6 ms·
This is a perspective which is easier to pull off in the first world.
by msane 10y ago
This is a perspective which is easier to pull off in the first world.
- jvanderbot 10y agoDo you really imagine that everyone not in the first world is constantly suffering? That is a first-world perspective: Claiming that only first-world-ers can be happy through adversity.
- icebraining 10y agoClaiming that only first-world-ers can be happy through adversity. I think the claim is that it's easier to find first-world-ers which experience less adversity.
- wu-ikkyu 10y ago>it's easier to find first-world-ers which experience less adversity. What kind of adversity?
- msane 10y ago> Do you really imagine that everyone not in the first world is constantly suffering? Of course. Water sanitation is a big thing. Access to affordable food, the list goes on ...
- krapht 10y agoHappiness is relative, not absolute. If not, our peasant ancestors surely would've killed themselves out of depression.
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- dajohnson89 10y agoThe misery of one's life has no predictive power on the likelihood of suicide.
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- armenarmen 10y agoI'd bare in mind that when stoicism was first concocted that the entire world was 3rd world
- Lagged2Death 10y agoWikipedia: When Demetrius of Phalerum conducted a population census [of Athens] in 317 BC the population was 21,000 free citizens, plus 10,000 resident aliens and 400,000 slaves.
- mac01021 10y agoHow do you prevent an uprising with those numbers?
- rhizome 10y agoCenturies of internalized repression.
- icebraining 10y agoProbably not; the ancient Greeks generally didn't allow their slaves to have children of their own, so few were born into slavery.
- airbreather 10y agoMaybe a slave's life in that society was not as bad as you think.
- tomjen3 10y agoMany greek slaves had decent enough lives, especially if they were educated, they might be running their masters business and have quite a lot to lose in a rebellion and not much of an upside. Greek slavery was not at all like the antebellum South.
- msane 10y agoI'm not knocking stoicism, it's a great outlook. But it asks us to have some perspective. A weakness of Stoicism is that it can allow people to attribute too much of thier emotional and intellectual success to thier own powers, when lack of physical comfort can be a limiting factor on having any intellectual life at all. You should remember that stoicism was concieved amongst the elite of their time and place, who worried least. Modern population density also makes comparisons of the contemporary 3rd world with ancient Greece rather far-fetched.
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- ioddly 10y agoEpictetus was a slave with a lame leg (possibly intentionally hobbled so he could not escape), and still managed to espouse the same ideas.
- coldpie 10y agoEven supposing you're right, what's your point?
- Cpoll 10y agoWhich means it's completely applicable for the majority of HN readers.
- grecy 10y agoFunny you should say that. I am driving through West Africa right now and having the time of my life.
- grecy 10y agoFunny you would say that. I'm in West Africa right now, moving through some of the poorest countries in the world. I would say, on the whole, people here are happier than people in Australia / Canada / USA (where I have lived). Obviously there are some severely sick or malnourished people where that is not true, but it's actually extremely uncommon. There is a lot of food and water here.