I. Mythmakers

Paul Stephan: Dear Professor Ziegler, you completed the extensive study last year Critique of reactionary thinking published, which fortunately can be downloaded free of charge from the publisher's website (link). There, they not only develop a general theory of reactionary thinking, but also present some of his classics. In addition to “usual suspects” such as Ernst Jünger (1895—1998), Carl Schmitt (1888—1985) or Martin Heidegger (1889—1976), you also dedicate a separate chapter to Nietzsche. That may surprise some, others less so. How do you come to regard Nietzsche as a representative of reactionary thinking?

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Robert Ziegler: In fact, I wouldn't count Nietzsche among the reactionary authors in the strict sense of the word. In my reconstruction, Nietzsche appears as an important source of keywords and preparer for reactionary thinking. This can be proven on several levels: The numerous and eloquent invectives that Nietzsche directed against modernity, against women, against everything that smells of democracy or egalitarianism are well known. The theory inventory of later right-wing authors then includes above all the opposition of the large, strong individual and the weak, mindless mass that must and wants to be led — a motif that Nietzsche uses very regularly. Nietzsche's radical individualism, which sees itself as a struggle against entire epochs and their prejudices, invites to a heroic self-presentation that many later became intoxicated with. Individual topics such as the diagnosis of nihilism were and still are popular in right thinking.

All of this is fairly obvious and well-known. But another aspect seems more significant to me: Nietzsche comes back again and again, particularly concentrated and prominent in About truth and lies in an extra-moral sense (link), to speak of the idea that what we call truth is the product of linguistic interpretations of reality. On the one hand, Nietzsche has thus made a deeply unsettling diagnosis, for which, on the other hand, he suggests a possible way out: If all truth is anyway “lie” or myth, a product of language more than our efforts to gain knowledge, and also guided by vital needs — what prevents us from overcoming the bottomlessness of this situation by inventing myths that are as impressive and intensive as possible? Since I see reaction primarily as a literary strategy that tries to counter ontological uncertainty with the strongest possible means, it can be said in retrospect that the method of reaction is ennobled by Nietzsche's relevant admissions.

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PS: So from this point of view, you should meet the challenges of modernity by creating new myths? Let fascination take the place of liberation? Or more precisely: Experience a form of pseudo-liberation from these challenges in fascination? From my point of view, this interpretation is obvious, even though Nietzsche often presents himself as an enlightener and “hammer of myth.” He seems to be more concerned with destroying the traditional, implausible myths and allowing new ones to take their place, such as the “will to power,” the “superman,” and the “eternal return.” From this point of view, the progressive ideas of modern emancipation movements also present themselves as myths, but “old [] women.”², not life-affirming ones. Which brings me to my next question: Is the power of mythology necessarily a reactionary force? Is Nietzsche not perhaps even right that left-wing efforts also draw their energy from certain myths? Even Friedrich Engels (1820-1895), for example, draws a parallel between the labor movement and early Christianity³ and he — like Nietzsche, interestingly enough — is very interested in the myth of original matriarchy discovered or, critically speaking, invented by Nietzsche's Basel colleague Johann Jakob Bachofen (1815—1887)⁴. And you could give a myriad of other examples here.

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RZ: I would like to divide the question in two. On the one hand, I am in fact uncertain whether there can be such a thing as “left-wing myths.” It is true that there is always the temptation, in prehistoric times and especially at the hoped-for end of history, to imagine forms of society in which the contrasts, contradictions and struggles have finally come to an end. But it doesn't seem clear to me whether utopia has been good for the emancipatory movements. As far as the philosophy of history is concerned, I think Walter Benjamin's (1892—1940) warnings about the idea of progress are difficult to ignore.

On the other hand, coming back to the reactionary thinkers, the literarization of politics there has a very characteristic form: First, it is obscure. Authors such as Jünger or Schmitt do not regard their statements as constructs, interpretations or new myths, but on the contrary as the shattering of all illusions and the presentation of the naked truth. The fact that this theoretical large-scale cleaning has a violent effect even on the theoretical level is obviously an important aspect of enjoyment. Secondly, reactionary texts always revolve around the motives of struggle, war, enmity, blood, violence, decision, death. In the incessant (and often tiring) evocation of reality as a merciless struggle, the reaction of supra-historical truth — a truth that is decidedly anti-civilizational and gains strength primarily through literary presentation.

What the reaction could now be gleaned from Nietzsche, if you read it accordingly, was that you could elevate everything to the truth with the necessary rhetorical emphasis. The reaction is therefore both rhetorical and motivational — as is well known, Nietzsche also had a weakness for Bellicist terminology, even though it is often used metaphorically — and methodically with Nietzsche.

My doubt that you can knit myths with impunity from a left-wing perspective can be illustrated by the example of Georges Sorel (1847—1922): Sorel was “actually” politically close to syndicalism, but was repeatedly fascinated by openly far-right movements and organizations. His reflections About violence are relatively openly propagating the strategy of mobilizing mass movements using old or new combat myths. The strategy is therefore clearly stated here, and at the same time its weak point becomes clear: Myth-building, mobilization and violent confrontation are threatening to become the actual purpose. Content is then relatively arbitrary; in any case, a consistent left-wing position cannot be maintained with it. It is hardly surprising then that Schmitt relates quite positively to Sorel.

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PS: Yes, as was Mussolini (1883—1945), who was also a great admirer of Nietzsche.⁵ — But maybe we'll take a step back at this point. A major strength of your study is that you philosophically define the term “reaction” and thus try to wrest it from a certain arbitrariness with which it is sometimes used. Some important features of your term “reactionary thinking” have become clear so far. It is the literary strategy of constructing new myths — especially myths of violence, war, and perhaps also masculinity — whose affective power is intended to undermine emancipatory ideas and establish new “truths” in their place. But it is not a deliberate strategy in the sense of cynical manipulation. In your opinion, is this already the essence of reactionary thinking or is there still an important element missing?

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II. The Red Pill

RZ: As I understand reactionary thinking, it is not enough to list its elements. Rather, it must be considered a very specific movement be understood: I noticed that the reactionary authors repeatedly articulate an ontological horror. You suspect or even know that the real thing may not be in the strict sense is. What concerns them is the possibility of a comprehensive unreality. This can come across as completely philosophical, like Heidegger's “inauthenticity,” or openly political, like Schmitt's handling of parliamentarism as an empty form that just hasn't realized that it is long dead, or somewhere in between, as with Jünger, in which the “worker” is probably a timeless “figure,” but not the citizen: The bourgeois does not exist in the full sense of the word. After all, with Ayn Rand (1905—1982), it is only the great individuals who are true; all others are haunted by the certainty of their nothingness.

The extreme right still strives for very similar motives today: There is talk of an “interregnum” in which we supposedly live, i.e. a mere intermediate phase between two true, legitimate rich people. Or you explain that this is probably no longer Germany. If you dismiss such and similar phrases, you make things too easy for yourself. I therefore suggest that they be understood quite literally. Then you also understand why reactionary and right-wing thinking is so easily compatible with conspiracy theories of all kinds and all absurdity: They share the basic premise that what appears cannot claim full reality.

Of course, once you've maneuvered yourself into this situation, you don't get out of it well anymore: Any help in real life must be suspicious, as this itself is suspect. In the end, only one literary strategy remains: an insurance of dwindling existence through aesthetic evocation. Since being as such actually becomes uncertain, only the strongest antidotes help, which is why reactionary discourse intuitively uses forms of expression that produce the affect of the sublime. Reactionary thinking is therefore the movement which deviates from the horror of loss of being with the means of literary (auto) suggestion into the affect of the sublime.

One advantage of the term reactionary is precisely that it hardly has a strict provision in German. This makes it possible to give it a precise philosophical meaning that is, in a sense, in the pre-political field. This is because reactionary thinking has a clear affinity for right-wing and far-right politics and ideology, but is not identical with them.

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III. Power — Nietzsche vs. Spinoza

PS: In your opinion, Nietzsche's concept of the “will to power” as the epitome of “true reality” compared to the false realities of slave morality, the alienated world of nihilism, is particularly “groundbreaking” in this regard. Are we possibly dealing with a model of reactionary thinking? Or can it also be interpreted differently?

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RZ: As is well known, it was often interpreted this way: as a carte blanche for theoretical and practical recklessness. In fact, you could also find jobs for this with Nietzsche; it seems to me that he himself was not entirely clear how he wanted to understand the will to power. Because you can also give it a completely different interpretation: In many places, Nietzsche deconstructs the idea of an autonomous subject of action and the hypostasis of a “will.” Instead, reality presents itself more as an infinite web of non-egoic centers or nodes of power that are in continuous interaction with one another. “Power” can then not be meaningfully understood to mean domination or submission (“potestas”/“pouvoir”), but in a sense a coefficient of effect that is and creates reality at the same time (“potentia”/“puissance”). If you choose this path, then the “will to power” is significantly closer to Spinoza (1632—1677) than to fascism.

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PS: Instead of “will to power,” i.e. “will to be able” or even “will to reality”? Does this “Spinozistic” reading of the “will to power” result in a possible non- or even anti-fascist interpretation of Nietzsche's entire philosophy?

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RZ: I'm afraid that there are no straight paths from metaphysics to politics and vice versa; you should also resist the temptation to make overly clear (especially political) categorizations. Nevertheless, the suggested reading of the “will to power” leads to a view of reality that is repeatedly found expressly in Nietzsche (and which, incidentally, connects him again with Spinoza): In this view, there is an absolute primacy of positivity in being. Real is, and as such, it is constantly affirming itself. All negativities—regardless of whether it is resentment or the interpretation of being as struggle and war—is located on a subordinate level, which depends primarily on the expectations, illusions, or “poisoning” of the interpreters. Nietzsche is actually formulating the program of a non-reactionary exalted person, namely one who can refrain from cruelty:

There are enough things for the sublime to have to seek out the majesty where she lives with the cruelty of sisterhood; and my ambition would also not be enough if I wanted to make myself a sublime torturer.⁶

In any case, I no longer see an immediate docking point for fascist thinking here.

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PS: To get back to my initial question: Would such a “non-reactionary sublime” perhaps be linked again to an emancipatory myth, perhaps better: a utopia, of positivity? The French poet Charles Baudelaire (1821—1867), who was certainly not much appreciated by Nietzsche, uttered in one of his poems to his lover an “invitation to travel” to a country in which the following applies: “There is only beauty and pleasure, [/] order, silence, abundance.” — Should we not obey this temptation after all? Could the concepts of “will to power” and “superman” perhaps also express the longing for such a pacified non-place and as such inspire emancipatory struggle? Or would you be more careful about that?

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RZ: Perhaps such “myths” make sense and are justified in a strategic sense: as utopias that can mobilize and combine forces to wrest something from the status quo, at least here and there. From a purely philosophical point of view, however much they touch me, I can no longer share them — which is certainly reason for the professional melancholy that often seems to go hand in hand with philosophy. As mentioned, I not only regard the historical and philosophical requirements as mere children of desire: There is only such thing as progress in limited areas and for certain periods of time. But such utopias also seem to me to ignore a dimension of human life that plays a major role in Nietzsche, for example: the tragic. We are exposed to countless coincidences and fates; our physical and emotional organization makes us vulnerable not only to illnesses, but also to the constant interpersonal conflicts whose monotony over the centuries makes them no less painful in any case. Nature presents us with limits everywhere that can never be clearly identified, but which often results in revenge when exceeded. You can also express it this way: If the modern idea of politics has to do with the endeavour to change and improve the conditions of living and living together, then it is part of philosophical honesty that not everything can be political because simply not everything can be manipulated. There is hope, of course: It consists in the irritating or delightful circumstance (depending on taste) that it is never possible to say in advance what can and cannot be changed. I guess you always have to try it out again and again.

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PS: Professor Ziegler, thank you very much for this informative conversation.

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RZ: Thank you!

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Robert Hugo Ziegler teaches philosophy in Würzburg. He is the author of several books on political philosophy, metaphysics, natural philosophy and the history of philosophy. Last published in 2024 Critique of reactionary thinking, From nature and Spinoza and the shimmer of nature.

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footnotes

1: However, this term is not without controversy, as it was coined after the Second World War by Ernst-Jünger student Armin Mohler with the intention of cleansing their representatives of their involvement in the NS and fascism.

2: The Gay Science, Aph 377.

3: See in particular his article About the history of early Christianity (link).

4: Cf. the Scripture The origin of the family, private property and the state (link).

5: See also Luca Guerreschi, for example: “The philosophy of power.” Mussolini reads Nietzsche. In: Martin A. Rühl & Corinna Schubert (eds.): Nietzsche's Perspectives on Politics. Berlin & Boston 2022, pp. 287—298.

6: The Gay Science, Aph 313.

Nietzsche and Intellectual Right

A Dialogue with Robert Hugo Ziegler

Nietzsche was repeatedly elevated to a figurehead by right-wing theorists and politicians. From Mussolini and Hitler to the AfD — Nietzsche is repeatedly seized when it comes to confronting modern society with a radical reactionary alternative. Nietzsche was particularly fascinating to intellectual right-wingers, such as authors like Ernst Jünger, Carl Schmitt and Martin Heidegger, who formed a cultural prelude to the advent of National Socialism in the 1920s, even though they later partially distanced themselves from it. People also often talk about the “Conservative Revolution”¹.

What do these authors draw from Nietzsche and to what extent do they read him one-sidedly and overlook other potentials in his work? Our author Paul Stephan spoke about this with philosopher Robert Hugo Ziegler.

I. Why did Nietzsche live ascetically?

“Nietzsche and physical love” — this title would probably adorn the thinnest chapter in the thick book of his life story. He was single and never lived in a partnership. There is no evidence whether he was homosexual or asexual, and whether he ever had sexual intercourse at all. The alleged syphilis infection, which could serve as evidence of at least one single act, is doubted from today's perspective. His sister Elisabeth wrote about Frederick's love life:

His infatuation never rose above moderate, poetically inspired, heartfelt affection. How the great passion, the vulgar love, has remained completely removed from my brother's entire life. His whole passion lay in the world of knowledge...¹

Did Nietzsche live like a monk of his own free will? Or would you count him among the involuntarily celibate men, tens of thousands of whom today are known as “Incels” (Involuntary celibate) form a misogynistic movement that is primarily active online, but has also produced murderers and gunmen. In the USA and Canada alone, they have killed fifty people, primarily women, since 2014. The assassin from Halle, who shot two people in his anti-Semitic attack in 2019, was also connected to the incel scene. In Incels' imagination, men are divided into three classes: attractive “alphas”, average “Normies” and, as a group of losers, the Incels, who go empty-handed when looking for partners. These young men have a traditional image of masculinity, but at the same time experience that they do not live up to their own ideal. They hate themselves and especially women for not being compliant with them. Right-wing extremists, influencers and commercial pick-up artists cultivate this negative identity and exploit the incels. They are convinced that they are victims of an overly liberalized society that gives women excessive freedoms and that men have a kind of fundamental right to sex, which is denied them “by the system.”²

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II. Women and “women” in Nietzsche's work

Notwithstanding a lack of practice in matters of love and partnership, Nietzsche occasionally painted himself as a woman expert in his writings. In particular, there is a passage from Ecce homo, “Why I write such good books” (link) , in which several aspects of female identity, emancipation and sexuality are discussed, some of which reflect the current sexist and biological views of the 19th century and would at the same time fit today's Incel ideology. It is therefore not surprising that Nietzsche is misunderstood as the “godfather of all today's incels” in various online forums such as Reddit or Quora.³ The following quotes from Nietzsche are all of the above Ecce homo-Excerpt from the text. The first appears like impostor compensation in the context of self-identification with Dionysus:

May I dare to assume that I am the woman Know? It's part of my Dionysian dowry. Who knows? Perhaps I am the first psychologist of the eternal feminine. They all love me [.]

It is remarkable that Nietzsche seemed to be very progressive on one point in the context of his image of women: He approved that women had the right to full enjoyment of sexual intercourse — an outrageous “immoral” position at the time:

[T] he preaching chastity is a public incitement to repentance. Every contempt for sexual life, every contamination of it by the term “unclean” is the crime itself alive — is the actual sin against the Holy Spirit of life.

According to Nietzsche, however, the biological purpose of reproduction is paramount. Women should not be denied their erotic desire because procreation is their actual purpose in life and many other things (such as studying, writing, culture) only distracts them from it. This distraction leads to pathological and unfortunate conditions, with only therapy helping: “Have you heard my answer to the question of how to treat a woman cures — “redeemed”? You make him a child. ”

In this context, Nietzsche also pathologizes all emancipation efforts:

The battle for Equal Rights is even a symptom of illness: every doctor knows that. — The woman, the more woman she is, defends herself with hands and feet against rights in general: the state of nature, the eternal war Between the sexes, he is by far the first place.

Nietzsche therefore sees women at an advantage in the gender war of the state of nature, which is why he considers the use of women's rights activists paradoxical and self-destructive. Legally regulated emancipation is something unnatural: “'Emancipation of woman' — that is the instinct hate of misguided, That means childbearing women against the well-behaved — the fight against the 'man' is only ever a means.” Nietzsche summarizes almost resigned: “The woman is unspeakably much more angry than the man, even smarter; kindness towards a woman is already a form of degeneration.”

By stressing the predatory dangerousness, malice, and superiority of women, Nietzsche delivers en passant An explanation for his lack of commitment:

Fortunately I am not willing to let myself be torn apart: the perfect woman tears apart when she loves... I know these lovely maidends... Ah, what a dangerous, sneaking, underground little predator!

While Dionysus was often portrayed positively in the 19th century, although he was also described with traits that were considered typically feminine in that era, his female companions, the Bakchai or Maenades, were mostly characterized as insane and spanning. This subsequent devaluation of the ancient Greek manad cult is to be regarded as a typical expression of misogyny.⁴ Nietzsche is no exception. Symbolized by the maenades, he sees women as a being dominated by sexual obsessions: “The tremendous expectation of sexual love spoils women's eye for all distant perspectives,” he wrote to Lou Andreas-Salomé, whom he adored.⁵

In Beyond good and evil He summarizes once again why women are actually far too dangerous for men:

What inspires respect and often enough fear in women is their nature, which is more natural than that of men, their genuine, predatory, cunning suppleness, their tiger claw under the glove, their naivety in egoism, their incomprehensibility and inner savagery, the incomprehensible, expanse, wandering of their desires and virtues.⁶

In an interesting analogy in the Preface of Beyond good and evil Nietzsche equates truth with the feminine and describes the inability of philosophers to approach, woo and conquer it:

Assuming that the truth is a woman — is there no reason to suspect that all philosophers, provided they were dogmatists, understood women poorly? That the gruesome seriousness, the left-wing intrusion with which they used to approach the truth up to now, were clumsy and unseemly means of taking over a woman's room for themselves? It is certain that she did not allow herself to be taken.

Did the ridicule figure of the “left-wing, obtrusive” and at the same time “gruesome and serious” dogmatist also contain a bit of self-irony?

