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13-11-2012 None of it fazes me anymore. That's how I know that I've reached the very peak of pessimism! When it no longer even makes you depressed.. it's just the reality. Live till you die (whether your death will be natural, accidental or self-inflicted) and do whatever you want till then (whatever makes you happy or sad doesn't matter). Don't have kids. And that's it.. |
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13-11-2012
Some of the tragic stories I learn about still bring me down because I can't effectively turn off empathy for good, though I'm trying lots of the times, coz it's useless. But yes, learning about yet another atrocity when you've already given up your rose-colored glasses and acknowledged this world is the one where anything can and did happen to sentient beings usually doesn't depress you any further. Finding posts like this one actually feels nice. I'm already aware of the grim reality, no surprises there, but finding others who openly speak out about it isn't easy. |
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13-11-2012 I just feel so helpless to change anything not only with myself and others but obviously in the existential conditions themselves which are fundamentally unalterable. Not having children is the most profound decision someone can make as you would essentially be ceasing the perpetuation of this horror on others. That's the only positive thing I can think of when contemplating reality - the fact that it will be inflicted on anyone else by me.I do agree though that it feels great reading similar posts that echo your own thoughts (rather than the incredible amounts of optimistic crap that's out there), but in my case, I can only nod my head and go back to life routine (unless I kill myself). You're always stuck between a rock and a hard place until the rock crushes you today or tomorrow. The thing about rational depression is that once you get used it, that's it.. the very resilience of the adaptation mechanisms that evolved with the DNA molecule that you decry with every fiber of your being in every post has now affected you and you are no longer reaching for the noose or for the gun but merely wish for nature to do you in as fast as possible and as soon as possible. As Cioran said: “No matter which way we go, it is no better than any other. It is all the same whether you achieve something or not, have faith or not, just as it is all the same whether you cry or remain silent.” I think that describes it pretty well.. Thanks for the post Irina. |
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13-11-2012 "That it will NOT be inflicted". Irina can you add an edit/delete function here? |
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13-11-2012
It'd take some time for me to write it. I'll put it on my 'to-do when not lazy' list :) |
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13-11-2012 "finding others who openly speak out about it isn't easy."Yeah, that's why I have liked this stuff so much! |
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15-11-2012 One thing that gives me comfort is that life could be SO much worse. Most people aren't tortured on a daily basis. Most people don't suffer extreme pain on a daily basis. Life is bad, but it could be much, much worse. |
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15-11-2012
I know when I'm in pain it doesn't help me in the slightest to see many people around me doing just fine. Every person's life is their one and only life, no matter whether they are of the majority or the minority of the statistics. So from the perspective of every human life matters it couldn't get much worse. |
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15-11-2012 I disagree that it could not get much worse. Each of us could be tortured physically non-stop from our birth to our death. That doesn't happen usually. |
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20-11-2012
Well, sure, we can always imagine worse. For practical reasons, to get thru our daily lives. That's how I sometimes try to cheer people up by saying 'it could be much worse, at least it's not this or not that'. But that's just practical psychology aimed at making ourselves feel better. Sure, it would have been even worse if every single sentient unit was being tortured every second of its life. We could even imagine everlasting torture why not, the concept of hell has been invented long ago. Btw, if hell really existed but only some people would be sent there, not the majority, would it still be much solice to think that at least not all of us are going there? What if only 1 person got the eternal torment? Even better? But what if that was sombody you loved most of all? The math usually changes here. I'm just speaking of some solidarity here, you know. We're all potential victims of this grinder that life is and saying it's not that bad because only some of us get the worst of it and others get away relatively fine?.. If the worst ordeals that take place in this world aren't acceptable for me, aren't acceptable for the people I love, isn't it then just fare to say that nobody should ever have to experience them? I guess you can look at it from that angle and say we're lucky it's not even worse than it is. To me it's like being kidnapped and imprisoned and thanking the guards for only raping you 3 times a week and not 7. Or you can look at our circumstance here and say 'What the fuck? Why should we have to tolerate any of it? Why should we thank the abusers for mistreating just some of us to the extreme and most of us just moderately?' That's how I tend to feel. Except in reality there's no personified abusing power one could hate. Just an unlucky set of events that took place long time ago... |
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15-11-2012 Each of us a separate consciousness which is what makes it literally impossible to feel anyone's pain but our own (even pain we once experienced doesn't seem to be all that bad when it happens to someone else since we are feeling fine at that moment).That's why we allow this nightmare to go on and why we impose it on the next generation. I said it before but I will say it again: if each of us could live every day of our lives with every single suffering that is happening out there every second of every day (both in the human and animal world) each of us would adopt antinatalism and very likely kill themselves. The isolated nature of each consciousness (i.e. being situated in one body and one mind) is what prevents that scenario from happening |
