If you have anger issues, this one is a great tool (h/t mindyourbusiness)
This week’s book:
Discourses and Selected Writings
Disclaimer: I’m not your Supervisor. These are my opinions after reading through these books a few times.
Epictetus was born a slave around 50 ad. His owner was Epaphroditus, a rich freedman who was once a slave of Nero. Though he was a slave Epictetus was sent to study philosophy under Musonius Rufus.
Epictetus was lame and there are some stories it was caused by his master and others that it was caused by disease.
He was a freedman when all philosophers were banished from Rome in 89 by the Emperor Domitian. He then started his school in Greece, and had many students. He did not leave any writings from his lessons, but one of his students, Flavius Arrian, took notes and wrote the Discourses.
Epictetus did not marry, had no children, and lived to be around 80-85. In retirement, he adopted a child that would have been abandoned and raised him with a woman.
He died sometime around AD 135.
He might be my favorite Stoic teacher. I love his bare bones and very straight forward approach.
Following is a paragraph-by-paragraph discussion of one of his lessons. Epictetus’s text appears in bold, my replies are in normal text.
As Epictetus was remarking that man is born to fidelity, and that the man who overthrows this is overthrowing the characteristic quality of man, there entered one who had the reputation of being a scholar, and who had once been caught in the city in the act of adultery.
To be the kind of man I want to be, being faithful to my wife is been a fundamental part of that. If I find out that a person is a cheater, I am not trusting of that person and will not be friends with them. I have lost friends because of this, and I am OK with it. While I did have dirt bags for friends when I was single, after marriage, I was more careful about who I hung out with.
But, goes on Epictetus, if we abandon this fidelity to which we are by nature born, and make designs against our neighbor’s wife, what are we doing? Why, what but ruining and destroying? Whom? The man of fidelity, of self-respect, of piety. Is that all? Are we not overthrowing also neighborly feeling, friendship, the state? In what position are we placing ourselves? As what am I to treat you, fellow? As a neighbor, as a friend? Of what kind? As a citizen? What confidence am I to place in you? If you were a vessel so cracked that it was impossible to use you for anything, you would be cast forth upon the dunghills and even from there no one would pick you up;
This is why I don’t trust cheaters and avoid them. Someone who can lie to the face of their spouse, knowingly destroying their marriage, and it’s worse if kids are involved, in my view are not to be trusted.
5but if, although a man, you cannot fill a man’s place, what are we going to do with you? For, assuming that you cannot hold the place of a friend, can you hold that of a slave? And who is going to trust you? Are you not willing, therefore, that you too should be cast forth upon some dunghill as a useless vessel, as a piece of dung? For all that will you say, “Nobody cares for me, a scholar!”? No, for you are an evil man, and useless. It is just as if the wasps complained that nobody cares for them, but all run away from them, and, if anyone can, he strikes them and knocks them down. You have such a sting that you involve in trouble and pain whomever you strike. What do you want us to do with you? There is no place where you can be put.
Harsh but fair. I don’t care what your worldly job or reputation is, once that line is crossed, you have labelled yourself as a selfish and deceitful person.
What then, you say; are not women by nature common property?[1] I agree. And the little pig is the common property of the invited guests; but when portions have been assigned, if it so pleases you, approach and snatch up the portion of the guest who reclines at your side, steal it secretly, or slip in your hand and glut your greed, and if you cannot tear off a piece of the meat, get your fingers greasy and lick them. A fine companion you would make at a feast, and a dinner-guest worthy of Socrates![2] Come now, is not the theater the common property of the citizens? When, therefore, they are seated there, go, if it so pleases you, and throw someone of them out of his seat. 10In the same way women also are by nature common property.
Greed for that which does not belong to you leads to evil decisions and only causes more pain down the road. I have had people tell me that I shouldn’t judge so harshly because I might end up in the same situation. I would bet my entire small fortune on that never happening to me. 1st: my wife and I are still happy after 29 years, 2nd: I would not do that to her, 3rd: I can see no situation where cheating would improve it.
But when the law-giver, like a host at a banquet, has apportioned them, are you not willing like the rest to look for your own portion instead of filching away and glutting your greed upon that which is another’s? “But I am a scholar and understand Archedemus.”[3] Very well then, understand Archedemus and be an adulterer and faithless and a wolf or an ape instead of a man; for what is there to prevent you?
Even the people in unhappy marriages are not exempt from this. While Epictetus does not go into the marriage situation of the adulterer, to me that is not an excuse. 1st thing should be to try to fix the relationship, barring abuse or infidelity on the other end. If that is truly impossible, divorce would be a better option than cheating.
I know I’m a judgemental asshole, but I’m OK with it.
