#Clemency

[blanket-burrito-protocol]

The 50th anniversary of AIMs (American Indian Movement's) occupation at Wounded Knee is coming up, so the Lakota People's Law Project is leading another push to free an AIM activist who was wrongly convicted of killing two federal agents in 1975- Leonard Peltier. He was convicted on false evidence and false testimony and sentenced to two life sentences. He is now 78.

LPL has a formatted email up on their website now which you can personalize and send to Biden to ask for clemency. (Please personalize emails like this so it doesn't get filtered as spam. Just move some words around, add some, take some, you don't have to write a whole email.) Please pass this around.

[rejamart]

clemency and accolade

hello. i’m a broke artist. if you like my work, consider tossing me a dollar or two on venmo $rejamrejam

[destielmemenews]

source 1

source 2

source 3

[worldbuildingwanderlust]

Remember The brown feather Prophecy

That premonition of peace

Remember That Fate promised Clemency

Ensuring all storms will cease

[illustratus]

The Continence of Scipio by Pompeo Batoni

[jeannereames]

Do you think alexander considered hephaistion his alter-ego?

"He, too, is Alexander"

Did Alexander think of Hephaistion as his alter-ego? Quite possibly—but not by that term. For one thing, “alter-ego” is Latin, and we find it first used in writing by Cicero, although it may have been (quite possibly was) in common parlance prior.

The concept did appear to exist in Greek, but the tendency to apply it to Alexander and Hephaistion owes chiefly to two attestations. The first is the recorded meeting between Alexander, Hephaistion, and Sisygambus, wherein he supposedly said, of Hephaistion, "He, too, is Alexander." The other concerns a quip attributed to Aristotle, mentioned in Diogenes Laertus that friendship is one soul in two bodies—but this not found Aristotle's surviving works, despite a longish passage on friendship in his Nikomachian Ethics.

Without being unduly cynical, we must always take exact phrasing with a grain of salt. I think there's very little we can be certain Alexander said. Same problem with Aristotle, unless you're reading his actual writings, and even some of those are dubious, such as the infamous Ath Pol, or Constitution of the Athenians. We typically distinguish these as “pseudo-Aristotle.” (So if you see “pseudo-”some-name, that means the work is attributed to that person but almost certainly not actually written by him/her.)

So, as part of my usual ‘Let me ‘splain you why you can’t trust that story/saying…,’ let’s play some dating games here.

First, Cicero is our initial attested use of “alter ego,” in a letter to his friend Atticus, that dates the phrase to somewhere between 68-44, or middle of the first century BCE. Maybe we can push it back a little earlier to the early first century, but I’d be uncomfortable pushing it further without solid evidence. Popular terms change. Anybody call a fashionable (male) person, “That cool cat…” these days—except as a bit of a joke? I didn’t think so. 😉 But “cool” itself is otherwise still in common use. So we have to be careful about when terms are popular.

Now, the story of Alexander before Sysigamgus is best known from Curtius (3.12.16-17), but Diodoros also relates it (17.37.5-6), and so does Arrian (2.12.3-8)—although with a caveat. He says it doesn’t appear in his trusted sources (Aristoboulos or Ptolemy) but he tells it anyway, apparently because he approves of the actions in it.

We don’t know where it comes from. Maybe Kleitarchos? Possibly Kallisthenes? It does not appear in either Plutarch’s bio of Alexander or his Moralia, although normally he loved these sorts of anecdotes. There’s a good reason, however, that Plutarch doesn’t tell it (see below). Justin is just too short. (It also appears in abbreviated form in a couple of later Roman sources, Valerius Maximus and Dio Chrysostom. So it was clearly popular in the rhetorician crowd.)

So, what are the words attributed to Alexander? Diodoros’ Greek is kai gar kai outos Alexandros estin: “and for also this [man] Alexander is” (6). Arrian renders it kai gar ekeinon einai Alexandron: “and for that man is Alexander” (7). Curtius puts it, albeit in Latin, nam et hic Alexander est: “for he also Alexander is” (17). Yes, I rendered those into English pretty exactly, even if it sounds a bit funny. First, it helps show how every translation is an interpretation, but also allows us to watch the parsing itself.

