Asceticism

Hedonism is for weaklings.

The future of the world belongs to ascetics.

A man doesn’t need anything other than food, clothing, shelter and maybe a computer.

Everything else is a mirage.

Why’re you working hard, plundering our environment for a mirage?

I propose a new game.

Instead of seeing how much we can acquire, let’s see how much we can do without.

The one who consumes the least, is first, the one who consumes the most, is last.

It’s easy to live a life of hedonism and luxury, let’s see you keep busy with little… use your imagination.

So many interesting things are relatively free, like books, and the internet is cheap.

The future belongs to ascetics, as the economy is going to collapse, in all likelihood, and those who’re used to having nothing, will be better able to survive and thrive in the aftermath.

“A man doesn’t need anything other than food, clothing, shelter and maybe a computer.”

A man? What does a female need?

A woman doesn’t need more, but I’d say they’re more inclined to think they need more.

Life as an Addiction

However, this is relative to the individual’s opportunities.

J,P&I

Everything that a man needs and shoes … lots of shoes.

A female needs nothing, but wants everything.

A female needs exactly what a male needs with one exception.

Yeah they both need a man. The difference is only that one needs one on the outside wanting to get in deep within, and the other needs one on the inside wanting to get out and about.

A female needs nothing, but wants everything.

Life is an addiction?

An addiction is something you desire, or even fear, that’s more trouble than it’s wroth, in the long run.

When you compromise your physical and mental health, for something that’s pleasurable, in some way.

You don’t compromise your physical and mental health by living, you compromise it by dying.

Life is an addiction, implies that we’re something other than life, like a ghost.

Atta boy!

Not needing what people nowadays desperately seem to need is not asceticism. Or need not be, rather. Getting all this pointless on any deeper level useless shit out of the way is just getting rid of plastic clutter. Any hedonist who is dependent on a car, cellphone, blackberry, expensive drapes and expensive shampoo is a poor hedonist. (not saying they are not hedonists, but they likely do not know how to enjoy life, you can have priorities you are terrible at achieving and not even notice). So sure Thorsten Veblen can be thrown on the table, or some version of EF Schumacher, but I don’t think we need to see this as Hedonism vs. Asceticism. For example one could see it as distraction vs. immersion. I don’t want to replace your schema with that one, but the problem to me is not, let me reign in my desires, but rather what the fuck is going on with my desires, and how did they great manipulated and what do I really want and what actually gives me joy and pleasure. Some people have very limited ideas about what pleasure and joy are or what the feeling of thriving is, so they become as smug as a priest damning the 7 deadly sinners while spitting out the word hedonist, while at the same time thriving and enjoying, if one subtle levels, their own chosen modes of existence. The answers to what the fuck do I really want have often been much simpler and less technological than my peers, but also often more subtle and complicated. In both cases they tend to be cheaper in terms of money spent to reach satisfy them. And yes, I lose a lot less in some post-apocalyptic world than my peers lose. But this is not because I suppress my desire for hair weaves and sports cars. If I ever had those desires, the issue would be to unlearn that these are my desires, rather than something imposed, and then figure out what I actually thrive with. hedonism and asceticism are often, though not always, seen as degrees of desire and degrees of trying to satisfy and value desire and its objects. Why waste energy controlling desires? Develop them, or really uncontort them.

For me the degree of desire is not an important issue. Alignment and authenticity, however are important to me.

Most women are more hedonistic/materialistic than most men.

They want a lot more than shoes, shoes is just the beginning.

Females were more helpless in the state of nature, because they’re physically and mentally weaker, and they bear children.

They’ve been designed by evolution to feel helpless, even now, when they’re no longer as helpless, due to advances in civility, science and technology.

Additionally, they’re more emotional, and emotions are, by and large, an expression of need and desire.

Women are the heart, and men are the head, by attempting to placate women, instead of getting a handle on them, men have given into their competitive, and cooperative drives, competing and cooperating with one another in order to satisfy women, who’re insatiable… a black hole, an abyss, a bottomless pit.

As a result, we’re compromising our physical, mental and environmental health.

By and large, men prefer freedom, and women security.

Rather than finding a balance, we’ve chosen to continuously move towards the latter at expense of the former.

In the state of nature, more competition/cooperation can often be beneficial, depending on the quality.

In the state of artifice, it’s just the reverse.

I’ll beat you no problem: I need nothing shoots himself in the head

As much as you’d like to deny it, the goal of life is to have as much as possible – the goal is to become the universe itself, in a sense. “Asceticism”, i.e. trimming your desires, can only be useful as a sub-goal, as a way to protect yourself from dangerous desires.

No, the goal of life is not life, birth, growth, pleasure and power, nor is it nonlife, death, decay, pain and weakness, the goal of life is balance, in all things balance, to deny this, is to deny existence. It’s not about extremes, asceticism and hedonism, necessarily, rather, you can have too much of a good thing. However, too much fire calls for ice. In the state of nature, man’s enemy is otherness, in the state of artifice, man’s enemy is himself. We ought to move from a propagation mentality to a preservation one, as frontiers are nonexistent, and present growth = future decay.

