Friedrich Nietzsche: The Joker or The Batman?

This may be repetitive and clumsy but i have to quote it again, i borrowed the analysis of Friedrich Nietzsche from one of his work while debating with a Maoist sympathizer who was quoting Karl Marx,  Che Guevera etc...

“When the exceptional man handles the mediocre man with more delicate fingers than he applies to himself or to his equals, this is not merely kindness of heart—it is simply his duty… . Whom do I hate most heartily among the rabbles of today? The rabble of Socialists, the apostles to the Chandala, who undermine the workingman’s instincts, his pleasure, his feeling of contentment with his petty existence—who make him envious and teach him revenge… . Wrong never lies in unequal rights; it lies in the assertion of “equal” rights… . What is bad? But I have already answered: all that proceeds from weakness, from envy, from revenge. The anarchist and the Christian have the same ancestry… .”

I am quite sure that the subject of 'Misinterpretations of Friedrich Nietzsche' would occupy more pages than the his actual works. Every ideology across the spectrum was influenced by the works of Friedrich Nietzsche and most of them deliberately misinterpreted his works and some misunderstood his works.

Anarchists have their own idiosyncratic imagination when it comes to the interpretation of Friedrich Nietzsche, they try hard to reach the line of "Hence Proved" to make others digest the fake that Friedrich Nietzsche was an Anarchist.

Christopher Nolan was accused of being insensitive to the Occupy Wall Street protests, as his film 'The Dark Knight Rises' allegedly ridiculed the protests and Nolan in an interview after the release of 'The Dark Knight Rises' said...

I think truly threatening villains are the ones who have a coherent ideology behind what they’re saying. The challenge in applying that to The Joker was to have part of the ideology be anarchic and a lack of ideology in a sense. But it’s a very specific, laid-out lack of ideology, so it becomes, paradoxically, an ideology in itself.

Happy Birthday Friedrich Nietzsche

“Some men are born posthumously” ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

I came across his name for the first time in my 10^th class Social Studies History textbook, a lesson about the World War II and if I remember correctly, the sentence was– ‘Hitler was inspired by the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche’. I underlined the sentence, in the presumption that it would come as an objective question and like always, I wanted to show my friends how good I am in Social Studies, especially in History. I did ponder about him for few seconds as he is one who inspired Adolf Hitler. This happened approximately 10 years ago.

I came across his name for the second time when I was in my final year of my Computer Engineering and read Ayn Rand’s ‘The Fountainhead’, I was remotely fascinated to know her inspiration, I did some research and eventually discovered that she was inspired by writings of Friedrich Nietzsche.

I was able to comprehend the intellectual humor of Woody Allen and after watching all his films, I came across an article ‘Thus Ate Zarathustra’ written by Woody Allen for ‘The New Yorker’ and thus I came to know about ‘Thus Spoke Zarathustra’. The admiration for Woody Allen made me look for his books ‘Side Effects, Without Feathers and Getting Even’ in book stores and luckily in the ‘Classics’ section of the book store my eye reads the title of a book ‘Thus Spake Zarathustra’, I was thrilled for an intangible reason, I was not sure whether I need to buy it or not?, I was holding the book in my hand and decided to turn few pages, the introduction section had a quote

“A testing and a questioning hath been all my travelling -- and verily, one must also learn to answer such questioning! That, however, is my taste --”,

I decided to buy the book – thus started my journey into Nietzsche’s works.

Never Let Me Go - Tunes of Sorrow

Its perhaps a guilty pleasure to admire tragedy because of the emotions it can spur in the viewers mind and with all the skepticism towards life and its meaning, ‘Tragedy’ may be the intangible essence of life. Life, as understood (or misunderstood) by us could bring its sorrow assorted with its ecstasy to play cruel jokes accompanied with hope. Thus, tragedy is a long spectrum of emotions which ruthlessly demands a lot of comprehension unless one experiences it.

Never Let Me Go (2010) is based on Kazuo Ishiguro’s book by the same name, it’s a dystopian film. Kazuo Ishiguro [1] has mastered the art of tragedy, the films fluidity is a testimony to it and the grief of its characters is the relentless questioning on the meaning of life. Almost every frame of the film has its share of melancholy, and the characters constantly ‘Break the 4th Wall’ and shoot uncomfortable questions. One might be under the assumption that a dystopian film would trim the burden of reality and it would be much easier to digest the feelings, but on the contrary – it’s the dystopian set which makes the film more tragic and engaging. What is it like to know you are a sacrificial goat?