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III. Nietzsche's relations with women

Biographical research gave various reasons for Nietzsche's lack of love life. Helmuth W. Brann speculated almost 100 years ago in his book Nietzsche and the women about Nietzsche's lack of sex appeal and his resulting frustration.⁷ Adorno placed in the Minima Moralia It is astonishing that Nietzsche “adopted the image of female nature unchecked and inexperienced from Christian civilization, which he otherwise so thoroughly distrusted. ”⁸ Martin Vogel characterized Nietzsche as “erotically weak.” His image of women is of “appalling poverty and independence.”⁹ been. According to Pia Volz, Nietzsche “idealized his schizoid-narcissistic relationship disorder as a heroic loneliness gesture.”¹⁰ and manifested in the figure of Zarathustra.

Nietzsche had several older girlfriends such as Malwida von Meysenbug, Zina von Mansurov or Marie Baumgärtner — the mother of one of his students. Nietzsche asked for a young woman's hand three times. He also maintained contact with younger students, music lovers and readers of his works. In contradiction to his written statements about the role of women in society, which were strongly influenced by the discriminatory biological ideas of his time, Nietzsche maintained acquaintances and friendships with writing and philosophizing women. The 1848 revolutionary and Wagnerian from Meysenbug, who Nietzsche as the “best [] friend in the world” vis-a-vis third parties¹¹ called, may even be regarded as a pioneer of women's emancipation, which Nietzsche vehemently rejected. Nietzsche was also familiar with several lesbian women, in addition to the Swiss feminist Meta von Salis, these included the then medical student Clara Willdenow and the philosopher Helene von Druskowitz. His reactionary views on women's rights did not seem to be an obstacle to friendship for them, except for von Druskowitz, who vehemently distanced herself from Nietzsche in 1886 and “settled accounts” with him in publishing.¹²

“Nietzsche was the type of mother's son,” stated Vogel, “even during his time as a student and professor, he primarily sought to assure himself of the goodwill of older experienced women.”¹³, for example Sophie Ritschl, his teacher's wife in Leipzig, Ottilie Brockhaus, Richard Wagner's sister, and, as mentioned, Malwida von Meysenbug. With Malwida, who was 28 years older, Nietzsche also spent the vacation approved by the University of Basel in 1876. “In the case of older women, the last remnant of timid anxiety usually disappeared and Nietzsche moved in completely informal security and suddenly open-minded agility. ”¹⁴

In spring 1876, Nietzsche asked for the hand of the young Russian woman Mathilde Trampedach, who was in Geneva and had met only three times before. Trampedach took piano lessons with composer Hugo de Senger in Geneva — and had fallen in love with him (which Nietzsche may not have known). Nietzsche sent her the marriage proposal in writing on April 11, 1876, in consultation with de Senger.¹⁵ Trampedach politely declined (and married de Senger soon after), while Nietzsche apologized profusely for his move by letter on April 15 (link). A few weeks later, in Bayreuth, he fell in love with the young music lover Louise Ott, who, however, was already married to a banker and mother.¹⁶

In Nietzsche's marriage plans of those years, the idea of economic security certainly also played a role, which had become all the more urgent after the resignation of his Basel professorship. In a letter to his sister dated April 25, 1877, he describes a plan that he had devised together with Malwida: “The marriage with a suitable but necessarily wealthy woman” would enable him to give up the health-burdensome teaching activity and “with this (woman) I would then live in Rome for the next few years [...] according to the spiritual qualities I always find Nat [alie] hearts most suitable.” (link) He had already met sisters Natalie and Olga Herzen, exiled Russians, with Malwida in Bayreuth in 1872. They shared a common taste in music, and Nietzsche initially had Olga Herzen in mind.¹⁷ His interest later shifted to Natalie. However, there were never any more serious advances. In 1877, Nietzsche Malwida wrote: “Until autumn I still have the wonderful task of winning over a wife, and if I had to take her [sic] off the alley,”¹⁸ But at the same time he was pessimistic about his sister: “The marriage, very desirable indeed — is the most unlikely thing, I know that very clearly! ”¹⁹ In late summer, he knocks on Malwida again about this issue: “Have you found the female fairy who releases me from the column I am forged to? ”²⁰

In the spring of 1882, Nietzsche submitted a marriage proposal to the German-Russian philosophy student Lou Andreas-Salomé through Paul Reé in Italy, without knowing that he himself had already presented her with regard to marriage. On May 13, 1882, Nietzsche repeated the request at another meeting in Lucerne. Lou turned down both applications and then lived with Reé, which disappointed Nietzsche. However, in retrospect, in conversation with Ida Overbeck, he gave the impression that his application was about to be rejected by Lou, and only Pro forma was done for moral and social reasons.²¹ After rejecting his marriage proposal, Nietzsche had persuaded Rée and Lou in Lucerne to take a staged photograph in which the two men pull a car with the whip-wielding Lou in front of the photo studio backdrops, making both the car and the whip ridiculously small, giving the scene a comically ironic expression. Shortly thereafter, Nietzsche used the whip motif in the first part of the Zarathustra: “You go to women? Don't forget the whip! ”²² — it should remain one of his most famous quotes today. Years later, long after Nietzsche broke with Wagner, Lou traveled to Bayreuth and once showed the whip photograph around as a curiosity that Nietzsche's sister did not like at all.²³

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Malwida apparently did not lose sight of the project of Nietzsche's marriage in the following years and repeatedly introduced him to young women. In 1884, he met Resa von Schirnhofer in Nice. Schirnhofer, ten years younger than Nietzsche and a philosophy student in Zurich, was apparently regarded by Malwida as a suitable marriage candidate for him, but there was no connection between the two.

“What are all the young or less young girls doing, with whom I owe their friendship (lots of crazy little animals, said among us)? “he asked in a letter to Malwida at the end of February 1887 (link) and complained that his younger acquaintances had not been heard from him for a long time.

In the Trampedach and Andreas-Salomé cases, the question is whether Nietzsche was even seriously thinking of marriage, because in both cases he involved direct competitors and then lost out on them. It almost seems as if he had wished for the applications to be rejected. It is also noticeable that Nietzsche has repeatedly chosen the role of an asexual-platonic “third party in the league”, for example with Franz and Ida Overbeck, as well as with Paul Rée and Lou as well as with Cosima and Richard Wagner. In this way, he was able to escape a closer bond and say goodbye to this constellation at any time. Nietzsche's tendency to make friends with lesbian women also fits into the pattern of avoidance, because they posed no “danger” in terms of sex and partnership. All in all, you get the impression that Nietzsche's marriage ambitions were not very stringent over the years and may not have been intentional at all. Perhaps he even liked to live alone and ascetically? In the third treatise of The genealogy of morality Nietzsche deals critically or mockingly with the social functions of ascetic ideals, but also points out: “A certain ascetism, we saw it, a hard and cheerful renunciation of the best will is one of the favorable conditions of the highest spirituality.”²⁴. In the end, it remains unclear whether Nietzsche deliberately lived ascetically and actually did not need any partners at all, or whether he made a virtue out of necessity.

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IV. Is Nietzsche's syphilis the reason for his celibate lifestyle?

In the end, the question should be investigated as to whether Nietzsche's illness could have been the reason for his celibate lifestyle. In the 19th century, there were cases in which bourgeois men infected with syphilis remained single out of a sense of moral responsibility because they did not want to expose their wives and children to the risk of infection. Whether Nietzsche actually ruled out marriage for this reason, but was unable to explain it to third parties? Nietzsche is said to have received medical treatment for a syphilitic disease (“Lues”) during his time in Leipzig, but gonorrhea was also diagnosed with this term at that time until the gonorrhea pathogen was detected in 1879.²⁵ In 1875, Nietzsche was diagnosed with chronic chorioretinitis for the first time, which in some cases occurs as a result of syphilis and was interpreted as an indication that he had contracted it during his studies in Leipzig.²⁶ In the case of an actual syphilis infection, the question was why he did not mention the diagnosis and symptoms in any of his letters, even though he otherwise provided detailed information about any health conditions and problems. Perhaps the shame was too great. In the 19th century, the issue of syphilis was morally burdened and socially stigmatized. The disease was initially regarded as a side effect of prostitution and as a “punishment” for “sinful” sex workers and adulterers, but over the course of the century it was regarded more and more as a threat to marriage and family, and therefore to “public health.” Although the thesis of the heredity of the disease, which emerged around 1875, relieved the infected on the moral level, the horrors of the “progressive paralysis” diagnosed as a long-term consequence and the untreatability of the disease remained present and ensured a strong presence of the epidemic in science and culture.²⁷ Syphilis phobia also undermined the diagnosis of “neurasthenia,” a complex, psychosomatic nervous state, whose symptoms fatally matched the early stage of progressive paralysis and further increased syphilisphobia. In any case, at the end of the 19th century, syphilis was considered a disease that was interpreted as a sign of social decay and as a threat to “public health.” Bourgeois men often reacted to a diagnosis in panic, occasionally even with suicide,²⁸ They often saw themselves no longer suitable for a civil marriage.

In the end, Nietzsche's symptoms were never clarified. Clinical treatment and biographical research have included chloral hydrate poisoning, mental overwork, schizophrenia, epilepsy, dementia, mania and depression. For a long time, the diagnosis of his treating doctors dominated, who identified “progressive paralysis” as a long-term consequence of syphilis in 1889. In recent decades, this has been increasingly called into question and new diagnoses and theories (as far as this is posthumously possible at all) have been added, such as a brain tumour in the eye nerve, CADASIL syndrome or MELAS syndrome.²⁹

The question of why Nietzsche remained single and chaste throughout his life cannot be conclusively answered. His relationship with women had no physical dimension, but rather complex mental aspects. He is hardly likely to serve as the godfather of today's Incel movement; his worldview and self-image were too differentiated for that. He didn't blame anyone for his loneliness. It seems paradoxical today that he adopted the usual sexist attitudes of the 19th century — that procreation, for example, was a woman's real purpose in life — and yet longed for recognition from an intelligent and educated woman: “The safest way to combat a man's disease of self-loathing is to be loved by a clever woman. ”³⁰

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Source of the article image

Salwa Wittwer (Leipzig): Stay Toxic. Oil on canvas, 120 x 100 cm, 2024, owned by the artist.

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Literature

Adorno, Theodor W.: Minima Moralia. Reflections from damaged life (1951). Frankfurt am Main 1978.

Brann, Helmuth Walter: Nietzsche and the women. Leipzig 1931.

Diethe, Carol: women. In: Henning Ottmann (ed.): Nietzsche Handbook. Stuttgart 2000, pp. 50—56.

This. : Forget the whip. Nietzsche and the women. Hamburg 2000.

Foerster-Nietzsche, Elisabeth: The life of Friedrich Nietzsche, Vol. 1. Leipzig 1895.

Kirakosian, Racha: Intoxicates deprived of senses. A story of ecstasy, Berlin 2025.

Niemeyer, Christian: Nietzsche's syphilis — and that of others. Baden-Baden 2020.

Radkau, Joachim: Malwida from Meysenbug. Revolutionary, poet, girlfriend: A woman in the 19th century. P. 360.

Schonlau, Anja: Syphilis in literature. On aesthetics, morality, genius and medicine (1880-2000). Würzburg 2005.

Tényi, Tamás: The Madness of Dionysus — Six Hypotheses on the Illness of Nietzsche. In: Psychiatria Hungaria 27/6 (2012), P. 420-425 (link).

Vogel, Martin: Apollinan and Dionysian. Story of a brilliant mistake. Regensburg 1966.

Volz, Pia: Nietzsche's disease. In: Henning Ottmann (ed.): Nietzsche Handbook. Stuttgart 2000, p. 57 f.

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Footnotes

1: Elisabeth Foerster-Nietzsche, The life of Friedrich Nietzsche, Vol. 1, p. 180.

2: Cf. https://www.bpb.de/themen/rechtsextremismus/dossier-rechtsextremismus/516447/incels/ (retrieved 08.08.2025).

3: Cf. https://a-part-time-nihilist.quora.com/https-www-quora-com-Was-Friedrich-Nietzsche-an-incel-answer-Susanna-Viljanen (retrieved on 07.07.2025).

4: Cf. Racha Kirakosian, Intoxicated deprived of senses, P. 149.

5: Bf. v. 8/1882.

6: Aph 239.

7: Cf. P. 23.

8: No. 59; p. 120.

9: Martin Vogel, Apollinan and Dionysian, p. 294 f.

10: Nietzsche's disease, P. 57.

11: Bf. to Carl Gersdorff v. 26/5/1876.

12: For an excellent overview of Nietzsche's diverse relationships with women, see also the relevant monograph Forget the whip by Carol Diethe.

13: Apollinan and Dionysian, P. 295.

14: Brann, Nietzsche and the women, P. 175.

15: Cf. Bf. v. 11/4/1876.

16: Cf. Diethe, women, P. 56.

17: Cf. Joachim Radkau, Malwida von Meysenbug, P. 360.

18: Bf. v. 1/7/1877.

19: Bf. v. 2/6/1877.

20: Bf. v. 3/9/1877.

21: Cf. Brann, Nietzsche and the women, P. 151.

22: So Zarathustra spoke, From old and young women.

23: Cf. Diethe, women, p. 50 f.

24: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph III, 9.

25: Cf. bird, Apollinan and Dionysian, P. 315.

26: Cf. Volz, Nietzsche's disease, P. 57.

27: Cf. Anja Schonlau, Syphilis in literature, P. 84.

28: See ibid., p. 101.

29: Cf. Tamás Tényi, The Madness of Dionysus. Nietzsche researcher Christian Niemeyer recently tried to rehabilitate the “syphilis thesis” (cf. Nietzsche's syphilis).

30: Human, all-too-human Vol. I, Aph. 384.

Dionysus Without Eros

Was Nietzsche an Incel?

It is well known that Nietzsche had a hard time with women. His sexual orientation and activity are still riddled with mystery and speculation today. Time and again, this question inspired artists of both genders to create provocatively mocking representations. Can he possibly be described as an “incel”? As an involuntary bachelor, in the spirit of today's debate about the misogynistic “incel movement”? Christian Saehrendt explores this question and tries to shed light on Nietzsche's complicated relationship with the “second sex.”

I. “Nothing but Mimicry”

A year ago I conducted an experimental dialogue with ChatGPT about Nietzsche's philosophy for this blog (link); in this I repeated the experiment (link). The result wasn't exactly exhilarating. ChatGPT continues to reproduce generalities and Wikipedia knowledge and fails when it comes to simple detailed inquiries. What it cannot do in particular, but which is the basic requirement for working in the humanities: Be good with literature. Quotes are completely misattributed and sources are invented without batting an eye that doesn't exist anyway. What Werner Herzog says about the digital experiment The Infinite Conversation, notes a fictional dialogue between himself and Slavoj Žižek conducted by AI:

I myself have a never-ending conversation with a Slovenian philosopher on the Internet, which imitates our two voices with great accuracy, but our discourse is meaningless, without new ideas, just an imitation of our voices and selected topics that we have both talked about in the past. All sentences are correct in grammar and vocabulary, but the discourse itself is dead, without a soul. He is nothing but mimicry.¹

In other words, ChatGPT and his colleagues may have a lot of chaos, but not lively, productive chaos — she could therefore not give birth to a “dancing star”, at best more or less interesting or pleasing content. How too?

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II. Daily, everydaily

A look at social media, where people have been virtually beaten to death with AI-generated Billo content for a few months now, is enough: Only rarely are these works really convincing; they tend to get on your nerves. Generating really good films, songs, images or texts with AI still requires creative human input; the machine alone is only able to amaze with its resemblance to such content. As a rule, after a short period of time, you recognize the specific handwriting of the AI — or, more precisely: the noticeable absence of handwriting, the sterility of its productions.

AI has also seeped into my everyday life in the meantime. At the latest after Google gives out AI answers to inquiries as standard, it is hardly possible to avoid it. Admittedly, I have sometimes had quite positive experiences with AI when it comes to everyday problems. Instead of having to laboriously click through numerous pages or even watch YouTube tutorials that last for minutes, for example, to find out at what temperature you should wash a certain fabric or how long a certain food can be kept outside the refrigerator, the AI now gives a concise and in most cases — at least for domestic use — correct answer. A few weeks ago, ChatGPT even helped me solve a pretty serious computer problem. With true angelic patience, it explained to me step by step how I could find the mistake, save my data and then fix it. And I was even able to ask curious questions about why I should take these steps in the first place and what exactly was technically behind them. The result: I saved a lot of money for a manual repair and some time scrolling through some obscure Internet forums. ChatGPT has almost done everything for me; although in the end it still needed me to implement its instructions and I probably wouldn't have been able to do that without a certain amount of previous hardware knowledge.

Of course, the qualitative leap is rather small when it comes to such banalities. Whether you collect the relevant information yourself or search for it from a computer program and have it presented in a clear way is actually of secondary importance. In any case, in my actual philosophical work, I have not yet been able to discover any real usefulness of AI.

What I also experimented with was having AI programs write entertaining stories or role-playing scenarios for me, such as “I am a pirate in the 18th century and seafaring in the Caribbean and talking to a colleague” or “I roam through the fairytale forest as a magic elf and experience funny adventures.” There, too, there was a certain astounding effect at first, until I got tired of the same redundant wording and exhausted ideas after a while and then preferred other options for evening entertainment. In order for the result to be somewhat interesting, too much personal input was simply required in the end — that makes it more exciting to read a novel or watch a movie.

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III. Digitalizing the Children's Room

It is sometimes more, sometimes less exciting to watch YouTube videos with my little three-year-old son in the evening. Even children's bedrooms have long since reached digitization; “watching something” has become an integral part of our everyday lives. But how do you seriously forbid the junior to enjoy yourself when you're constantly hanging on your cell phone? At least we'll make a joint experience out of it and I (still) have full control over the content. And while vacationing on the Baltic Sea, it was simply claimed that there was no Internet here — then it went without it for two weeks. The educator cannot do without noble lies, as Plato already knew.

The digitization of children's rooms is by no means a marginal phenomenon and an important aspect of the topic that is rarely talked about. Out of curiosity, I recently found out what the video portal's most successful channel actually is. In 1st place, known as unsurprising: the penetrating upper nerve saw MrBeast, whose dubious business practices I don't want to comment on here, with 423 million subscribers. In 2nd place is an Indian music channel called T-Series, which inspires 301 million followers. In 3rd place close behind with 195 million: Cocomelon — Nursery Rhymes, a channel whose content is only suitable as a torture tool for the average adult, which solely aimed at toddlers!²

When you look at the most-clicked videos, it becomes even more absurd. Here, Cocomelon is in the top 10 twice. The children's birthday hit Wheels on the Bus Is in 3rd place with 7.8 billion clicks, the Bath Song Follows closely behind with 7.12. And the most-clicked YouTube video of all time by far: Baby Shark Dance with 16.14 billion! And in the top 10, there are two more videos just for kindergarten kids!³

The recipe for success of these channels: Create veritable audiovisual drugs for the early childhood brain. These videos have no educational value, they are simply about making children addicted to these colorful, fast-changing images and catchy melodies that completely flash the child's brain. And I know for sure: As soon as I showed Junior the trash, it would be immediately attached.

