Resource A Stoic Defense Against Pro-Life Rhetoric (and Other Stoic Quotes on Death and Suicide!)

[GoodPersonEffed]

Epicurus II to Menoeceus, Greetings.

One should not believe that at a young age, it is too early to learn to die, nor should one renounce to learn to die at an older age. Because it is never too early or too late to walk towards true serenity. Now, he who would claim that the hour of learning to die has not arrived yet or has passed for him, may be compared to a Man who would say that the hour of no longer being afraid to die has not arrived yet or is no longer there for him. The young man and the old man, both must therefore learn to die; the latter to rejuvenate through the contact with the serenity that comes from the certainty of dying gently, remembering the pleasant days of the past; the former to fully enjoy his youthfulness, without missing the party of a lifetime because of the fear of death. And so, it is necessary to meditate upon the means which can allow us to die gently, for when these means are ours, there is nothing frightening about dying, whereas when they are lacking, we risk dying in long lasting pain.

(...)

Hey, @Alucard, I didn't create this thread for you to advertise what you did there by getting creative with Epicurus, who was not a Stoic, and which you've already posted multiple times on the forum. Please bring value to the thread by relating your work to the Stoic discussion established in the title and the OP, or pay me for the space you took for advertising.

 

[Alucard]

Moral letters to Lucilius/Letter 70 - Wikisource, the free online library

en.wikisource.org

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

Deleted my comment.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

Revisiting a portion of a quote I previously shared on this thread:

The best thing which eternal law ever ordained was that it allowed to us one entrance into life, but many exits. Must I await the cruelty either of disease or of man, when I can depart through the midst of torture, and shake off my troubles?

- Seneca


If only the act of suicide were as easy as shaking off troubles! If only there were peaceful methods that were safe and reasonable to obtain, without undue risk of being harmed by predators who can provide or block access to them, or having to jump through very narrow hoops to both be able to afford and to be accepted for assisted suicide.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

@OrangeJuiceCabal, I was following the thread "Death to Liberate" and wanted to engage with you in the discussion. However, I did not want to take the focus from the thread and turn it into a focus about your position and appeals. Out of respect for @PDAnnie2610 and the conversation which she created for her own purposes, I thought to engage you in a different space that is already focused on arguments you introduced in @PDAnnie2610's thread.

I note that the title of this thread may seem combative and create a kind of arena. When I created the thread, not anticipating such a dialogue would be possibe as the one in which you introduced in the other thread, the title I chose was the starting point, a basis from which to explore the rationality of death and suicide from a particular perspective devoted to logic and reason. Since many of your appeals are based on claims of logic, I thought it would be appropriate to discuss them here. I invite you, not to an arena to fight to the...death (a little humor, and good will), but to engage in logical, non-combative debate.

Assuming you agree, I wll proceed. If you do not wish to engage here, there may still be dialogue with others who read and wish to engage.

A quick note to all, as others may engage: I ask that any dialogue in this thread be respectful, and non-negating of any person or beliefs, lest it be done in return, which is not welcome in this thread. Disrespect and negation do not resolve anything, end anything, or improve anything, they only encourage and feed and enmity and cause fires. If anything is to be knocked down, it is an argument, and argument only. Others are to be respected, whether one agrees with them and their viewpoints or not. If any chooses to override this in commenting, I will report it to the mods for derailing and flaming. If you feel incensed, combative, defensive, etc., I suggest you create another thread to get it out; I do not force you to keep it in, but it does not fit here. Go make your own arena and battle there. Capisch?



@OrangeJuiceCabal, in the following, I have quoted specific assertions you made and responded to them. This is the text of your original comment in its entirety, lest it seems I am selecting only certain things and omitting any relevant context. For anyone reading who wants the entire picture, they can click the link and read the conversation in which the original comment was included.

it is not possible liberation can involve killing oneself and any sort of true liberation would have to come from actions within life, not death.

The universality of your assertion makes it both arguable and disprovable. If I may...

Consider if you would the following perspectives:

An African village in the 1600s is ambushed. Those who are old and infirm are murdered. All others are kidnapped and sold into slavery. Many will die in the harsh conditions of transport. Of those who live, the women will be particularly vulnerable, subject not only to work, but to rape, and to be forced to produced children to be slaves. There are rumors of what has happened in other villages, of what has happened at the shores from which the kidnapped departed. Moments before the ambush, you arrive. You meet a woman in the village. She knows the stories. The ambush begins. She has the option to kill herself to avoid fate. Do you attempt to convince her that any sort of true liberation would have to come from acts within life and not death? Suddenly, you become her. All hope for freedom within life is lost. Torture and suffering are certain. Does death look like freedom yet, or are you still convinced for yourself that any sort of true liberation from the situation would have to come from actions within life and not death? In this moment, everything freezes, and you are able to consider the situation. It would helpful if you had someone talk to and support you while you make your terrible choice. You have two options as to who would best serve you: someone who takes a pro-life stance and pushes you to live, or someone who takes a pro-choice stance and supports you in determining what is best for yourself?

A plane crashes into the World Trade Center. In the restaurant on the top floor, there is a fire. All escape routes leading to safety are blocked. The people in the restaurant do not yet know what has happened, only that it is major, that there is fire, and there is no escape. Do you attempt to convince them to not jump from the windows because any sort of true liberation from their situation would have to come from acts within life and not death?

liberation can't be a single and isolated event because that would render the term useless.

In such situations as noted above, is the term liberation when applied to suicide still useless?

For many people, life is torture. It is not irrationality or mental illness (as you asserted in the full text of your comment) that makes the option of suicide to end torture appear but or seem valid. It is violence and/or oppression, combined with a lack of available, accessible, and effective internal or external resources that creates the need to get free of enslaving and soul-killing situations. Until you are one of those people, experience the situation, know the totality of it, and know the external limitations as well as the certain, how can you determine for them from your removed and unengaged stance that liberation lies within life and not death? How can you determine for another what is untenable, what is resolvable, and what liberation means?

We're not really forced to live, we chose to not die (for the most part, because it's a bad choice and regardless of morality is illogical).

I respectfully note that in your claim there is an appeal to unity: we. I respectfully untangle that unity. For now, you and certain others choose to not die, because of the reasons you stated, and that is your we. It is not universal, and I know this because not everyone makes the same choice, otherwise there would be no contemporary acts of suicide.

