Peripateticists, kinda, except girls not boys, bare cunt instead of toga and walking around the house not the garden, but otherwise exactly the same.

This is the Engli> English version of an older Romanian article entitled Peripateticieni gen, cu deosebirile ca fete nu baieti, in pizda goala nu-n toga si prin casa nu prin gradina, da-n rest tatatat la fel, which marked down for public curiosity the discussions in my harem preceeding and following the butchering at my hands of an innocent cute fluffy bunny, due to the idiotic posturing of some lame-ass Romanian style social justice warrior.

Her: So I was trying to say, I'm not sure how rights of individuals make sense if there's no such thing as a right to life (not that there's necessarily a right to life, it's clear as mud where the lines are drawn, but I'm just saying).
Me: A rabbit is not an individual. The fact that plenty of humans are dumb as wood does not make wood people.

Her: Are those idiots people?
Me: Which ?

Her: The ones dumb as wood.
Me: Sure.

Her: How about monkeys?
Me: No.

Her: Or where's the line? Just our specific species?
Me: Yes. It can be extended if we ever meet aliens and they bargain convincingly. Otherwise, humans are predatory and this heritage must be preserved.

Her: Why?
Me: Because that's our identity.

Her: Is there some problem if that identity changes over time?
Me: Yes.

Her: What'd be wrong with it?
Me: The fact that it changes.

Her: It's not clear to me why the change would be a problem in itself. I mean, change happens.
Me: No. Change does not happen. Stupidity happens.

Her: Well the wisdom of the ages tends to focus on the idea that change happens and is unavoidable etc. The most important theories we've come up with, like for instance evolution, focus on this. Refuting it is a fairly fringe attitude, I'm not familiar with the argument.
Me: You are very poorly qualified to comment on "the wisdom of ages". In point of fact this wisdom focuses on the idea that change never happens, ever, except as either a) as perceived by idiots or b) as a disaster. The fringe issue is ridiculous, in that a bunch of idiots that aren't visible in the millenia of cultural history or relevant in any measurable way have decided "they are the center" by virtue of their crass inculture and circlejerk habitsⁱ. So they call things "fringe" that are not. Let me tell you something : the US "liberals" are the fringe. And a fringe so fringy it's barely worth the mention. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSjLiQxEZlM < there.

Her: Haha
Me: Mk.

Her: If the fact that I think that clip is funny and agree with its point proves something about this conversation I'm not sure what it is.
Me: I don't think it proves anything.

Her: Oh. K then.
Me: And to make you even happier : you're a woman. There's nothing wrong with you disagreeing on this point on account of your being a woman. But there'd be something wrong if you don't understand that you are merely a woman, and that means half and no more of the whole picture.

Her: What do you mean "merely" a woman? You mean there are two genders and a woman is only one?
Me: Exactly.

Her: Aha, kay....
Me: That'd be the connection with the clip : an excess of nurturing is the problem. There's nothing wrong with maternal love in itself, but there can be too much of a good thing.

Her: But I'm not diagreeing with anything from a female perspective, not that I'm aware of.
Me: That simply means you're unaware.

Her: I don't think it's very fair to insist that the reason I disagree is because I'm a woman when I do have an actual argument that's not based on emotion (even if I got emotional about it, the argument itself isn't an emotional one).
Me: Your argument is entirely based on emotion.

Her: The idea that killing something for the sole purpose of proving a point to an idiot falsely attributes harm is emotional?
Me: Yes. There's nothing false about death, nor could there ever be.

Her: What emotion is this?
Me: Asking someone to name an emotion is an appeal to ignorance.

Her: Well, given that you're harming something in response to the actions of an unconnected third party seems to suggest there's something about attribution going on.
Me: That'd be an emotional judgement.

Her: Hm.
Me: It's of the ilk "he smiles when I pass so he must like me."

Her: I don't see the connection there at all. I didn't put intent in my argument.
Me: It's the exact same construction. Not a simile, an identity.

Her: "He smiles when I pass so he must like me" means the thinker is assuming it knows what the party in question is thinking.
Me: Exactly.

Her: You've already said what you're thinking, I'm not assuming it. Neh?
Me: Yes, you are.