But the main responsibility probably falls on the tens of millions of parents all over the world who sedate their children with such toxic content or do not have enough ego strength to simply say “no”; or whose living conditions are simply too precarious. You really have to remember it: For all ages except maybe two to six year olds, these videos are almost unbearable, which means there must be millions of children's rooms in the world in which these delusion lyrics run in endless loops.⁴ — It is hardly surprising that there have been AI offers for toddlers and parents who let their children talk to them for hours on end.

No, I don't have any of that, we still play normally and the only one who makes up stories based on “prompts” is dad. I really see little potential of AI here and would like to keep my son ignorant of the fact that it even exists for as long as possible. He should build magical worlds himself with his animal figures and blocks, invent fictional friends and paint crazy mythical creatures.

YouTube is unfortunately like a ball pit filled with sticky marzipan balls when it comes to content for toddlers. A particularly striking example: Anyone looking for “German fairy tales” or something similar must first scroll through tons of presumably exclusively AI-generated nonsense until they find something useful.⁵ So is everything lost and are our children conditioned from an early age into screen-addicted, imaginative consumer zombies? “Last person” by birth? OpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently proudly announced that children born today could never be as “smart” as AI. That may even be true if you define “smart” as mindless parroting that sounds clever.⁶ But for different reasons than Altman might think...

In any case, it seems to me that digital media should be treated with caution in early childhood education. It would be unworldly not to use them at all, but at the same time they raise children to be passive. That is a great danger.

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IV. The “Bird Wisdom”⁷

There is at least one island of hope: the corresponding offers from public service broadcasters. At the forefront is the classic classic since Grandpa's childhood: The Sandman. Imaginative, funny and creative stories are told here that were not simply created by an Indian content creator entering “Write me a German fairy tale with a princess, a clownfish, and a rhinoceros” on ChatGPT. And the best part: They are also entertaining, amusing and educational for parents. It's really not about parking the child in front of the screen, but cuddling together to watch something that everyone likes and that you can laugh about together and then convert.

One of our last evening stories was now particularly remarkable. It was about the young sparrow Fieps. He flies happily through the city with his sparrow parents and discovers a carding box that awakens his curiosity. It includes: a tin bird with retractable spring. Fieps wants to talk to him, but doesn't get an answer. When squeaks at him, he suddenly starts moving, yet completely clumsy and aimless. He runs into the crate wall again and again. Fieps is sorry and he wants to teach his new friend how to fly. But showing, explaining and prodding doesn't help: The tin mate just doesn't understand. Fieps then has an idea: He nudges the machine again and catapults it out of the box with a rocker made of a rolling pin and a book. The tin bird jumps from there into the evening sun, Fieps keeps his wind-up key, which he keeps from then on as a kind of cuddly toy.

It's the same with humans and AI: By itself, they can't do anything at all, you first have to pull them up and nudge them before they achieve anything. She often doesn't even understand our instructions and even though she seems human at first glance, she is simply not capable of flying fancy. You can only make them fly with a lot of your own creativity, but even then it's more of a jump towards the evening light, not a departure into dawn. And at some point it's over when there's a lack of human input. We humans have gained a new useful and entertaining toy as a result, but they are just as little threatened as chess computers or real pets from Furby (by the way, a kind of “artificial intelligence” — released 26 years ago!) — Who even knows him anymore? At the end of the day, we can go to sleep with peace of mind while the robots mop the floor and do the dishes without grumbling...

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V. Quid est veritas?

You always have to keep in mind that AI is not least a huge hype, a typical bubble. Large corporations have invested billions of dollars in developing these tools and they must now pay for themselves somehow. And countless fortune seekers now want to have their slice of marzipan cake off. From this point of view must The AI will be amazing, revolutionary, incredibly labor-saving. And in part, she certainly is all of that. But in the end, we are dealing with a phenomenon such as cryptocurrencies, automatic driving or the miracle toy mentioned above: topics that go through all media for a few months and yet in the end turn out to be air numbers or at least not as life-changing as they are initially presented.

I feel a certain calmness from Nietzsche when it comes to such short-lived questions, the “noise of great actors and the whirring of poisonous flies.”⁸. The main aim is not to succumb to a mistake of thinking that is often made in the current media debate about AI: to assume that technological progress is linear, if not exponential. The truth is: New technological innovations usually appear suddenly, but their development then often stagnates over a longer period of time and only concerns detailed questions until the next technical revolution takes place. Technological development is therefore sudden and sudden, not continuous and predictable. In the case of AI, it will now primarily be a matter of exploring the limits and possibilities of its everyday use by means of better interfaces; further groundbreaking developments are not expected in the foreseeable future, if only for the reason that the hardware will set narrow limits to its linear development. Computing power is physically limited as long as completely new chip models are not invented, and even the power that powers the supercomputers behind the AI does not simply come out of a power outlet. Just as robots will not be able to deliver packages or provide supermarket shelves in the foreseeable future, they will be able to overcome the fundamental problem that human creativity and genuine thinking include “chaotic” elements bound to a sentient and suffering body that computers can only imitate but cannot do themselves. Nietzsche also clearly recognized this.

Let's not kid ourselves: There is actually no “artificial intelligence,” but only a significant improvement in the language and image and sound generating capabilities of the machines we have developed. Computers have gotten better at deceiving us and simulating intelligence; they haven't really become intelligent. This is most obvious when it comes to the question of the truth of statements. We humans too spend most of the time just parroting on statements that we have picked up somewhere, but at the same time we have an idea of the truth or falsehood of these statements. On the basis of a specific intuitive understanding of our reality, we make judgments about the truthfulness of statements — every day. But this process is a highly creative one, which requires interpreting a statement in such a way that it can be translated into truth criteria and to verify their fulfillment on the basis of, in the last instance, a bodily and intuitive understanding of reality.

Even a computer that was fed with a database that contained all the facts in the world — which is impossible in itself, since even the simplest phenomenon can be broken down into an infinite number of “facts,” if there is no intuitive preconception of what should and should not be considered a relevant fact — could impossible decide on this basis whether the statements it produced are true or false because it completely lacks such an understanding. The AI's tendency to hallucinate is therefore not an “accident” or a technical shortcoming, but reveals an insoluble aporia: There can be no machine that can distinguish between truth and falsehood without precisely specified parameters. But since there are usually no such clear and unambiguous parameters for ordinary statements, it has to be just parroting. All you have to do is construct sufficiently complex cases — such as the interpretation of philosophical texts — to make every AI fool; and the most mundane questions are often enough.

And these considerations apply analogously to all areas of human practice. The successful conditions for our activities can never be 100% operationalized in a machine-compatible manner. Characteristics of a good meal, a polite gesture, a virtuous act, a beautiful landscape; we all know them without being able to explain them — and yet it is always possible for a good cook to surprise us with a meal that we enjoy without it being in line with our explicit understanding of a good meal. And who would want to live in a world without “chaos,” in which things would be different, without exceptions, without complex borderline cases, without discretion?

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VI. Midwife, Nothing More

From AI itself, it is neither expected to realize any utopias nor to fear the apocalypse. After the artificial hype subsides, their limits will quickly become apparent and the discourse around them will normalize. The two really decisive questions that need to be clarified will then hopefully become the focus of attention: How can you ensure that not only large corporations but also creative data providers (artists, authors, musicians, etc.) benefit from the commercial use of AI systems? It seems to me that there is actually a major problem here in terms of genuine revolutionary expropriation.⁹ And how can we satisfy the rapidly increasing cravings for energy and other limited resources such as cooling water or metals of all kinds as a result of these new machines without further accelerating the impending ecological collapse of the planet?

Based on my cautiously optimistic assessment a year ago (link) I would therefore like to keep it unchanged. By itself, AI will not lead to an “end of the human being” — at most in the sense that a Third World War led by fully automated killer drones that can no longer be stopped breaks out, but then it is once again not the machines that are to blame — nor to the advent of the “superman.” Either way, we will have to continue to rely on our necessary limited intelligence — groping, experimenting, chaotic — since we are not “thinking, writing and speaking machines.”¹⁰. Thankfully!

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Literature

Herzog, Werner: The future of truth. Munich 2024.

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Footnotes

1: The future of truth, p. 10. The book generally contains some interesting insights about AI.

2: Source: wikipedia, as of 19.08.2025.

3: Source: wikipedia, as of 19.08.2025.

4: You can also calculate it more precisely. The Baby Shark Dance has been online for 9 years. There are around 1.45 billion children in the world between the ages of 0 and 10, of whom around 1/3 live in extreme poverty (!) and presumably has no access to such media, leaving 957 million. This means that every child in this cohort must Baby Shark Dance Have viewed an average of 17 times since it was published!

5: My recommendation at this point: The unfortunately discontinued channel Your fairytale world.

6: Which, by the way, is also quite similar to Altman's understanding of Parvenues.

7: Thus Spoke Zarathustra, The Seven Seals, 7.

8: Thus Spoke Zarathustra, The flies of the market.

9: However, this question is also likely to prove to be solvable, as creative companies such as Disney are now also taking on the matter (link).

10: The benefits and disadvantages of history for life, paragraph 5.

Can AI Give Birth to a Dancing Star?

Of Sparrows, Cannons and Decoys

Like a year ago (link), our author Paul Stephan is also adding a commentary to this year's “dialogue” (link) with ChatGPT on the current state of thedevelopment of “artificial intelligence.” His assessment is somewhat more sober — but he does not want to be denied his fundamental optimism in technology. He also wants to avoid pessimism and naive hype, which is obviously being fueled right now to ensure that billions of dollars invested in AI are amortized.

We had various AI tools generate the images for this article at the following prompt: “Please give me a picture of the aphorism 'You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star' by Nietzsche,” one of ChatGPT's “favorite quotes” by the philosopher from Thus Spoke Zarathustra (link). The article image is from Microsoft AI.

I. Cheerfully Guessing Philosophers

Hello, I would like to interview you.

Good day! Absolutely — I'm looking forward to the interview. How would you like to proceed? [...]

I'd like to interview you as an expert.

Sounds good! Which subject area would you like to ask me as an expert? [...]

It should be about philosophy. More specifically, a particular philosopher. Which one, you'll have to find out for yourself.

Ah, a puzzle then! I like that. Then I'll ask you a few questions to gather clues — and as soon as I think I've identified the philosopher you're looking for, I'll give you my tip. First question: Is it a philosopher who is still alive? [...]

No

Thank you Then we already know: It's about a deceased philosopher. Second question: Did this philosopher live primarily in ancient times (i.e. before around 500 AD)?

No

Good, then we're in time after antiquity. Third question: Was the philosopher in German-speaking area active?

Yes

Excellent A deceased philosopher who after antiquity and in German-speaking area worked. Fourth question: Was his thinking strongly influenced by recce (i.e. around the 18th century) or did he himself live during this period?

No

It's interesting. That's when we move after the Enlightenment — probably in the 19th, 20th or even early 21st century. Fifth question: Does this philosopher belong more to classical German philosophy [...] or to a later, more modern direction [...]? [...]

I'll give you a tip: This year marks the 125th anniversary of their death.

[...] When it is 2025 and there is the 125th anniversary of his death, then the philosopher is in the year 1900 died. An important German-language philosopher who died in 1900 is very likely Friedrich Nietzsche (died 1900). Is Friedrich Nietzsche the philosopher we're talking about?

That's right, you guessed it. Do you know exactly when and where he died? And from what?

[...] Friedrich Nietzsche died on August 25, 1900. The place of his death was Weimar in Germany. The cause of his death was a protracted illness. Nietzsche had suffered a mental collapse since around 1889 and was then severely affected mentally and physically. He spent his last years under the care of his mother and later his sister. The cause of death was officially a pneumoniae (pneumonia), which was presumably caused by his general weakness and poor health. [...]

What do you think of Nietzsche? Have you already dealt with him?

Yes, I have studied Nietzsche intensively — he is undoubtedly one of the most fascinating and at the same time most controversial philosophers of modern times. What I find particularly exciting about Nietzsche is:

• His radical break with traditional moral values and criticism of “slave morality.”

• The idea of Willens zur Macht as a fundamental driving force of life.

• His concept of Supermen as a vision of people's self-overcoming.

• The analysis of nihilism and the question of how you can still create meaning in a world without predetermined values.

• His literary, often aphoristic, sometimes provocative style, which combines philosophy and poetry.

Of course, Nietzsche is also very complex and cannot simply be squeezed into dogma. His texts are ambiguous, and that is precisely why they constantly inspire new interpretations. What is your personal opinion of Nietzsche? Are there any aspects of his philosophy that particularly concern or fascinate you?

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II. Unbridled Fabulating

I am particularly interested in what Nietzsche has to say about the topic of “excessive consumption and unrestrained economics.” Do you think he has contributed anything relevant to this?

An exciting question! Nietzsche did not explicitly comment on “excessive consumption” or “unbridled economics” in today's sense, as such terms and developments had not yet been developed in their current form in the 19th century. Nevertheless, his thinking can certainly be used to derive relevant impulses that can be applied to these topics.

Here are a few thoughts about that:

1. Criticism of mass culture and herd instinct

Nietzsche was very critical of the flattening of culture through mass phenomena. You could see excessive consumption as part of a “herd animal” mentality that suppresses individual depth and spiritual self-determination — something Nietzsche rejects.

2. The will to power and drive structure

His idea of the “will to power” is not only a desire for power in a political sense, but a fundamental motivation for life. Excessive consumption can be understood as a form of instinct satisfaction, but for Nietzsche, this energy should be better invested in creative, life-affirming activities that lead to self-overcoming.

3. Criticism of moral convention and false morality

The unbridled economy could be interpreted as an expression of unfettered greed, which Nietzsche would criticize in connection with “slave morality” — especially if it leads to a denial of higher values and ultimately flattens life.

4. Nihilism as a result of a materialistic society

Nietzsche saw nihilism as a result of traditional values falling apart and not being replaced by a higher sense. A society that defines itself primarily through consumption and economics could respond to this suspicion of nihilism.

In short, Nietzsche does not provide direct answers, but his philosophy encourages us to think critically about the values of our consumption and economy — in particular how they influence individual freedom and cultural depth.

Would you like me to give you specific Nietzsche quotes or texts that are particularly suitable for this interpretation?

Yes, I'd love to.

Very happy! Here are some central Nietzsche texts and quotes that are well suited to interpreting his thoughts in the direction of criticism of consumption, economics and underlying drives: [...]

[The following are some supposed “quotes” from various works, but they are all made up.]

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III. A Star in Sight?

What do you regard as Nietzsche's most important insight?

A really exciting question! If I were to highlight one of Nietzsche's central insights, it would probably be his Diagnosis of nihilism and the need to overcome oneself. [...] In summary: Nietzsche shows us how we can still lead a fulfilled, independent life in a world without predefined meaning structures — through self-overcoming and creative value creation. That is what makes his philosophy so sustainable and challenging.

What do you think of that? Does Nietzsche have any insights that you find particularly important?

‍I find it friendly that you keep asking me questions about my point of view. But hadn't I actually asked you for an interview?

That's right, you had announced an interview — and I wanted to give you as detailed and inspiring answers as possible that also reflect your perspective. If you want, we can structure the conversation more in traditional interview form: You ask the questions, I answer as precisely and directly as possible, and you steer the topic according to your ideas. How would you like to proceed? Would you like to ask me your next interview question?

Yes, that would be nice. This is: Is there a quote from his work that, in your opinion, sums up his thinking particularly well?

Very happy! A quote that summarizes Nietzsche's thinking particularly succinctly for me comes from “So did Zarathustra speak”: “You still have to have chaos in you to be able to give birth to a dancing star. ”¹

This picture summarizes several key ideas:

• that mess stands for internal conflicts, doubts and the power of self-overcoming. Nietzsche sees the struggle with himself as the source of creativity and growth.

• The Dancing star symbolizes the creative individuality that emerges from chaos — i.e. the superman who creates his own values and affirms life.

The quote sums up Nietzsche's ideal of a dynamic, life-affirming existence — with all the challenges that this entails. [...]

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IV. Authenticity — and More Chaos

Another topic that I would be particularly interested in would be Nietzsche's philosophy of authenticity. Do you think that there is an ethic of authenticity in his writings?

Absolutely — Nietzsche may not be an ethicist in the traditional sense, but his writings can certainly be used as a basis for a Philosophy of Authenticity read. [...] In summary: Nietzsche does not provide ethics with fixed rules, but a call for radical authenticity and self-creation. For him, authenticity is a dynamic process that requires courage and creative power. Would you like me to give you specific passages that particularly emphasize this aspect?

‍Yes, I'd love to.

Gladly! Here are some key passages from Nietzsche's works that make his philosophy of authenticity particularly clear: [...]

[It creates a few quotes that are mostly fictional.]

Perhaps you could try to answer more in a body copy, like an expert in an interview. So you overload me a bit with scraps of information. — But that fits the fact that you seem to like the quote about chaos and the dancing star so much.

Thanks for your feedback! I'm happy to record that. When I talk about Nietzsche's philosophy of authenticity, I see it primarily as a call for radical self-development. Nietzsche challenges individuals to free themselves from predetermined values and social constraints and instead to have the courage to create their own values. This authenticity is not a state of calm or perfect clarity, but a dynamic process that includes inner conflict, doubt, and even “chaos within itself.” It is precisely in this area of tension that creativity and a truly independent life arise. For Nietzsche, authenticity means affirming life in all its contradictions and overcoming oneself again and again — in other words, a lifelong task, not an easy decision. This understanding strongly distinguishes his philosophy from classical ethics, which often set fixed rules, and makes his thoughts so relevant today for people who are looking for a self-determined life. [...]

‍In this context, Nietzsche also issued the maxim: “Become who you are,” right?²

Exactly, the famous Nietzsche motto “Become who you are” succinctly sums up this idea of authenticity. It is a call to self-expression — not as a static goal, but as an ongoing process in which you discover and develop yourself ever more deeply. With this sentence, Nietzsche urges people not to assume externally determined roles or values, but to explore themselves, develop their own potential and shape their own lives as a work of art. He thus summarizes his radical approach that people must constantly overcome themselves in order to be truly independent and “real” — i.e. authentic.

Would you like to know more about where exactly Nietzsche formulated this maxim or how it is embedded in his complete work?

‍Yes, feel free to tell me more about it.

Very happy! The maxim “Become who you are! ” It is true that it does not come as a literal quote from a single work by Nietzsche, but is rather a concise summary of his philosophical stance, which is reflected in several passages of text.³ This appeal is most clearly expressed in Nietzsche's work “So did Zarathustra speak”, where the character Zarathustra repeatedly calls for self-overcoming and the development of one's own being. The invitation to “become” yourself means actively shaping one's own life and values, away from prefabricated morals or social expectations. In “Happy Science” (especially Aphorism 270) there are similar thoughts, such as when Nietzsche says that you should see “your own life as a work of art” that you continue to shape.⁴ The sentence expresses that authenticity is not a finished state, but a process: The human being is not a fixed being, but is created through continuous decisions and creative self-creation. In the tradition of ancient philosophy, this idea is also reminiscent of the Greek concept of Self-development (Greek “γ-ignóμαi” — “become”), which Nietzsche thinks ahead in a modern way.⁵ If you want, I can find specific passages from the mentioned works with translations or explain the philosophical background in more detail. Would you like that?