Now that this is untangled, are you open to considering two arguments which assert that dying is logical? As a point of comparison, many people who adhere to any religion are closed to hearing other points of view which make shake their faith, their certainty, they are wedded to it, they adhere to it, and there is no room for anything else to enter. You claim to be speaking from a place of logic, not of faith or belief, therefore I approach your logic with opposing logic and respectfully challenge you to consider if your own can still stand firm and totally unchanged, without relying on any social ideology that makes one "feel good," feel "good," and feel "right":

The Stoics likened life to a party, and determined there were five reasons to rationally exit the party (suicide):

1. In service of one's country, i.e., an old friend shows up to the party and requires your services.

2. The arrival of rowdy revelers, i.e., tyrants who force us against our will to say or do disgraceful things at the party.

3. Protracted illness that prevents the soul from the use of its tool, the body, i.e., spoilage of provisions for the party.

4. Poverty, i.e., scarceness of party provisions.

5. Madness, i.e., drunkenness at the party. In Buddhist terms, intoxicants lower one's inhibitions against doing no harm to others and, by default, to the self. In Stoic terms, this equates to lowering the inhibitions put in place by practicing virtue. According to Epictetus, the purpose of practicing virtue is for life to flow more smoothly, and as social animals, virtues directly impact our interactions with others. This agrees with the purpose of the Five Precepts of Buddhism, considered gifts to others for the good of social order (no killing, no stealing, no lying, no sexual misconduct, no intoxicants).



Source: Griffin, Miriam. "Philosophy, Cato, and Roman Suicide I," Greece and Rome, vol. 33, no. 1, 1986, pp. 64-77. Original source cited by Griffin, Stoicorum Veterum Fragmenta, a 1903-1905 collection by Hans von Arnim of fragments and testimony of the earlier Stoics. The Buddhist/Stoic commentary under madness is mine.

The source article and article II by Griffin are available for free online viewing at JSTOR.

You can find men who have gone so far as to profess wisdom and yet maintain that one should not offer violence to one's own life, and hold it accursed for a man to be the means of his own destruction; we should wait, say they, for the end decreed by nature. But one who says this does not see that he is shutting off the path to freedom. The best thing which eternal law ever ordained was that it allowed to us one entrance into life, but many exits. Must I await the cruelty either of disease or of man, when I can depart through the midst of torture, and shake off my troubles? This is the one reason why we cannot complain of life; it keeps no one against his will.

From Moral letters to Lucilius by Seneca, Letter 70

I respectfully look forward to your respectful response, should you choose to respond.

 

[Alucard]

"Reason, too, advises us to die, if we may, according to our taste [sans douleur] ; if this cannot be, she advises us to die according to our ability, and to seize upon whatever means shall offer itself for doing violence to ourselves. It is criminal to "live by robbery";[12] but, on the other hand, it is most noble to "die by robbery." Farewell." Seneca to Lucilius (Letter 70)

 

[PDAnnie2610]

If living brings about huge pain and one is trapped in life filled with pain, then death does liberate one from pain.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

@OrangeJuiceCabal, I was following the thread "Death to Liberate" and wanted to engage with you in the discussion. However, I did not want to take the focus from the thread and turn it into a focus about your position and appeals. Out of respect for @PDAnnie2610 and the conversation which she created for her own purposes, I thought to engage you in a different space that is already focused on arguments you introduced in @PDAnnie2610's thread.

I note that the title of this thread may seem combative and create a kind of arena. When I created the thread, not anticipating such a dialogue would be possibe as the one in which you introduced in the other thread, the title I chose was the starting point, a basis from which to explore the rationality of death and suicide from a particular perspective devoted to logic and reason. Since many of your appeals are based on claims of logic, I thought it would be appropriate to discuss them here. I invite you, not to an arena to fight to the...death (a little humor, and good will), but to engage in logical, non-combative debate.

Assuming you agree, I wll proceed. If you do not wish to engage here, there may still be dialogue with others who read and wish to engage.

A quick note to all, as others may engage: I ask that any dialogue in this thread be respectful, and non-negating of any person or beliefs, lest it be done in return, which is not welcome in this thread. Disrespect and negation do not resolve anything, end anything, or improve anything, they only encourage and feed and enmity and cause fires. If anything is to be knocked down, it is an argument, and argument only. Others are to be respected, whether one agrees with them and their viewpoints or not. If any chooses to override this in commenting, I will report it to the mods for derailing and flaming. If you feel incensed, combative, defensive, etc., I suggest you create another thread to get it out; I do not force you to keep it in, but it does not fit here. Go make your own arena and battle there. Capisch?



@OrangeJuiceCabal, in the following, I have quoted specific assertions you made and responded to them. This is the text of your original comment in its entirety, lest it seems I am selecting only certain things and omitting any relevant context. For anyone reading who wants the entire picture, they can click the link and read the conversation in which the original comment was included.




The universality of your assertion makes it both arguable and disprovable. If I may...

Consider if you would the following perspectives:

An African village in the 1600s is ambushed. Those who are old and infirm are murdered. All others are kidnapped and sold into slavery. Many will die in the harsh conditions of transport. Of those who live, the women will be particularly vulnerable, subject not only to work, but to rape, and to be forced to produced children to be slaves. There are rumors of what has happened in other villages, of what has happened at the shores from which the kidnapped departed. Moments before the ambush, you arrive. You meet a woman in the village. She knows the stories. The ambush begins. She has the option to kill herself to avoid fate. Do you attempt to convince her that any sort of true liberation would have to come from acts within life and not death? Suddenly, you become her. All hope for freedom within life is lost. Torture and suffering are certain. Does death look like freedom yet, or are you still convinced for yourself that any sort of true liberation from the situation would have to come from actions within life and not death? In this moment, everything freezes, and you are able to consider the situation. It would helpful if you had someone talk to and support you while you make your terrible choice. You have two options as to who would best serve you: someone who takes a pro-life stance and pushes you to live, or someone who takes a pro-choice stance and supports you in determining what is best for yourself?

A plane crashes into the World Trade Center. In the restaurant on the top floor, there is a fire. All escape routes leading to safety are blocked. The people in the restaurant do not yet know what has happened, only that it is major, that there is fire, and there is no escape. Do you attempt to convince them to not jump from the windows because any sort of true liberation from their situation would have to come from acts within life and not death?



In such situations as noted above, is the term liberation when applied to suicide still useless?