Her: Oh, well I don't want to assume. So if you're not thinking "I will prove a point to these assholes by killing a mammal" what exactly are you thinking?
Me: I kill it because it is my sovereign, absolute and indisputable right to kill.

Her: Hm. But in the context, it seems like you're only executing this right because of the actions of someone else. Is that false?
Me: I need not show causeⁱⁱ. It can be for sport as well as for anything, or for nothing. It makes no difference.

Her: Hm.
Me: Do you want to come along for rabbit picking ?

Her: Is it in the wild, like a rabbit hunt? Because I'd like to learn how to do that, with you. But if you're going to a pet store or something then no.
Me: A grower.

Her: Tonight?! Romania, land of bars that close at sundown and rabbit farms open all night?!

[...]

Me: He's really cute.

Her: Are you going to butcher him yourself?!
Me: Of course.

Her: How?
Me: With a knife.

Her: While it's wriggling and all?
Me: Well yeah.

Her: Would you consider breaking its neck before you cut it?
Me: Nope.

Her: May I ask why not?
Me: Because that is exactly the point I am making : pain and suffering OF ANIMALS is irrelevant.

Her: Irrelevant in what sense?
Me: To people.

Her: Why is the pain and suffering of people relevant to people but not the pain and suffering of animals?
Me: Because people are categorically distinct from animals.

Her: Is there something wrong if people care about the suffering and pain of animals?
Me: Not at all. I'm sorry for the poor thing too.

Her: So then why does it matter whether it's relevant or not?
Me: Because life is about what's right. NOT about what we feel like. This is the essence of maturity. This is how children become adults.

Her: What do you think about the occasional person who shows up on youtube or in the news or whatever after having tortured an animal? Are they just doing what's right?
Me: How would I know ?

Her: Same way you know the rightness and wrongness of the other things you've said are right or wrong, I imagine.
Me: Well without context ? I imagine they could be, or could not be.

Her: What do you think about the idea that the ability to distinguish practical things such as killing and eating a rabbit and needlessly cruel things such as purposefully hurting a rabbit is part of what separates people from animals in the first place?
Me: I do distinguish, but I don't agree with the theory.

Her: Is human suffering that isn't physically sourced relevant to humans?
Me: Hm ?

Her: Is the emotional suffering of humans relevant to humans? In the way that the physical suffering of animals is not?
Me: There's no such thing as "emotional" suffering. That's a pussyfoot word for asinine idiocy. The people who think they are "emotionally" suffering should be beaten until their physical suffering is so great that they do not recall what emotional suffering is.

Her: Do you remember how you felt when [Censored], when you were sad? Would you say that was not suffering?
Me: I would so say.

Her: So what was it?
Me: Sadness.

Her: Is human sadness relevant to humans in the way that the physical suffering of animals is not?
Me: Human sadness is the sad human's god damned business. It's neither relevant nor even transparent to any other human.

Her: Then when I was there and you were sad, why did you say you were glad I was there?
Me: 'Cause I was.

Her: But why?
Me: What do you mean "why" ?

Her: Did my being there have any interaction with your being sad?
Me: You can't directly interact with people's emotions. You interact exclusively with the people themselves.

(pause)

Me: So what was the point of your little interrogatory ?
Her: Finding answers to the specific questions that I asked.

Me: Aha. Got more ?
Her: Nothing comes to mind right now. I feel inept in my ability to either agree with and come to terms with what you have said or successfully argue a point against it.

Me: Aha. Well yea. See, the thing is sometimes fate chances a hand, and you get exposed to things you're not prepared to either digest or oppose.
Her: I wish he could be a pet rabbit instead of being sacrificed on the altar of human stupidity. I hope he got to eat a lot of nice grass, and to drink a lot of dew, and to play with other rabbits.

Me: Well he did live with a dozen or so little rabbits. He's two months old.

Her: Do you think it suffers if it is taken from its family and kept in a scary box and then has its neck broken?
Me: I'm pretty sure it knows it's the end of the ride.

Her: But do you think it suffers during the scenario I described?
Me: Probably. Everyone and everything suffers all the time. That's why old people are so annoying, too in tune with their own suffering.