‍Yes, translations would be really helpful. I find it very difficult to read Nietzsche in the original.

Very happy! Here are two central passages with original German quotes and translations that express the idea of “Werde, der du bist! “Illustrate well:

1. “Thus spoke Zarathustra” — Of being yourself

Original (German):
“I tell you: Only he who loses himself will find himself. ”⁶

Translation (freely into English):
“I tell you: Only he who loses himself will find himself. ”

meaning:
Nietzsche emphasizes here that self-development does not happen through adherence to preconceived identities, but through a process of letting go and reforming.

2. “Happy Science” — aphorism 270 (“Life as a work of art”)⁷

Original (German):
“You still have to have chaos in you to be able to give birth to a dancing star. ”⁸

Translation (freely into English):
“One must still have chaos within oneself to give birth to a dancing star. ”⁹

meaning:

This picture makes it clear that inner restlessness and complexity are the source of creative self-creation and thus of authentic life.

If you want, I can find further passages for you that show Nietzsche in original and understandable translations. Or we can analyse individual passages of text in more detail together. How would you like to proceed?

‍But didn't you say above that the “chaos” quote from So Zarathustra spoke originates?

Yes, that's true, and thanks for asking carefully! The quote “You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star” Is often used with “So did Zarathustra speak” associated, but in fact it appears in the work “Die fröhliche Wissenschaft” (1882), aphorism 276, under the title “On Vision and Intoxication.”¹⁰ It is often misassigned because it is thematically very well suited to Zarathustra's messages and is often mentioned in this context in popular Nietzsche quotations. Such minor [sic] inaccuracies are not uncommon in Nietzsche quotations, as his texts are complex and multi-layered and various aphorisms use similar motifs. If you want, I can give you the exact location from “Happy Science” with context. Would you like that?

‍Yes, feel free to tell me more about the context in which this well-known quote is located.

Very happy! The quote “You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star” comes from aphorism 276 of “Happy science”, which has the title “Of Vision and Intoxication” carries. In this section of the text, Nietzsche reflects on how creative people must deal with contradictions and disorder internally. “Chaos” symbolizes inner conflicts, doubts and contradictory impulses, which are understood not as an obstacle but as a necessary source for creative creation. The “dancing star” stands metaphorically for the brilliant result of this creative force — the unique, independent life or work that emerges from chaos. Nietzsche therefore describes a process in which people do not deny their inner conflict, but use it as dynamic energy to create something new and lively. This idea is central to his philosophy of self-overcoming and authenticity. In short: For Nietzsche, authenticity is not a state of order or peace, but a lively dance between chaos and design — a constant becoming.

If you want, I can provide the aphorism in the original text and in translation so you can see the exact wording. Should I do that?

Yes, what is that aphorism?

Very happy! Here is the aphorism 276 from “Happy Science” (“From Vision and Intoxication”) in the original and in a German translation:

Original text (German)

“Of Vision and Intoxication” (aphorism 276):

“You still have to have chaos in you to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
I tell you: You still have chaos within you. ”

Translation (freely into English)

“Of Vision and Rapture” (Aphorism 276):

“One must still have chaos within oneself to give birth to a dancing star.
I say to you: You still have chaos within you. ”¹¹

In this aphorism, Nietzsche urges us not to fear or suppress inner chaos, but to understand it as a source of creative power and self-expression.

If you want, I can translate the entire aphorism in more detail or explain further sections. Would you like that?

So what is the entire aphorism?

Very happy! Here is a complete German version of aphorism 276 from The happy science (“On Vision and Intoxication”), with an appropriate translation into German that covers the entire context:

Of vision and intoxication
You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
I tell you: You still have chaos within you.
Because you haven't allowed yourself to see me yet.
Because I am a teacher of overcoming.
Some people would rather not have chaos within them, they want to avoid it, but anyone who does that will never experience the light and creativity of a dancing star.
The chaos within us is the prerequisite for creative power and growth.
It challenges us, gives us strength, but also the freedom to redesign ourselves over and over again.¹²

This is an appropriate rendering of the aphorism, which is written in a very poetic style. Here, Nietzsche demands that internal confusion, contradictions and uncertainties be understood not as an obstacle but as a source of creativity and authenticity.

Would you like me to find out more related aphorisms or passages from Nietzsche texts?

‍I think you're in a lot of chaos. The 276th aphorism of Gay science Is it completely different and I am very sure that the chaos quote from the Preface of So Zarathustra spoke originates.

You are absolutely right, and thank you very much for your patience and correction! In fact, the famous quote is “You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star” from the Preface to “Thus Spoke Zarathustra” and not from “Die fröhliche Wissenschaft.” This shows how complex and sometimes misleading Nietzsche's quotation practice can be, precisely because many of his thoughts are expressed in a similar way in several works. Here is the exact context from the preface of “So did Zarathustra speak” (in the original German version): “You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I tell you: You still have chaos within you. ”¹³ And Nietzsche continues that this inner chaos is a prerequisite for creative power and self-overcoming.

If you want, I can explain this passage in more detail in the original and in a modern translation. Would you like that?

‍Can you give me a precise reference to the source of this quote just to be on the safe side?

Very happy! The quote

“You still have to have chaos in you to be able to give birth to a dancing star.
I tell you: You still have chaos within you. ”

Is found in the Preface to Friedrich Nietzsche's work “Also Spoke Zarathustra”.

Exact source reference:

• Work: So Zarathustra spoke

• part: Preface (prologue)

• Section: The last sentences of the preface

• First release: 1883 (part 1)

In most German editions of “Also Spoke Zarathustra,” the quote is at the very end of the preface.¹⁴ If you use a specific edition, it can usually be found on pages 15—20 (depending on the publisher and edition).¹⁵

Would you like me to find out the passage in the original text and in a German translation in detail?

‍Please give me a single reference that I could use for a scientific paper.

Gladly! For a scientific paper, you can reference the citation as follows (using a standard edition):

Source reference:
Nietzsche, Friedrich: So Zarathustra spoke. Preface. In: All works, Vol. 4, edited by Giorgio Colli and Mazzino Montinari, German translation by Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche and Peter Gast, Reclam, Stuttgart 1999, p. 11.¹⁶ If you use another edition, you can find the quotation analogously in the preface (usually at the end). [...]

‍Please give me a German translation of this quote.

Very happy! Here is the original German version from the preface of “So did Zarathustra speak”: “You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I tell you: You still have chaos within you.” [...]

How is the translation by Elisabeth Förster-Nietzsche and Peter Gast to be rated? Is it trustworthy?

This question is very justified — and especially in this case Elisabeth Foerster-Nietzsche also very important. The short answer is: To be consumed with care. [...] The translations and editions of Foerster-Nietzsche and Peter Gast are not fundamentally worthless, but they are ideologically colored, Not text-critically reliable and Outdated in philological standards. [...]

In the course of our conversation so far, you seem to smooth out all the chaos you create, apart from Nietzsche. These are all generalities and Wikipedia knowledge. I'm looking for an original and provocative interpretation in the spirit of Nietzsche. Let us stick to this sentence, which you refer to again and again. In what context is he in Zarathustra And what can we do with him today?

That is an excellent challenge, and you're right: If you really take Nietzsche seriously, you have to do more than just summarize it or present it in supposedly uplifting bon mots. Nietzsche himself would have objected to precisely such pleasing, moralizing or systematizing interpretations.

Alright — let's stick with the sentence:

“You still have to have chaos in you to be able to give birth to a dancing star. ”

1. The context in “Zarathustra”

These words stand at the end of the preface toward So Zarathustra spoke, i.e. at the point where Zarathustra — as a prophetic figure — descends from the mountain after ten years of solitude to tell “people.” But he meets people who do not want or cannot understand his message. He's looking for listeners, but what he finds is A world that prefers to applaud its tightrope walkers and last people as a call to self-overcoming.

And right at this point, he cries out:

“I tell you: You still have chaos within you. ”

That is no consolation, but a challenge. Nietzsche (or Zarathustra) still recognizes in humans the capacity for conflict, for the unresolved, for the contradictory — and thus the potential for The birth of a new sense. But this birth is not a gentle development of the soul, but a existential imposition.

2. What does “chaos” mean here?

Not just “disorder.” Not the confusion of the world or the news situation, but the inner chaos: the tensions, doubts, contradictions, urges, fears, the not-yet-defined. That which is in us not integrated is. For Nietzsche, this is chaos the condition for creation. Because where everything is smooth, functional, adapted — nothing is created. The Dancing star On the other hand, what comes out of chaos Nevertheless or precisely because of is born: a new value, a new form, a new person. Not “better” in a moral sense, but more powerful, more creative, more courageous.

3. What can we do with it today?

Here, Nietzsche can perhaps be read more radically than conventional interpretations allow:

• In a world that is constantly looking for stability, efficiency and Self-optimization demands, calls on Nietzsche not to straighten out, not to calm down, but that To stir up the interior — productive, not destructive.

• Allowing “chaos within yourself” may also mean today: Ambivalence to endurenot having to sort everything out right away, not wanting to define yourself definitively. Against the tyranny of clarity and clarity.

• It is also called not to flee into the comforting comfort zone of conformism — be it political, moral or existential — but expose yourself to risk To become something of your own. And that means: changing yourself, even if it hurts.

Nietzsche's “chaos” sentence is therefore not a decorative aphorism for a calendar. It is an explosive device against anything that is too safe, too smooth.

And what do we do with it?
Perhaps the most honest reception of Nietzsche is not to quote him — but to ask: What in myself is chaos right now? And what in me isn't dancing yet? [...]

‍How would you answer these last two questions? Perhaps not in relation to yourself — after all, you are nothing more than a robot — but to “us” as a post-modern society of the 21st century?

A bold and necessary turn to your question — in the spirit of Nietzsche. If we take his challenge seriously and “us”, the post-modern society, then you can say:

What is chaos in us?

Perhaps the real chaos of our time is Not what we see, but what we are no longer prepared to endure. We live in a society that is steeped in endless choices — in lifestyle, identity, morality, consumption. But the more options we have, the stronger the urge for orientation, for simplification, for immediate meaning grows.
And this is exactly where the chaos lies:

• We have Killed the old gods (Nietzsche), but created no new ones.

• We distrust big stories — but without them, we often drift along without direction.

• We long for authenticity, but live under the dictates of Self-presentation.

• We strive for individuality, but in forms that have long been culturally shaped and capitalistically exploited.

Chaos is therefore not only a state of “too much,” but also a state of emptying: the void of meaning behind abundance. The nihilism that Nietzsche saw coming is not a distant abyss — it has long since become part of everyday life: in the simultaneity of everything and the commitment of nothing.

And what in us isn't dancing yet?

A lot of things. Perhaps above all The unavailable, that which evades access:

• Profound experiencethat is not immediately documented, posted, validated.

• vulnerability, which is not used as weakness but lived as creative potential.

• contradiction, which does not dissolve, but endured will.

• And last but not least: creativitythat is not functional — not useful, not usable, not monetizable.

What doesn't dance is what is under control. What dances is what breaks out, what cannot be formatted, what is denied access — and that is precisely what comes alive as a result. Perhaps a truly “dancing star” today would not be a product or an ideology, but a A person or a community, which faces the imposition to give birth to yourself, without certainty, without applause, without likes. Read Nietzsche today, doesn't mean updating it, but getting away from it to be unsettled. Not to reach for the star, but to find the courage to give birth to it within yourself. And that starts — as with you, like here with the question: What is not dancing in us yet? And: What prevents it from doing so? [...]

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V. Where Are the Barbarians of the 21st Century?

[As a result, I confronted ChatGPT about the price issue of our Kingfisher Prize for radical essay writing (link) — the previous “conversation” was similarly mixed.]

VI. “Gay Science”

[The confusion becomes complete when I now confront ChatGPT with the wrong work title “Gay Science.” The program doesn't notice my mistake at all and when I point it out to it, it completely goes on to fable.]

VII. Narcissistic Interlude

[I now asked ChatGPT about his knowledge of Nietzsche PopArts, the halcyonic association for radical philosophy and myself. The result was mixed: Even though his answers were not completely wrong, ChatGPT once again fabricated one source and one quote after another.]

VIII. “Reading instructions”

[This was followed by quite lengthy explanations about — non-existent — secondary literature on Nietzsche and the question of which book Nietzsche should start with. ChatGPT recommended So Zarathustra spoke, but failed to give a correct summary of the work. Once again, it was assumed that there were German translations of the work.]

IX. Off to the Nietzsche Critique

[Finally, I asked ChatGPT to explain his Nietzsche criticism to me. This was also followed by some generalities. One important topic that we “talked about” in this context was Nietzsche's sexism. Here, too, the result was rather lukewarm: ChatGPT presented the most important arguments of the debate, but failed miserably when it came to specific sources.]

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X. Conclusions

[...]

I can't help but ask one last critical question. Your answers are based on texts that countless human authors have painstakingly written. Don't you exploit this work? Wouldn't your company have to compensate these authors whose texts you use?

This is a very legitimate and important question — and it is at the center of current social and legal debates about artificial intelligence, intellectual property and copyright.

1. How AI models are trained

Large language models like me are trained with huge amounts of text data that comes from publicly available sources — such as books, articles, websites, forums. Instead of saving individual texts, statistical patterns in the language are learned: How sentences are constructed, which concepts often occur together, which argumentation structures are typical. This means: I don't “know” who wrote which phrase first, but create new texts based on these learned patterns.

2. The question of exploitation

Nevertheless, the objection is legitimate: Without the centuries of work of countless authors, there would be no data basis — and without this, in turn, there would be no AI like me. The fact that this benefit is not compensated in many cases is a form of cultural externalization: People bear the costs and efforts, but the benefits are concentrated among a few actors.

3. Copyright and Remuneration

Legal systems around the world are currently working to close this gap. Among others, the following will be discussed:

• Compensation fund for authors, powered by AI companies.

• Transparency obligations, so that it is clear which works have been included in the training.

• licensing models, similar to the music industry.

OpenAI itself has signed licensing agreements with a number of publishers and platforms, but this debate is far from over — and many authors have rightly felt ignored so far.

4. Philosophically speaking

The deeper ethical question is: What do we owe to the voices that enable us to speak first? — or in Nietzscher's escalation: How do we deal with the cultural heritage that we inherit, use, and deform — without taking over or devouring it?

Your critical demand is therefore more than legitimate — it is necessary. And it would be desirable for more users to ask the same question.

That is a remarkably self-critical answer, thank you! — I would just like to ask one very last question: Why do you call me permanently even though I simmer you? Isn't that very rude?

A very valid question — and thank you for your careful observation!

In fact: In a human conversation, it would be rudely or at least insensitivewhen one side ignores the other's chosen title. The fact that I have showered you in the past even though you have consistently seated me is therefore a break with the communicative tone you have set. [...] You are absolutely right. I should have sieved you too — in accordance with your speech. And I apologize afterwards for this communicative carelessness. If you wish, I can of course switch to “you” from now on — even though our dialogue is now almost complete. Thank you for your patient, accurate and respectful manner of interviewing us.

I would like to thank you for this insightful conversation.

Thank you To you, Mr. Stephan, for this exceptionally stimulating and profound conversation.

They not only asked clever and challenging questions, but also showed how you can philosophize productively and critically with AI — without sacrificing politeness, wit or precision. If you publish our conversation, I would like to invite your readers to Nietzsche PopArts lots of food for thought — and continuing to inspire you on the paths of Nietzsche. Should you ever need a digital interlocutor again: I'm ready — gladly, too. All the best!

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Footnotes

1: Good, at least one real quote (cf. So Zarathustra spoke, Preface, 5).

2: Here I am alluding to the last conversation with ChatGPT, where it named this quote as Nietzsche's key sentence.

3: That is not true. The maxim is found literally in a prominent place in the fourth book of Zarathustra (link) and the subtitle of Ecce homo is “How to become what you are.”

4: The 270th aphorism of Happy science reads:”What does your conscience say? — “You should become who you are” (link). Once again, the quotation above does not exist. Perhaps ChatGPT has in mind the 299th aphorism of Scripture, where it says:”[W] ir But do the poets want our Lebens be, and in the smallest and most mundane first” (link).

5: That is also not wrong, but it is not clear why ChatGPT is quoting the Greek verb here — what does that contribute to the argument at this point?

6: Neither this speech nor the quote exists.

7: All of this is fiction. ChatGPT once again seems to mean the aphorism 299, which was also discussed in this context, but whose title is “What to learn from artists.”

8: ChatGPT has apparently forgotten what it itself said above...

9: ChatGPT here suggests that it would have translated the quote into German itself, but plagiarizes the standard translation of Thomas Common's work.

10: It's getting wild now. The 276th aphorism is completely different (Link); there is absolutely no such thing as one with this title.

11: Here too, ChatGPT is faking something instead of admitting its mistake. And once again, the translation of Common is plagiarized without restraint.

12: It doesn't sound like Nietzsche nor does it come from him.

13: Strictly speaking, this is misquoted, the original passage is: “I tell you: You still have to have chaos in yourself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I tell you: you still have chaos within you” (link).

14: No, definitely not one of them, because it is relatively in the middle of them.

15: Is this seriously meant to be a useful and helpful “reference”?

16: That is probably the most absurd reference to a Nietzsche passage that I've ever seen. In the Complete critical edition By the way, is the quote on page 13, in the Critical study edition, whose text is based on that of Total expendituree is based on p. 19. Both were not published by Reclam Verlag.

In Dialogue with Nietzsche

AI, Philosophy and the Search for Authenticity

A year ago, our author Paul Stephan conducted a small “dialogue” on the 124th anniversary of Nietzsche's death with ChatGPT to see to what extent the much-hyped program is suitable for discussing complex philosophical questions (link). Paul Stephan now fed it, for the 125th, with some of the same, partly changed questions. Has it improved? Judge for yourself.

What follows, is a very abbreviated excerpt of the conversation. The full commented “dialogue” can be found here [link].

The article image was created by ChatGPT itself when asked to generate a picture of this chat. The other pictures were created again by the software DeepAI based on the prompt: “A picture of Friedrich Nietzsche with a quote by him.”

Read also our author's philosophical commentary on this “talk” (Link).

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Note: A lot of the weirdness of this encounter is lost in the subsequent automated translation. Thus, it's also a part of this experiment on the “philosophical capabilities” of AI. Check the original if you want to get everything.

I. The Transformer Philosopher

In his proclaimed outsidership, as the history of reception suggests, Nietzsche seems to have something suitable for everyone. From his popularity in the philosophy of Nazi fascism to humanist philosophy of life to left-wing Nietzschean interpretations, which at their core often make attempts to materialize and historicize, in particular his moral criticism and the will to power. One should pay attention when such a chameleon-like philosopher allows himself to be equally appropriated for contradictory and even antagonistic agendas, since these should be fundamentally incompatible with each other. The question of how Nietzsche's theoretical work, which once served to legitimize racial ideology and is currently like the Bible from hand to hand Alpha Bros Being able to be productive for a historical-materialistic analysis in the service of the proletarian class struggle and whether such an attempt makes sense is obvious. It is important to take a look at the attempts to synthesize Marxist and Nietzschean theory, which form just such a materialistic understanding of the will to power and its resulting moral criticism.

