writers (hello Readercon!) who've read every damn series and then proceed to write yet another Tolkienesque knockoff. Their brains are pretty much like overtrained LLMs.
Additionally, the very next sentence is "Joking. I would never say that. But I certainly fucking think it."
Casual obscenity has become so normalized in the culture, you probably feel outraged I'm even bringing it up. Not reading has also become normalized in just the same manner. No one reads if they can at all help it-- not at work, not in parks, not on the commute, and not for writing. Their loss, of course.
We found it because of HN, but his audience - the only one's who's opinion he should give a shit about - are his readers, who presumably know him because of his (according to the article) Raymond Chandler-influenced sci fi. I'm willing to bet those people are not put off by some swearing. :-)
If you are trying to make a living writing you should a) be fucking reading and b) appreciate all the wild and wonderful facets of language.. like using a good cuss word for deliberately over the top emphasis.
Why? Because they do a thing differently from you? I don't see any harm in that, unless they're an obvious grifter. I certainly do see harm in fucking gatekeepers telling other people how to do X, and Y. Why the fuck do you care if they don't read? Because it ruins your holy image of the craft? Let them do their thing and stay out of the way, if reading is truly necessary to writing – they will discover it on their own, or just drop out completely if they never learn.
This many times. A great reader, who reads 52 books a year, and a writer has to resort to cringy "fuck you" to convey his thought.
So you don’t agree with his one golden rule for becoming a better writer?