Forget Greek, what about the Indian Tragedy?

“It’s the real Greek Tragedy” claimed my Left-Liberal friend after hearing the Greece Election Results. The phrase “The Greek Tragedy” is generously used by our Indian journalists and I am quite sure that 9 out of 10 journalists using the phrase have no idea what that actually means. With my limited knowledge of Economics and very little knowledge of Greek Mythology, I surprisingly find very less similarities of the Greece Economic Crisis and the ‘The Greek Tragedy’.

Its  one of my guilty pleasures to include Nietzsche whenever and wherever I can, in this case – I drag Nietzsche and elevate him to a different level, many may feel that it is quite unnecessary, but guilty pleasures hardly take care of others opinions.

“But, at this juncture, when the will is most imperiled, art approaches, as a redeeming and healing enchantress; she alone may transform these horrible reflections on the terror and absurdity of existence into representations with which man may live. These are the representation of the sublime as the artistic conquest of the awful, and of the comic as the artistic release from the nausea of the absurd. The satyric chorus of the dithyramb is the saving device of Greek art."

Ayn Rand, Friedrich Nietzsche and Liberalism

There has always been a case on how to encounter genuine hypocrisy right from the start of ideological dissection of politics which can be traced back to 1900’s. The highly touted egalitarian activisms and the bigoted collectivisms are the insignias of this century. The intellectual fraud is an ablution of a particular sect, whose ideological inclination has been derived from their anti-Bourgeoisie views and has been extended into various other fields of community. The legacy of intellectual fraud is successfully carried forward by the liberals, one should not take the de facto meaning of the words ‘Liberals’, ‘Liberalism’, ‘Libertarian’ etc.. as they are used in this article with respect to their ugly repercussions which they have made in the course of our history. It’s quite obvious that the world needed something more prudent and ingenuous ideologies to hinder the spreading immorality of these vicious thoughts.

Cold War is always an important chapter in any history text book, because it has tilted and questioned the existing ideological morals. Some feared, some celebrated and some contemplated when an ideology was on the verge of extinction but very few knew that there was a backup created to accommodate the evil which was about to become extinct in a different form. This parasite has embedded itself into many other forms of ideology and very often successfully masks itself to achieve its goals. It’s quite an intriguing question for most laymen of political science on “why does a certain clique of people need a mask to propagate their ideologies?” To give an adequate answer to the previous question, allow me to quote this insightful dialogue from Sidney Sheldon’s book ‘The Other Side of Midnight’

“Whores did not change the course of history, courtesans did”

Friedrich Nietzsche on Communism/Socialism

A man’s political inclination is based on a series of experiences and expectations from the society and the idea of political thought is an instant reaction from the brain to counter/support the arguments made on the particular situation. A man’s political philosophy cannot be limited to his personal good but it has to be extended to a society in which he has his own goals to achieve and make a political statement which has its implications beyond his reach and would impact other generation. The Next–Gen impact is not accidental to the political philosophy, but a conscious decision and decisive perception of the man who intends to spread it irrespective of time and geography.

The question of ‘morals and politics’, ‘ethics and politics’, ‘greed and politics’, ‘humanity and politics’, ‘Development and politics’ and ‘Barmecidal and Politics’ are sophomoric arguments in context of active players. Politics is almost a necessity of mankind. The power of Power in the political arena is underrated; it is the driving force behind frenzy political activity. Politics is a path for the quest for power and man’s ‘Will to Power’ should not be ignored in this process.

An anarchist’s propriety should be scrutinized in a society and his scorn for politics cannot be just based on his claims of evil in politics. The sacred texts, mythology and society has very much proven that anarchism is no less evil that bad politics but a greater evil than shoddy politics. Ayn Rand has edifying views about anarchism ….