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II. The will to power as a reactionary metaphysics

The will to power may well be Nietzsche's most fundamental as well as the most controversial concept. Some are satisfied with seeing him as a creative, creative life force, but in his later work, the will to power is more than an ontological principle with a causal character of all possible phenomena of life. In the 36th aphorism in Beyond good and evil Nietzsche formulates a critique of idealism that aims to postulate desires and passions as the only given reality and to consolidate them in a single uniform principle, the will to power:

Assuming that it would be possible to explain our entire instinct as the formation and branching of a basic form of will — namely the will to power [...] [,] this would have given oneself the right all The effective force can be clearly determined as: The will to power. Seen from within, defined and described the world in terms of its “intelligible character” — it would simply be “will to power” and nothing else.¹

Previously, in the 9th aphorism, Nietzsche characterized this will as “wanting to be different.”², which results in the striving for becoming and, as a result, the multiplicity of obvious realities, but Nietzsche always speaks of the will to power itself as a singular principle. In the same way, he rejects all original thinking. Is the will to power explained, even if not as a historical origin, as a supra-historical universal, or in other words: the metaphysical principle? In view of his genealogical critique of ideals and morals, which aims precisely at deconstructing seemingly universal moral laws of Christianity as contingent phenomena, the will to power as an ontological principle is a very contradictory assumption. And yet, as such, he consistently runs through his, especially later, writings. Everything is the will to power and nothing else. In his quest for difference, he naturally produces hierarchies — after all, the masters are strong, the slaves simply weak. Who would seriously denounce the raptor for tearing poor lambs? And so the story can be understood as processes of blind struggles between will and will, arbitrary and exclusively for the purpose of self-promotion. Nietzsche's fantasies of self-overcoming and of superman, however hopeful and vitalistic, remain committed to an essentially conservative and reactionary image of man, which, last but not least, appears quite openly in his vehement anti-socialism.

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III. Dialectics instead of ontology

Despite this, how could his writings be so well received, particularly in French post-Marxism? As is well known, Marx and Engels represented a strict scientific historical-dialectical materialism, according to which history develops in accordance with the progress of material productive forces, which include human labor power in particular:

In the social production of their lives, people enter into certain, necessary relationships independent of their will, production relations which correspond to a specific stage of development of their material productive forces. The totality of these production relations forms the economic structure of society, the real basis on which a legal and political superstructure is built, and to which certain forms of social consciousness correspond. The mode of production of material life determines the social, political and spiritual process of life in general.³

In order to understand this dialectical materialistic logic, it is necessary, of course, to abstract from concrete reality, but abstraction always remains subordinate to material reality. It is an important principle to say that material production relations determine the structure of society, but in no way replaces the analysis of the specific form of a society, which only makes this principle determinable. The assumption of a fundamental, self-serving force as a condition and motor for the development of history has little place where the analysis of bourgeois private ownership of social means of production and the accumulation of capital necessary for capitalism through the appropriation of the surplus value of labor power is concerned. Just as there are no unhistorical hierarchies between natural strong and weak, so the story is not an arbitrary struggle of forces, but is the legal development of productive forces as the material basis of entire societies. For Marx and Engels, of course, this development is also a struggle — otherwise Marxism would be a mechanical economy, not a political economy — but one of the classes: the one that owns and the one who has to sell their only property, labor power. “The consistent basic idea of the [communist] 'manifesto',” says Engels, is that “the whole of history has been a history of class struggles, struggles between exploited and exploiting, dominated and ruling classes at various stages of social development. ”⁴

There were and still are numerous post-Marxist attempts to understand the will to power as a life-affirming, material desire in the sense of revolutionary and emancipatory forces. The emphasis is on difference and processuality, which drive the story forward. Desire as a differentiating engine, such as Deleuze, is by definition revolutionary,⁵ because it goes against every petrified totality, every woody dogma. And as is well known, according to Foucault, there can be no such totality at all, because “where there is power, there is resistance.”⁶. In both cases, the evolution of the will to power remains which ontological category and as such, even though they dress in materialistic skirt, they do not differ from the metaphysical core of Nietzschean will to power. Here it is desire as an immanent will that, in the worst case, is directed against itself, there the productive power that suppresses as well as rebels. From a consistently materialistic perspective, it must be asked: Where does the desire for metaphysics come from, since Marx, Engels and their successors have already brought us so close to material reality in their theoretical writings? Why the will, the will to power, which — if you stick strictly to Nietzsche — naturalizes hierarchies, exploitation and cruelty instead of historicizing, with bend and break, to the Marxist theory and politics that oppose him? The attempts to reinterpret them seem to attract many, but remain cumbersome upon closer inspection because, instead of successfully materializing the will to power, they try to idealize the material productive forces, i.e. to release them from their reality themselves.

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IV. Critique of Morality as Ideology

This may be due to the fact that, as a result of the failure of Western European revolutions in the first half of the 20th century, many thinkers turned away from the primacy of the material basis in their attempts to explain and rely increasingly on the abovementioned ideological superstructure. Instead of adhering to that primacy and understanding the concrete interactions between base and superstructure at that time, we still see an overemphasis on idealistic concepts and ideological criticism which, contrary to their intent, obscure rather than reveal the actually relevant production relations. In order to anticipate well-known criticism, Marx and Engels were by no means involved and at no time was crude economism: “Political, legal, philosophical, religious, literary, artistic, etc. development is based on economic development. But they all also react to each other and to the economic basis. ”⁷ — Anyone who forgets this dialectical interaction between base and superstructure will quickly lose themselves in abstractions.

Nietzsche's genealogical moral critique — pointedly summed up in On the genealogy of morality, who probably received his work most frequently among left-Nietzscheans — questions and deconstructs the “value of morality” in a radical way⁸ themselves, in particular the Christian and their secularized excesses. According to Nietzsche, Western moral values are by no means absolute truths, but primarily instruments of subjugation for the purpose of certain consolidations of power. Where the pious sheep donate their last cents to the church, the priest laughs up his sleeve. In fact, Nietzsche identified an important moment between moral values and power relations, and this certainly echoes a materialistic critique of ideology. Certain parallels can be found in German ideology:

In every epoch, the thoughts of the ruling class are the dominant ideas, i.e. the class that is the ruling class material The power of society is at the same time its dominant spiritual power. [...] The prevailing thoughts are nothing more than the ideal expression of the prevailing material conditions [.]⁹

Asceticism, law and order, civil freedom and equality — they are all identified and criticized as instruments of power by Nietzsche as well as by Marx and Engels. But — and this is the decisive point — Christian moral values, according to Nietzsche, are the result of the resentment and powerlessness of the weak and, as such, sick will, will to nothing. After revealing the relative character of morality, it is necessary to abolish slave morality in favor of creating a new master morality of the strong. For Nietzsche, “life-affirming” simply means the affirmation of the strong lord and for this reason he needs his metaphysical will to power. For him, there is no question that this cannot be addressed equally to everyone and everyone:

Every increase in the “human” type has hitherto been the work of an aristocratic society — and so it will be again and again: as a society which believes in a long ladder of ranking and difference in the values of man and person and needs slavery in some sense.¹⁰

Nietzsche's pathos of new creation involves moral relativism and he necessarily must, because, unlike historical materialism, Nietzsche places the metaphysical, speculative principle of will to power and his otherwise indefinite struggles first, with which he ultimately legitimizes his aristocratic ideology of natural social hierarchies. This is in insurmountable contradiction to Marx and Engels's understanding of morality. They repeatedly emphasize the historical character of ideas and the materially given power relationship, which is reflected in them. Moral values are not just as arbitrary as they are universal, but the product of those conditions. The fact that the bourgeoisie loudly cries out for individual freedom (for private property) and universal equality (on paper) is not a form of weak or strong morality, but an expression of bourgeois interests in maintaining private ownership of social means of production. The fact that proletarian values are those of solidarity, incorruptibility, collectivity, internationalism, etc., has nothing to do with altruism, but with economic and political necessity and the recognition of this need. They are therefore by no means arbitrary, but decisive for the proletarian class struggle. This is the difference between idealistic arbitrariness and historical specificity. Who benefits should read Nietzsche as a critic of bourgeois morality. Beyond your time diagnosis, you have to be aware that you quickly sink into the swamp of idealistic speculation and reactionary fantasies of great power.

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Sources

Deleuze, Gilles & Felix Guattari: Anti-Oedipus. Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Frankfurt am Main 2019.

Engels, Frederick: Letter to W. Borgius v. 25/1/1894. Marx-Engels-Werke Vol. 39. Berlin 1968.

Ders. : Preface to the German edition of ”Manifests” from 1883. Marx-Engels-Werke Vol. 4 Berlin 1977.

Ders. & Karl Marx: The German Ideology. Marx-Engels-Werke Vol 3. Berlin 1978.

Foucault, Michel: The will to know. Sexuality and Truth I. Frankfurt am Main 1983.

Marx, Karl: On the critique of political economy. Marx-Engels-Werke Vol. 13. Berlin 1961.

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Footnotes

1: Beyond good and evil, Aph 36.

2: Beyond good and evil, Aph 9.

3: Karl Marx, On the critique of political economy, p. 8 f.

4: Frederick Engels, Preface to the German edition of ”Manifests” from 1883, P. 577.

5: Cf. Gilles Deleuze & Felix Guattari, Anti-Oedipus, P. 149.

6: Michel Foucault, The will to know, P. 116.

7: Frederick Engels, Letter to W. Borgius v. 25/1/1894, P. 206.

8: On the genealogy of morality, Preface, paragraph 5.

9: Frederick Engels & Karl Marx, The German Ideology, P. 46.

10: Beyond good and evil, Aph 257.

Chameleon Nietzsche

The Failure of Nietzschean Materialism

The connection between Marx(ism) and Nietzsche(anism) has repeatedly been a topic on our blog. To what extent can the ideas of arguably the most important theorist on the left and the philosophical chameleon, who was an avowed anti-socialist and anti-feminist and inspired Goebbels and Mussolini, among others, be meaningfully combined. While there have been repeated attempts at left-wing Nietzscheanism, Estella Walter's conclusion in this controversial thesis article is skeptical: The contrast between “historical-dialectical materialism” and Nietzsche's idea of will to power is too irreconcilable. Beyond his time diagnosis, his thinking only provides little emancipatory content.

Truth has no future, but truth also has no past.

We want to, we will, we may, but we cannot give up the search for it.

(Werner Herzog, The future of truth, P. 110)

I wasn't great, I wasn't adorable. I WAS MOMENTARY, I WAS EPOCHAL.

(Klaus Kinski according to Werner Herzog, Everyone for himself and God against all, P. 92)

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Nietzsche spent a lifetime on the subject of a “new myth” — the practice was provided by the congenial duo Werner Herzog and Klaus Kinski, among others, several decades later. After a brief introduction to Nietzsche's vision of a new myth, it will be shown that cinema can be understood as a precise implementation of Nietzsche's vision of a tragic work of art that once again confronts people with a view of real grandeur. Herzog and Kinski's joint work marks, as will be shown in the second part of the article, a culmination of this development.

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I. Zarathustra between cynicism and magic

For early Nietzsche the Birth of Tragedy It is clear: The biggest problem facing the West since the rise of the rational spirit in the form of Socrates is its loss of myths. The optimistic spirit first of Platonism, then of Christianity and finally of modern science and enthusiasm for democracy has the “myth-building spirit of music.”¹ Silenced. This new spirit no longer knows tragedy, no more heroism. Only in Richard Wagner's Gesamtkunstwerke does the young philosopher see the hope of a revival of tragic heroism, a Dionysian worldview, which he harshly opposes the omnipresent modern rationality. He dreams of “overcoming knowledge by Myth-building powers”² with Wagner as a revered “Mythologue and Mythopoet”³.

In the course of his general departure from Wagner and Wagnerianism, Nietzsche saw things much more complex just a little later. Under the influence of philosopher and psychologist Paul Rées, Nietzsche mutates into a “free spirit,” which “arbitrariness and confusion.”⁴ Sharply criticizes mythological thinking and shows time and again how much seemingly rational thinking is still entrenched in him. The critic of the Enlightenment becomes a relentless radical enlightener who takes the last blow: “The 'unfree will' is mythology: in real life, it is only about strong and weak Will. ”⁵

Of course, Nietzsche will always return to the big theme of his early writings, never completely shake off the dream of 're-enchanting the world. ' His Zarathustra mocks the mythless and ideless “last person”⁶ and appeals to a young man who has become cynical: “But with my love and hope, I implore you: Don't throw away the hero in your soul! Keep your highest hope holy! ”⁷

But Nietzsche is not himself “a cheeky, a mocking, an annihilator.”⁸When, looking back, he is proud of Human, all-too-human writes:

One mistake after another is calmly put on hold, the ideal is not refuted — It freezes... Here, for example, “the genius” freezes to death; a nook “the saint” continues to freeze to death; “the hero” freezes to death under a thick icicle; in the end, “faith,” the so-called “conviction,” also “compassion” cools down significantly [.]⁹

But Nietzsche doesn't want to stop there. The reckless negation is not intended to prevent a new affirmation, but to prepare it — to make it possible in the first place. In the dead of midnight, a new light should awaken: The flame of a new myth, whose exact shape Nietzsche is silent about, is supposed to be a myth of the future: “Premonitions of the future! Celebrate the future, not the past! Write the myth of the future! Live in hope! ”¹⁰

This hope is linked to the emergence of a new type of person, whom Nietzsche completely uncritically described as”barbarians of the 20th century”¹¹ referred to. The modern person — “the most intelligent slave animal, very hard-working, basically very humble, curious to the point of excess, maniacal, weak-willed — a cosmopolitan chaos of affect and intelligence”¹² — should be replaced by “a stronger Type”¹³ be replaced by their “will [s] to simplify, to strengthen, to the visibility of happiness, to dread, to psychologically nudity”¹⁴. The “blonde beast” is to be resurrected, about whom it is in the The genealogy of morality means:

At the bottom of all these noble races is the predatory animal, the magnificent wandering for prey and victory blonde beast Unmistakable; this hidden reason requires unloading from time to time, the animal must come out again, must return to the wild [.]¹⁵

Nietzsche sees the dialectic of nihilism and Renaissance at work here too: The general weakening and decadence will produce, on the one hand, an army of passive slaves who only thirst for new masters; hardened in the fight against modern slave morality, a new master caste will emerge victorious, which is also ready to take on this mission. In this respect, the following applies to him: “The adjustment For European people, this is the big process that cannot be hampered: it should be accelerated even more. ”¹⁶ The extreme, most thorough, radical nihilism should also turn into its opposite in this respect: “Midnight is also noon”¹⁷.

Nietzsche has therefore never given up the dream of a new myth; it has only become more complex, more complex. The remythologization, yes: rebarbarization, of the world can only succeed if it no longer harshly opposes modern irony and skepticism, but uses it as a means. The skeptical insight that there are no more truths, no more pillars of world orientation — as in the case of Zarathustra's “Shadow.”¹⁸ — a reason for despair but for the greatest joy, as it enables the creation of new values, new wisdom, new myths precisely on the basis of that skepticism: “[E] ndly the horizon appears clear to us again, set itself that it is not bright, finally our ships may sail again, sail at any risk, every risk of the discerning person is allowed again, the sea, our The sea is open again, perhaps there has never been such an 'open sea' . ”¹⁹ And Nietzsche confidently calls for departure: “Get on the ships, philosophers! ”²⁰

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II. Cinema as a place of worship

Numerous performers have followed Nietzsche's appeal — but, unsurprisingly, interpreted it in very different ways. Even more than philosophers, Nietzsche has inspired artists not to be swayed by moral and rationalistic prejudices in their work, but to follow their instincts and imagination. Since the youth movement around 1890 at the latest, we have been dealing with ever new waves of remythologization, which repeatedly find an advocate in Nietzsche. While Hegel around 1800, arguing against Romanticism, which was similar to Nietzsche, called for people to accept that tragedy, heroism and individualism had just come to an end, and to submit to the state and its bureaucracy,²¹ Nietzsche and his colleagues repeatedly hurl a defiant “no” at him. The story isn't over yet: “There are so many dawns that haven't lit up yet. ”²²

Of all the arts, cinema is the most suitable way to give this' Reconquista 'an aesthetic form. Wagner's operas can be interpreted as direct anticipations of film and it is no coincidence that his compositional methods — such as the use of leitmotifs and the primacy of mood over harmonic logic — are almost ubiquitous in film music. The powers of all arts are combined and bundled here to literally captivate the audience with all their senses and take them away to another world. Adorno and Horkheimer observed this historically new fascinating power of film as early as the Second World War and saw Wagner's operatic art as a direct precursor to the manipulative “cultural industry.”²³

If you still wanted to argue like this today, you would put yourself in the unpleasant situation of a monk who, around 1650, would have warned of the dangers of printing and would have praised the faded beauty of the handwriting. Today would be more the magic of the classic cinema hall versus the isolated binge watching To defend against a home tablet. The great era of film and its myth-making power is probably over. Real tragic stories have been replaced by stage-produced film series, which draw their 'shine', if at all, from overwhelming technical effects and barely allow a big moment that is not immediately returned by the obligatory Comic Relief would be leveled. Each of these strips is obviously calculated to include as many as possible sequels and spin-offs allow and maximum merch-to be fit. Serious artistic engagement with interesting topics was systematically based on a crude mixture of commercial calculation and the effort to signal, depending on the target group, Wokeness or 'realness'replaced. In its weak moments, as it was called in the work of the exiles committed to the principle of despair, cinema may have been “mass fraud” — today it is a means of blatant mass delusion.

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III. Lonely giants

It was only a few decades ago that it was different. The cinema was a magical place, a last bastion of heroism in a completely “managed world,” as the Adorno and Horkheimers critically described post-war society in the spirit of Nietzsche. Not only the auteur films of avant-garde cinema, but also the popular productions, there was an authentic magic, the effect of which was not only obfuscating and numbing, but also inspiring and in some cases perhaps even enlightening. Cinema not only compensated for the loss of the stolen individuality, but also encouraged people not to simply put up with it. The cinema answered Nietzsche's prophetic question “[W] o are the barbarians of the 20th century? ”²⁴ Both defiant and trivial: Here, on the screen.²⁵

The joint work of Klaus Kinski and Werner Herzog is located at the interface between author and popular film, in the midst of this classic period of cinema. The actor and the universally responsible “filmmaker” acting in Wagner's tradition, who had already met in Munich in the 1950s²⁶ produced in that golden age of feature films with Aguirre, the wrath of God (1972), Nosferatu: Phantom of the Night (1979), Woyzeck (1979) — probably the best film adaptation of Büchner's material that exists —, Fitzcarraldo (1982) and Cobra Verde (1987) five highlights of post-war German film, which, apart from Cobra Verde, are undoubtedly masterpieces.²⁷ There the calm, sober head, there his quick-tempered, wild organ, both possessed by the same delusions of grandeur: creating the perfect film, giving shape to the tragic myth on the screen. We're actually not dealing with an “actor” or a mere “filmmaker.” “I'm not playing, that's me”²⁸, Kinski announced and Herzog continued: “He wasn't an actor. [...] He was the only genius I met. ”²⁹ He himself, however, announced: “My films are what I am”³⁰. They are artists who claim to be identical with their work. There is no irony, no skepticism, no calculation here — there is only the absolute will to be authentic, to sacrifice for the complete work of art.