Music this week is from Iron Maiden’s Seventh Son of a Seventh Son. This was the first Maiden CD that I bought, all the others were albums or cassettes.
1st song is excellent, Moonchild
This tour was the first time I saw them live, 16 year old me was a huge Maiden fan and 52 year old me still really like them.
To me this is the last true Iron Maiden album, the later albums still have good songs here and there, but no more really strong albums.
This one and all the ones before it I can listen front to back without skipping any, but not so much after this.
OT & too local – someone better be stoic, their combine harvester is on fire. I have quite the view of my deck.
Do they grow peppers?
Stoic and hopefully heavily insured.
Interesting topic, this week I had two marriage-related things happen with some in-laws.
Thing 1, just found out the wife’s cousin and her husband are divorcing over his infidelity. Apparently it was multiple women and a few weeks later, he’s already dating a third woman. They are younger, about 35, with one kid in middle school.
Thing 2, another cousin is recently divorced and dating, and said she’s meeting someone Sunday who is in a “polyamorous” marriage. I told her it sounds sketchy and no matter what they say, that situation never works out long term. But I guess we’ll see.
Sounds Spciy.
Next you’ll tell us that the guy the other cousin is seeing is the Husband of wife’s cousin…
“I am my own grandpa. ”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDrsiGw1FIw
The divorce situation is on the QT, and the second cousin doesn’t know about it. So it is entirely possible. That did cross my mind.
I wouldn’t have the energy for that if I wanted to. Reminds me of a good joke:
A son decided he would hire a prostitute to entertain his dad, who was living out his final years in a home.
The prostitute goes up to the old man’s apartment, knocks on the door and the old man answers.
The prostitute puts one leg up on the door sill, stares the old man in the eyes and says “I’m here to give you super sex!”
The old man looks at her for a minute, then says “I’ll take the soup.”
Heh
I’ve known a couple of groups that have been able to keep a poly relationship going for over a decade at this point. It is possible, but it also isn’t easy.
I’ve known two women in separate polyamorous groupings who claim/ed to have done it well and for decades.
Okay. If you say so.
You are right about #2. Monogamous marriages in our culture exist for a reason. Polyamory doesn’t work out well and leaves people feeling empty.
BAD IDEA.
I think it can work for a precious few. I don’t understand it but that doesn’t mean it’s not possible. It’s like anything else you can put on the Bell curve.
*shrugs*
That is just my two cents. Other people’s sex lives are none of my business anyway.
No, but I’ll still judge in the privacy of my mind the husband of Thing 1 as an asshole. Especially with a kid. Keep it in your pants, and stay in the marriage for your kid’s sake, fuckwit.
I’m old school when it comes to social mores, I know.
I am an old schooler myself. Mantra drilled into me since I was old enough to talk —> “A man is only as good as his word”
I gave my word and I have kept it for 30 years. If I get to keep it another 30 it won’t be long enough to suit me.
I even let the Mrs. control the TV. I sit through endless Perry Masons, Walker Texas Ranger, Law and Order, etc.
I just smile and let her have her way.
Walker is on right now….brace yourselves….Walker’s DA girlfriend has been kidnapped by the villain.
I swear that silly thing gets kidnapped on a weekly basis. I am not sure there are any episodes wherein she is not kidnapped. That need to put a tracker of some kind on that girl.
I told her it sounds sketchy and no matter what they say, that situation never works out long term. But I guess we’ll see.
She can always sell her tales of getting railed by dozens of strangers to the Daily mail.
That usually includes $10k a month income from OnlyFans, IIRC.
Thank you Ron, for keeping us all Stoic.
I shall remain so as I drive my brother to go see my mom in Shreveport this weekend. All I was is rest, but I know this is something I should do. So I must remain calm and do it, and socialize when all I want is to clean up my house post-Halloween and nap.
Speaking of infidelity…
Big news; Bezos is abandoning Seattle for Miami. Must be for the weather.
Wow I didn’t expect him to be racist and transphobic. We all know Florida is pretty much the antebellum south.
He won’t be allowed to say “gay” any longer.
Washington passed a capital gains tax and the fucktard State Supreme Court is going to let it fly despite a constitutional ban on income taxes.
What then, you say; are not women by nature common property?
*scratches head, wanders off*
OT: DeSantis says he will imitate a famous Libertarian.
https://justthenews.com/politics-policy/desantis-vows-wear-boot-head-if-trump-will-debate-him
“Babylon Bee’s Ashley St. Clair posted a satirical video of herself putting on thigh-high boots.”
The perfect woman may not exist, but Ashley St. Clair comes close.
Sadly that page is down.
Yesterday I learned that humans are not the only species that practices sexual bondage.
With certain species of spiders, the male will tie up the female before depositing his sperm, primarily to avoid being killed and eaten by the female after the act is completed.