For many people, life is torture. It is not irrationality or mental illness (as you asserted in the full text of your comment) that makes the option of suicide to end torture appear but or seem valid. It is violence and/or oppression, combined with a lack of available, accessible, and effective internal or external resources that creates the need to get free of enslaving and soul-killing situations. Until you are one of those people, experience the situation, know the totality of it, and know the external limitations as well as the certain, how can you determine for them from your removed and unengaged stance that liberation lies within life and not death? How can you determine for another what is untenable, what is resolvable, and what liberation means?




I respectfully note that in your claim there is an appeal to unity: we. I respectfully untangle that unity. For now, you and certain others choose to not die, because of the reasons you stated, and that is your we. It is not universal, and I know this because not everyone makes the same choice, otherwise there would be no contemporary acts of suicide.

Now that this is untangled, are you open to considering two arguments which assert that dying is logical? As a point of comparison, many people who adhere to any religion are closed to hearing other points of view which make shake their faith, their certainty, they are wedded to it, they adhere to it, and there is no room for anything else to enter. You claim to be speaking from a place of logic, not of faith or belief, therefore I approach your logic with opposing logic and respectfully challenge you to consider if your own can still stand firm and totally unchanged, without relying on any social ideology that makes one "feel good," feel "good," and feel "right":





I respectfully look forward to your respectful response, should you choose to respond.

Well, @OrangeJuiceCabal has been logged on since I posted. I note at the beginning of the comment that I quoted and tried to engage in respectful dialogue, s/he said:

I hope I don't sound too combative, but I want to try and explore the notion and maybe even dissuade people the best I can.

I guess s/he doesn't seek a dialogue, just an agenda to dissuade. His/her signature may hint at that: "Winning! And we will win"

Bummer. I've always treated the pro-life folks with compassion and respect. I did so with this person, too. But I can't make them receive what they don't want, and I accept and respect that. Would that they comprehended and respected others as well.


Just in case mods are interested...

@Hasssssuùuu
@RainAndSadness
@Meretlein
@angel-of-the-night

 

[OrangeJuiceCabal]

I'm sorry I took some time to respond, this is not the only place in which I write long things and I have a sort of queue where I will denote my wonderful writing to (obvious sarcasm; I hardly passed English). I had read your post when I logged on but did not want to respond on my phone since it is very slow to type on there and I would much prefer to use my laptop when I had the opportunity, which I do now. Unfortunately you were bit more hostile than I expected in your recent post, which is ironic that you mentioned "respectfully" several times but now claim I am promoting some sort of agenda without any recievance of criticism, and then find it necessary to take moderator action against me (which is oddly not a very "respectful" discussion tactic). It's not that I don't want to discuss it, it is that I simply did not have the time or wanted to plan a part of my day around getting my laptop out to debate people on a suicide forum. When you inevitably respond since you have vested a lot of interest here (and for some reason are confident other people do to) I will be more hasty in my third response.

But I can't make them receive what they don't want, and I accept and respect that.

No, that is not it, I am not pro-life because I am religious nor because I have lost someone, I am pro-life because I think it is... in the generic sense, good. I am very familiar with stoicism and was not scared away (or... why ever else you thought I delayed in responding) by old philosophy.

Regardless of meta-discussion, I will present my case against your stoicism now, and, since this is a separate thread that has little to do with "liberation" as a central topic, will not limit my disagreements specifically to that.

So, let us begin, and hopefully the moderators will not be interested in doing administrative things to me



Your first point is what you can find here:

An African village in the 1600s is ambushed.

And your second example is very similar, it is based off pain being a justifiable factor for suicide, however it seems rather irrelevant since the individual will know they will die and one method is estimated by the victim to be less painful, so I will mostly focus on the more pressing example, the former. Myself and I would think most people would agree that this is an acceptable case for voluntary death. However, there are 2 glaring differences between that (what I will refer to as the African example out of simplicity since it was the first noun mentioned) and say some depressed teen on this forum who has chose to "ctb" is 2 things, and of which I will try and guess a bit what you might say (if necessary):
1 - magnitude of pain
2 - opportunity to alleviate pain
2.5 - suicide as a characteristic of mental disorder

Point 1 is a bit tricky because we know we can't measure pain. People who want to die are experiencing pain. A lot of it, and I nor anyone else can decide if someone being raped is more painful than a suicidal individual with likely mental disorders. I can assume most if not all suicidal people would chose to not be raped in an African slave birth factory (although this method cannot be applied to the second example as it results in death when I'm trying to argue in extension of life) nor anything remotely similar to that situation, so we have a guess that this is a poor example because the magnitude of pain is much different.

Point 2 is much stronger (in my opinion, of course). In the African example there is no chance for escape. Usually and almost always this is not true regarding modern suicide. Most people are in pain and think there is no option other than death, which they don't actually know because they almost always never get help (or get incorrect help, such as a bad counselor). And furthermore, this opportunity to recover is expanded if you see suicide as a characteristic of mental disorder. I imagine right then when you saw that you assumed I am saying suicide is a mental disorder. I am not, because I don't know. I'm sure there are strong arguments for and against but I find this irrelevant (I am a mere amateur psychologist and am not very well-read in academic studies on the matter). What matters is there is a very strong correlation between suicide and mental illness which makes it irrelevant whether suicide is a mental illness itself or not (and I have used disorder and illness interchangeably, which would probably be shunned in the academic world, but I think you understand what I mean), what more matters is where there is suicidal tendencies there is most likely a treatable mental disorder. Because of that, it is safe to assume we, as a government and society, can make efforts to alleviate this pain by addressing common mental disorders present in suicidal individuals.
Some citations:
This study is well cited and claims 95% of successful attempts have a mental illness, but I cannot find where it cites this in particular so take it with a grain of salt
This is a much more through Dutch compilation of studies and says individuals are 8x to commit suicide with them
And finally this study gives us our "over 90%" fact, which for the sake of the quality of the report I will let you click the citation within it itself

So because:
1 - pain is not as strong in suicidal people as your example
2 - pain is most likely mitigable/cured with treatment of underlying mental conditions
I see no reason to generally oppose suicide and promote life without either more analogies or attacking my criticism of your examples



Point 2, broken up:

It is not irrationality or mental illness (as you asserted in the full text of your comment) that makes the option of suicide to end torture appear but or seem valid.

Irrationality is less important than the undeniable correlation with mental illness. So since I addressed this phenomena and logic in my previous paragraph I will just await your response.

It is violence and/or oppression, combined with a lack of available, accessible, and effective internal or external resources that creates the need to get free of enslaving and soul-killing situations.

