Epictetus Fullofshitus

I am so sick and tired of the god thing. 

I miss the ‘olden days’.

This is gonna be décousu I can tell!

First the god thing I guess.

Let’s start with Epictetus now.  I was kind of boiling in the bathtub where I was presumably sitting in in order to RELAX reading the golden sayings of Epictetus part of a much broader liberal education apparently called the Harvard Classics, assembled by a dénommé  Charles W. Eliot in 1909.

Well maybe in 1909 you could get a liberal education but I doubt one can get one these days because in 1909 it was a different world, a world with no television and no internet.  I read of people like Dickens and Mark Twain who have read Thomas Carlyle’s long (and probably very tedious) French Revolution not ONCE but MANY times over and over.   

Also back then many a scholar and polymath were well-versed into every single old Latin and Greek writing from Ovid to Homer, from Cicero to Plato, from Horace to Sophocles, Virgil to Aristotle.

Anyway back to Epictetus now the father of so-called Stoics.  Here is one thing I said yesterday about him:

I only have 2 words 

for someone who wants me to be 

a better slave, 

a better soldier:

FUCK YOU!

Assumptions like “so-called non-existent gods know better” piss me off.  Plus the deceiving translation of Zeus into God is to say the least misleading. 

God, Yahweh, Allah, and Zeus are all different MYTHS, different LIES, with different attributes and qualities.

Add on his all-knowing, all –present daimons here and we have a nice mixture of Greek and Christian mythological mash.  There is no such thing in the bible as the notion that each one of us has a guardian angel but it is a clear Greek mythological teaching that we all have a personal daimon, a spirit to look over us.

Nevertheless he has placed by every man a guardian, every man’s Demon, to whom he has committed the care of the man, a guardian who never sleeps, is never deceived. For to what better and more careful guardian could He have entrusted each of us? When, then, you have shut the doors and made darkness within, remember never to say that you are alone, for you are not; but God is within, and your Demon is within, and what need have they of light to see what you are doing?
Epictetus Discourses Chapter 14

So when I hear of how a proud US G.I. survived years of horrors in horrific Vietnam camps (insert visions of Deer Hunter here) I am not overly impressed to begin with since the horrors were somewhat self-inflicted, choosing a way of life I totally oppose.

And now again we have so-called science, psychology, fornicating with mythologies one more time where Epictetus is one of the champions of Albert Ellis and his therapy style.  

Some of you will still remember my rant on Marsha M. Linehan fornicating with Buddhism’s Mindfulness.
DBT, REBT and all the other bastards BT one can think of. Let’s not forget CBT now where your mind is apparently a computer: garbage in, garbage out.

If one tries to eliminate all possible myths and lies out of his life one is left with nearly nothing and utterly isolated from so-called normal society. I mean try so find some form of help somewhere that is not FORCING you to

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be

Why Oh Why Can’t I conceive it/him/her to be non-existent now?

I mean it would be impossible to communicate without using some sort of mythological metaphors now like this is hell or it is a Sisyphean task etc.  It is a very concise way of communicating, much shorter than to explain the whole story of Sisyphus before using the expression anyway.

I do understand some Stoics principles and I do yearn for some stoicism at times the high and lows of my epicurean life get a little hard on the system at times, like going ballistic over dogs barking and such other disturbances in the force.  But the whole base of it is ruined now, totally ruined, because if the reason for acceptance is in order to properly

worshit some godhole 

somewhere, 

especially when one can fill the fucking hole 

with whatever he/she 

wants it, 

conceives it 

to be 

well it is all BULLSHIT then.

The way I see it I guess is Stoic equals flatline, Epicurian equals high mountains and low valleys of passions, burnings. 

What is moderation called then?

A LOT OF ASS & U & ME

Rosenberg emphasized that evil “needs to be desperately explained.” The Christian theologian responded by saying: “The problem here is that we are assuming that God's purpose is just to make us happy in this life, but on the Christian view that's false. The purpose of life is not worldly happiness as such, but rather the knowledge of God. There may be many evils that occur in this lifetime that are utterly pointless with respect to producing worldly happiness, but they may not be pointless with respect to producing the knowledge of God and salvation and eternal life.”

