The Weekly Stoic

OK, I know Socrates wasn’t a Stoic, but he had a massive influence on Stoicism. His “three tests” which he used to apply to someone who was about to speak to him certainly harmonise with a Stoical perspective. Specifically, he would say to the person:

“before you speak,  can I just check that it meets three criteria which are very important to me?”

1. “Is what you are about to tell me founded on TRUTH, is it factual, is there evidence to support it, are you being completely factual, and are you absolutely certain”

2. “Is what you are about to tell me focused on GOODNESS, is it a positive thing and meant to be helpful towards a situation or person, or is it negative and wilful?”

3. “Is what you are about to tell me USEFUL, will it make a definite contribution in a practical sense to a situation or is it of no use whatsoever and merely a statement of your personal opinion?”

   

Truth-Goodness-Usefulness

Aren’t these wonderful tests? Old Socrates certainly knew a thing or two about modern day journalists and mainstream media, he was 2500 years ahead of his time and would have ripped into the BBC and CNN spectacularly! Well somebody needs to, we can’t leave it all to Donald Trumps Twitter Feed! Just imagine Kuensberg or Dimbleby or Marr beginning a leftist Marxist snowflake monologue and someone like Gove or Rees Mogg says “hang on a minute, I have three questions for YOU” ……..

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Categories: Philosophy

Tags: BBC, BBC bias, BBC licence, BBC propaganda, Brexit, journalism, Leave, MSM, Philosophy, socrates, stoic, Stoicism