I agree the lack and ineffectiveness is a problem. However, this is a solvable problem, say a government spent 5% of their GDP (ignore the practicality of this much money on psychiatry, the important part is there is a conceivable solution) treating mental illnesses this would drastically increase all of the above and we'd likely see an equally drastic drop in suicide rates. The problem of incentivizing these resources is also a problem, and probably even more tricky. I think if there is more pro-life sentiment (on rational grounds) this could help.

Until you are one of those people, experience the situation, know the totality of it, and know the external limitations as well as the certain, how can you determine for them from your removed and unengaged stance that liberation lies within life and not death?

I addressed the "we can't measure pain" problem earlier, however I think I ruled out the African example.

How can you determine for another what is untenable, what is resolvable, and what liberation means?

untenable, what is resolvable

I can't, but I can determine their suffering is most likely due to an underlying and treatable mental illness

and what liberation means?

I can guess liberation means freedom from suffering, or ataraxia. This is a subjective meaning, however, I am certain, as was my main thesis previously, that destroying your freedom is not liberation, and instead curing of pain is



Point 3:

For now, you and certain others choose to not die, because of the reasons you stated, and that is your we. It is not universal, and I know this because not everyone makes the same choice, otherwise there would be no contemporary acts of suicide.

Well, sort of. The way I see it, people default to living. However there is no one forcing them to live. There is no force that prevents us stabbing ourselves with a nearby pencil other than pain is our own will, and the desire to succumb to suicide is, as I've said, illogical but more importantly unhealthy. There are contemporary acts of suicide because society has not focused enough on combating suicide

Now that this is untangled, are you open to considering two arguments which assert that dying is logical?

Sure, and you mention strictly logic but I do want to mention that we both still believe it's acceptable/bad, and inductively I know I do and probably you assume whatever point comes next will be disagreed with. But I am always open to opposing arguments, so of course.



Point 4:
You start with a normative claim. The thing about normative claims is they only hold up if every proposition is logical and it's beneficial to accept the entire text as true. If they don't, then they're arbitrary and nothing stops me from adding or subtracting claims to the text. That's the way we did it with Kant, at least.
I disagree with 1 and 2, and on the fence about 3 and 4 and don't see it as a objective basis but possibly permissible, and have no idea what point 5 means

1. In service of one's country, i.e., an old friend shows up to the party and requires your services.

I want to note that this does not mean being a soldier in general, the citation says "Roman suicide". I condemn practices of suicide tactics within militaries (such as in DAESH or the Imperial Japanese Army Air Service). This leads to an incentivization of suicide, and people are trained and sometimes forced with violence to accept that this is a good thing.

2. The arrival of rowdy revelers, i.e., tyrants who force us against our will to say or do disgraceful things at the party.

I don't value honour or status above life. This seems like a very Roman point and if I were forced to say things I disagree with I would oblige, but then when there is opportunity I would either condemn those "disgraceful things" or go somewhere where this is not an issue.

3. Protracted illness that prevents the soul from the use of its tool, the body, i.e., spoilage of provisions for the party.

This is an odd point, not that it is a bad argument but could have a bad justification. If I were paralyzed for the rest of my life in the 1800s I would definitely chose suicide but there is a glaring problem with this. See paragraph 6. The concern is that treating death as an acceptable outcome of severe diseases is counterproductive to developing treatment for diseases. The paragraph explains the point much better.

4. Poverty, i.e., scarceness of party provisions.

Again, this is a selective case. In somewhere where there is absolute poverty with no access to anything and you are slowly dying of hunger, than maybe, sure. But in the developed world there are many government programs such as unemployment and public housing available that prevents painful poverty.

5. Madness, i.e., drunkenness at the party. In Buddhist terms, intoxicants lower one's inhibitions against doing no harm to others and, by default, to the self. In Stoic terms, this equates to lowering the inhibitions put in place by practicing virtue. According to Epictetus, the purpose of practicing virtue is for life to flow more smoothly, and as social animals, virtues directly impact our interactions with others. This agrees with the purpose of the Five Precepts of Buddhism, considered gifts to others for the good of social order (no killing, no stealing, no lying, no sexual misconduct, no intoxicants).

Like I said.... what? So if we either are drunk or violate stoicism, we are justified in killing ourselves? I'd hope that's not the argument, but could you please expand?



Point 5:

You can find men who have gone so far as to profess wisdom and yet maintain that one should not offer violence to one's own life, and hold it accursed for a man to be the means of his own destruction; we should wait, say they, for the end decreed by nature. But one who says this does not see that he is shutting off the path to freedom. The best thing which eternal law ever ordained was that it allowed to us one entrance into life, but many exits. Must I await the cruelty either of disease or of man, when I can depart through the midst of torture, and shake off my troubles? This is the one reason why we cannot complain of life; it keeps no one against his will.

I explained my opposition to the freedom argument very well I feel like



I would like to offer another argument, and I briefly mentioned it in discussing the nature of this forum. If you believe x is rational for an agent, you might believe you ought to promote x for that agent. Where x is suicide/euthanasia, this gets close to pressuring those with suicidal tendencies to die. The "see paragraph 6" document I mentioned explains this, but I find it concerning that encouraging the validity of suicide will increase suicide rates. You may or may not think this is a bad thing but I'm curious to see your response

There ends my formal arguments

I do want to mention 2 more things though
You did say:

I respectfully look forward to your respectful response, should you choose to respond.

But then... called the mods "in case they were interested", which what I think you were expecting is me to continue advocating pro-life while apparently conveniently ignoring this thread... which would make it seem like it's not so much of a choice, and if I chose to not respond I "incriminated" myself for spreading pro-life propoganda or something

And the other thing was in relation to my signature, "Winning! And we will win"
Which I should clarify
If there are any Italians here they might recognize the phrase as a rough translation of "Vincere! E vinceremo". I will guess you are a leftist because of the stoicism/Buddhism and general euthanasia statements, and I am too, so I should state I am not a fascist and consider myself an anti-fascist. I say that because the quote is from Mussolini, and as much as I disregard the traditionalism and usually ethnically-inclined nationalism, me and Benito agreed on one thing: life is struggle. Life is a rebellion but also an embrace of the absurd, and it is a rebellion we will win through whatever we like to do, through hedonism, stoicism, altruism, etc.. It's a rather benign and misinterpreted quote from a deplorable figure, yes, but something I can't quite pin struck me about the idea of "winning (that whatever we have done already has been victorious in life) and we will win (against the absurd of life)". No, it is not in relation to me convincing people to not kill themselves. From what I've seen here, that is not something I can win. What I can do is argue against people who not quite encourage but certainly accept it and spread their ideas, but I don't care about "winning" nor do I even expect that this will reach a solid conclusion other than "agree to disagree".