Audience members, the formal debate panel and online viewers all said that Craig, the Christian theologian, won the debate.

I hope there was more to it than that but still I seem to have missed the point here or the whole boat.

The purpose of life is the knowledge of God?

Empirical knowledge?

Epistemological knowledge?

Emotional Knowledge?

Intellectual Knowledge?

Scientific Knowledge?

First define Knowledge and then go on and define God.

And those were the second and third assumptions only.

The first assumption was to ASSUME that life has a purpose.

So

1.       We ASSUME life has a purpose

2.       We ASSUME we know what knowledge is despite all the contradictions of epistemology and

3.       We ASSUME there is such a thing as one God vaguely defined amongst 1000 myths.

That is a lot of ASS and U and ME if you ask ME.

All these debates seem so absolutely pointless to me.  The rules are bent, the audience is bent, pride and prejudice play the biggest part in it and it is as invalid as democracy.

We haven’t moved a single inch forward from the days of the Aeropagus
and public intellectual masturbation. 
Rhetoric is not a science.
Rhetoric is a mastering of fallacies to fool the many.
Paul was just one more rhetorician among millions.

The truth is that there is NO explanation for our race of violent apes.  We are evil and that’s it. We are cruel and we don’t need no gods and no demons to be so we can do it all by ourselves same as any other apes do.

What is the point at all of master debating with another monkey?
Are we going to convert the planet to reason and good sense?
I THINK NOT!

Greed and Ignorance will rule forever or until the day the last human dies after having destroyed all other humans around him.  There is no redemption in the universe. 

So what is the point anyway with debating with greed and ignorance? What does it achieve?

Majority and numbers on your side mean nothing at all here.

So Craig could have just STFU after his first seven words then

The problem here is that we are assuming PERIOD. STOP. 

POINT FINAL.

Missing the Mark

Missing the fucking mark is such a big deal in this world. 

An awful lot of religion seems to be founded on negative words.

Aletheia, (Truth)  Hamartia (Sin) all express the lack, the removal, 

the negation of something.

The removal of the river Lethe, the missing of a lot or destiny appointed to us by some mysterious will somewhere.

So much foaming at the mouth over other people missing their mark while totally forgetting how many times they have missed the fucking mark themselves.

All empowered again in our darkest subconscious twisted minds, the so-called Freudian defence mechanism which bring the absolute worst of us all and which apparently are inevitable AND inexorable as well.

Projection, Repression, Regression

Denial, Displacement, Dissociation,

Rationalisation, Intellectualisation

Passive Aggression, Isolation.

All sicknesses found in large numbers in religious people.

If one is worried about missing the mark one should worry about missing the mark of reality and mental health really.

Venereal Veneration or Roshi This!

Life always gives us exactly the teacher we need at every moment. 

This includes every mosquito,
every misfortune,
every red light,
every traffic jam,
every obnoxious supervisor (or employee),
every illness, every loss,
every moment of joy or depression,
every addiction,
every piece of garbage,
every breath.

Every moment is the guru.”

― Charlotte Joko Beck

Even when that teacher himself, that sacred guru is an arrogant, alcoholic, adulterous, obnoxious, seducing piece of garbage prick preying on his disciples.

For Fuck Sake when will people see?

For one thing, I keep repeating it:

Life, the Universe is NOT AN ENTITY.

It has no will, no wishes, and no desires.

If it has any ‘will’ at all it is only concerned about itself. Propagating itself, surviving and procreating and that’s all. 

It doesn’t give a fuck about you as an individual and your capricious tender little needs and wants.  

A sperm does not think! It acts. 

It doesn’t give a fuck about the million other sperms surrounding it.

They can all die as far as it is concerned.

The universe does not care for one planet more than another and given time will not flinch at launching deadly asteroids on us one random day without the will of anyone or anything.

