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- On the matter of Stoics qua Dialectics -

"[Humans] are disturbed, not by things, but by the principles and notions which they form concerning things. Death, for instance, is not terrible, else it would have appeared so to Socrates. But the terror consists in our notion of death that it is terrible. When therefore we are hindered, or disturbed, or grieved, let us never attribute it to others, but to ourselves; that is, to our own principles. An uninstructed person will lay the fault of his own bad condition upon others. Someone just starting instruction will lay the fault on himself. Some who is perfectly instructed will place blame neither on others nor on himself."
Epictetus, 5th § of the Enchiridion.

So I had made light of not only using Stoicism in my previous post but even going with it along with my current studies in Psychoanalysis, Proletarian Feminism and Marxism. So lemme go on and explain myself there - of course not to excuse it, that's to make me guilty; but to remark my usage of such and how I have sympathies for it though I am not a Stoic in the fullest sense. Of course I have only sympathies since, to go with Hegel and Marx and Engels, you cannot become what already has been dialectically superseded - there's of course the modern Stoics, but I need to sit down and actually read them before moving on. So I state sympathy instead of commitment - as to shrug off actually Stoics but now narrowing their concerns to how I have interpreted and possibly made false of what the Stoics were suggesting. Now lemme explain my philosophical sympathy for such a group that I could, for all intents and purposes, work with.

What is a sympathy for me is much like an acquaintance in a world of connections, useful to pick on when I want to explain a concept and to demonstrate an example. But unlike an acquaintance, I do ideologically practice it and work through the apparent contradictions it can have with my primary ideology-philosophy. Stoicism, much like Pyrrhonian Skepticism which I might touch on later and have to obviously re-read on that, are very much useful tools for me to analyze the World around me and to live my life. To go further, my sympathies for Stoicism goes further as well - where some I might just tinker out of usefulness and make my perception of Dialectics better, I go further in incorporating, or attempting so anyways, it into a Dialectical framework.

For in a Heartless World that is in Spiritless conditions, Stoicism nowadays isn't an escape but, like Absurdism, an ideologically-philosophical rebellion against a NeoLiberal Social Order. Stoicism demands you to confront what is actually in one's control and what is not, which leads you to question what is to worry and what is to worry not and to not accept the present when you have the control to change it. Now of course I mentioned the power of we and what we can control together, and this is a mere Dialectical Idealism in me playing off - but one I wish to remind that I stuck to having a Dialectical Materialist backing whenever I do wish to properly explain it one day. Getting back on track, I mentioned the we as a way to explain the power individuals uniting can have when one alone couldn't possibly control and how that we can be steered to help steer material flow to our favor.

Yet I also mentioned efficiencies and how we ought to strive towards that, especially dropping moralisms altogether. For it is of no use to say x is right when we know the Social Order will say no, so if we value x as a virtue, then we must work on building towards a New Social Order that values x as a virtue. Stoicism is, after all, an application of virtue ethics and the most sincere of Stoics values justice over the non-worry of things out of their control - if nothing else, it tells us what society values and what society sees as a vice. But also the fact that Stoicism doesn't tell us to shut up, we very much can perceive something negatively and we can very much get our passions stirred - which a NeoLiberal Social Order dislikes when semblances of differentiation are ignored. In fact, the basis of justice is to fight against vice whenever we have the ability to do so, for how can one be actually virtuous without practicing the virtue equally to all that deserves it?

And a modern Stoic project today is one that fights to remove all these inefficiencies, these hindrances, of contemporary society and build on the efficiencies that won't hinder us and lead us to a virtuous life. The Stoics today ought to call for justice, as they had applied in the past, and stand with those struggling for justice, as that particularity of the we is fighting to gain control of something it can have control over. Stoicism in its universality may be indifferent to groups and total application of justice, but it turns no blind eye to injustice and shall not mock people suffering from such - for their wails shouldn't be our worry, that is out of our control, but the root cause of this symptom should be as we can gain control over that and supersede it. The revolutions of Robespierre's France, Bolshevik RSFSR, People's Republic of China and so on and so on proved that what was out of our control can be turned into our control and can be dealt with. This is why I have sympathies with Stoicism, all the indifferences in its philosophical structure lays out many paths, a Dialectical approach leads to a revolutionary project and the establishment of new virtues that roots out the hindrances that plague contemporary society.

Of course this isn't a writing post, or a video or even a truly philosophical utterance - just a footnote I felt like including. It's out of my control the length doesn't stick to my formatting, but so is most things. Regardless of such, it bears no more constitution than what is required out of this - so I shall no more even put the slightest of thought. If you're flustered, be so but you are angry at how you perceive the piece in front of you. If you are not, so much a Stoic you are, but maybe out in this instance only and you must be denoted as a "stoic" in this instance. If you are a sage, so much the better for you - may one share thy wisdom to those not a sage then?

"Consider when, on a voyage, your ship is anchored; if you go on shore to get water you may along the way amuse yourself with picking up a shellish, or an onion. However, your thoughts and continual attention ought to be bent towards the ship, waiting for the captain to call on board; you must then immediately leave all these things, otherwise you will be thrown into the ship, bound neck and feet like a sheep."
Epictetus, 7th § of the Enchiridion.

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