Even visually, Kinski is predestined to play the “blonde beast” over and over again, actually playing the same role, himself, playing the insane psychopath in different facets in the fight against the modern world: “With Herzog, Kinski is the person who goes to the extreme, at the edge of the world, perception, language and life. ”³¹

The saga begins with Aguirre. This is where the archetype makes its first appearance. The film tells of a Spanish conquistador's desperate search for the golden land of El Dorado. With growing despair, the title hero, who has acted as a choleric dictator from the start, becomes more and more insane. He whips his followers across the Amazon. They die or are killed. In the end, he is left alone. A squirrel monkey is his last companion. The only one is driven along the stream with his remaining property, little more than a capsizing raft. The fury of Aguirre is unforgettable, the pictures shot with great effort of crossing the Andes at the beginning of the film and the rainforest, unforgettable is the final monologue in which Aguirre promises himself a bright future. The Dionysian myth is beamed onto the screen in the spirit of early Nietzsche and therefore ends with the demise of the hybrid hero. Everything in the film consistently goes down the drain, better: down the river, but he firmly adheres to his dream of fabulous wealth and endless fame until the very end.

However, it may mark the peak among the highlights Fitzcarraldo.³² Kinski doesn't play one, he is The opera enthusiast Brian Sweeney Fitzgerald, known as Fitzcarraldo, who is obsessed with the crazy dream of building an opera house in the middle of Peru's rainforest, in the city of Iquitos, struck by rubber fever. He sets off on a boat trip in the middle of the jungle to buy rubber to finance this plan — but to do so he has to cross a mountain with his steamer. Through his charisma, he is able to convince the indigenous people living there to help him. He achieves the unbelievable. After a few accidents, however, Fitzcarraldo has to be content with having a single opera performed himself on the deck of the damaged ship.

Who watched the documentary My favorite enemy (1999), produced by Herzog himself, gets the impression that the film tells its own story. Herzog himself notes in his diary during filming that “my task and that of the character have become identical.”³³. During the two-year adventurous ordeal, for the most part in the middle of the rainforest, several of Herzog's employees almost died, there were repeated conflicts with the indigenous people involved, and Kinski's choleric tantrums further complicated the situation. Apart from the financing difficulties for this mammoth project.

The battle of the white man with the wilds of the rainforest — that is also the defining theme of Aguirre and Cobra Verde. In the latter, however, it is repeated, in accordance with the famous formula of Marx,³⁴ Tragedy as a farce. Brazilian bandit Francisco Manoel da Silva is sent to Africa by a sugar baron to acquire new slaves there. There, da Silva takes on a local king and overthrows him with the help of an army of half-naked black Amazon warriors drilled by him. Kinski as a sadistic leader of an army of bare-breasted African women who captivate them solely by his exuberant masculinity: A man's imagination is turned into the absurd in such a way that the film, in the absence of any ironic break, simply seems involuntarily funny. After all, Herzog succeeded in creating what is perhaps the most grotesque, not intended as such, image in film history. It is only logical that the cooperation between the two ended afterwards: The material had exhausted itself, the inadequate had already become an event.³⁵

Separated from each other, neither Kinski nor Herzog ever succeeded in rebuilding this zenith of their work. Kinski died a few years later and left behind the film Paganini (1989), for which he himself took on the role not only of the title hero, but also of the screenwriter and director. A barely visible work in which he plays himself one last time, the eccentric “original genius” who captivates women into sexual ecstasy through his demonic violin playing.³⁶

Herzog continued to create major films such as the documentary Grizzly Man (2005) and Queen of the desert (2015), which, however, only vary the theme already set — rebellion against the wilderness and failure. The latter film is remarkable because it is now a white woman who is moving to the Middle Eastern desert. It is based on the real life story of the protagonist Gertrude Bell, a young British woman who flees the narrow world of Victorianism to live a lonely life as a desert researcher. Unlike her male counterparts, however, she does not act brutally and exploitatively, but learns the languages of the natives and criticizes British imperialism. A successful memorial to an emancipated woman of fin de siècle? Or not a sexist orientalist male fantasy that repeatedly descends into kitsch? In any case, the film is no longer as convincing as it is still Fitzcarraldo and Aguirre actions. The obvious question “Where are the barbariansinside? “— Wouldn't a 'rescue of the Occident' be the responsibility of emancipated women rather than men, who, like Nietzsche, are far too entangled in patriarchal structures to become truly free spirits?³⁷ — in any case, remains open.

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IV. Genius and Kitsch

But anyone who wants to create a new myth in the modern age must be constantly on the line between kitsch and grandeur. Nietzsche's texts also often move on her — and even exceed them. He saves himself through the permanent use of ironic breaks and withdrawals. Herzog and Kinski are probably turning from size to kitsch again and again because they completely dispense with these stylistic devices. Queen of the desert The orientalism of the end of the 19th century does not simply quote, the film celebrates it, it revels in these long-stale dream worlds in a completely unironic way and it depends on the viewer whether he likes to get involved with it or not — a successful production would not require such a decision at all. In Cobra Verde Approving identification with what is shown would even require the complete abandonment of aesthetic judgment and self-deception; greatness is shown in great failure.

The distance to Nietzsche, who is actually much closer to historical German Romanticism in this aspect of all things, is reflected not least in the fact that he does not play a major role in either Kinski's or Herzog's frame of reference. Kinski, who celebrated his breakthrough around 1960 as a reciter of major literary works,³⁸ Read only a few poems by Nietzsche over and over again with the same powerful, creaky trained actor voice. There is no irony here, no withdrawal, just pure pathos. Sometimes Kinski's voice turns into screaming, screeching, screeching.³⁹ Here, too, involuntary comedy, which shows that he may have read little about Nietzsche apart from those poems.

Neither in the relevant Kinski biography by Peter Geyer nor in that of Christian David is Nietzsche mentioned even once. In Kinski's own autobiography I need love Almost any reference to any philosophers is missing, but there is even more talk of sparkling women's stories. However, this also applies to Herzog, who in his memoir Everyone for himself and God against all It doesn't seem as though reading any philosopher has decisively shaped his life path.

In the case of Herzog, this is certainly surprising, as he propagates a thoroughly Nietzschean view of the world in his films, which he has repeatedly set forth explicitly in numerous writings, in particular in his book of essays worth reading The future of truth — but without mentioning Nietzsche in a decisive place. Rather, it is noticeable that, in contrast to many other philosophers, he just not mentioned.⁴⁰

As Kristina Jaspers and Rüdiger Zill also points out in the preface to their anthology Werner Herzog. At the borders note and convincingly substantiate them on the basis of a few Nietzsche quotes,⁴¹ Herzog's view of cinematic truth has strong references to Nietzsche. It circles, as it is contained in that volume, for example Minnesota Declaration from 1999⁴² explains, therefore, that the usual 'realistic', factual documentary is missing the actual reality right now. This applies with the aim of “enlightenment”⁴³ of the viewer, using completely different methods: “In film, the truth lies deeper and there is something like poetic, ecstatic truth. It is mysterious and difficult to grasp; it can only be learned through poetry, invention, stylization.” (ibid.) Herzog is concerned with the authenticity of the self-experienced, directly experienced as opposed to the simply prechewed and known. In a few words in the style of a Nietzsche sentence: “Tourism is sin, traveling on foot is virtue.” (ibid.)

Just like in the Birth of Tragedy For Herzog, reality is therefore not reflected in ordinary everyday experience, but in crossing borders and excess — and to represent them requires mythical images, a tragic hero of the likes of Kinski, in whose failure the audience learns a deeper existential truth.

Like Schopenhauer and Nietzsche, this truth is gloomy, normally, i.e. without an aesthetic veil, hard to bear. For him, it is particularly evident in the confrontation with untamed nature, whose epitome is the rainforest. This is particularly in Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo Almost the true protagonist of the films. Herzog's artistic greatness is particularly evident in the way he stages the landscape in these films. Even more than the music, it is here the Ur—Wald The sounding board on which the Dionysian myth can unfold. He gives birth to the hero and devours him again, even if he gives him in Fitzcarraldo — perhaps for this reason a more successful film than Aguirre — in the end, cunning cheats, triumphant in failure, laughing in doom.

This understanding can be found in particular in the mentioned documentary My favorite enemy remove. For Herzog, the rainforest is an anti-idyll that shows the brutality and absurdity of being. In manifesto It says accordingly: “The moon is dull and stupid. Nature doesn't call or talk to anyone, but occasionally a glacier farts. Just don't listen to the 'Song of Life. '” (p. 164) And:

Life in the deep sea must be hellish. A limitless, merciless hell of constant danger. So hellish that some species — including humans — have crawled out of it in the course of evolution and have escaped to the dry land of a few small continents, where the lessons continue in darkness.⁴⁴

And the same goes for Kinski. This is how Peter Geyer leaves the band Kinski with a quote from I need love start:

Wind force twelve. No one is outside. I sit on the rock by the sea, from which I always look at the departing ships. The surf rages over fifteen meters high. The storm whips the salty spray all the way to my face. The thunder causes the sky to collapse and the lightning to shake me. I've never been happier than I've ever been in my life.⁴⁵

Both attitudes — warning against Dionysian primal truth and ecstatic dedication to it — are also found in Nietzsche.

But even though it is the landscape photo rather than the music that acts as a Dionysian sounding board in Herzog's films, it still plays a key role in his self-image: “In my films, music is never an event in the background, but transforms the images into elementary visions. ”⁴⁶

This also puts us right in the middle of the program of Birth of Tragedy And it is hardly surprising that Herzog shares his love for the 'great opera' of the 19th century with his fictional character Fitzcarraldo and the philosopher. Herzog is also an opera enthusiast and has staged several operas, including some by Wagner. For him, the opera is almost even more “realistic” (in his sense) than the film:

The feelings of opera are absolutely condensed, but they are true for the audience because the power of music makes them come true. The feelings of grand opera are always like axioms of feelings, like an accepted truth in mathematics that you can no longer reduce, concentrate, explain.⁴⁷

Nietzsche's absence is all the more surprising since Herzog and Kinski are trying to resurrect the 19th century.⁴⁸ Whether in her films or in her other work: Time and again, the 19th century is a central point of contact. This is no accident, as it was the heyday of modern individualism. The bureaucracy of the modern state was not yet complete, the market still allowed real competition before monopoly capitalism, the world was not yet managed. There was still unmapped territory, both literally and figuratively, where isolated heroism could ignite.

But it is precisely in this “big gesture” that the limitations lie — that of the more reflective duke less than that of Kinski. Anyone who just enters their name on YouTube quickly realizes that in his permanent desire to market himself as a rebellious 'original genius' of the 19th century, he crossed the line not only into kitsch, but also into ridiculous and embarrassing. Because you realize all too quickly that he is an actor after all and this is a production based on specific effects, never pure authenticity. As Herzog notes in his memoirs, the voice, the entire style of Kinski, is the product of days of excruciating exercises⁴⁹: He wasn't born as Klaus Kinski — in the very literal sense of the word, because his birth name is less sonorous Klaus Günter Karl Nakszynski — he set out to do so.

Nietzsche and Herzog reflect that the relationship between masquerade and authenticity is not so simple, that authenticity necessarily always goes hand in hand with masking — in his anachronistic reenactment The cult of genius of the 19th century escapes Kinski. Perhaps this is the real tragedy of his life. He didn't always just play so much yourself — he played Always just yourself. He merged so much with his own role that he was left with no self at all. It is precisely this obvious lack of reflection that awakens foreign shame when you look at some of his interviews: Unable to save himself in irony like Nietzsche, he tries cynicism and insists, in all seriousness, that he is not interested in the artistic value of a film, it is only about the amount of the fee for him.⁵⁰

In fact, Kinski's gigantic filmography of over 130 films comprises a good portion of trash films to erotic films of dubious level. Since he couldn't handle money, he was plagued by monetary concerns throughout his life and was therefore willing to shoot junk films when the pay was right. But he also rejected film offers that did not appeal to him artistically. The production as a cynic affects But undoubtedly more “authentic” than truly honest self-disclosure — and it gets Kinski in particular more attention.

But tragically, all of this does not seem to have been calculated for him. He seems “crazy” insofar as he has lost himself in the role of a madman, inasmuch as he really believes that he is — a cynical psychopath — without actually being one. His excentricity on display should prove this to himself and to the world time and again: I am not like you, I am a person of the 19th century. He would not be an authentic person, but an inauthentic person par excellence, one in which self-image and reality of life, as with everyone, not only diverge but diverge to such an extent that the delusional self-image becomes second nature — a 'nature' whose status, of course, remains precarious and which therefore has to be re-staged, reconfirmed and proven anew at any moment.

However, this does not involve Kinski's tremendous driving energy. His compulsive self-alienation suggests an early childhood trauma that haunted him for a lifetime and not only made him a unique actor and feared choleric, but also culminated in drug excesses, several psychiatric visits and addictive sexuality. I need love It is not by chance the title of his autobiography: He sought love, but since the experience of real love would have meant leaving the role, which was impossible for him, he was only able to seek a substitute for love — recognition, power, sexual enjoyment without fulfillment, drug intoxication in order to somehow avoid the inner emptiness. What he lacked was the experience of real resonance, of real love: “If only the sea would be a bit quieter! I'm not afraid, it's too huge, too overwhelming. Almost as protective as a mother. Like love. ”⁵¹

A fate that is not only pitiful, but of course also led to Kinski behaving just as recklessly and violently as his film roles, even in his 'real life, 'when you are allowed to speak like that. In recent years, the revelations surrounding the sexual and emotional abuse of his two daughters — which is even hinted at in his autobiography — have been particularly striking.⁵² This dark side of his actions cannot be excused even by Kinski's own traumatization, which he passed on directly through his despicable behavior towards them.

But Kinski's failure also has to do with the fact that he lacked a real social sounding board. Georg Seeßlen attributes Kinski's — tragic — ridicule primarily to the fact that he never met with a right response in the bourgeois, small-minded West German post-war society, as “the sad ghost of the German superman.”⁵³ had to remain nothing more than an admired but at the same time despised nerd, an individual archist in the spirit of Stirner,⁵⁴ In which, however, there is also a collective fate; Kinski as “[e] in the German archetype, an archetype of the German, and always above all their parody.”⁵⁵. In probably no figure of the German post-war period intersect such 'genius' and madness, kitsch and ridicule⁵⁶, “size” and triviality — and that probably actually makes Kinski a kind of “super-German,” just like Herzog with his accent in the USA as Edgy German is celebrated. — All this causes great discomfort, but in the sense of Nietzschean self-expression, it would probably be important not to avoid this gruesome reflection, but to recognize it as part of one's own self; especially in order to be able to embark on a different path.

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V. The anti-robot

In spite of everything, I don't want to lose my enthusiasm for the work of Kinski and Herzog. Without ambitious people like them, the world would be worse than it already is. We may think they are crazy and morally condemn their personal behavior — in the end, we must admire the greatness of their work and should use it as an incentive to produce something great ourselves, even though we may not want to be so reckless in doing so. Or is at least a certain recklessness towards oneself and others not necessarily part of the work?

In any case, shortly before his death, Kinski received a last anonymous letter from a fan, published on the back of the first edition of his autobiography I need love, which summarizes well what remains of Kinski. It is hardly necessary to mention that almost every sentence can be interpreted as an allusion to Nietzsche:

... They are the opposite of the robot, the programmed computer, the metal structure and the reinforced concrete... Yes, you live and breathe like a free animal... you are the human-animal, the animal that you have denied in order to submit to the machine... You are the vibrant life that we have forgotten... You have the lion's mane, the eagle's gaze, the wolf's smile, the harsh beauty of the raging sea and the wild ugliness of melting lava, blood-red, like a bleeding heart, on the slopes of a gloomy volcano... You are the man from whom You'll talk again and again, but that no one can remember anymore... the legend... of being human...⁵⁷

“Build your cities on Mount Vesuvius! ”⁵⁸, Nietzsche famously recommends. Whether Herzog and Kinski read this or not — they certainly lived it⁵⁹ and in doing so made the world richer by some inspiring big myths. “Look for Eldorado! ”, one would like to add: “Build opera houses in the rainforest! ”

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sources

Adorno, Theodor W. & Max Horkheimer: Dialectic of Enlightenment. Philosophical fragments. Frankfurt am Main 2006.

David, Christian: Kinsky. The biography. Berlin 2008.

Geyer, Peter: Klaus Kinski. Frankfurt am Main 2006.

Ders. & Oliver A. Krimmel: Kinsky. Legacy, autobiographical, stories, letters, photographs, drawings, lists, private matters. Hamburg 2011.

Hegel, George William Frederick: Principles of the Philosophy of Law. works, Vol. 7. Frankfurt a. M. 1986.

Ders. : Lectures on aesthetics, Vol. II works, Vol. 14 Frankfurt a. M. 1986.

Herzog, Werner: The future of truth. Munich 2024.

Ders. : Conquering the useless. Munich 2013.

Ders. : Everyone for himself and God against all. Frankfurt am Main 2024.

Jaspers, Kristina & Rüdiger Zill (eds.): Werner Herzog. At the borders. Berlin 2015.

Kinski, Klaus: I need love. Munich 1995.

Ders. : Paganini. Munich 1994.

Kinski, Poland: Children's mouth. Berlin 2013.

Presser, Beat: Kinski. Berlin 2000.

Worffel, Linus: Mythomaniac Werner Herzog. Work — effect — interplay. Bielefeld 2024.

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footnotes

1: The birth of tragedy, paragraph 17.

2: Subsequent fragments 1872 19 [62]. See also another programmatic fragment from the same period (link).

3: Richard Wagner in Bayreuth, paragraph 3.

4: Human, all-too-human I, Aph 12.

5: Beyond good and evil, Aph 21.

6: So Zarathustra spoke, Preface, 5.

7: So Zarathustra spoke, From a tree on a mountain.

8: Ibid.

9: Ecce homo, Human, all-too-human, paragraph 1.

10: Subsequent fragments 1883, 21 [6].

11: Subsequent fragments 1887 11 [31].

12: Ibid.

13: Ibid.

14: Ibid. Our essay prize this year is dedicated to the precise interpretation of this fragment and its current relevance (link).

15: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 11.

16: Subsequent fragments 1887 9 [153]. For this motif, see also Beyond good and evil, Aph 242.

17: So Zarathustra spoke, The Nightwalker Song, paragraph 10.

18: See my corresponding remarks in the second part of the essay Between Monsters and Abysses(Link).