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19-11-2012 God damn...I love this whole quote starting with Diderot and then those philosophical points you listed Ukrainian-PRINCESS. I am going through some shit that I been going through for years. Major SHIT..and this is oddly uplifting and reassuring. Because its true. None of that "Chicken Soup for your Asshole", The Secret, Oprah, the bible/religion, or any other delusional bullshit we turn to when in fear. This is more reassuring. Because you see how we are not alone. We are all on this this shit ball we called Earth: We all have feelings, fears, anxieties. The majority are all going through private pains and different journeys. And we all have hopes. Normally I come to partake of your pretty visage baby, but thank you for posting this on your blog. All I need is some harsh philosophical truths, some Henry Miller, some Marcus Aurelius "Meditations", some of the great youtuber Inmendham, some Vodka/beer, some Purple Rain, and I'm good to go for another day, for another hour, for another breath. Thank you. Hasta la vista, baby. |
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20-11-2012
This is more reassuring. Because you see how we are not alone. Exactly. And also, we realize that our feelings are normal: the despair, the horror, the tragedy - all those emotions the majority likes to outrule like it once liked to deny our sexual feelings in Victorian era. If you want some more philosophical pessimism you've come to the right place. "Chicken Soup for your Asshole" lol that's funny some Vodka/beer You should try Hrenovuha)) |
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20-11-2012 I am not sure how it's reassuring though.. for me, its much better than the alternative, but reassuring? Not really |
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21-11-2012 We were born screaming, crying and naked... and it all goes downhill from there. |
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22-11-2012 I was walking through a university campus near me tonight and read this quote:"If you would only recognize that life is hard, things would be so much easier for you." - Louis Brandeis It was outside the gymnasium. I thought about your writings here, Irina.. it's exactly the relaxing, good feeling I feel for things being told as they are, without delusions and bullshit. It can actually make life better. |
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21-12-2012 This is not a drive-by post, I came here because I found your videos interesting.I am what the article terms a "hard-core cynic" but I disagree with most of what is written above - several parts stick out as particularly nonsensical: 1. "We are by far the most intelligent species on Earth.. most powerful, complex brain.." So? Says who? and why would this make a difference? is suffering more acceptable if it is an "unintelligent" beast that suffers? 2. "War can only happen in a species of low collective intellect. To get people to partake in that mass insanity they have to be below a certain intellectual threshold." This is nonsense. A person who defends themselves is not a moron for doing so, and is this not what soldiers see themselves as, defenders? The author - who displays some slight prejudice towards elitism - would have us believe that intellectuals are never warmongers and that they eschew violence, which is patently incorrect. To say nothing of psychopaths who sport high IQs. 3. "refuse collector, plumber, dentist, street sweeper, assembly line worker, maid, salesman, mechanic, butcher, nurse, accountant, farmer, prostitute, etc." How on Earth can the author equate these jobs? 4. "It is impossible to socially interact without lying." So? Where is it forever etched in stone that lying is always wrong..? this person is moralising, and their version of morality is coming from a stock-standard, bible-based Christian ethos - the very thing he/she decries. No one would argue that to lie to intend to cause harm is a bad thing, but truth is a spectrum, not black and white as some would claim, and any attempt to state otherwise betrays a kind of closed-in thinking. 5. "Scientists are often accused of �playing God’, well someone's got to because he is doing such a awfull job of it." I don't really know where to begin with this statement. It's confused, to say the least. 6. "The human race is perfect and should not be modified. Yeah right!" This is not an argument that anti-GM/anti-transhumanists espouse. It has more to do with the technology employed and the dangers involved with hijacking of the processes of reproduction causing enormous, unforseen problems. 7. "Suicide the ultimate rebellion against nature, reality, this universe." The Universe desn't care about you, don't you get it? it is absolutely unfazed, whether you live or die, so how can you "rebel" against something that doesn't give a shit? 8. "A defiant �fuck you’ to the universe, deciding when and how you are going to die, not passively leaving it to fate. The ultimate control of your life. Overcoming your strongest primitive instincts." You have a trophism towards that which is good, and away from that which is bad, correct? Then it is your "primitive instinct" that causes your unhappiness, and therefore your suicide. You are not overcoming your instinct, you're following it. There's mature, insightful writing on this blog, but I find this one article extremely sophomoric. Without being too uncharitable, it smacks of insecurity, and an unwillingness to deal with the pragmatic nature of day-to-day existence that billions of people take for granted, on the reasoning that the author is some kind of intellectual superhero who sees things "as they really are." It's this sort of thinking that gets us precisely nowhere. |
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23-12-2012
I like the entry as a whole, it's kind of a rant. Since I agree with the sentiment overall and love the way it was expressed I don't care to dissect it into separate arguments to point to some disagreements. I perceive it more as a poetry. Disappointment, disillusionment, rebellion against society's norms. |
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