Stockdale on Stoicism 57

Like all good squeeze-play systems, political prisons are meant to destroy the man who chooses the "middle way," who decides to be "reasonable," to "meet them half-way." 

For hours on end, my commissar would plead with me to follow that track: "You are an American, you are pragmatic; come, let us reason together." 

It is only when he can get you to level with him in some small way, to drop your guard and betray an emotional dependence on his good will, that he can get his crowbars of fear and guilt behind your armor and begin to twist.

Political prison extortion is one grand leverage game. The inmate is well served to chant the rules he must live by under his breath: "Show no fear." "Never trigger shame." "The credibility of your defiance must be maintained." "The prison onslaught must be contained." "Never level with a jailer." 

One soon learns that to survive with self-respect, he has to divest himself of the remnants of his student-body-president personality: the willingness to be open, to interact, to respond in interesting ways. 

With time and care, many prisoners create a new independent personality that even under torture is difficult to manipulate. In Stoic terms, having external needs makes one vulnerable and vulgar.

The condition and characteristic of a vulgar person is that he never looks for either help or harm from himself, but only from externals. The condition and characteristic of a philosopher is that he looks to himself for all help or harm.

I do not suggest that I understood all this while in prison or that the Enchiridion was familiar enough to use as a text on how to face the challenge. But, remembering my experiences in prison, I have since come to think that the Enchiridion has all the right answers. 

—from James B. Stockdale, Epictetus' Enchiridion: Conflict and Character 

IMAGE: Nikolai Yaroshenko, A Prisoner in His Cell (1878)