“Anarchy, as a political concept, is a naive floating abstraction. A society without an organized government would be at the mercy of the first criminal who came along and who would precipitate it into the chaos of gang warfare. But the possibility of human immorality is not the only objection to anarchy, even a society whose every member was fully rational and faultlessly moral, could not function in a state of anarchy, it is the need of objective laws and of an arbiter for honest disagreements among men that necessitates the establishment of a government. “[1]

In a democracy and particularly in a developing country, the debate of the role of state is vehemently argued by Left, Right and Centre. The left has always presented its simple solution which goes smooth with its ideology, the Centre as always has never made a their stand clear and the Right has its own dilemma in having a rigid opinion about the role of state in the life of an individual and in society. Is it politically possible for an Authoritarian state with limited control? Can such a government exist in a democracy? Is it practically possible to accommodate such a scenario? Does it pass political Rectitude?

Friedrich Nietzsche was not in favor of Democracy. He equates Democracy with Christianity “The democratic movement is the heir to Christianity” [2] and waylays Socrates and Plato by asking , “How could the most beautiful growth of antiquity, Plato, contract such a disease? Did the wicked Socrates corrupt him after all? Could Socrates have been the corrupter of youth after all? And did he deserve his hemlock?” [3]

Sigmund Freud’s praise for Nietzsche is obvious in its recognition of Nietzsche’s philosophical finesse and Freud’s theories have often exposed the Marxist grotesqueness. Sigmund Freud declared that Nietzsche is “a philosopher whose guesses and intuitions often agree in the most astonishing way with the laborious findings of psychoanalysis.” I reference Sigmund Freud to make a strong base to support Nietzsche’s Political Philosophy which is often criticized for the lack of political-ness in it and it’s often said that Friedrich Nietzsche’s works do not reflect the true politics and it’s a misadventure, but his political philosophy has made me feel the other way and I am glad to say that he was one of best political philosopher and an underrated one.

It’s just not literary romanticism or a political manifestation or an antipathy towards a political class, it’s a view of an individual with his bionic grasp of society and man as it pivotal element in shaping the future of the society. As always, man is a superman – his strong belief that man is something has to be surpassed is not rhetoric, but an actual postulation of the animal instinct which is hidden deep inside a man.

“‘Why so hard?’ the kitchen coal once said to the diamond. ‘After all, are we not close kin?’
Why so soft? O my brothers, thus I ask you: are you not after all my brothers?” [4]

Friedrich Nietzsche on Communism/Socialism:- 

“When the exceptional man handles the mediocre man with more delicate fingers than he applies to himself or to his equals, this is not merely kindness of heart—it is simply his duty… . Whom do I hate most heartily among the rabbles of today? The rabble of Socialists, the apostles to the Chandala, who undermine the workingman’s instincts, his pleasure, his feeling of contentment with his petty existence—who make him envious and teach him revenge… . Wrong never lies in unequal rights; it lies in the assertion of “equal” rights… . What is bad? But I have already answered: all that proceeds from weakness, from envy, from revenge. The anarchist and the Christian have the same ancestry… .”[5]

“A question of power, not justice. For men who always consider the higher usefulness of a matter, socialism, if it really is the uprising against their oppressors of people oppressed and kept down for thousands of years, poses no problem of justice (with the ludicrous, weak question: “How far should one yield to its demands?”), but only a problem of power ( “To what extent can one use its demands?”). So it is like a natural power-steam, for example-which is either forced by man, as a god of machines, into his service, or, when there are mistakes in the machine (that is, errors of human calculation in its construction), wrecks itself and the human with it. To solve that question of power, one must know how strong socialism is, and in which of its modifications it can still be used as a mighty lever within the current political power game; in some circumstances one would even have to do everything possible to strengthen it. With every great force (even the most dangerous), humanity must think how to make it into a tool of its own intentions.

Socialism gains a right only when the two powers, the representatives of the old and new, seem to have come to war, but then both parties prudently calculate how they may preserve themselves to best advantage, and this results in their desire for a treaty. No justice without a treaty. Until now, however, there has been neither war in the indicated territory, nor treaties, and thus no rights, and no “ought” either.”[6]     .