Back to my original quote now. The pride of life. The wisdom of a guru.
To have submissive mindless slaves, err I mean disciples, around him who worship his every word and move.  

Submit to your evil masters just in case I ever become one of them and I usually do as we all know what power does to someone.

Obey! Obey! Obey! And take off your underwear while you are down there bowing to me. And above all give me all your money. You don’t need it silly, a primate like you would not know what to do with it anyway.

This is always what happens when equality is taken away,
 when it is laid down at someone else’s feet. 

Sit my way.
Eat my way.
Shit my way. 

And one day, 

one faraway day 

you will be perfect too just like me.  

Perfect until I get caught with my pants down of course.
Perfect in pure hypocrisy.

Many have become filthy rich telling you what life and the universe wants and if lucky they end up showing with Oprah. 

 
When life and the universe do not talk at all in fact no more than any gods do but we all know that now don’t we? 

The ultimate common quality of life, the universe, and the gods is to be utterly speechless.

That ultimate quality is given to us baboons to translate to interpret these mute masters we have invented and  to Ka-Ching all the money for them too since not only don’t they have any tongues, they don’t have any hands either poor things.

So go on then. The world will always be full of shamans and charlatans.  

It’s a profitable business and the fringe benefits are awesome.  

Not everyone can become a rock star after all.

Or you could question everything and stay poor. :)

Dominion Dominate

As the owner of a beloved pet rabbit and also as a man getting older by the minute, I am becoming more and more sensitive to cruelty to animals in a strange way.

I watched a very traumatic French film last night and I was a bit horrified at the “cold-heartedness” of the reputable film maker Robert Bresson.  The film was Au hazard Balthazar and I hear its so-called sister film Mouchette is even crueler to animals having won an 8^th place in IMDB’s list.

I am far from being a PETA or vegan freak but I do not see the necessity of cruelty for the sake of art.  The very strange reactions in the comments do not surprise me much as there are plenty of idiots out there and many do not seem to know the difference between acting and real.

Another film I had found quite traumatic as well was Renoir’s La règle du jeu.

French in the 30’s and in the 60’s did not seem to mind showing it.  They are not guiltier than their Russian, Spanish, Chinese or even American counterpart but from what I hear it is hard for one to be a vegetarian tourist in Paris and the techniques of producing foie gras have always been quite controversial.  

Add to this an existentialist approach and maybe some  Dostoyevsky/Dostoïevski and who knows?

Even Dexter could show some controlled violence towards animals by removing the offending dog and relocating him in a less offensive place. J

So now I am not quite sure if I want to continue my exploration of Bresson and watch this ‘sister-film’.  I probably will knowing me even though I am getting more and more soft core every day now. Curiosity might win on this one but I am not pushing the envelope anymore. 

Life is all we have and every breath counts and is precious.  

In a strange dichotomous paradox I will still eat my chicken/lamb/pork/beef every day though but I carry flies and spiders live outside, well sometimes anyway not all the time J I did put rabbits out of my menu though. J

The attitude though is still ongoing from what I hear not only in B movies like Cannibal Holocaust but in ‘reputable’ filmmakers like Lars Von Trier and a scene to cruel to survive the editing floor in Manderlay from what I hear.

At least we know that the horrifying scenes of Antichrist were NOT real. I still have those deeply encrusted in my mind now therefore my reason for getting more and more soft core; some things just cannot be unseen.

Tripping horses and cockfighting and bullfighting will go on for quite some time I am afraid showing us the absolute ‘superiority’ of man over the animal kingdom given to him by god himself.  Read highly sarcastic tone here.

I don’t quite see the correlation though between smug existentialism and cruelty to animals.

O well here is my piece on film criticism, a commentary I will not attach to the IMDB long debate but some notes I needed to clarify in my head and what better way than writing them down now.

P.S. After having seen Mouchette, right on the top of my head I would put Au hasard Balthazar and La règle du jeu above 8 in the list of cruelties from my POV and talking only of what I have seen personally.