Her: May I ask why it's necessary to vivisect it if it suffers anyway, even with a different mode of death?
Me: Yes.

Her: Why's it necessary?
Me: It's not necessary at all. This is simply what I want to do.

Her: Why do you want to do it that particular way?
Me: Mostly 'cause it scares people like you [used to be]. Also 'cause it's the natural way.

Her: Wouldn't it scare people more if you cut them?
Me: Uh. They're animals, these people ? Haha, are you about to propose I vivisect you instead of the rabbit ?

Her: Well I wasn't, seeing as you said it was for people like I used to be. But I would propose that if you wanted to scare someone or otherwise affect them because of their stupidity or some other fault, that you perform any action on them specifically, rather than a different party.
Me: Here's the layout : some people claim that things affect them that don't. I do these things. They have no option but to come to terms with their own lies themselves.ⁱⁱⁱ

Her: Don't they have the opportunity to come to terms with their own lies themeselves without you doing these things?
Me: I don't care.

Her: You've said that it's not wrong for people to care about the suffering and pain of animals, yet you also seem to suggest that people have no business caring about it.
Me: People have no business "legislating" about it, busybodying about it and so forth. To care is one thing. To think your issues matter is WAY the fuck another thing.

Her: Well, for other people, not harming animals on purpose is "right" just as you conversely say what's right is suffering and death.
Me: Hey. Any time they are ready for it we can fight it over. I'm not negotiating this point.

Her: They wouldn't fight it over, seeing as they don't have faith in beligerence in the first place.
Me: In that case I guess then they get to stfu and learn an important life lesson in the process.

Her: If violence conquers all, even argument, why are you training me in logic instead of shooting?
Me: You gotta be willing and able to stand for what you believe in. If you're not, you might as well be a rabbit. And if you recall I have on numerous occasions indicated that you must meet minimal standards of violence.

Her: You think the rabbit's problem is it lacks the will?
Me: I wouldn't kill a wolf to prove this point.

Her: Do you think this is an issue of will rather than ability?
Me: Cat has the will but not the ability and it didn't help it. I've killed some obnoxious cat that was acting like it owned the place.

Her: But you said you gotta be willing to stand for what you believe in.
Me: Yes. Doesn't mean you won't be killed.

Her: I thought this indicated that the rabbit does not have the will.
Me: Rabbit is on my side of the argument, imo.

Her: Please be consistent.
Me: The rabbit is not the one claiming rights. I don't think it thinks it has rights. Seems very resigned and dignified, something most people fail to be. And I'm not even sure I'll be as competent at it as this poor rabbit honestly.

Her: You said it seems very scared earlier. Moreover I do not understand why this is turning into a projection of the idea that you can possibly perceive how the rabbit feels, much less whether animals feel or not in the first place.
Me: He's very scared, but I don't see how that means he can't be resigned and dignified, for one. For the other, I made some statements that were not about the rabbit, you tried to talk about its will so we changed to talking about the rabbit's internals. Now you are protesting that we do so. Well...I'm just following in this dance.

Her: How come you don't break into a bar that closes at 11pm at 3am and get a drink?
Her: Yeah. Why *wouldn't* you kill the wolf to prove the same point? Is it because it'd fight back?
Her: I really am interested in understanding. It's emotional for me which I'm trying to keep controlled, but it's difficult and I sense that I may not be doing the best job. I apologize for that, and I'm grateful that you've answered the questions you have so far.
Me: Simmer down now. I don't break into a bar cause I respect the ownership enough. If it got to be a problem I would, sure.

Her: Wow, I didn't think you had any respect for the places that close early/aren't open when they say they're going to be open/close for months at a time/etc
Me: Ownership. Not the places themselves, the concept.

Her: Does the rabbit own itself?
Me: Sure.

Her: Why do you respect the ownership of the bar but not of the rabbit?
Me: The owners of the bar are people.

Her: But the people keep the bar closed when it should be open. Has the rabbit done anything stupid with that which it owns?
Me: Not afaik.

Her: So then isn't it correct to conclude that the bar is far more deserving of punishment than the rabbit then?
Me: It's not correct, in that this is not punishment.