“Socialism in respect to its means. Socialism is the visionary younger brother of an almost decrepit despotism, whose heir it wants to be. Thus its efforts are reactionary in the deepest sense. For it desires a wealth of executive power, as only despotism had it; indeed, it outdoes everything in the past by striving for the downright destruction of the individual, which it sees as an unjustified luxury of nature, and which it intends to improve into an expedient organ of the community. Socialism crops up in the vicinity of all excessive displays of power because of its relation to it, like the typical old socialist Plato, at the court of the Sicilian tyrant;11 it desires (and in certain circumstances, furthers) the Caesarean power state of this century, because, as we said, it would like to be its heir. But even this inheritance would not suffice for its purposes; it needs the most submissive subjugation of all citizens to the absolute state, the like of which has never existed. And since it cannot even count any longer on the old religious piety towards the state, having rather always to work automatically to eliminate piety (because it works on the elimination of all existing states), it can only hope to exist here and there for short periods of time by means of the most extreme terrorism. Therefore, it secretly prepares for reigns of terror, and drives the word “justice” like a nail into the heads of the semi-educated masses, to rob them completely of their reason (after this reason has already suffered a great deal from its semieducation), and to give them a good conscience for the evil game that they are supposed to play. Socialism can serve as a rather brutal and forceful way to teach the danger of all accumulations of state power, and to that extent instill one with distrust of the state itself. When its rough voice chimes in with the battle cry “As much state as possible,” it will at first make the cry noisier than ever; but soon the opposite cry will be heard with strength the greater: ‘As little state as possible.’”[7]


“It is a lie! Creators were they who created peoples, and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served life. Destroyers, are they who lay snares for many, and call it the state: they hang a sword and a hundred cravings over them. Where there is still a people, there the state is not understood, but hated as the evil eye, and as sin against laws and customs. This sign I give unto you: every people speaketh its language of good and evil: this its neighbour understandeth not. Its language hath it devised for itself in laws and customs. But the state lieth in all languages of good and evil; and whatever it saith it lieth; and whatever it hath it hath stolen. False is everything in it; with stolen teeth it biteth, the biting one. False are even its bowels.”[8]

“As little State as possible! All political and economic matters are not of such great value that they ought to be dealt with by the most talented minds: such a waste of intellect is at bottom worse than any state of distress. These matters are and ever will be the province of smaller minds and others than the smaller minds should not be at the service of this workshop: it would be better to let the machinery work itself to pieces again! Yet as matters stand at the present time when not only do all people believe that they must know all about it day by day but wish likewise to be always busy about it and in so doing neglect their own work. it is a great and ridiculous mistake. The price that has to be paid for the “public safety “is far too high and what is maddest of all we effect the very opposite of “public safety” a fact which our own dear century has undertaken to prove as if this had never been proved before! To make society secure against thieves and fire and to render it thoroughly fit for all kinds of trade and traffic and to transform the State in a good and evil sense into a kind of Providence—these aims are low mediocre and not by any means indispensable; and we should not seek to attain them by the aid of the highest means and instruments which exist—means which we should reserve precisely for our highest and rarest aims! Our age, however much it may chatter about economy is in fact wasteful: it wastes spirit the most precious thing of all.”[9]

“The stupidity — at bottom, the degeneration of instinct, which is today the cause of all stupidities — is that there is a labor question at all. Certain things one does not question: that is the first imperative of instinct. I simply cannot see what one proposes to do with the European worker now that one has made a question of him. He is far too well off not to ask for more and more, not to ask more immodestly. In the end, he has numbers on his side. The hope is gone forever that a modest and self-sufficient kind of man, a Chinese type, might here develop as a class: and there would have been reason in that, it would almost have been a necessity. But what was done? Everything to nip in the bud even the preconditions for this: the instincts by virtue of which the worker becomes possible as a class, possible in his own eyes, have been destroyed through and through with the most irresponsible thoughtlessness. The worker was qualified for military service, granted the right to organize and to vote: is it any wonder that the worker today experiences his own existence as distressing — morally speaking, as an injustice? But what is wanted? I ask once more. If one wants an end, one must also want the means: if one wants slaves, then one is a fool if one educates them to be masters.” [10]

References:
1. Virtue of Selfishness by Ayn Rand.
2. Beyond Good and Evil
3. Twilight of the Idols
4. Thus Spoke Zarathustra
5. The Antichrist
6. Human, All Too Human
7. Human, All Too Human
8. Thus Spoke Zarathustra
9. The Dawn
10. Twilight of the Idols

Most of the works of Friedrich Nietzsche are in Public Domain.