Barbers do not exist

'You know what? Barbers do not exist.'    

Dear Concerned Student:

I am not allowed in schools.

Sincerely,

God

The sound and the fury, the madness 

of a compartmentalised mind, 

so limited in its perception,

so blind to its own limitations.

What does it take to see, to hear, to Know?

The so petty arguments for such a petty moronic powerless impotent little god of their little minds.

What will it take?

A cheap god who pouts and crosses his all-powerful arms in a corner unable to act and do one of his very few miracles, a bit of a Scrooge with his miracles in fact, healed some sick raised some dead blah blah blah, changed some water into wine.

Why pick and choose? Why not heal ALL the sick raise ALL the dead and have wine at the tap now? 

What about the poor fuckers that DID NOT get healed? 

What about the poor mothers that DID NOT get their sons back? 

Free will and all that bullshit I am omni-everything  but totally impotent to change most things because of what? 

BECAUSE of a stupid puny capricious moronic ape that I created apparently who just won’t let me BOO HOO HOO.

Otherwise I’d be breaking his free will, free will he never had to begin with.

He did not choose when to be born and where and in what kind of family and he cannot choose to get out of this pattern he was thrown into and I don’t even give him the free will to end it all when it becomes too stupid or painful, after all Life is MY gift (apparently) and he does not have the right to take it away.  Not mentioning that he does not have the right to stop it from happening either.

 Free will my ass.

I cannot help the kids being murdered, maimed and butchered in school because they kicked me out of school?

FOR FUCK SAKE what kind of a puny impotent whining god is that now?

I can’t help them because I don’t exist and I CBF by the 7 billion of procreating monkeys that are overpopulating a little dot in one huge universe, one of many.

Man’s gods are so much like man it is a wonder no one ever clued up. 

Puny petty 12 year old pouting and fighting.

All the mythologies are about war, incest, drunkenness and petty fights and we see this as the absolute top of holiness: how blind can we be?

12 holy sons/tribes born of 2 wives 2 mistresses conniving and lying and these are the crème de la crème of humanity.  Not talking about the sexual prowess of Zeus or Krishna now.

Cheap tales made by cavemen.

The religion of billions based on wild tales many of them told by a guy who fell off his horse and OBVIOUSLY severely damaged his temporal lobe.  

Would he be around today no one would give him the time of day.

And the only reason we have a “young” earth is because we have a “young” WRITTEN history. DUH!

No writing = no old wives tales to carry on.

Six thousand years of writing has not made us any smarter now and six million more years won’t help us either.

The hubris and pride of it all is mind-boggling for those of us who still have a mind.

The “CHOSEN” people is the beginning of hell and blood and murder wherever one might be.  Once you are CHOSEN you are better than the rest of the dirt that doesn't deserve to live and should be eliminated by your special god but since he doesn't exist and is impotent, 

“WE” have to do his dirty work always and KILL, KILL, KILL.

Down with the infidel, he is not one of US.

WE are so much better than him, the goyim, the infidel, the trashy dog.

And then the reverse also happens because we all know what happens to the smart ass who thinks he is better than all of us: we call it here the Tall Poppy Syndrome.

Not forgetting also that KILL, KILL, KILL also makes you many enemies with long memories.

What a stupid self-righteous hysterical mob we are.

There will not be a day on this planet when someone is big enough to imagine a bloodless god, a magnanimous ethereal being of pure love and knowledge and peace and joy and wisdom above all human capacity.  

A god that doesn't fuck left right and centre, commits incest or encourages it anyway, orders to kill and is so petty and explosive

… a consuming fire

… a consuming fire DOES NOT love, 

it destroys everything on its path with no mercy or compassion or knowledge or even consciousness.

A god that is much concerned with words like BLOOD and SACRIFICES and SACRED and HOLY, all words of pain and contentions, of pride, hubris and arrogance.

Show me such an ethereal perfect being or show me nothing.

