# Bodybuilding
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316
**Category:** The Game Room
**Created:** [September 15, 2024, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316 "2024-09-15T21:27:04Z")
**Posts on this page:** 11
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Nightfall1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nightfall1)
#### Post date: [September 15, 2024, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/1 "2024-09-15T21:27:04Z")
Hello everyone. I hope someone can help me. Maybe 50 years ago in a Dan Lurie bodybuilding magazine there was an article about the myth Sisyphus.
He was a devious tyrant who killed visitors to show off his power. This violation of the sacred hospitality tradition greatly angered the gods. They punished him for trickery of others, including his cheating death twice. The gods forced him to roll an immense boulder up a hill only for it to roll back down every time it neared the top, repeating this action for eternity.
The author of the article said it seemed like a horrible way to live forever, pushing the boulder and never getting to the top of the mountain. As a bodybuilder though he thought of it as a never ending workout.
Use your legs the first time you pushed the boulder up before it would roll back down. On your way down to start again you could watch the women and children working the fields.
The next time you would mostly use your back to push the boulder up then it would roll down again. As you walked back to the bottom you could look at the beautiful blue ocean.
Each time you started up again you would use a different muscle to push that boulder up.
The point of the article was it depended on how you looked at the situation, it could be horrible or it could be a wonderful workout.
Does anyone remember this article or know where I can make a copy of it. It would be great to post it at the gym I work out at. I know it’s a long shot but I think the teeming millions would know before anyone else. Thank you all.
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [September 15, 2024, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/2 "2024-09-15T21:36:10Z")
This doesn’t seem to be what you are looking for: [A Bodybuilders Perspective of Sisyphus and his Sisyphean Task](https://persistenceandtenacity.com/a-bodybuilders-perspective-of-sisyphus-and-his-sisyphean-task/)
Searching on ‘bodybuilding and Sysyphus’ returns a number of quotes and other references.
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### Author:  [@Nightfall1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nightfall1)
#### Post date: [September 18, 2024, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/3 "2024-09-18T00:38:26Z")
Hi TriPolar, that’s not the article but thank you for trying.
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### Author:  [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2024, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/4 "2024-09-19T01:14:06Z")
How much time did he have to spend every day rolling the boulder? Was it like he had to spend an hour each morning pushing it up the hill but could get on with his day or did pushing the boulder take the entire day?
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2024, 1:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/5 "2024-09-19T01:29:08Z")
What I don’t get is what’s forcing Sisyphus to make the attempt. What if he simply refuses?
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### Author:  [@Nightfall1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nightfall1)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2024, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/6 "2024-09-19T01:43:23Z")
He did it 24/7 for eternity. You don’t mess with the #1 god. 🙂
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### Author:  [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)
#### Post date: [September 19, 2024, 2:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/7 "2024-09-19T02:01:06Z")
All I know is, don’t fuck with the gods. (Which is how he got himself into that predicament in the first place.)
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [September 24, 2024, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/8 "2024-09-24T19:57:54Z")
Slave labor as bodybuilding was also parodied in this Oglaf strip (NSFW of course):
> **Summary**
>
> [Stroke](https://www.oglaf.com/stroke/)
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### Author:  [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)
#### Post date: [September 24, 2024, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/9 "2024-09-24T20:44:13Z")
> [@Lumpy](#):
>
> Slave labor as bodybuilding was also parodied in this Oglaf strip (NSFW of course):
Also here:
> **[Sisyphus Myth](https://pbfcomics.com/comics/sisyphus-myth/)**
>
> The Perry Bible Fellowship
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### Author:  [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)
#### Post date: [September 24, 2024, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/10 "2024-09-24T20:47:00Z")
You’d think Sisyphus would at least hit upon wedging a smaller rock under the boulder so it can’t slip back; or did it take Archimedes to come up with that?
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### Author:  [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackknifed_Juggernaut)
#### Post date: [September 25, 2024, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bodybuilding/1007316/11 "2024-09-25T01:55:01Z")
I think Camus had it right…
> **[The Myth of Sisyphus](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Myth_of_Sisyphus)**
>
> The Myth of Sisyphus (French: Le mythe de Sisyphe) is a 1942 philosophical essay by Albert Camus. Influenced by philosophers such as Søren Kierkegaard, Arthur Schopenhauer, and Friedrich Nietzsche, Camus introduces his philosophy of the absurd. The absurd lies in the juxtaposition between the fundamental human need to attribute meaning to life and the "unreasonable silence" of the universe in response. Camus claims that the realization of the absurd does not justify suicide, and instead requir