Some interesting points.

You could say the priest or the philosopher, damning others for indulging in all sorts of things which give them pleasure, are indulging in things which give them pleasure as well: spirituality, religion and philosophy, and yes, some people equate more expensive or popular with more pleasure, when the two aren’t necessarily aligned. You’re sort of changing the dichotomy, rather than agreeing or disagreeing with what I said, and I think what you’re saying has just as much value as what I’m saying. Sure, pursue your desires, but some desires are more trouble than they’re wroth, or they can gradually become more trouble than they’re worth, one needs to know when to cut back, or opt for something healthier, more holistic.

See, balance is merely a means, never a goal. Beside that, in the universe of flux, you either go forward or you go backward – there is no middle position here. You cannot stand still in the flux – everything changes. So you will either change toward greater or toward smaller. Balance, or standing still, or oscillating around a fixed point, is merely a disguised version of going backwards – to nothingness. For oscillations cannot be fixed either – they too always move in one of the two directions, toward God or toward nothingness.

The human specie has evolved a symbiotic gender relation between men and women. Men secure women’s physical needs, and in return, women secure men’s sexual needs. This is how civilization (artifice) is created, maintained, and grown. The stronger a civilization is, the stronger the symbiotic relationship between the genders also is. As a result, women never worry, or think about needs. From the female perspective, a “need” is a myth. Needs don’t exist. Because a female has all of her needs taken care of. The female specie is the privileged specie. For males, needs are not secured, and males eventually realize male expendability. Males are the expendable, unprivileged specie. A male life is worth very little, inside civilization. A female life is worth a lot, inside civilization.

We now approach a time period, postmodernity, where a global civilization will form, led by the new world order and illuminati, and any “wilderness” or “nature” will evaporate. It will cease to exist. And so too will any escape for males. Males are inherently disadvantaged inside civilization, which, inherently favors females over males. Daughters are worth more to the state, than sons. Sons are unwanted, or worse, a direct threat to the state. This is the reason why the state encourages war making and warmongering, in order to justify the slaughter of all the sons of the state. The state wants a few males inhabiting it as possible. So the state actually wants sons and boys to die. The state wants as small a male population as possible. However, once males understand this undeniable fact, begin to resist and overthrow the state.

This is why males are the primary cause of revolutions and rebellions, due to male expendability and unprivilege.

Females are catered to, and females have different internal gender conflict than males. Females fight over resources, wants and desires, but not needs. Females are never in a state of need, inside the security of the state. This is why females fiercely, violently protect the “status quo” of society, despite all the repercussions, even if doing so threatens the lives of a few women. Women as a whole, as a group, are entitled to defend society and statehood. Because females value security over freedom. Females actually hate and despise the idea of “freedom” proper, and reject the idea. Females call freedom “negative”, and have negative reactions to freedom. This is also why there are no female philosophers now, and never before, and never will be.

Because the female gender, the female genes, the female biology, is outright opposed to any form of “freedom”. Freedom is not what females are after, or want. Females want to have things, luxurious, hedonistic, decadent things. Females want the fruits, sugars, and candies of society. Females never want to venture or travel “outside” of society, where it’s unsafe. Where a negro in afrika would rape a woman, if she walked into the ghetto. Females want safety behind a plexi glass window. Driving in cars and riding in private airplanes.

This makes females predictable. The female mind is very easy to overcome and control, as a result of her expected desires. Females never have a compulsion to “think outside” society, or the state. And so philosophy does not appeal to the female brain.

Males develop a more powerful, primal connection to needs. Because our needs are unsecure. They are never secure. And if males actively, obviously resist the state, then the state and society will deprive men of their needs. This is called “crime” and the “criminal”. This is also why a vast majority of criminals are male, not female. And even within crime and punishment, even certain needs are still offered. For the state to remove all needs, requires a heinous type of crime, something that directly attacks the status quo of a state, society, and culture.

Standing in between point A and B is no more of an illusion than any other phenomenon.

No you cannot stand in between them perfectly… but you can imperfectly.

I’m not sure I agree with you.

Take pain: we define pain in contrast to pleasure.

The hungrier or thirstier we are, the more satisfying it is to quench our hunger and thirst.

At some point, even for human beings, who’s desires are more numerous than other creatures, as they begin to satisfy more of their desires, they become less intense, as we’ve been programmed as such (imperfectly, mind you), as too much of this, or that, can lead to death.

Our desires have limits, it’s just that some are more limited than others.

Too much sugar or salt can taste disgusting.

Too much knowledge spoils the mystery.

Pride comes from overcoming obstacles, including the obstacle of thinking will be happier by doing away with all obstacles.