Me: Why are you crying?
Her: For one, because I feel sorry for the rabbit and remorseful that I can't do something nice for it or save it.
Her: And for the other, because I'm inept at either understanding and agreeing with your viewpoint or successfully lodging an argument against it, I feel like I've failed the rabbit.

Me: You haven't failed the rabbit.
Her: I can't know that.

Me: If you take an oath or make a promise you can fail. There's no failing you don't know about. When you fail you know, and it takes a particular effort to efface that knowledge.
Her: I guess that makes sense.

Me: People mostly suffer, if you care to know, by being trapped in these false representations that paralise their otherwise good nature. Do what we tell you or else you can't know you've not failed the rabbit. This is poopycock. Utterly nazist transactioning and profiteering off naive people's feelings.
Her: Well. Sure, false representations are bad. I think I know what some are. I'm sure I don't recognize some for what they are. I'm still not sure that making animals hurt for the sake of affecting some third party is a shitty thing to do is a false repesentation.

Me: Animals exist to serve people. Either as food or subjects of study,
Her: I don't know that at all.

Me: A. Well this is the core of the problem.
Her: Probably, huh.

Me: You're thinking of animals based not on interaction with animals, but on interactions with human depictions of animals. Such as animals drawn by a person in a book, "animal" cartoon characters made to resemble people, people in animal plush costumes and so forth.
Her: What about the pets I've had?

Me: All of this creates in you the false but deep seated impression that animals are residually a sort of people. This is not true. Animals are not at all a sort of people with different characteristics. Animals are animals. It's a thing into itself, not some anthropomorphized cuteness. Fundamentally, we could present the problem in saying that you're a furry.
Her: What about the pets I have had?

Me: Did you hunt them ?
Her: No.

Me: Kill them ?
Her: No.

Me: Captured them yourself ?
Her: Well Mr. Beetle, but otherwise no.

Me: Well then ?
Her: Then what? You said I'm thinking of animals based on anthropomorphized representations, non-animals, ie. cartoons and stuff.

Me: Exactly. This is what a pet is.
Her: They were animals. Are animals.

Me: No, they were cartoons.
Her: You wouldn't feel differently about harming a cartoon animal in the sense of a pet, though, would you?

Me: I would, yes.
Her: Then why did you get a rabbit from a breeder and pay for it instead of hunt one in the wild?

Me: Convenience ? I wouldn't have done so had I never hunted a rabbit.
Her: Your convenience doesn't change the animal's nature.

Me: Me and the world, we're old acquaintances you have to understand. I didn't just up and become myself yest.
Her: What, like this changes something you just said about how they're not animals etc?!

Me: Um. I can buy a rabbit, ie, as an animal. You prolly can't. Even if it is the same physical rabbit.
Her: Mk if you start bringing in unexplained mystical crap into this I don't imagine I'm going to be able to reach a logical understanding. It's either logical and based on reason or it's touchy feely.

Me: What's mystical ?
Her: "I can buy a rabbit as an animal, you prolly can't, even if it is the same physical rabbit".^iv

Me: Ok, a simile for explanation. A girl has been born into an underground slave camp for prostitutes. She grew up there, in a cage, being occasionally electrocuted or otherwise tortured for the amusement of various people. Patrons or whatever. This, ever since she can remember. This girl can not walk into a bar and pick up a boyfriend. Far as she's concerned all men are horrible rapists, irrespective of the actual underlying physical man underneath, her mental representations are set a certain way. So is the case with you and rabbits. You look at an animal, which is both true and beautiful, but you do not see either. You see a pet, this grotesque deformity that has nothing to see with the actual being before you. A grotesque deformity resulting entirely from the greed of your "fellows". Stockholm Syndrome big time.
Her: Let me get this straight: the fact that I didn't catch my cats in the wild or kill them means that I have a grotesque deformity and can't even properly consider animals for what they are.

Me: Exactly.
Her: Basically, I'm mentally ill because I didn't lasso or kill them.

Me: Yes. Convenience is ok, but only if you have the experience.
Her: Did you hunt or kill me, ftr?

Me: No.
Her: Well wtf?!

Me: What?
Her: Well, you're a grotesque deformed furry!

Me: Why exactly ?
Her: You said I'm ill because I didn't hunt or kill my pets. As far as I know you haven't hunted or killed a human pet.