This revelation disturbed me way more than I thought it would.
Why? It’s a survival mechanism. The uneaten male will be able to go on to father more offspring later.
Or did you not realize a lot of she-spiders are vicious cannibals?
No, that much I knew.
I wonder about the long-term population benefits of male spider survives to father more offspring versus female spider gets a much-needed meal and is more likely to give birth to healthy baby spiders…
You will have more descendants from the males who avoid being eaten as a proportion of the population, so the behavior will propigate.
Logged in. Write big-ass comment. Hit REPLY. “Sorry, you must be logged in to comment.” Hit BACK. Comment gone.
Conventional wisdom is If you write a long comment, make a copy of it before hitting the button.
A lot of us get bit by wordpress… umm… proclivities.
If you find out where that comment went please let me know. I have dozens of meticulously researched and carefully worded comments residing there.
All of us are dumber than any of us
The billionaire technology leader, who is CEO of Tesla, SpaceX and CTO and executive chairman of X, formerly known as Twitter, and owner of the newly formed AI startup xAI, said late Thursday that AI will have the potential to become the “most disruptive force in history.”
“We will have something that is, for the first time smarter than the smartest human,” Musk said at an event at Lancaster House, an official U.K. government residence.
“It’s hard to say exactly what that moment is, but there will come a point where no job is needed,” Musk continued, speaking alongside British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. “You can have a job if you wanted to have a job for personal satisfaction. But the AI would be able to do everything.”
The world needs ditchdiggers, too.
Ahem.
You couldn’t even teach a car to drive.
Define ‘smart’.
“Kill all humans.”
Yikes. That went wrong.
That was the robots giving you a warning.
It’s like anything else you can put on the Bell curve.
The outliers will always be with us.
I could have used some stoicism earlier this week. There was a public meeting for a housing development near me that the local NIMBYs want to stop. My position is that I don’t own the land, it’s been zoned for housing since the 70s, the owners want to build, it’s not my business. The spot where my home is now was once owned by the same people The owners have made the mistake of not fencing in the land, so people have been using it for hiking and biking, myself included, which makes them think they are entitled to block the development. No good deed goes unpunished.
There was an asshole environmentalist from a “responsible growth” (aka no growth) group, who constantly interrupted wondering why the city hadn’t hired his pet company to do the environmental impact report, which probably would have given the results he wanted, wink wink nudge nudge. He had previously gone to the news saying the owners of the land are old and must not know the situation, they maybe are being financially abused, and someone really should do a welfare check on them. That’s made the owners dig in there heals and not want to sell to the city.
There was an upper class Russian gopnik, complete with bald head, Adidas pants, sandals and colored socks, but a nice sweater, who suggested rezoning the land so it’s not worth so much and the owners would have little choice but to sell. At least he sat in his seat rather than squatting in the aisle.
There was Foghorn Leghorn drug dealer (a pharma sales rep) who bloviated about oil that seeps up from the ground and will cause all kinds of trouble, and that there have been oil spills in the past and how are they going to mitigate that? We do indeed have oil, but the seepage is nothing like a spill. It’s more like a sheen on the surface of the creek every now and then. The neighborhood isn’t going to blow up.
There was an entitled parent who complained that he likes to go on walks on the land with his kids, and why can’t they just stop the project? He must have missed the part where the guy from the city said that would constitute a taking. I finally lost my patience and said, “You don’t own the land. You’ve been using it for free. Buy it if you feel so strongly.” He obviously didn’t like that idea.
The hypocrisy, deviousness and entitlement makes me sick, and many of them are my friends and neighbors. Yet they probably think they are the good guys and they wonder why housing is so expensive. I’m so glad that nobody was around to complain when our homes were built.
The only persons that should have been at that ‘meeting’ are the persons who pay the property taxes on that land. Period.
Yeah, the property tax thing bothers me too. It’s not just that the complainers don’t own the land, they haven’t been paying property taxes on it over the years. Granted, it’s been in their family for over 100 years, so with Prop 13 the tax is probably close to zero, but still.
Property Tax is always on my mind *comment sung to the tune ‘you were always on my mind’*
Be very happy it isn’t in the UK, where there’s the “right to roam”.
68 million pommeys living on and island barely larger than my state of Louisiana. That causes all kinds of social, legal and political pressures that most Americans would find intolerable. I know I would find that unacceptable.
When I grew up we kind of had an unwritten right to roam. There were few people and lots of empty land. People that posted their property were frowned upon.
Those conditions are gone now. Between increased population and the increased litigiousness of our society those heady days of hunting where you please are gone. All land is considered posted unless one has permission, you cant sue someone if you are committing a crime (trespassing) and the only people that can hunt are private owners on their own property or members of paid hunting clubs that lease land.
