critique of the stoic programme

[Anonymous No.17710950]

Stoicism is an aristocratic perspective. Although veneered in asceticism and a poverty of desires, its true character is altogether lofty and magnanimous. One turns away from the world and to the divine- that's not a tendency of the vulgar masses, outside of romantic stereotypes. It's a tendency of the rich, heeled, and well-to-do. Aurelius was an emperor, Seneca was carried around in a sedan between estates by teams of slaves, Epictetus ran a school for the privileged to study philosophy. Today its advocates are executives, pro athletes, venture capitalists. And people think this is a worldview for coping with hard times! On the contrary its advocates have never truly known hard times. They are so showered in fortune they need a framework to transcend the hierarchy they've already summitted. Stoics are not struggling with setbacks, they're struggling with success. The philosophy of aloof detachment from externals they espouse serves to lengthen the distance between them and the common man. A king is not only not distressed by the lives of the peasants, he cannot even relate to them, theyre as inconsequential to him as beasts in the field. This is the exact perspective of stoicism toward everything in the world. What kind of commoner can afford that kind of detachment? Only men of wealth and means can pay the costs incurred by caring for nothing but their personal virtue. The more resources you have, the less you need fear loss. The more options you have, the less you need fear chance. Normal people by definition have only a normal amount of these things. Having a huge surplus of them is what makes one an elite, an outlier at the top. And this is why it's the rich and powerful who you find pushing stoicism, contrary to its facade of folksy humility. It is the philosophy of the 1%, and not fit for common people.

[Anonymous No.17711858]

>>17710950
Where is the critique? You just made it sound based.

[Pyrrho No.17712165]

>>17711858
Only if you're an aristocrat and think yourself privileged.
>>17710950
Based anon. Here take this. A wise anon gave this to me a while ago when I too carried this criticism.

[Anonymous No.17712535]

>>17711858
This

[Anonymous No.17712575]

>>17710950
Epictetus ran a school sure but you neglected to mention that when he began his study of stoicism he was a crippled slave.

[Anonymous No.17713316]

>>17710950
>asceticism
That's not an intrinsic part of Stoicism at all.
>Turn away from the world
That's the opposite of Stoicism entirely.

It sounds more like you're describing Buddhism tbqh. Which I would very much agree is the program of an idle aristocrat (and also coping cucks).
Stoicism isn't an aristocratic perspective. It's probably more accurately described as an arrogant or elitist perspective. That is to say, it is for people who are ambitious, successful, and see themselves as leaders.
That's why western Stoics are stereotyped as venture capital types, but western Buddhists are stereotyped as champagne socialists who are obsessed with self-care.
>>17712575
this

[Anonymous No.17713460]

>>17713316
>That's not an intrinsic part of Stoicism at all
Yes it is, where have you got the idea that it isn't? Bearing in mind we are discussing the actual Stoicism of Aurelius, Epictetus and Seneca rather than the modern "stoicism" found within self-help books

>That's the opposite of Stoicism entirely.
There's a degree of retreat within Stoicism, certainly an indifference of the matters of the external world

[Anonymous No.17713521]

>>17713316
Western Buddhism is based on misunderstandings by the Theosophists and Hermann Hesse. Asian Buddhism varies widely from esoteric monasticism to pseudo-megachurch styles of worship.

[Anonymous No.17713540]

>>17710950
Ryan Holiday is the opposite of a stoic. he is the most cynical and insecure person ive ever heard speak.

[Anonymous No.17713886]

>>17713460
>Asceticism
"If one oversteps the bounds of moderation, the greatest pleasures cease to please." - Epictetus
Epictetus clearly believes in pleasure; he just warns not to overdue it.
"But nothing is so damaging to good character as the habit of lounging at the games; for then it is that vice steals subtly upon one through the avenue of pleasure." - Seneca
Seneca is more of a hardo about self-denial, but even still, you can see that it's not like Christians who see poverty as a virtue or Buddhists who see everything as suffering. I interpret Seneca as saying that exposing yourself to pleasurable vices can be self-destructive.
I.e. don't do heroin even though it feels amazing.
>There's a degree of retreat within Stoicism, certainly an indifference of the matters of the external world
I think that's a mischaracterization. Stoics aren't indifferent to the external world. They just don't think it is productive to perseverate over non-immediate things out of your control. So if your critique is that Stoics are aristocratic because they don't believe a middle class American should get worked up over the Rohingya genocide, then maybe you have a point. But it's not a very good point.

[Anonymous No.17713970]

>>17713886
Yeah, I'd agree that it can differ on the particular thinker then, Seneca even goes as far to say "As much as you can, withdraw from it now and from all pleasure except that which is linked to the necessities of life within a body"

>Stoics aren't indifferent to the external world
This is where I'd say you're incorrect, this was the ultimate Stoic goal, an indifference to all external goods. That apatheia led to the Stoics not calling for any kind of radical change, because true freedom is internal freedom, totally irrelevant of external condition and worldly goods. It's the idea of total independence and a discarding of anything that is dependent on fate or fortune (anything that isn't a 'true good' as they're described), which isn't attainable unless you are truly indifferent to external matters

[Anonymous No.17714067]

>>17713886
Also, take for example Stilpo, whose example Seneca mentions, to do it justice I'll paste the section

