headings in org-mode: unexpected behavior

Question

Recently, I started experiencing unexpected behavior when editing org-mode files.

Suppose I have two headings, with _ indicating the cursor position.

* Heading
*_
** Subheading

I want to insert a new subheading before the existing one. So I now press * to get a second asterisk. But I don't get a second *. Instead, one of the asterisks from the existing subheading on the line below disappears! Then I press * again, and now the asterisk reappears! Now I press * for a third time, and I finally get the second asterisk on the new heading that I want to insert. So I press space to give it a title, only to find that I now have four asterisks! Like this:

* Heading
**** _ 
** Subheading

I find this behavior extremely annoying and have no idea how it is supposed to be helpful or what purpose it serves. I don't think I changed anything in my setup, so it might have been enabled by an update. I want to turn it off, but I can't find the relevant variable (meaning I don't even know what to search for). Does anyone know how to turn this "feature" off?

Answer 1

EDIT:

I found this is a known bug in org-mode. The problem is setting org-hide-emphasis-markers to t. Once it's set back to nil (the default), the problem goes away. It is because org tries to hide the strong emphasis marker, **.

I reported my finding to the org mailing list.