None of them is exactly the same, even if the meaning is the same. That’s a good reminder we don’t have his exact phrasing!

Assuming the event even happened.

Why should we doubt it? Aside from Arrian’s skepticism?

This story feels a LOT like a classic lesson in proper clemency. I’ve talked about the importance of clemency before. The bulk of this tale is meant to show a chivalrous Alexander early in his career, before he fell victim to divine aspirations and the lure of that nasty Oriental Luxury <tm>. See what a good guy he was?! Plutarch, in his take, insists not only did Alexander not rape the royal women, he wouldn’t even look at the women. That’s probably why he doesn’t tell this story, because going to their tent absolutely IS looking at them, donchaknow. It’s even funnier because it’s Plutarch who tells us Statiera died in childbirth well, well after that baby could have been Darius’s. (Consistency? What consistency? Pfff.)

My point here is that the story may very well have been fabricated to make a MORAL point of how to be an honorable victor—whether in the era of the Successors (which grew increasingly bloody and vicious), or in the later Roman period. It would also provide a perfect example for Curtius to contrast with Alexander’s later Asian debauchery.

You may be wondering, But why would they make up an entire story like that? Wouldn’t people know?

Um, to prove my point I give you…Twitter, QAnon, and whatever quote is being attributed (wrongly) to Samuel L. Jackson this week. The more often people hear something, even a lie, the more likely they are to believe it’s true. Arrian’s other stories of after-Issos events has Leonnatos going to talk to the women, not Alexander (and Hephaistion). Of course, it’s entirely possible Leonnatos went the first evening, while Alexander and Hephaistion went the next morning. It even makes a certain amount of sense that he’d visit the royal women. So, the bare-bones of the encounter may be true, but mistaken identities and all those speeches were likely put in people’s mouths later.

Incidentally, there’s a pun in the line, as alex-andros translates to “protector of men.” So Hephaistion is also a protector of men. Romans and Greeks ate up that sort of word-play.

As for the Aristotle titbit…Diogenes Laertus reports a list of “sayings” (aphorisms) attributed to various philosophers. For Aristotle, one is: “To the query, ‘What is a friend?’ his reply was, ‘A single soul dwelling in two bodies’” (5.20). I’ve seen people claim he was referencing Alexander and Hephaistion. There’s absolutely no reason to assume that except romanticism and an Alexander-centric view. In our surviving writings by Aristotle, he barely mentions Alexander.* Shock, I know. 😂 But Alexander wasn’t at the forefront of his mind.

Additionally, as I said above, we have a longish bit on friendship in the Nikomachian Ethics, where that definition doesn’t appear, although nothing he says about true friendship in it contradicts the quote, either. But “Sayings of…” were a popular form of literature in antiquity, and sometimes a clever quip got attributed to more than one person! Maybe Aristotle did say that, but it’s not in actual writings about friendship by Aristotle. Aristotle’s writings on friendship are rather more complex; he lists three types of friendship in Book VIII.

Anyway, this little in-depth study is meant to help folks see how complicated it can be, to get back to what ALEXANDER himself said, thought, or even did.

Yet one thing ALL the sources agree upon: Hephaistion was Alexander’s favorite, not just (or even primarily) as a commander, but as a person. I’ve never read any claim to the contrary, and I have (quite literally) read everything in the ancient sources that concerns Hephaistion (and most everything that concerns Alexander too).

So, while it’s impossible to say that Alexander considered Hephaistion an “alter-ego,” or ever called him “Alexander too,” you can rest assured that every ancient source agrees that Hephaistion was dearer to Alexander than anybody else, maybe even including his own mother.