If living brings about huge pain and one is trapped in life filled with pain, then death does liberate one from pain.

If only. That would make things very easy wouldn't it. But we don't know what death will be like and I do know there are people than can help, maybe not accessible to you but there are people who can help you and if you look hard enough I'm sure you can find one. From there you could probably find some hobbies or a nice job and a spouse or something in the future. I'm not really helping though, am I, I'm just a broken record. I wish there was some better way to do something for you and for all the distressed users here, but alas I am simply someone with a keyboard and old books. I don't want you to kill yourself. But I can't stop you either.
Good luck.

 

[InterstateFlowers]

Browsed your post because this is interesting but didn't think much because I'm sleepy and gonna go to bed. I'll reread/discuss it and and ask questions later. Thank you @GoodPersonEffed for teaching me something new today and your high quality posts. Night!

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

I read your entire response. After considering it, I find that there are applications of logic (I concede you got me with Kant), as well as a slew of diversionary tactics, including refusal to admit that you meant what you said about mental illness in your original post that I quoted. You also expanded the discussion from freedom to make other points you wanted, which to me says it is about an agenda, not the conversation I invited you to have. Therefore, I find the first portions of your comment are not debate or agreeing to have the same discussion, but bait. I disengage from it.


This is what I'm willing to respond to, which is the end of your post, beginning with the Stoics' five rational reasons to suicide.

disagree with 1 and 2, and on the fence about 3 and 4 and don't see it as a objective basis but possibly permissible, and have no idea what point 5 means
[POINT 1 - Government service]
I want to note that this does not mean being a soldier in general, the citation says "Roman suicide". I condemn practices of suicide tactics within militaries (such as in DAESH or the Imperial Japanese Army Air Service). This leads to an incentivization of suicide, and people are trained and sometimes forced with violence to accept that this is a good thing.

The point is to give up one's life in service of one's country if asked (drafted), walking into a method of death willingly, therefore akin to suicide.

[POINT 2 - Tyranny]

I don't value honour or status above life. This seems like a very Roman point and if I were forced to say things I disagree with I would oblige, but then when there is opportunity I would either condemn those "disgraceful things" or go somewhere where this is not an issue.

Sometimes people can be forced to do things against their will, which is tyranny. Examples are citizens under oppressive governments (and some members here are), victims of human trafficking (and some members here have been), and young people with no resources who are trapped in situations of coercive domestic violence (and some members here are).

[POINT 3 - Prolonged illness]

This is an odd point, not that it is a bad argument but could have a bad justification. If I were paralyzed for the rest of my life in the 1800s I would definitely chose suicide but there is a glaring problem with this. See paragraph 6. The concern is that treating death as an acceptable outcome of severe diseases is counterproductive to developing treatment for diseases. The paragraph explains the point much better.

If I'm understanding you correctly, if someone has an illness that causes unbearable suffering, and there is not yet a cure, they are responsible to keep living in that unbearable suffering for a greater good, and contribute to the finding of a cure. That's assuming they have treatment resources available and not blocked by money or oppression of any kind, and also assuming that medical services will treat them in a timely and effective manner even if not curable.

[POINT 4 - Poverty]

Again, this is a selective case. In somewhere where there is absolute poverty with no access to anything and you are slowly dying of hunger, than maybe, sure. But in the developed world there are many government programs such as unemployment and public housing available that prevents painful poverty.

I'd suggest asking a very large random sampling of people in receipt of government programs such as unemployment and public housing whether that poverty is painful.

A member just posted the other day about feeling literally tortured in council housing in the UK. We've had homeless members. We've had poor members from all over the world, both developed and not. And just because programs are available does not mean one qualifies, or qualifies quickly enough. For instance, in the US, if one needs to be on Social Security Disability, they have to stop working, then apply for benefits, then wait a bare minimum of months with no income for approval. People who qualify for Section 8 housing vouchers or supported housing are on waiting lists for years. Once one is in the system, they live in dangerous neighborhoods and buildings where victimization due to crime, domestic violence, slum lords and other sources is rampant.

I think you speak from a place of privilege in that you have not been exposed to what such pain is, or perhaps just one small view of it. There is no condemnation in that. You have been fortunate to not experience it, nor experience the special layer of hell that is government assistance programs. If you have, and you still feel blessed, I am genuinely happy for you.

[POINT 5 - Madness]

Like I said.... what? So if we either are drunk or violate stoicism, we are justified in killing ourselves? I'd hope that's not the argument, but could you please expand?

I think you may have overlooked the first word: madness, e.g., mental illness. Drunkenness is an analogy for not being in control of one's faculties and doing things one wouldn't do sober. In such a state, one can do harm to others, or be more vulnerable to harm from others. The whole point of virtue in Stoicism is for life to flow more smoothly for all, same with Buddhist precepts, it's about common law. If one cannot control their actions and choices, and they do not receive adquate help no matter how much they've tried, then suicide may be liberation from such afflictions should their own agency even in getting help not be enough. They cannot get along with and be safe for themselves nor others, they are more vulnerable to abuse from others, there is no effective help available no matter how hard they seek it or are willing to receive it, and in fact the help often further harms and disempowers them.

Point 5:
I explained my opposition to the freedom argument very well I feel like

I am aware this is how you feel.

I would like to offer another argument, and I briefly mentioned it in discussing the nature of this forum. If you believe x is rational for an agent, you might believe you ought to promote x for that agent. Where x is suicide/euthanasia, this gets close to pressuring those with suicidal tendencies to die. The "see paragraph 6" document I mentioned explains this, but I find it concerning that encouraging the validity of suicide will increase suicide rates. You may or may not think this is a bad thing but I'm curious to see your response

My response is that when something is repressed, such as the idea of suicide, it gains greater power than it would have and grows to monstrous proportions. When one faces it, works through it, engages with it, not only does it shrink down to a more appropriate and manageable size, but once faced, things which it may have been obscuring have the opportunity to surface, and such things may lead away from suicide. In my months on the forum, I have seen numerous people write suicide letters, or begin to make logistical plans to suicide, and realize that suicide was not the solution they were seeking. As long as one says, "Don't think about suicide," they're going to think about suicide, and think about it even more. If anyone is creating a monster, perhaps it is those who want to take down the site, making it only more desireable. It's not a suicide fetish fest around here, with the exceptional outlier. Folks who talk about suicide and keep living because they were able to talk about it are, in my experience, more the norm. And of course there are those who do decide to suicide, but they are actually in the minority. The zeitgeist of the site is to promote careful consideration and planning before acting on such a decision, not to "just to do it already."