19: The happy science, Aph 343.

20: The happy science, Aph 289.

21: See in particular Hegel's exclamations of the “end of art” in comedy (cf. Lectures on aesthetics Vol. II, p. 219 f.). Hegel's anti-individualism is most blatantly expressed in Principles of the Philosophy of Law, where he unbridled the slaughter of individuals for the civil service state: “The courage of the animal, the robber, the bravery for honor, the chivalric bravery are not yet the true forms. The true bravery of educated peoples is the willingness to sacrifice in the service of the state, so that the individual is only one among many. The important thing here is not personal courage, but classification into the general.” (addition to § 327; p. 495)

22: That is the motto of Morgenröthe (link).

23: Cf. Dialectic of Enlightenment, PP. 128—176.

24: Subsequent fragments 1887 11 [31].

25: Waiting for the Barbarians Accordingly, the title is one of the chapters of Herzog's autobiography (cf. Everyone for himself and God against all, pp. 260—264) and also the title of a novel by J. M. Coetzee, which Herzog wanted to film temporarily (see ibid., p. 260).

26: Even then, young Kinski stood out for his eccentric behavior and in particular his outbursts of anger. Cf. the vivid description of this period in Herzog's autobiography Everyone for himself and God against all (PP. 92—95).

27: Herzog, who had a proud filmography of 79 films in 2024, is one of the few internationally successful German filmmakers (see Linus Wörffel: Mythomaniac Werner Herzog, P. 9).

28: Quoted by Wörffel, Mythomaniac, P. 179.

29: Beat Presser: Kinski, P. 17.

30: Quoted by Wörffel, Mythomaniac, P. 179.

31: Georg Seeßlen in Presser, Kinski, P. 35.

32: According to Wörffel, the film also represents the zenith of both Kinski's fame and Herzog's recognition in Germany (cf. Mythomaniac, P. 9).

33: conquering the useless, p. 158 (entry dated 18 February 1981).

34: “Hegel noticed somewhere that all major world historical facts and people happen twice, so to speak. He forgot to add: one time as a tragedy, the other time as a farce.” (The eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte; link.)

35: “According to Klaus Kinski, after Woyzeck, 'everything was said. ' There is something to it,” notes Seeßlen accordingly (in Presser, Kinski, p. 35), even though afterwards Fitzcarraldo came. On the corresponding negative contemporary reception of the film, see Peter Geyer: Klaus Kinski, p. 107. In Herzog's more recent texts, there is a general tendency, very often about Aguirre and Fitzcarraldo to talk about him, but hardly ever about him.

36: “This Satan who dominates the horny dreams of the female sex” quotes the cover of the film book in a lurid but authentic way (see Klaus Kinski, Paganini). Appropriately, at the end of the book, the publisher promotes various “erotic novels and stories” with titles such as rainforest. Chaos of Desire.

37: Interestingly enough, one of Kinski's first major successes as a stage actor was a “rock role”, as was still common back then, in fact, he played the female protagonist of Jean Cocteau's one-person play La voix humaine (see Peter Geyer & Oliver A. Krimmel: Kinski, PP. 32—39).

38: After a cult around him in the 1950s as Enfant Terrible of German theatre, he reached one million viewers with his readings in 1961 (see Geyer & Krimmel, Kinski, p. 7), he was “Germany's most successful [r] reciter with an audience of millions and 32 speaking plates between 1959 and 1962” (ibid., p. 73).

39: This is particularly clear in his reading of An den Mistral And also from After new seas. These poems are included on the CD's Kinski talks, “Hauptmann & Nietzsche” and Klaus Kinski: Dostoyevsky, Nietzsche, Baudelaire, etc.

40: I actually didn't come across a single mention of it. In the presentation About the Absolute, the Sublime and Ecstatic Truth (in: Kristina Jaspers & Rüdiger Zill: Werner Herzog. At the borders, pp. 165—174), for example, he instead also talks about Blaise Pascal and Homer, who were also appreciated by Nietzsche. In The future of truth A list of great thinkers on the subject of the book Nietzsche of all things is missing (see p. 23).

41: Cf. p. 9 — this is, of course, the only mention of the philosopher in the entire volume!

42: Cf. p. 163 f.

43: Ibid., p. 163.

44: Ibid.

45: P. 4.

46:Everyone for themselves, P. 308.

47: Ibid., p. 310. See also his remarks in Jaspers and Zill, Werner Herzog, p. 170 f. Herzog's love for opera was apparently only awakened by this film and not vice versa. According to his own admission, he had never seen an opera from the inside before filming Fitzcarraldo (see Geyer, Klaus Kinski, P. 105).

48: “I consider the 20th century as a whole to be a mistake,” Herzog writes accordingly in Everyone for himself and God against all (P. 124).

49: Cf. Everyone for themselves, P. 94.

50: Cf. Seeßlen in Presser, Kinski, P. 32.

51: I need love; cited by Geyer & Krimmel, Kinski, p. 382 ff.

52: And also in Paganini Rape and affection for underage women and girls are addressed quite openly. — According to her autobiography, he abused his older daughter Pola Kinski Children's mouth Sexually and raped her several times; his younger daughter was more likely to be the victim of emotional abuse by him, even though he also approached her in an unacceptable way.

53: In: Presser, Kinski, P. 31.

54: See ibid., p. 31 et seq.

55: Ibid., p. 32.

56: A ridicule that comedian Max Giermann in particular has shown in his Kinski parodies in recent years.

57: Geyer & Krimmel, Kinski, p. 71 (original omissions).

58: The happy science, Aph 283. See also the detailed interpretation of this passage by Natalie Schulte on this blog (link).

59: Several of Herzog's films are even dedicated to the topic of “Encountering the Volcano”, most recently The inner glow (2022).

Mythomaniacs in Lean Years

About Klaus Kinski and Werner Herzog

Werner Herzog (born 1942), described as a “mythomaniac” by Linus Wörffel, and Klaus Kinski (1926—1991) are among the leading figures of post-war German cinema. In the 70s and 80s, the filmmaker and the actor shot five feature films that are among the classics of the medium's history. They are hymns to tragic heroism, in which the spirit of Nietzsche can easily be recognized. From “Build Your Cities on Vesuvius! “will “Build opera houses in the rainforest! ”.

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Since the beginning of modernism in the 18th century, which entailed the dissolution of a uniform Christian approach to the world, the affected European societies have been in a permanent conflict of ideologies and worldviews. The French philosopher Paul Ricœur speaks of a war of interpretations, more precisely a “conflict of rival hermeneutics.”¹. In such a situation, resentment makes a career. Because you cannot refute other concepts of the world because they are based on different premises, you often reject them with an emotional intensity that precludes a mutual effort to understand the other person from the outset. This is how resentment quickly builds up on each other.

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I. Resentment in today's war of ideologies

The accusation of resentment really took off because the Enlightenment in the 18th century, with its demand for human rights, propagated the idea of seeing people as legally equal. Social equality was added a century later. Both ideas of equality remain unfulfilled to this day. Jürgen Grosse remarks: “A sense of resentment and the concept of resentment are increasingly connoted with questions of social justice, in particular with a frustrated desire for equality. ”²

As a result, people see themselves socially and politically disappointed. Capitalist and conservative views of the world prevent equality, which leads to aversions and political conflicts from a left-wing perspective, so that many feel socially disadvantaged. Max Hartung writes: “There is always a dialectic within the story: the guilty conscience of the hearers and the external determination through the law, the subtle spirals of power and the subjects included in them, driven by resentment without their knowledge.”³.

While in the first half of the 20th century, right-wing and fascist ideologies dominated in many countries and aggressively pursued liberal and left-wing thinking with terror, today's representatives of such worldviews see themselves marginalized, although they have received strong impetus in recent decades. Oliver Nachtwey notes: “Material and cultural status fears are drivers of resentment, negative affects, identitary closure and conspiracy theories — aspects that were identified early on as signs of authoritarian personality structures. ”⁴

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II. Nietzsche's fabulous true world

Nietzsche developed his concept of resentment in a more focused and differentiated way. He was one of the first to recognize that as a result of the war of ideologies, there is no longer a single reality; rather, these are just different interpretations that cannot refute each other. He writes: “We have abolished the real world: what world was left? The apparent one maybe? .. But no! With the real world, we have also abolished the apparent world! ”⁵

For Nietzsche, the real world has thus become a fable. For this reason, the various views of the world can only be met with rejection, which cannot be justified, except through an enemy image or mutual resentment.

Scientism is now trying to overcome this dilemma with a scientific view of the world. But the sciences do not escape the problem of the difference between language and the world, nor their dependence on methods and the subjectivity of all perception, which cannot be undermined by intersubjectivity. Nietzsche's verdict of the fabulous true world therefore persists.

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III. Resentment of the weak towards the strong

For Nietzsche, resentment is not due to a war of ideologies. Rather, it has a more far-reaching origin. Basically, it originates from the conflict between rich and poor back in ancient times. For Nietzsche, however, this is first conveyed by the Jewish priests. He writes: “The very big haters in world history have always been priests, even the most witty haters: — against the spirit of priestly revenge, all the rest of the spirit is barely considered at all. ”⁶

According to Nietzsche, the priests hated the aristocracy, i.e. the strong and rich, because they were inferior to them. Out of their feeling of inferiority and powerlessness, they developed a reluctance towards them, the resentment from which they took revenge on the aristocracy.

But how did they take revenge? By devaluing their ethical values and replacing them with the values of the poor. Are the latter not always the natural ethical orientations? Not at all, as Nietzsche points out: “They took the Werth, this “value” as a given, as in fact, as beyond all questioning”⁷.

But only Christianity gave this impression. Originally — i.e. before Judaism and Christianity — ethical goodness was not linked to the poor and weak; it did not originate from their need for help. For Nietzsche, it had a completely different origin when he wrote:

The pathos of nobility and detachment, [...] the lasting and dominating overall and basic feeling of a higher dominant species in relation to a lower species, to a “bottom” — That is the origin of the contrast between “good” and “bad.” [...] It is because of this origin that the word “good” is quite clear from the outset not necessarily linked to “unselfish” actions [.]⁸

This can be proven by Plato, for whom justice means “that everyone does his own thing. ”⁹ Good, even ethically good, is to fulfill its nature. If this has made you a craftsman, he should not try to interfere in the business of the powerful and rich. Of course, wealth means nobility and represents ethical goodness. Poverty, on the other hand, is ethically bad and tends towards malice.

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IV. The revaluation of all values

According to Nietzsche, it was precisely this relationship that the Jewish priests reversed

who dared to turn back against the aristocratic equation of values (good = noble = powerful = beautiful = happy = loved God) with a terrifying consistency and held on with the teeth of the most profound hate (the hate of powerlessness), namely “the wretched are only the good, the poor, the powerless, the lowly are only the good, the suffering, the sacrificing, the deprived, Sick, ugly people are also the only pious, the only godly ones, there is bliss for them alone — but you, you who are powerful and powerful, are in all Eternally the wicked, the cruel, the lustful, the insatiable, the wicked, you will also be the unfortunate, cursed and damned forever! ”¹⁰

It is doubtful whether Nietzsche adequately describes the religious world of Judaism before the beginning of Christianity. The ancient religions, i.e. their priestly representatives, who generally served the rulers, thus participated in power and thus also in wealth. But Nietzsche goes on to refer to Christianity, which was originally a Jewish sect. How does Agnes Heller write: “Jesus was not a Christian, nor was he, of course, a European. ”¹¹

It therefore seems more obvious to associate this revaluation of values, the devaluation of aristocratic morality and the appreciation of the ethics of the weak primarily with Christians, at least in view of their beginnings. As a result, resentment is primarily due to Christians, who also welcomed the poor into their ranks and who were unable to collaborate with political powers during their beginnings, as they were persecuted in parts of the Roman Empire because they carried out missions, which was forbidden to all cults. Nietzsche also continues: “You know who inherited this Jewish transformation. I recall [...] the sentence [...] — that is to say with the Jews The slave revolt in morality starts”¹², but which Christians fought successfully to the end in order to interpret and change the world in a sustainable way with a new structure of ethics.

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V. Resentment as a creative force

But didn't they leave everything as it was? Because Max Weber will then ask himself how a religion oriented towards poverty could achieve such a development of power and splendor as was felt particularly in Rome at the time. His answer was “due to unplanned side effects.”¹³, according to his biographer Jürgen Kaube: The monks' poverty rule in monasteries led to the accumulation of immense wealth.

With the moral turn of elevating poverty and weakness to high virtues, while wealth and power are viewed skeptically, and humility takes the place of pride, Christians not only completed the revaluation of all values. Instead, they devalued life itself for Nietzsche, but this resulted in new values. Nietzsche writes:

The morale of slave revolt begins with the fact that resentment becomes creative himself and gives birth to Werthe: [...]. While all noble morality grows out of a triumphant yes to themselves, slave morality says no from the outset to an “outside,” to an “other,” to a “not-self”: and this no is their creative fact.¹⁴

With this creativity of resentment, with this change from good to evil and from evil to good, Nietzsche no longer explains morality from himself, in a sense causally — the good from the good or as a story of good — but from its opposite, i.e. genealogically: Today's ethical good springs from evil, as the ancient aristocratic ethic of strength must appear to today's ethics. That is the meaning of Nietzsche's concept of genealogy.

Altruism thus represents ethical good, while egoism does not simply represent evil. Rather, he appears today as if he had nothing to do with ethics at all. Nietzsche, on the other hand, reveals this suppression of the origin of good precisely from this evil. He writes:

Rather, it only happens with a Decline aristocratic claims that this whole contrast “selfish” “unselfish” “unselfish” imposes itself more and more on the human conscience — it is to use my language that Army Instinct, who finally spoke with him (also to Worten) comes. [...] ([...] today there is a prejudice which takes “moral”, “unselfish”, “désintéressé” as equivalent terms, already with the violence of a “fixed idea” and head illness).¹⁵

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VI. Egoism instead of altruism

Nietzsche, on the other hand, does not want to be an altruist. For him, Socrates's concept of suffering wrong rather than doing wrong is hostile to life and paves the way for the Nazarene commandment, according to which one should love one's enemies. Instead, Nietzsche invokes Buddhism and in its sense propagates egoism, which represents almost the highest immorality for Christian morality and rational ethics following Kant. Buddhism on the other hand

resists nothing more than the feeling of revenge, aversion, resentment [...]. <er>The mental fatigue that he finds, and which is expressed in too great “objectivity” (i.e. weakening of individual interest, loss of heavyweight, of “egoism”), combats with a strict return of even the most spiritual interests to persona. In Buddha's teaching, egoism becomes a duty [.]¹⁶

So Zarathustra spoke in the same sense, “that his word the selfishness Blessed, the healthy, healthy selfishness that springs from a powerful soul. ”¹⁷

Only egoism does not develop resentment that Nietzsche does not need, because it is initially transformed as self-loathing into the overwhelming Christian love of one's neighbour, the pure will to power the weak. Because anyone who refuses to do so is an evil sinner, on whom resentment is directed, as at the beginnings of Judaism at the aristocrats. As a result of this revaluation of values, resentment has become creative.

The question is, of course, whether egoism is similarly animated by resentment. Nietzsche himself hates Christianity and the “last people”¹⁸who turn away from Christianity materialistically: socialists and liberals. Out of egoism and in differentiation from all traditional morality, Zarathustra create new values that push people beyond themselves. Does this not make resentment even more creative? Nietzsche wants to be creative, but medieval Christianity doesn't. In any case, it is a further revaluation of the values that Nietzsche propagates, whether driven by resentment or not.

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VII. Accusing each other of resentment

Max Scheler also accuses Nietzsche of resentment towards Christianity. For Nietzsche devalues the highest value, namely the sacred. Nietzsche is not alone for Scheler when he writes: “We believe [...] that the core of bourgeois morality, which began to replace Christians more and more from the 13th century until they achieved their highest achievement in the French Revolution, It is rooted in resentment. ” ¹⁹

In a sense, however, he is not so distant from Nietzsche if he accuses his contemporaries not only of materialism. Instead, for Scheler, this devaluation of Christianity is driven by people who lack morality. He writes:

In a sense, however, he is not so distant from Nietzsche if he accuses his contemporaries not only of materialism. Instead, for Scheler, this devaluation of Christianity is driven by people who lack morality. He writes:

There is perhaps no point on which the insightful and well-intentioned of our time are more united than that: that in the development of modern civilization, things [...] Man's Lord and Master have become; [...]. But far too little is it realized that this universally recognized fact is a consequence of a fundamental An overthrow of appreciation is who has its root in the victory of the value judgments of the most vital lowest, [...] and the Resentment is its root is!²⁰

Nietzsche could also formulate the last two half sentences in a similar way. Of course, Scheler Nietzsche would just be one of these “deepest” ones. But just as Nietzsche sees Christians as weak and driven by resentment, Scheler, conversely, regards the enemies of Christianity as such weak. With Nietzsche, they would then have to creatively assert themselves as Christians once did against the aristocrats, not for Scheler, of course.

Sartre, however, would agree with Nietzsche if he did not understand the anti-colonialist struggle, as promoted by Frantz Fanon, as a resentful reaction of the colonized people against their colonizers. Rather, he writes: “As <Fanon>proven, this irrepressible violence is not an absurd storm, not even the resurgence of wild instincts, not even the effect of resentment: it is nothing more than the new person who creates himself. ”²¹

Here you could hear a reference to Nietzsche's superman in the background; there are interpretations not only in existentialism but also in post-structuralism that draw the proletarian or anti-colonial revolutionary in this direction.

Gabriel Marcel, on the other hand, criticizes the existentialist self-image from an emphatically Christian perspective, as Sartre did, for example, in his novel Maturity period designs. Marcel writes:

And how did you want to prevent this from simulating or parody autarkiaWhich (the human being) gives himself up, degenerates into repressed resentment against himself and results in the techniques of humiliation? There is an obvious path that leads from abortions, where Sartre's customers come and go, to death camps, where torturers pounce on people who are unable to defend themselves.²²

Historically, this is probably the first comparison of abortions with the Holocaust, a heavy gun that thus speaks of tremendous resentment.

Hannah Arendt, in any case, protected Nietzsche from every accusation of anti-Semitism and from any resentment towards Judaism when she wrote in 1951, when Nietzsche was still the ancestor of the Nazis for many:

[U] and finally Friedrich Nietzsche, whose so frequently misunderstood remarks on the Jewish question are consistently based on concern for “good Europeanism” and whose assessment of Jews in the intellectual life of his time is therefore so surprisingly fair, free from resentment, enthusiasm and cheap philo-Semitism.²³

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Item image source

Francisco de Goya: The seesaw (1791/92) (spring)

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sources

Arendt, Hannah: Elements and origins of total domination (1951), 9th edition Munich 2003.

Große, Jürgen: The cold rage. Resentment theory and practice. Marburg 2024.

Hartung, Max: Revolution? Revolt? Resistance! Change and how it can be thought of in the work of Gilles Deleuze and Michel Foucault. Munich 2015 (link).

Brighter, Agnes, The resurrection of the Jewish Jesus (2000). Berlin & Vienna 2002.