Hopefully not in my lifetime but the time will come when people start agitating for a right to roam here.
I kind of wish we had the right to roam, but I understand why we don’t. If I were a land owner I wouldn’t want to face a lawsuit from someone who got injured on my land, and I wouldn’t want environmentalists trying to find an endangered specie so they can tell me what to do with my land.
“Tresspassers Will Be Shot”
There was an asshole environmentalist from a “responsible growth” (aka no growth) group
Responsible use just happens to coincide with my preferences.
Others here have linked to Puddles Pity Party videos before, but I never expected to see him show up at a reunion show for a band that broke up 20 years ago.
I have seen lots of his videos and never realized that that guy is a freakin’ giant.
I don’t know how people do adultery. Besides the morality of it eating me from the inside, I’m busy enough in my life without adding dating and covering up the dating to my plate. Sounds exhausting.
I didn’t before and now I have kids, and I *REALLY REALLY* don’t get it.
I understand it in principle. Some people have an emptiness inside they are trying to fill and dont realize that it can never be filled by someone else, but they try. It almost always ends disastrously, then they have a wrecked marriage and home and they still have that emptiness.
I find it sad.
No shit. Careful cost/benefit calculation says NO.
I have one at home already and one is all I can handle.
Agreed. I’d rather clean the garage, or smoke a brisket. These are productive things that make me feel good long-term.
I’ve been taking lots of Lyft and Uber these past 4 weeks post-accident. Well over 3/4 of the drivers have traditionally Muslim names.
Most are friendly and helpful, a couple just strictly neutral& silent.
But yesterday I had an Uber driver who had Arabic news radio, fairly high volume, with the sound of automatic gun fire in the background. I could pick out the words Hamas and Israel.
As a customer, I’d prefer quiet music or silence to any talk radio, but especially radio in a foreign language about controversial ongoing events seems completely inappropriate for a ride share driver.
I did not tip.
I also would like a hair stylist to not talk to me.
+1 massage therapist
+1 dentist. WHY do they talk to you when they’ve got their hands buried in your mouth???
“Nobody else will listen to me.”?
The two of us sound like Andy Rooney right now and I love it.
OT — *love* the new avatar!
I second that.
Oooooh, husband just won tickets to see TSO next month!
TSO?
Trans-Siberian Orchestra.
Jealous have fun!
Transportation Safety Office?
Tranny Selection Organization?
Mostly famous for this gem: https://youtu.be/MHioIlbnS_A?si=ikLE2t0kh1jJbyLA
Very nice. That should be a blast.
Music…I have been listening to this chick lately
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Io3UU9YeLn4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OflpWQCPQOw
Brain fart 1: Almost all of the music I listen to have female vocalists. I think there are studies showing that men exposed to women…sight of them, smell of them, sound of their voices etc. in general have much better mental health than those men who are not.
No shit. If it weren’t for women what would the point of us even being here be? That is what we men are…companions, providers and protectors for women. That is our only real job. Take that away and we might as well all crawl off into ditches and die.
Brain fart 2: My father and I stopped at a convenience store near my home recently. After we left he said “Those girls sure seem sweet on you”
Me: “No. I am just the only guy who is polite to them, doesn’t ogle them and doesn’t make passes at them. They have commented to that effect before. They like me, that is all. ”
I am not blind and I am not dead but I am married.
Great voice and even better face.
Best possible Christmas show. Have fun!
Been to one, years ago. Very good show. I wish they’d do the whole Carmina Burana instead of just O Fortuna.
Tactical Sports Orange
Good afternoon all,
I’ve got one more meeting to end my week, of course it’s at 4:00.
Then i’m out. Rockets are Red kind of day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Na3Vwas8U3o
From above: “No, but I’ll still judge in the privacy of my mind the husband of Thing 1 as an asshole.”
I’m close to the people involved and I like the guy, but you are 100% correct. He is being an asshole. He’s like mid 30’s so this sounds like a midlife crisis. My SIL predicts he’ll sow his wild oats for a while, then realize what he lost and come back. But it will be too late.
Agreed on both counts. The old ‘ I realize what I lost’ story. I have seen that many times. I have seen them taken back only to get caught cheating again and I have seen them have doors slammed in their faces. The rejectors usually go on to have a new happy life and the taker-backers usually regret it.
I have never seen one taken back and they lived happily ever after.
When Mrs. Suthenboy and I were to be married a lot of people warned us that they thought it was a bad idea. She is 10 years older than I am, she was religious, I am not, and so on with a hundred other reasons. Our respective acquaintances knew we were good marriage material and their envy made them not want us to be successful, I guess.
Every single one of those people are divorced now. Every one of them.