There ends my formal arguments

I do want to mention 2 more things though
You did say:
But then... called the mods "in case they were interested", which what I think you were expecting is me to continue advocating pro-life while apparently conveniently ignoring this thread... which would make it seem like it's not so much of a choice, and if I chose to not respond I "incriminated" myself for spreading pro-life propoganda or something

That exact kind of behavior from pro-life propagandists is common on this site. However, I recognize that I do have a tendency to make wrong or skewed assumptions in reaction to both covert and overt aggression, which weakens the force and effectiveness of my arguments, and gives an aggressor something to divert the focus to rather than the topic at hand, such as was liberation/freedom. Other tactics from propagandists include emotion-stirring messages (see Barthes below), and trying to talk someone out of suicide based on an agenda, rather than interpersonal concern that would be demonstrated by listening and giving personally-tailored responses, advice, and compassion.

Calling the mods served a specific purpose. I liken it to you having entered a house uninvited, though the door is open and not closely monitored. Above the door, it's clearly noted that this is a pro-choice house. Sometimes people enter this house who are opposed to that (and some who misread it and insist it says pro-suicide). I like to let the bouncers know and let them determine who can be in the house or not, or at least keep any eye out. I do the same when minors come in.

You know I like Stoic philosophers. Here's a quote about what I mean:

Keep an eye on one man to avoid being hurt; on another, to avoid hurting him. Rejoice in the happiness of all, and sympathize with them in their misfortunes; remember what you should take upon yourself, and what you should guard against.​

​

- Seneca​

And the other thing was in relation to my signature, "Winning! And we will win"
Which I should clarify
If there are any Italians here they might recognize the phrase as a rough translation of "Vincere! E vinceremo". I will guess you are a leftist because of the stoicism/Buddhism and general euthanasia statements, and I am too, so I should state I am not a fascist and consider myself an anti-fascist. I say that because the quote is from Mussolini, and as much as I disregard the traditionalism and usually ethnically-inclined nationalism, me and Benito agreed on one thing: life is struggle. Life is a rebellion but also an embrace of the absurd, and it is a rebellion we will win through whatever we like to do, through hedonism, stoicism, altruism, etc.. It's a rather benign and misinterpreted quote from a deplorable figure, yes, but something I can't quite pin struck me about the idea of "winning (that whatever we have done already has been victorious in life) and we will win (against the absurd of life)". No, it is not in relation to me convincing people to not kill themselves. From what I've seen here, that is not something I can win. What I can do is argue against people who not quite encourage but certainly accept it and spread their ideas, but I don't care about "winning" nor do I even expect that this will reach a solid conclusion other than "agree to disagree".

Winning is regularly repeated theme in the user names and signatures of pro-life propagandists who join the site. When someone walks like a pro-lifer and talks like a pro-lifer and has the feathers of a pro-lifer, well...I'm not chagrined for my error if I indeed made one.

Once again, I note your appeal to unity. I am not like you, I am not a leftist. I think all political parties and platforms are myth and myth-based. I highly recommend Roland Barthes' Mythologies, or even Baudrillard if you're into him. I'm not.

As with my disengagement from the earlier debate, I too agree to disagree. I don't wish you ill, I in fact wish you well, but I also wish you'd stay in your own house if you're opposed to the foundation on which ours stands. Or maybe you just want to see if it shakes. I'd suggest checking the foundations of your own house. Again, Barthes is a buddy. So is Foucault.

I don't know if you'll respond or not. Based on the slippery nature of your previous response, I choose to be done with this particular conversation between us, and you of course are welcome to the last word, no matter how you state it or what questions you may want to ask me. Others can of course engage with your comments and with you as they choose, as it is an active thread. Just a reminder to all to be respectful, and to stay on the topics outlined for this thread so as not to derail.

 

[OrangeJuiceCabal]

I will respond of course, and will try and defend my points without bringing up any new argument or content which would require a response, and because this isn't much of an essay like the last one I won't take the effort organize it as well as I did so sorry if it seems a bit muddled

I think at some point there was a fundamental disagreement over what this discussion was, I was initially confused when you said:

as well as a slew of diversionary tactics

Since... it was a debate, and I was simply stating my points. I did this because you started this thread with

particular perspective devoted to logic and reason.

And hoped I would

engage in logical, non-combative debate.

And reading more you said

You also expanded the discussion from freedom to make other points you wanted, which to me says it is about an agenda, not the conversation I invited you to have.

Which was never specified to me in you introduction so I assumed was irrelevant. You said the 2nd and 3rd phrases I quoted, which led me to believe our conversation was not exclusive to "liberation" which in itself is a rather useless term since the conversation has in my opinion way hyperbolized the importance of "liberation". And I'm sure you noticed I hardly if ever used the word, because it's not helpful as a deciding factor in suicide. I only artificially isolated it for the purpose of pure reason (and I should emphasize, considerably weaker reason compared to other arguments), and when I enter a thread called "A Stoic Defense Against Pro-Life Rhetoric" I was not expecting this defense to, for some reason, nullify any rhetoric against it other than an appeal to liberty.

I also want to mention that your example, which is specifically designed against an appeal to liberty, gives no solution for liberty. I am incapable of providing a reason why liberty is a useful or productive term for those examples, so I analyse the differences between a modern average suicide and your analogies. I hope you understand, I simply cannot appeal to liberty in an example you specifically engineer for the purpose of voiding any sort of liberty since all available conclusions result in loss of freedom. Because of that, the only productive way to continue the conversation is to ask "what is different between this and a modern average suicide" and logicize from there, which obviously will not involve defending a term impossible to defend in the given circumstances.


After typing this I tried to read it as close as I can and this does, to an extent, indicate limiting the conversation to "liberation" alone

I was following the thread "Death to Liberate" and wanted to engage with you in the discussion.