Happy Women's Day

Deepa Mehta’s film ‘WATER’ starts with the mention of text from the ‘Manusmriti’ which is slightly edited.

By violating her duty towards her husband, a wife is disgraced in this world, after death she enters the womb of a jackal, and is tormented by diseases of her sin.

Today on the ‘Women’s Day’ I had an informal chat with an upcoming Marxist-Feminist activist. In the small little chat she was expressing her frustration against Indian culture as she felt that it is unfair to women and her descent disapproval of Hinduism in context of women could not be ignored by me.

Manusmriti was written in 200 BC when people preferred to count the years backwards and when many civilizations around the world weren’t even born. The intriguing part of our great Indian feminists is their strict reference to the negatives of Manusmriti towards women and constantly trying to snub the good parts of Manusmriti towards women.

For decades Women under the name of Feminism have deceived their real cause for emancipation and will continue to do it. Even philosophers have been consciously misinterpreted to suit the assertive statements of Feminists. Friedrich Nietzsche, the great 19th century philosopher, who still attracts the 21st century folks, was also misinterpreted for his views on women. The problem with Nietzsche’s philosophy is his blunt frankness which makes people hard to comprehend the real meaning behind his thoughts on women, his references towards women are often funny, sarcastic and also stunning.

Nietzsche in his masterpiece ‘Beyond Good and Evil’ starts with

Suppose that truth is a woman – and why not? Aren’t there reasons for suspecting that all philosophers, to the extent that they have been dogmatists, have not really understood women? That the grotesque seriousness of their approach towards the truth and the clumsy advances they have made so far are unsuitable ways of pressing their suit with a woman? What is certain is that she has spurned them – leaving dogmatism of all types standing sad and discouraged.

It can be quite possible that the hatred towards Nietzsche by Marxists-Feminists is due his love and admiration for Manu Smrithi and Upanishads.

Ayn Rand, perhaps one of the rare species of women which many of our feminists try to bash for her Anti-Feminist views has been deliberately misunderstood as the time in which she gained popularity for her works coincided with the feminist uprising. She was verbally attacked by feminists in reference to her novel ‘The Fountainhead’ where Dominique Francon was raped(According to our great Feminists) and her views on a women sitting in the White House. Strangely, the same feminists who are critique of Ayn Rand’s works do not respond when referred to works of Nobel laureate ‘Rabindranth Tagore'.

The imprudent philosophy called Marxism was not inclined to Feminism in the early stages, but later as time passed and the evil of Marxism has spread to considerable parts of this globe it evolved to be a manufacturing factory of Women-less souls. Women, who felt that their gender has been strangled by Men got infatuated to the baseless theory of ‘Equality’ by Karl Marx and thus led to the destruction of the real causes.

Recently a small incident narrated by a friend just refreshed my gray cells, he told the religious conversions happening in his village.

Women are asked to ditch their present religion and are advised to get converted as their religion provides freedom to women, unlike the other religion where women are subjected to harassment for centuries and does not allow modernity in women’s life.

Targetting women for religious conversion is a clever idea and can be a good case study for Harvard University. Coming to the point, women has been seen as a inferior in the religion which the above conversionist was referring but does one know about the harassements and humiliation which women faced in other religions?. The amount of freedom which Hinduism offers to living being cannot be equated to any religion and the core essence of Hindusim is the development of an individual. Like the words ‘Secularism’ and ‘Liberalism’ even the word ‘Modernity’ is seriously molested. What is modernity? Just a FCUK T-Shirt or a Levis Jeans or a Fastrack Sunglass or visiting 21+ Pubs define the modernity of Indian women?

On this women’s day I spotted a interesting situation, the female colleagues in our office celebrated Women’s Day-- female colleagues who usually wear Saris and chudidhars for office came in Jeans and who usally wear jeans and other western outfits came in Saris, this is a perfect snapshot of Feminism.

I don’t recommend Manusmriti, I don’t stop anyone from being converted to a different religion, I am not against women wearing any outfits, if men can enjoy alcohol so can women and I don’t force my opinion on others. Just one question to all women- What did you achieve in the name of ‘Feminism’.

Anyway. Happy Women’s Day. Even though, it doesn’t make any sense to me.