If you need to explain, never ever shorted the phrase. Just keep saying “bourgeois nihilism”.

The bourgeois nihilism of today is distinct from the bourgeois nihilism of Nietzsche’s era…

  • SpiderFarmer [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    30·
    5 months ago

    It is kinda wild. I used to read some nihilist folks like Nietzche and my takeaway was to make what you can of nothing and help people when possible. Others just use it as an opportunity to be evil.

    • Dessalines@lemmy.mlEnglish
      16·
      5 months ago

      Nietzche was definitely not about helping people lol. More like, “wouldn’t it be rad if we killed all weak people and races? Also socialists and women too.”

        • Dessalines@lemmy.mlEnglish
          16·
          5 months ago

          https://dessalines.github.io/essays/nietzsche.html

          All direct quotes from Nietzche:

          It is dangerous to try equality with a woman; she will not be content with that; she will be rather content with subordination if the man is a man. Above all, her perfection and happiness lie in motherhood.

          Women are considered profound. Why? Because we never fathom their depths. But women aren’t even shallow.

          From the beginning, nothing has been more alien, repugnant, and hostile to woman than truth—her great art is the lie, her highest concern is mere appearance and beauty.

          Woman! One-half of mankind is weak, typically sick, changeable, inconstant… she needs a religion of weakness that glorifies being weak, loving, and being humble as divine: or better, she makes the strong weak–she rules when she succeeds in overcoming the strong… Woman has always conspired with the types of decadence, the priests, against the ‘powerful’, the ‘strong’, the men.

          Whom do I hate most among the rabble of today? The socialist rabble, the chandala apostles, who undermine the instinct, the pleasure, the worker’s sense of satisfaction with his small existence–who make him envious, who teach him revenge. The source of wrong is never unequal rights but the claim of “equal” rights.

          A high civilization is a pyramid; it can stand only upon a broad base; its prerequisite is a strongly and soundly consolidated mediocrity.

          Only a man of intellect should hold property.

          • PM_ME_YOUR_FOUCAULTS [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
            10·
            5 months ago

            Obviously Nietzsche had reactionary politics. But that’s not what you said, now is it? Are you going to quote any of his writings that indicate “it be rad if we killed all weak people and races? Also socialists and women too.”“

            This is just the same (lazy) warmed-over guilt by association from the Nazis’ vulgar interpretations of his works

            • Dessalines@lemmy.mlEnglish
              8·
              5 months ago

              This is just the same (lazy) warmed-over guilt by association from the Nazis’ vulgar interpretations of his works

              Not really that vulgar when you look at what Nietszche thought about Jews:

              There is only nobility of birth, only nobility of blood. When one speaks of “aristocrats of the spirit,” reasons are usually not lacking for concealing something. As is well known, it is a favorite term among ambitious Jews. For spirit alone does not make noble. Rather, there must be something to ennoble the spirit. What then is required? Blood.

              What follows, then? That one had better put on gloves before reading the New Testament. The presence of so much filth makes it very advisable. One would as little choose early Christians for companions as Polish Jews: not that one need seek out an objection to them — neither has a pleasant smell.

              Do I still have to add that in the entire New Testament there is only one solitary figure one is obliged to respect? Pilate, the Roman governor. To take a Jewish affair seriously — he cannot persuade himself to do that. One Jew more or less — what does it matter ?

              • boboblaw [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
                1·
                5 months ago

                This is such a bizarre, absurd argument. What do those sentences, taken out of context and misrepresented, demonstrate about Nietzsche’s view of Jews?

                The New Testament isn’t exactly considered the Jewish part of the Bible. Just on the face of it, the quotes seem to be more anti-christian than anti-jewish.

                Also idk about the implication that stanning Pilate is antisemitic. He does have an absolute banger of a line.

                This take on Nietzsche is particularly ironic considering that actual German nationalism was being born at the time, and Nietzsche opposed it. He broke with Wagner over all the batshit antisemitic stuff (again, Nietzsche was anti-christian, not antisemitic…).

                Nietzsche famously loathed Christianity, and the slavish mentality he perceived to be at the core of the faith.

        • Dessalines@lemmy.mlEnglish
          11·
          5 months ago

          What do you think Nietzsche meant when he said, “only men of intellect should hold property”.

        • Comrade_Improving@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
          9·
          5 months ago

          As someone who has actually never read Nietzsche, but some years ago did a course in college that had him, I have to ask: What is so wrong about Dessalines description of Nietzsche?

          My takeaway from the course was that he was sort of a proto-fascist saying that society was divided between the weak and the strong, and if wasn’t for certain institutions that “glorify” the weak like the Judeo-Christian religions, the strong would rightfully subjugate the weak.

          If that is a wrong view of his work I’m open for other interpretations.

          • boboblaw [he/him, they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
            2·
            5 months ago

            he was sort of a proto-fascist

            Nietzsche’s political views are unclear at best. He often writes hyperbolically and ironically (sarcastically?) so quoting scattered sentences from his works proves nothing.

    • thebartermyth [he/him]@hexbear.netOPEnglish
      8·
      5 months ago

      tbh for that part of the post I just looked up “bourgeois nihilism guy” and took the first result. I don’t think that’s usually the takeaway though.