>Stilpo's homeland fell to invaders; his children were lost, his wife lost, and he alone survived. Yet he emerged happy; and when Poliorcetes asked him whether he had lost anything, he replied, "All my goods remains with me". Here is a brave man and a tough one: he conquered even his enemy's conquest. "I have lost nothing," he said, and made Poliorcetes doubt whether he had really conquered at all. "All my goods are with me, justice, courage, prudence, and this in itself, the ability to think that nothing is good which can be taken away"

Furthermore, I can't remember the context of the quote from the Discourses, but don't you think that "If one oversteps the bounds of moderation, the greatest pleasures cease to please." could very likely mean the opposite of how you mean? As in, if one oversteps the limits of moderating desires, things become less pleasurable (as a life of debauchery often leads to). I ask because a common idea in Stoic writing is that moderation makes things more pleasurable, i.e., limiting your meals to bread will make eating bread as pleasurable to you as if you were to always consume extravagant meals of oysters and meats, so it would make much more sense if that is how it's meant

[Anonymous No.17714073]

Epictetus lived great part of his life as a slave.

[Anonymous No.17714081]

>>17713540
he's rich

[Anonymous No.17714084]

>>17714073
oh great someone mentioned already, nevermind. OP you're a fag.

[Anonymous No.17714106]

>>17710950
I for one, am willing to help these unfortunate Stoics by lifting the burden of wealth from them.
I'm willing to take one for the team and receive their fortunes gracefully.

[Anonymous No.17714451]

>>17714073
>>17714084
I cant believe you brainlets think this is news to anyone. Everything he said in Discourses is something he said while RUNNING A PHILOSOPHY SCHOOL, not as a slave. Youre essentially defending the president of Harvard from 2000 years ago. Good boy.

[Anonymous No.17714502]

>>17713886
>Stoics aren't indifferent to the external world.
Oh come now, "indifference to externals" must appear 100 times in Epictetus alone.

[Anonymous No.17714540]

>>17711858

The critique is that if you're a commoner fag and the type of guy who listens to Jordan Peterson and sleeps to binaural beats to increase his productivity at his IT job then it's pretty cringe to aspire to be stoic. Most people who rise to success from the bottom are the exact opposite of stoic, which is a very conservative approach to life.

[Anonymous No.17714597]

>>17710950
And the critique is what? No, stoicism is not a philosophy for the masses. But it's a philosophy for me.

[Anonymous No.17714624]

Stoicism is for rich fucks, Epicureanism is for working-class Chads.

[Anonymous No.17714626]

>>17714597
Critique means analysis and assessment in this context.

[Anonymous No.17714797]

>>17714451
He was a Stoic also as a slave, are you saying he founded a school of philosophical stoicism and then became a Stoic because he didn't have to worry about anything anymore? What exactly is your logic here??

[Anonymous No.17714838]

>>17714797
Let me see if ai can get this across another way. If he had been such a stoic when he was a slave, do you really think his master would have had cause to smash his leg?
Do remember that stoicism is all about doing your duty as well as you can and having no external desires.
Nice how he came to that view once he had prominence and status in society with a bunch of students to order around.

[Anonymous No.17714867]

>>17710950
'Stoicism' is actually a very powerful tool. In its proper usage, it is like taking control of a machine (in this case, the mind) beyond the 'factory settings.' This is not well-understood by most people, and even by people who dabble in superficial 'stoicism.'

For example, if you break your arm, the ideal Stoic response is not to 'suppress' the pain and suffer in silence. It is to attain a level of control over your perception of stimulus to the point where you literally aren't experiencing the sensation of the broken limb as 'pain' to begin with. This is quite different from merely suffering, but trying not to show it. It is fundamentally different. Those who don't understand the difference do not understand the nature of the philosophy.

[Anonymous No.17714891]

>>17714838
Slaves were property and I have no idea what the circumstances were surrounding his leg-smashing. It was common for masters to be cruel and vicious, it's not correct to assume that just because he was punished he behaved unvirtuously, he could've been punished for a virtuous act which was treated with contempt by an unvirtuous master

>Do remember that stoicism is all about doing your duty as well as you can and having no external desires
So you are saying that he founded a school of Stoicism while not being a stoic in order to pull off some kind of scam in order to rise to prominence and then became an actual Stoic? Don't you think he'd need to have been a Stoic during his enslavement and before he founded the school for any aforementioned rise to prominence and popularity and students coming to hear his teaching could take place?

[Anonymous No.17714918]

>>17714838
>>17714891
In other words, it was for this very philosophy that he rose to prominence, your logic here doesn't have much sense, how could he have become famed and revered as a great Stoic sage without being an actual great Stoic sage originally?

[Anonymous No.17714925]

>>17714891
Okay, so I'm supposed to believe that the Epictetus we see in the discourses, who sings day and night about duty and virtue, who berated any student who shows even the slightest sign of external concerns, who said that people who dont serve their role effectively should be "thrown in the trash heap like broke dishware," I'm supposed to believe this guy as a slave got his leg smashed up for NO reason whatsoever by his master, who just happened to be the most sadistic guy of all time and didnt care about having what must have been the world's ultimate slave. Sounds really likely. I'm sure it can't be that Epictetus gaining wealth and status also changed his worldview. We know that never happens to people.