Me: You didn't ever do it with any animals at all.
Her: I've killed animals.

Me: O you have ?
Her: You asked if I killed any *pets*. I haven't. But I've killed animals.

Me: To wit ?
Her: Bugs. Worms. Snails.

Me: Woman. Larger than a breadbox.
Her: No. Why does that matter?

Me: Sigh. Warm and fuzzy and with eyes.
Her: Lol snails and bugs have eyes.

Me: You've killed animals as in protozoans. Go towards the cock wouldja.
Her: Look, if your argument is going to hinge on the idea that I've never killed an animal, I'm going to have to point out that I've killed animals. If you mean mammals only that's something else, and that's fine, just, word was animals.

Me: You either want to understand what's going on or you want to not notice what your problems are. Pick one and let me know aforehand.
Her: I do want to understand what's going on. I get what the issue is here. I'll stop pursuing it.

Me: It's really like two kids talking in Ohio. "See the problem is you've never gone to the big towns." "I was so! I WENT TO AKRON BITCH!"
Her: Yeah. Maybe so.

Me: It's true, the metropolis of Akron prolly has 1mn inhabitants...nevertheless.
Her: 700k. Good guess. Do you have to hunt an animal in order to interact with it? What if you're hunted BY it?

Me: I guess if it were good enough I'd die.
Her: But I'm asking if being hunted by it qualifies as interaction.

Me: Only if I die once. Possibly wider than that, but still, gets fuzzy if you go past the definiteness.
Her: Hm.

Me: See, playing with animals is fine and dandy. But it is playing. You know, what children do. Nothing wrong with it, but the world is wrong with the proposition that that's all there is.
Her: I dont think people are denying the existence of animal suffering.

Me: They are.
Her: I don't.

Me: They misrepresent it as human suffering. Which is wrong. Animal suffering is about animals.
Her: So what's the problem if I acknowledge that humans and animals are different and that there shouldn't be lawmongering etc the way these people are doing it, and yet I wish you weren't going to vivisect the rabbit?

Me: Nothing, you can wish whatever you wish.
Her: There's nothing wrong with what I wish in this case?

Me: There wasn't anything wrong to begin with, I think I said so way up. As long as you understand that it's my rabbit and thus my business I'm more than happy to understand that it's your wisher and thus your business.
Her: Well I'm not sure what "my business" really means, it's a placemarker people use. On the one hand, people do what they want with their property. On the other hand, what they do with their property, if I care about their property, might upset or piss me off to the degree that I feel some sort of action is necessary.

Me: The action being necessary is getting it straight in your head.
Her: You know what? You go around saying you have to stand up for what you believe in and then you laugh at me.

Me: The risk with standing up for shit you believe in is that you'll get crushed. The idea is to stand up for things that are right. Not for shit.
Her: Jesus christ. Standing up for what you believe in means standing up *for what you believe in*, not standing up for what a third party has approved as being correct to stand up for. That is the OPPOSITE of standing up for what you believe in.

Me: There's no third party. There's an objective truth. Some things are right, some others aren't, and through the act of standing up for them we find out which are which.
Her: Yeah but you insist you hold the truth above others and your proof of this is "let them come and kill me or else believe what I say."

Me: Exactly.
Her: That's not truth, that's being a tyrant.

Me: Truth is a tyrant.
Her: *spazzz*

———

1. See Anonymous derpage for a more detailed discussion of what exactly it means to be "American", culturally speaking. [↩]
2. What, are you answer'd yet? [↩]
3. Yes, that's what it is. You've constructed a thing "to be", and you're going around pretending you are that thing. You aren't, but for as long as Yellen keeps printing and the Saudis keep pumping (in exchange for all sorts of things you - quite literally - do not wish to know about) that pretense can be maintained.

   The problem here is that while the honest is immune, all the wrong in the world can be pinned on the hypocrite. All of it, and especially so and a lot easier the more integrated the world gets. Which is why you're struggling under that all-consuming pile of guilt. That you turn around and pretend even more to try and escape it just perfects the vicious circle. [↩]

4. Meanwhile, "You cannot fix a machine by just power-cycling it with no understanding of what is going wrong." [↩]