And nothing is what we will all get. 

Once you’re gone, you’re gone. 

And all the delusions, dreaming, wishing, and all the religions of the world will not change anything to this immutable fact. 

What does it matter, a dream of love
Or a dream of lies
We're all gonna be in the same place
When we die
Your spirit don't leave knowing
Your face or your name
And the wind through your bones
Is all that remains
And we're all gonna be
We're all gonna be
Just dirt in the ground

the Deuteronome was written by a Deuterostome

the NEED for eliminating subjectivity and treacherous emotions from the human being has created our FICTIONAL Vulcan Mind and Detached Zen and probably a great part of Buddhism too. All wishful thinking considering our apian and incurable heritage.  We are now down to trying to comprehend why some homo sapiens continually refuse to use their frontal and temporal lobes and much prefer to give way to their lizard brains.  What is the use of some of us using our frontal lobes and to what extent will that prevent humanity from going into complete chaos> Even though I would think the latter is just a matter of when rather than if.

7 billion temporal life forms among many other billions and billions of temporal life forms and given the power of time none of this will matter at all in a too near future.

So many have passed already unnoticed and long forgotten if not for the fact that some of them have left descendants, descendants who know nearly nothing at all from their only case to be here for a short time, a long forgotten and ignored antecedent who left his mark on this planet for a short time.

We know nearly nothing at all; the little we know is hardly worth mentioning.
First of all we are very limited in our neocortex according to Mr. Dunbar and his number.

The media keep showing us also that we are at core very parochial and that for a Canadian or an American or anyone it is only the local news that really matter and how "our own" are doing in the Olympics or in any world event.

The greatest scientists in the world barely know their only subject and are totally ignorant of hundreds of other sciences and histories.  We're even highly ignorant of our own history let alone thousands of years of Chinese, French, Egyptian or Greek civilisations with the billions of souls that went through them.  

The very little we know is based on lies, what we call history, the conqueror's report of their grandiose conquests where of course they are always the good people and the millions they butchered, murdered and massacred were obviously wrong AND Evil too.  

Today we are repeatedly reminded over and over of only one massacre and holocaust in the whole of history.  Forget the Amalekites and the Canaanites who did not deserve to live neither did their children or their animals.

Forget the Armenians. Forget all other atrocities. 
We concentrate on certain numbers only, forgetting all the other numbers that ever existed, that still exist today.  Everyone can tell how many died at Pearl Harbour, in Auschwitz, on 911

but who remembers how many died in Hiroshima? Nagasaki? Dryden?

How many Indians and African died in British Imperialism? 

How many aborigines where slaughtered in South America? North America? Australia? Wherever else the white man decided to set his foot upon and “declare” his.

How many died in Iraq? Iran? Afghanistan? China? Russia?  

How many have died today? Children dismembered and charred by a hellfire drone or just starving to death from economic sanctions? How many civilians were charred with Napalm?  How many die every day from the millions of Kalashnikov- brandishing- illiterates all over the world?

Today is the first day of just another year just in our tiny neighbourhood here half a dozen have died already. Many of them I would strongly assume related to alcohol and an already limited brain power. 

Two people/souls
(someone's mother, brother, sister, child, loved one) 

die every single second on this planet and too many from sheer stupidity and utter cruelty and nonchalance from the powers that be, that is when the powers that be are not directly involved in the death of those. 

So what are words to express beliefs and opinions?

Beliefs and opinions in what anyway?

The deadly fruits of politics and religions?

We don’t have the neocortex, or the temporal lobes nor the frontal lobes to know anything good or anything worth knowing.  

We fight like ants and monkeys and pretend to be so much better and superior to them. 

Really?

So opinions and beliefs will go on until the last one of us finally disappears so the saying is right the last opinion will disappear with the last asshole.

After all don’t forget that all the laws of this planet were established by assholes.

Yes the Deuteronome was written by a Deuterostome, 

someone who started as an asshole.

So from one Deuterostome to another

Live long and prosper while you can