Argument against Seneca's letters

From Letter 63 of Seneca's Letters, I disagreed with line 13, which he states "Our forefathers have enacted that, in the case of women, a year should be the limit for mourning; not that they needed to mourn for so long, but that they should mourn no longer.  In that case of men, no rules are laid down, because to mourn is not regarded as honourable.  I disagree with this statement because grieving is a valuable part of the human experience because grief puts you in a state of self-knowledge, therefore making it unfair to allow women to grieve and not extending that right to men since men are just as human as women and children.  The part about the mourning period from this statement is disagreeable because in order to gain full strength from grief, the person that is grieving needs to be able to mourn as long as necessary.  From Letter 99 of Seneca’s Letters, I disagreed with line 3, which he states, “We hunt out excuses for grief, we would even utter unfair complaints about Fortune, as if Fortune would never give us just reason for complaining!”  I disagree with this statement because grief is a genuine human experience and when we grieve we have a just reason to grieve instead of complaining about what we disdain in life to receive recognition.  I also disagree with this statement because unlike complaining, grieving is a multi-step process.  In section 3 Michael Cholbi’s paper, he cites Elisabeth Kuebler-Ross's idea that grieving is a process that contains denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. 

Comments

  1. SnowdenFebruary 23, 2019 at 5:12 PM

    I agree with your disagreements towards the passages from Seneca which you chose to discuss in your post. I don't think that there should be a seperate grieving standard when it comes to men, women, and children. I agree with the positions you take against Seneca's argument, but I think you should spend more time putting his claims into your own words rather than directly quoting from the passage. This gives you more time to focus on your own arguments instead of clearly presenting what his are and saying that you disagree with them.

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  2. Ashley SarkodeeFebruary 25, 2019 at 10:18 AM

    Everyone needs to grieve for their lost loved one disregarding the fact that they are a man or woman. Grieving is not a womanish act, so men should be able to still be seen as honorable. Man or woman, everyone does not grieve the same or for the same amount of time. For your last statement, I honestly in between agree and disagree. It is true that the grieving process is a genuine feeling but there are some people who like other people to be sympathetic towards them.

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