I must of overlooked this when I saw the bold text and read your statement referring to logic and courtesy.
Even then though, despite you having good intentions and apparent interest in appeals to liberty alone, and respectfully, I find this unfair. It is as if we are in some sort of battle and you say:
"let us duel, I saw you were using a sword so I would like you to engage my shield", and I say:
"but I cannot penetrate that shield with my sword, since you have crafted that shield specifically against my sword and any attempt to wield this sword would be in vain for thus duel, so instead I will use a bow or a pike or something", and you say:
"no, but you must use the sword for that is the only reason I chose to duel you"

So, for the purpose of the discussion, I cannot advocate an appeal to liberty as it is not possible. So... I guess I concede and wave the white flag to your shield? But... only because I am not allowed to use a more productive argument.

Please understand I mean this with utmost civility, but the exclusive premise is rather pointless, especially for a "resources against pro-life rhetoric" thread.

2 more things, first you said

including refusal to admit that you meant what you said about mental illness in your original post that I quoted.

Which when I typed my original post I had not yet decided that I would not argue that. This is because, like I said, I don't know, and it doesn't even matter if suicidal tendencies are itself a mental disorder or not, because suicidal tendencies are not recognized as a treatable disorder by psychiatry. Instead it is usually (although not exclusively since it is a controversial topic (surprise, surprise!)) seen as a symptom or some sort of diagnoseable and treatable illness, such as chronic depression or schizophrenia. Me arguing suicide is a mental illness itself would be silly when it is not treatable. Instead I explain how what is treatable is a likely underlying disorder is treatable, which would provide the chance of alleviating the general pain of life and thus give a reason for people to not kill themselves

And then

Therefore, I find the first portions of your comment are not debate or agreeing to have the same discussion, but bait. I disengage from it.

Well, I don't have much to say on this but I didn't even know I was baiting when I was using rational arguments against your analogy. As I said above, that discussion is not possible, but okay.



Now, to defend my actual claims:

The point is to give up one's life in service of one's country if asked (drafted), walking into a method of death willingly, therefore akin to suicide.

I find there are 3 different ideas being presented here, mashed together.
1 - being drafted for service, which is illegal (everywhere I know) to decline
2 - volunteering for service
3 - suicide

1 is the most dissimilar to suicide, because it is at its premise being forced to be employed in a dangerous job. The country would almost certainly prefer if you didn't die either, because in many countries that would require paying reparations to family in addition to the general disadvantages of a casualty. I do not see where submitting to a draft comes anywhere close to condemning oneself to immediate and voluntary death.

2 is also dissimilar because it lacks intent to die and lacks the immediate-ness of suicide. Suicide is an act, and volunteering for a dangerous job usually does not include the intention to die, but more importantly does not involve the actual conscious decision. Volunteers do not decide "I will stand up and be shot to death now", they usually intend to live to continue their service to country and if they do die it is rarely because of their own action, it is a murder.

3 is only fulfilled if there is an immediate act with the intent of death. A kamikaze is a good example, it is a brief act with the intent to die.

Sometimes people can be forced to do things against their will, which is tyranny. Examples are citizens under oppressive governments (and some members here are), victims of human trafficking (and some members here have been), and young people with no resources who are trapped in situations of coercive domestic violence (and some members here are).

True, so I suppose it depends on if the individual determines the pain of tyranny (but I should stress I'm referring to directly painful tyranny. For example if you are an average individual in Canada and are censored for saying bad things, that is not a justifiable tyranny because it lacks pain) it could be reasonable to justify suicide, but it would be foolish to even entertain the thought that this is a universal and normative case for every individual who has decided their government or some other authoritative force has wronged them.

If I'm understanding you correctly, if someone has an illness that causes unbearable suffering, and there is not yet a cure, they are responsible to keep living in that unbearable suffering for a greater good, and contribute to the finding of a cure.

No, besides the point that treatment is an alternative to cure, ill people do not contribute to finding any cure nor to a greater good. What I am saying is that, in cases where there is not an obvious permission for suicide, deciding that suicide is the rational decision for contracting a disease will not do very much in making people want to find a cure. Not because there is the moral weight of a stockpile of suffering people, but because people will conflate suicide as the cure. For example something like fibrodysplasia ossificans progressiva, where injuries received will create bone melds, is bad and occasionally as youth but certainly towards the end of life painful. However, if the medical community decided that this pain is so great (which people with this condition can usually still do active things in life, sometimes braces are needed though) then there will not be a cure developed, because a stoic has decided that suicide is the cure. The deciding factor cannot be a normative claim that "if you have an illness and feel like dying, then die if you want" because suggesting this is counterproductive to the cure, and this is not a justifiable question that can be decided by authority

This point has a few different quotes I should address

I'd suggest asking a very large random sampling of people in receipt of government programs such as unemployment and public housing whether that poverty is painful.

The overwhelming majority would say yes. However we do not stop here, we ask first "is this pain great enough for suicide?" and second "is this pain curable?". Most people would answer no and yes, since most people in poverty either do not expect to be in poverty forever or are unsure if they will be but do not consider it bad enough for voluntary death. Yes, there are many cases in which poverty is an extreme and incurably painful situation, but to assume this is a universal justification since pain is unknowably great enough and unknowably cureable is wrong. Once again it is a problem of arbitrary lines. A presentation of the problem could be: imagine if a child was orphaned and had to eat canned food and share a room with rude strangers for several weeks and was considering killing themselves, however the next day a rich uncle would find them and they then lived a life of pleasure and happiness. If we are to declare their immediate adverse conditions is a justification for suicide in this case I think that would be a shortsighted and silly decision. Once again that is the problem with suicide in general since we don't know if pain is cureable (although more so than not, from my experience here)

A member just posted the other day about feeling literally tortured in council housing in the UK. We've had homeless members. We've had poor members from all over the world, both developed and not. And just because programs are available does not mean one qualifies, or qualifies quickly enough. For instance, in the US, if one needs to be on Social Security Disability, they have to stop working, then apply for benefits, then wait a bare minimum of months with no income for approval. People who qualify for Section 8 housing vouchers or supported housing are on waiting lists for years. Once one is in the system, they live in dangerous neighborhoods and buildings where victimization due to crime, domestic violence, slum lords and other sources is rampant.

Indeed this is a great problem, and I think it is a fixable political matter that is criminally neglected in the modern, industrialized world. And as I said, I recognize some struggles as great enough to culminate in voluntary perishing, but as I see poverty as a case of artificial scarcity that can be resolved, so people committing suicide because of this is a preventable cause of death.

I think you speak from a place of privilege in that you have not been exposed to what such pain is, or perhaps just one small view of it.

