Let’s talk about Rufus.

No, not that Rufus. I hesitate to cast aspersions on the obvious metaphysical endowments of Chaka Khan and her band of Rufusians (Rufusniks? Rufusticans? Ruffians?), but I’m talking about Musonius Rufus. Dude was a Roman philosopher in the first century AD. He’s like the Roman version of Socrates. Well, I say he is, anyway. For instance, neither togalicious dude wrote anything down that we know of. Everything we know about what they said comes from notes from their pupils. I always hated the kids who sat in the front row and scribbled down everything the teacher said, but I was never averse to cheating off their test papers.

Socrates sounds like about the most irritating person who’s ever trod the Acropolis. Answering questions with questions gets old fast when you’re on the receiving end. If you’re unfamiliar with the process, buy a three-year-old and try to get a straight answer out of them. If you’re in the mood to hear, “Why?,” more than four Columbo episodes put together, I mean.

Gaius Musonius Rufus got under plenty of people’s skin, too. Got run out of town from time to time, but unlike Socrates, he was never forced to ask the question, “I drank what?” He had a hint of Billy Sunday about him, although I don’t know if Rufus batted left and threw right in the Etruscan League. But they both had more or less the same schtick. They were pointing their fingers at the audience and telling them to wise up. They didn’t have TED talks exhorting people to fully explore their solipsism. They told people to straighten up and fly right. Don’t lie, you know what you did. Now knock that shit off.

I see Rufus as the granddaddy of the Stoics. The Athenian Greeks were airy-fairy and thought endlessly about thinking. Worrying endlessly about thinking usually ends badly, when people like Spartans or Philip of Macedon show up, and start doing things. The Romans like Rufus came up with rules for living. It’s robust, moralistic, and practical advice.

So, the internet, in all its glory, got me to thinking about the way the modern woman operates. Unlike the dim dark past — you know, ten years ago — everything is recorded now. The police, your doorbell, lightpoles, Walmart lobbies, your laptop if you don’t have any electrical tape in the house, and every chad and strumpet clutching an iPhone like it’s a heart lung machine makes sure that everything happens in front of a silicon audience, ready to be curated for a silicone audience. It got me to thinking about what Rufus said about Roman chicks back in the day, and whether it applies to the girls nowadays:

“Women have received from the gods the same reasoning power as men — the power which we employ with one another and according to which we consider whether an action is good or bad, noble or base.”

He didn’t mention anything about parallel parking or hogging the bathroom, so I guess he’s on firm ground here. Women have the same ability as men to understand what virtue is. I gather from surveying the internet and entering a Walmart that cultivating virtue is another matter entirely. Are modern women cultivating virtue? Has feminism set them free to become nobler, more educated, more fully formed, more helpful, pleasant, and productive? What practical advice did Rufus have for the distaff set, and how’s it working out two centuries on?

“…a woman must… be pure in respect of unlawful love, exercise restraint in other pleasures, not be a slave to desire, not be contentious, not lavish in expense, nor extravagant in dress.

“As for justice, would not the woman who studies philosophy be just, would she not be a blameless life partner… a sympathetic helpmate… an untiring defender of husband and children, and… free of greed and arrogance?”

… to control her temper, not be overcome by grief, and to be superior to uncontrolled emotion of every kind. Now these are the things which the teachings of philosophy transmit…”

Hmm. Maybe I had the right idea at the top of the page. The philosopher Rufus, featuring Chaka Khan, was on to something deeper and more topical than Rufus the Roman:

Once you get started
Oh, it’s hard to stop
You can’t stop, you just can’t stop
When you get down, y’all
When you get down, ain’t no turning back, no