These rhetorical questions amount to an assertion: that if there was nothing that Oidipous could see or desire or hear with pleasure, then it made sense to close himself off to all things. Yet the list’s elements do not constitute a coherent set, for desire is not a sensory organ, and this incongruity might prompt the reflection that Oidipous’s greatest desire has been of an ethical nature; not to kill his his father or marry his mother. Now these deeds have been done, and now he knows it, so there is nothing more for him to desire, and therefore no need for him to interact with the world or other people. Is this, the audience should wonder, an appropriate response? Surely, one—and a ruler in particular—must inevitably face unpleasant, difficult, and stressful situations and conversations, but that is no reason to blind or deafen oneself to them, for then one makes oneself both helpless and useless. [Mg] When Oidipous was previously confronted by unpleasant statements, such as the ones he heard at Delphi and from Teiresias, rather than accepting, confronting, and addressing the challenges they posed, he turned away and even against them, for what he could not do “with pleasure” he refused to do at all. [Mip] [Md] In turning away from Delphi, Athens has acted similarly, and similarly might now expect that setting itself against unpleasant truths, especially those expressed by a god, will if anything only intensified its suffering. [Gt-a]