I live in poverty. Well, the net household income <24k sort, and I am fortunate enough to not have to live in a community shelter so obviously I cannot speak for those who do. I suppose my situation is sort of "painful" but if anyone was in a similar one to be I would find contemplating suicide absurd. I certainly have limited resources and am sort of socially estranged (if my verbiage didn't already demonstrate that), but eventually I will be free and autonomous and will not have any more financial burden, so considering suicide because of that would be pointless if it were for even minute pain.

If you have, and you still feel blessed, I am genuinely happy for you.

No, I am not blessed, and I think even the people that think they are in this circumstance have blinded themselves with humbleness. Although if being blessed means not wanting to kill myself, then sure, I am blessed.

Drunkenness is an analogy for not being in control of one's faculties and doing things one wouldn't do sober. In such a state, one can do harm to others, or be more vulnerable to harm from others. The whole point of virtue in Stoicism is for life to flow more smoothly for all, same with Buddhist precepts, it's about common law. If one cannot control their actions and choices, and they do not receive adquate help no matter how much they've tried, then suicide may be liberation from such afflictions should their own agency even in getting help not be enough.

Okay, that makes more sense, albeit I still disagree. This seems less of an issue in modern times than Epictetus and Seneca's time though, because almost all "madness" is treatable and in modern society instead of condoning suicide we are almost always able to give those suffering from madness care to alleviate pain. The problem is not madness in itself, but the availability of treatment for it. I can only offer a similar rebuttal that I mentioned to the poverty point, that it is case by case and arbitrary but we still should not rationalize suicide in cure for a treatable condition (in most cases).


At this point you say "I am aware this is how you feel." but I don't even remember what I said you're responding to so I will move on.

My response is that when something is repressed, such as the idea of suicide, it gains greater power than it would have and grows to monstrous proportions... etc.

I cannot argue against this, I'm usually skeptical of the sort of "a healthy dose it okay" argument against censorship but admittedly my brief experience here has proved no contradiction. I did think it was interesting how you mentioned:

It's not a suicide fetish fest around here, with the exceptional outlier.

And on a different note I agree, I don't think it's a "fetish" for lack of a better word, but I do find it curious why there so many members that aren't suicidal and who don't seem to have a primary goal or promoting a side or providing comfort. I'm assuming there's a sort of "aesthetic" to it which is a factor in attracting members, but I really have no good explanation for the site's activity

the topic at hand, such as was liberation/freedom.

Like I said, I didn't realize at the time the conversation was strictly limited to "liberation" since I neglected that "the discussion" was strictly of a liberty ethos from assuming the thread title was open to all rhetoric of a logical and civil nature.

I like to let the bouncers know and let them determine who can be in the house or not, or at least keep any eye out. I do the same when minors come in.

I'm not sure how minors would be allowed since the vetting system mentions it would decline them if they are one, and why the people who inevitably lie would announce they have lied (or they might not, I don't know how the system works very well)

Winning is regularly repeated theme in the user names and signatures of pro-life propagandists who join the site.

I was not expecting that but I am not surprised. I'm curious what they think they're winning against, I guess just suicide in itself. I suppose I should consider changing it to disassociate with them, but since it's already been mentioned I might as well stick with it. And I am a propagandist no more than anyone else with an opinion is one. I have my ideas and they have theirs, and I am not afraid to share it but I will not preach that I am "the way". I cannot help most of the people here, especially with my manner of text.

Once again, I note your appeal to unity.

This time although it probably seemed like it I am not trying to say "hey nice leftist gang", I was more so trying to make it seem as not-abhorrent as possible when explaining why I have a Mussolini quote as my signature, since if you were a leftist it would make me look very bad (although I am not sure how you managed to decouple Barthes and Foucault from their Marxist analysis? It doesn't matter though).

Based on the slippery nature of your previous response, I choose to be done with this particular conversation between us, and you of course are welcome to the last word, no matter how you state it or what questions you may want to ask me.

Oh



This isn't very relevant but probably important to mention since not very many people will understand what I mean by this, so this is an open note:

(I concede you got me with Kant)

I'm surprised out of my arguments that one was mentioned in their introduction in particular since this was more so an allusion and less of a point in itself.

Anyway, if you ever have the unfortunate and god-forsaken chance to discuss morality with a Kantian deontologist, they will bring something up called the Categorical Imperative, which is a brief list of what sort of actions are moral for people to do. These sorts of lists are called normative. You will notice if you ask them "why should I listen to this?" they will say "because it just works" and leave it at that. This justification works if and only if they prove that their propositions are true and it is most beneficial if we uphold them without dropping any or modifying the Imperative. Because if you drop a proposition, what stops you from adding a different one? Or adding several, or dropping another one.... etc. . In my arguments above then against the stoic quote, if I really wanted to (although it would of been a disingenuous tactic since this is a discussion, not high school debate) I could of attacked only a single point with that same number of paragraphs, and since a point would probably be dropped, it would render the justification for the entire proposition obsolete. Apparently, the OP decided this worked, which is why they mentioned it, but I'm guessing for the sake of discussion they chose to continue defending the points.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

[D]eath is a debt which every man owes. Yet it is certain that that which renders life most miserable for the aged is this very thing, the fear of death...And yet how could there have been any smattering of knowledge or of acquaintance with true good and evil in the man who thought that an evil which is the necessary sequel even to the best life? The best life, you will agree, is that of a good man, and yet the end of even such a man is death.

- Musonius Rufus

 

[bigdog]

I personally found stoic thoughts very useful when you have low or medium level struggle. When it is complete savagery it stopped working for me. I am like yeah it is cool but why me? I don't know what can be worse than my brain damage. Maybe blindness and quadruple amputee but still this compare shit also doesn't work. It is the end for me unfortunately.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

I personally found stoic thoughts very useful when you have low or medium level struggle. When it is complete savagery it stopped working for me. I am like yeah it is cool but why me? I don't know what can be worse than my brain damage. Maybe blindness and quadruple amputee but still this compare shit also doesn't work. It is the end for me unfortunately.

Stoicism also recognizes when it is the end. That's the point of this thread.



Didn't mean for that to sound like a smartass or unkind, I didn't know how else to say it except bluntly.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

Lots of new people on the forum since this thread was last active, thought I'd bump it. There are some great quotes and discussions here.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

"But you know this, to how many men it [death] is useful, how many men it frees from tortures, destitution, ailments, torments, and weariness. We are in the power of no one, when death is in our power."

- Seneca