—————-

* 391a2: his “On the Universe” treatise opens with a reference to “Alexander,” who I think it’s safe to assume is the king. And 1420a5, is “Rhetoric to Alexander”--except that treatise is widely understood (even in the medieval world) to be bogus: e.g., a "pseudo-Aristotle" text. Plus Alexander is mentioned in a couple fragments.

[fuckyeahmarxismleninism]

Leonard Peltier’s 80th birthday statement released

On this Wrongful Conviction Day, Leonard Peltier, the longest-serving Indigenous political prisoner, is incarcerated in lockdown-modified operations conditions at USP Coleman I, operated by the U.S. Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP).

Yet, in this moment of silence, Leonard speaks. To honor his birthday and all those who are unjustly convicted and incarcerated, the Leonard Peltier Official Ad Hoc Committee has released a video of Leonard Peltier that is going viral. Narrated by renowned scholar Ward Churchill and set to a video created by award-winning filmmaker Suzie Baer, the film most importantly centers Leonard’s personal reflection on his 80th year.

To view the film, please visit https://tinyurl.com/Peltier80thPresentation. We hope to have additional updates on Leonard soon. In the meantime, please engage our calls to action or donate to his defense efforts. Miigwech.

[holdmecloser-gandydancer]

In honor of officially starting this new campaign, everyone look at my silly

Image Description: a digital drawing of Clemency, a green tiefling with long, wavy, black hair and grey horns. They're wearing a long white cloak, black pants, and brown shoes. Their tail peeks out from behind them. They're on an orange background with a soft yellow ring of light behind their head. The image is framed in a pale peach frame, text below the image reads "The Fool"

End description

[corvianbard]

#6793

Out from a cocoon That is called mortality Is the king of divine grace, And he shall grant clemency To those he could shepherd Away from agony.

[niv-horizons]

To start off this blog: DA-1712-5650-3922, dream address for Clemency, my archived island. It's not perfect, but it's a mixture of elegant and weird themes that are very me.

[asharaks]

🩵🤍

for. >:3 clemfalynastarion >:3

EXCELLENT TY

🩵 Who does what chores? Which chore do they both avoid?

falyn cooks, clem cleans, astarion drinks wine and heckles; clemfalyn have exactly the same taste in chores (do NOT want to fold the laundry) but clemmy's martyr complex means that they end up picking up the slack

🤍 What is their favorite or most admired quality in the other?

if asked, falyn would say clem's sense of humour: in reality, they're probably the first person in the world she actually trusts and relies on, and as someone who's spent most of her life alone and entirely self-reliant that's more important to her than she'll ever be able to actually express:3

for clem, falyn is a grounding influence; she's the pragmatic side of the relationship, and a non-emotional counterpoint to the higher-strung partners who love an emotional spiral<3

also they both think the other guy is the coolest guy in the room

[rejamart]

i made a girlfriend for the lance-unicorn i've been drawing. she still needs a name, but i felt like a knight needs his lady

[morreiy]

dreamscape

[trendynewsnow]

Governor Newsom Delays Clemency Decision for Menendez Brothers Amid DA Transition

Governor Newsom on Menendez Brothers’ Clemency Request California Governor Gavin Newsom announced on Monday that he will postpone any decision regarding clemency for Lyle and Erik Menendez, the brothers who infamously murdered their parents in Beverly Hills in 1989. This decision will be made after the newly elected district attorney of Los Angeles County conducts a thorough review of the…

[raurquiz]

#happybirthday @AlfreWoodard #alfrewoodard #actress #LilySloane #startrek #firstcontact #thecore #12yearsaslave #salemslot #summercamp #TheBookofClarence #SpaceOddity #annabelle #desperatehousewives #lukecage #captainamerica #civilwar #kpax #Clemency #TheLionKing #memphisbeat

[fuckyeahmarxismleninism]

Peltier has already served a longer sentence than most principals in murder convictions. There is no way to look at the evidence and come away with any conclusion other than Peltier is being punished for crimes that could not be proven beyond a reasonable doubt in a court of law.