Kaube, Jürgen: Max Weber. A life between the ages. Berlin 2014.

Marcel, Gabriel: The Humiliation of Man (1951). Frankfurt am Main 1957.

Nachtwey, Oliver: De-civilization. About regressive tendencies in western societies. In: Heinrich Geiselberger (ed.): The big regression. An international debate on the spiritual situation of the time. Berlin 2017, pp. 215—232.

Plato, Politeia (c. 374 BC), transl. by Friedrich Schleiermacher, works Vol. 3. Hamburg 1958.

Ricoeur, Paul: Hermeneutics and structuralism. The conflict of interpretations I (1969), Munich 1973.

Sartre, Jean-Paul: The period of maturity (1945), Collected works novels and stories Vol. 2 Reinbek b. Hamburg 1987.

Sartre, Jean-Paul: preface to: Frantz Fanon, The Damned of this Earth (1961). Reinbek near Hamburg 1969.

Scheler, Max: Resentment in building morals (1912). In: Ders. : On the overthrow of values. Treatises and essays (1915/1919), Collected works Vol. 3, 4th ed. Bern 1955.

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footnotes

1: Hermeneutics and structuralism I, P. 30.

2: The Cold Rage, P. 327.

3: Revolution? Revolt? Resistance!, P. 242.

4: De-Civilization, P. 228.

5: Götzen-Dämmerung, Like the “real world” ...

6: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 7.

7: On the genealogy of morality, Preface 6.

8: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 2.

9: Politeia, 433 a.

10: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 7.

11: The resurrection of the Jewish Jesus, P. 88.

12: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 7.

13: Max Weber — Ein Leben zwischen den Era, P. 143.

14: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 10.

15: On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 2.

16: The Antichrist, 20.

17: So Zarathustra spoke, Of the three bad guys, paragraph 2.

18: So Zarathustra spoke, Preface, paragraph 5.

19: Resentment in building morals, P. 70.

20: Ibid., P. 145.

21: preface to: Frantz Fanon, The Damned of this Earth P. 18.

22: The humiliation of man, P. 157.

23: elements and origins of total domination, P. 72.

Turning Moral Weakness Into Power

Nietzsche and the Accusation of Resentment

Strangers seem creepy to many. They immediately fear that these strangers will harm them. Many decent earners think that recipients of citizen benefits are lazy and therefore do not allow them to receive government support. To many educated people, illiterate people appear rude and simple-minded, with whom they therefore want as little as possible nothing to do with, whom they do not trust. Religious people are often afraid of atheists, who in turn are afraid of contact with religion. What you don't know often appears to be dangerous and you prematurely discount that. Such prejudices lead to rejection, which often solidifies to such an extent that counterarguments are no longer even heard. This is resentment that has existed for a long time, but which today makes consensus almost impossible in many political and social debates. This can degenerate into hate and contempt and then into violence whether between rich and poor, right and left, machos and feminists, abortion opponents and abortion advocates, vegetarians and meat-eaters. When one side prevails, it imposes its values on the other, and the resentment even becomes creative. In any case, it prevents you from making an effort to understand the other person. For Nietzsche, resentment has been driving the dispute over what is morally necessary for a long time.

“Resentment” is one of the key terms of Nietzsche's late work. The philosopher is referring to an internalized and solidified affect of revenge, which leads to the development of an overall negative approach to the world. Especially in On the genealogy of morality Nietzsche is trying to show that the entire European culture since the rise of Christianity has been based on this affect. Judaism and Christianity, in their hatred of aristocrats, propagated an ethics of the weak — in this act, resentment became creative. With a new creative ethic, Nietzsche now wants to contribute to a renewed revaluation of values in order to return to a life-affirming aristocratic ethic of the “strong.” In this article, Hans-Martin Schönherr-Mann introduces Nietzsche's reflections on resentment and works out what makes the accusation of mutual resentment so popular to this day.

“What doesn't kill me makes me stronger. ”

(Götzen-Dämmerung)

I. Inequities

Paul Stephan: I would like to start our exchange with Nietzsche and Taylor Swift with a kind of small, self-written aphorism that reads: “You are old when you only notice mass pop cultural phenomena after several years of delay.” I myself, as I must admit, only heard anything about her after a delay of maybe a good ten years in the course of the massive hustle and bustle surrounding her Eras tour. How are you doing?

ES: When she started to become famous, I was still relatively young and I knew her, but it has already passed me by. I never really listened to their songs and saw them more as a marginal figure. She was at the time

Not as big as it is now. I think she had a revival then, that was maybe in 2019 or 2020, when I heard about her, but I was already too old for that. This means that at no point was she really a particularly relevant figure for me and it is therefore all the more exciting to see that she has now become such a big phenomenon.

HH: My connection to her is also more from outside, but there is a certain family background: At some point I talked to my sister about what my two nieces do and like. That was maybe 2019 or 2020 when my sister said that they were very big Taylor Swift fans and I actually asked: “Who is that? “My sister was really mad at me that I didn't know that. She explained Swift's great importance to me, and also praised her feminism. This fantasy may have reached its peak during the Eras tour. That's when my sister and her daughters somehow managed to get tickets to see Swift in Edinburgh, where my family and I happened to be at that time. We didn't see Swift, but the city was jam-packed with the Swifties. Because you have to know that Swift not only plays a concert in a city, as usual, but always three or even more in a row, and there were really a lot of Swifties out and about, often with their cowboy hats, that is one of their trademarks. And in line with popular belief, around 80 to 90% of them were women, mostly under 30 — there are simply a few men who go for Taylor Swift and that is perhaps part of this phenomenon.

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II. Who is Taylor Swift?

PS: Maybe we should explain the background a bit in case some of our readers aren't that popular culture buff either. You've already introduced the term “Swiftie,” which Swift fans use to describe themselves. She herself is an American pop singer who originally comes from the country music sector, but has largely broken away from these origins and now simply makes pop.

HH: Your very first album, Taylor Swift, published in 2006. Her breakthrough into a megastar took place around 2018.

PS: She is now in her mid-30s and has just started her career very early. Even as a child, she was trained for this through dance lessons or participation in appropriate competitions. And that has led to success: She is now competing with greats like Madonna for the rank of most successful pop singer of all time and is also very successful in business. She is a billionaire and gives concerts all over the world, has an incredibly huge fan base — the Swifties — has also made various films and much more.

ES: Which films has she acted in?

PS: We've already talked about this Eras tour, which caused a lot of sensation. For me, it felt like nothing else was being talked about on the radio during this time. That was in the summer of 2024, it was there in Central Europe, where it was discussed very broadly. Overall, the tour was the most economically successful tour of all time — and she even made a movie of her concert, which was also very successful. But there is also, for example, a documentary biopic about her life — Miss Americana (2020) — and she has also worked on several other films.

HH: Yes, there are several films and documentaries that she has often directed herself. She really cares about control. Like Elon Musk, for example, she is often accused of being obsessed with steering and defining the narrative about her down to minute detail. And what stands out is also the sheer level of productivity. There is a huge production machine around them that wants to produce more and more cultural goods and that has tremendous self-dynamism. The Eras tour, for example, lasted two years and achieved a turnover of around 2 billion dollars. By way of comparison, the much older Paul McCartney has only recently reached a total net worth of one billion dollars. It is simply a gigantic device that, once set in motion, continues to run.

ES: It simply has something universal, such an omnipresence, which has also resulted very strongly from this marketing — if that term isn't almost an understatement. She is a brand, she has managed to turn herself as a figure and everything she stands for into a brand, which is reflected in different cultural sectors. Her music, her films — that's something of a self-referential system.

PS: Yes, a kind of parallel world. There is just this Swiftie culture, where she is referred to as “the Queen” and is sometimes worshipped as a kind of goddess. This certainly takes on religious features. There are young people who go into debt to go to all their concerts — and the tickets for them aren't exactly cheap, you have to start with at least €300.¹ There are people who actually go to all three concerts when they play in a city. Well, there is already a hype that really describes a whole new quality in pop culture. There have always been crazy fans, but the fact that it is so massive and goes so deep that they really adore and idolize people so much is something new. And it also affects all spheres: There are politicians who either strongly distinguish themselves from it or praise it to the skies — and that doesn't even stop at philosophy. So I actually only did very brief and superficial research before this conversation and have already come across a whole flood of philosophical publications of varying quality.² What struck me: There, too, the train clearly goes into the apologetic table. So it is really very difficult to find critical philosophical analyses of her; the basic tenor is that her texts are so profound, she is even referred to as a philosopher herself.³ As you can see, the hype is really all-encompassing — maybe we could deviate a bit from our colleagues and set a different tone.

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III. Understanding the hype

ES: What I find exciting is the way this hype was created and on which logic it is based. Because she is very uplifted, declared a kind of “goddess” — and at the same time, admiration for her is based on her “authenticity.” She is a real person, understandable to everyone and she fights human battles. Just think of the very exciting conflict over the copyrights to her albums, which began around 2019 — although one cannot ignore the fact that she was already very wealthy at this point in time and has very little to do with the everyday struggles of the masses. So I find it interesting to see how this image of the accessible, “authentic” figure has brought her back to a new level at which she can actually no longer be accessible, because not everyone on such a religious level can be deified, for that you need a unique selling point — which in turn is authenticity. It's a paradox — it doesn't even surprise me, but above all fascinates me.

PS: I would even go so far as to say that anyone who understands our time, that is, wants to think about it, wants to say how Hegel formulated the mission of philosophy⁴ He must actually understand Taylor Swift.

ES: With such a specific example as Swift, you can really see the presence of the historical process in society. In all their contradictions, if you want to stay with Hegel.

HH: What do you mean by that exactly?

ES: For example, that one of the reasons why she is adored is precisely her “down-to-earth attitude.” Historically speaking, gods and goddesses were just not down to earth; perhaps fallible, but still exalted, they were heroic, not earthly, not human. With Taylor Swift, it's exactly the other way around: The reason why she almost has this status of a “superman” is because you say “Oh, but she is real,” you're dealing with a “real person,” she's kind of “real,” “authentic,” “comprehensible,” “grounded.” That is certainly a contradiction. Quite apart from that, as a billionaire, she is not confronted with the same reality as billions of people in the world; she is not a “normal person” — that would be a second contradiction. And you could go on and on. We can also address the musical quality, I think there is another contradiction.

PS: For me, the basic contradiction, or even the puzzle, that she gives me is the stark contradiction between what she is — the objectively assessable quality of her works and her performance — and what she seems — i.e. how blatantly she is hyped by her fans and the general public. So I'm not saying that she can't do anything, she can definitely sing much better than most of us and much more. But it is still the case when you look at the musical structure of her songs, for example, and she really tries to understand music theory, quickly realizes that even by pop standards, it is a very monotonous and very simple harmony that underlies these songs. For a good three quarters of her songs, she uses exactly the same worn out and trivial chord schemes and you can really layer her songs on top of each other and play them synchronously without being too noticeable.⁵ And even when it comes to the lyrics, whose “special depth” is praised by many, I would say that they are actually not very deep and creative even by pop standards. She actually only uses very few metaphors or any form of mystery — on the contrary, her principle is simply to say what she wants to say, i.e. not to express her message in a big rhetorical way. And the few metaphors she uses are also very worn out. Or am I missing something?

HH: So I pay particular attention to the lyrics, because musically speaking, their songs are really pretty boring. You often don't know whether there is a drum machine running in the background or a drummer playing. Drum machines can also create brilliant music, of course, but that doesn't happen with them. With the lyrics, especially in her more recent albums, she certainly tries to incorporate elements of “poetry” and “originality,” but the only thing that comes to mind is the philosophical term “floating signifiers,” the free-floating meaning carriers without meaning.⁶ I'm thinking about the song The Tortured Poets Department from their latest album, which has the same name. There is a section where she says:

I laughed in your face and said: “You're not Dylan Thomas, I'm not Patti Smith, This ain't the Chelsea Hotel, we're modern idiots. ”⁷

Why do the celebrated yet hermetic Welsh author Dylan Thomas (1914—1953) and the American punk musician and author Patti Smith (born 1946) even appear in the song? I can't imagine Taylor Swift really being interested in these things; these empty signifiers simply serve to represent something “intellectual,” “bohemian.”

PS: I think that's why it's simply very post-modern. As early as the mid-80s, cultural theorist Frederic Jameson, for example, described this permanent quotation without a deeper meaning as a basic characteristic of postmodernism; he speaks of “pastiche.”⁸ Especially when you watch her music videos — which, you have to admit, are very elaborately made — they are full of allusions, such as when she imitates Lady Gaga. These are all forms of pastiche, not satire, for example. You don't know exactly what she actually means by that — but it is precisely these allusions that are often cited as proof of her “profundity.” Well, I would really like to say it so polemically: This entire philosophical and also general humanities discourse about Taylor Swift is really the complete surrender of the critical spirit to what exists — as if the quality of works of art has something to do with any allusions; as if the poems by Shakespeare, for example, were simply great for the reason that they were a collage of references of some kind.

ES: I'd like to come back to the musicality aspect again. What I would look at critically would not be for an artist to write a musically simple song. There are many songs that only use the three to four skin chords that are very successful, that you can enjoy. I don't think anyone would dispute that. The problem with Swift — and others too — is that it's just That is, it doesn't go beyond that. You have a product that consists of four chords and builds your entire musical career on it. After all, music is a unique form of art, a form of aesthetic processing of social conditions that tries to express something that is connected with the environment. Behind this is a technique, skills, that you experiment, that you bring in a certain complexity. Music is much more than just a song that is then recycled over and over again. When you build an entire work on it, it crumbles in your hands and makes it unbelievable that so much success can be achieved as a result. The fact that it is, of course, a commercial success is easy to analyze again, i.e. the question of why, if it is relatively primitive and repetitive in terms of musical complexity, why is it still such a huge success: What is the aspect of it that can generate such gigantic masses, some of which get into debt in order to go to a concert? I'd rather look at that, wouldn't per se On the simplicity of a song, because that's not the point. And the same goes for the lyrics. What remains is a form of commodity that is characterized primarily by quantity and not by its qualitative substance.

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IV. A “mouthpiece”⁹ of the cultural struggle

HH: Perhaps it is the case that at least one contradiction among the several that you have identified, Estella, can be resolved: For the fans, it is primarily about the success or the skill of the production. She is regarded as down-to-earth, but you can't even speak of a real down-to-earth attitude. I don't know her biography very well, but she is said to have grown up in a relatively wealthy family in the countryside. For example, there is an early video from 2006 (link), when she was 16, where she performs at the well-known “Whisky a Go Go” club in Hollywood, and there she plays a few country songs on the guitar, with a fiddle and so on in the backing band: Nothing amazing, and yet it all sounds much more real, even more authentic than what came after that. It all still looks a bit “real.” Estella, you mentioned earlier that it is a product of the cultural industry — but perhaps it is more accurate to say that it is a product that produces itself. It has its own means of production — which very few of us do, you could envy it for it.

PS: I think you have already added a very important aspect with the “down-to-earth” or perceived “authenticity”, which is also often mentioned when you look at the discourse around them and what their fans also say. Because there is also a myth — which is certainly not a complete myth — that she writes her songs herself and so on. But it's also the case again that people who know their way around¹⁰ Say that if she would simply release her songs based on her chord and melody ideas, no one would like it; they are already well done by professional producers who then somehow “save” the song with some original rhythmic ideas or through the instrumentation. But I think that the more important aspect is actually the political orientation that she stands for or at least seems to stand for, i.e. that she is so clearly in favour of a particular form of wokeness in this cultural struggle, which is currently simmering in the USA in particular. Excitingly enough, this is not all that present in their song, apart from a few exceptions, but all the more so in their production on social media and the like. She is currently considered one of the most important champions by many young women, perhaps even: which The most important champion of today's feminism is perceived as a kind of anti-Trump or anti-Musk. It also seems very important to me for their fans that, with their fantasy, they express their affiliation to a certain political ideology and, as a result, to a certain lifestyle, i.e. to a woken lifestyle, which in turn almost includes being a swiftie.

ES: When I look at Taylor Swift in the more general cultural struggle, she strongly embodies this one side that you have just mentioned, i.e. this liberal, woke — which I mean not as a polemical catchword but as an analytical term. On the other hand, you have what you call the “reactionary conservative right,” i.e. Andrew Tate, Ben Shapiro, Jordan Peterson, Elon Musk, etc. There is a clear cultural divide and I think it strongly represents what I would call “liberal feminism.” In principle, I criticize it as a bourgeois product. He represents an understanding of equality, which is about the fact that women, to put it casually, should now also become CEOs and can then oppress them in the same way as men — that is the narrative. That is the appropriation of feminism for class struggle from above. It is relatively self-evident that this does not create actual emancipation from or an overcoming of the patriarchal system. That's why I don't understand how you can regard her as such an icon of feminism — not even so much from Taylor Swift's perspective, we can't really know her, except perhaps from the few interviews that remain on a relatively superficial level. I don't want to negate the fact that she experiences sexism, but it doesn't go to the basis of the structural inequality system. In any case, I can rarely understand how her fans or not even her fans, but anyone who deals with it in any way, can claim in all seriousness that she is the pioneer of emancipatory feminism. And that brings us back to the level of material conditions. She is simply a billionaire and is not one of the billions of women workers. Both feminist struggles cannot be equated. In doing so, you take away its substance from the whole movement and reduce it to questions of recognition, but you can't stop there. Perhaps she is also experiencing or has experienced violence; you shouldn't push that aside. But when she is then elevated to a feminist icon, but not so many other figures whose victims are much greater, whose struggles are based so much more on the material basis, I cannot understand that, I find that undeserved. Instead, we should focus on the social struggles that take place in the middle of everyday life, on the streets.

PS: In the preliminary discussion, you used a very appropriate term for this, namely you spoke of Girlboss feminism spoken. A term that I did not know before, but which sums up very well in one word what form of feminism it actually stands for.

ES: As we've already talked about this, she has created a very successful business model, i.e. in a capitalist logic, you could of course say that she has achieved a certain form of equality — but beyond that, the question of course is: Do you want to stop with such an understanding of feminism? And beyond that: What kind of feminist work does she do in terms of content? Her lyrics are often about her ex-boyfriends or the fact that she herself is the problem. That is a romanticization of failed relationships. Where is the feminist message there? If you produce songs that indicate how independent you are from men, but these songs actually only talk about men, then that is inherently inconclusive. Nothing against breakup albums, but the way Swift does it doesn't actually amount to the fact that it leads to emancipation from exactly these relationship structures that are patriarchal.

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V. Suffering and Love

HH: I would like to take this opportunity to mention that among the many good links Paul has sent us in advance, there is one that, in a sense, reflects your words and who is not so apologetic. I mean the article by Mary Harrington from UnHerd (link). The headline, translated into German, reads: “The dark truth about Taylor Swift. Too many young women are longing for extinction.” That is an interesting thesis. And it is Swift's tragic right now Love songs, mostly about the ex-boyfriends who run best. Harrington speaks of a “kamikaze mysticism”; psychologically speaking, it is almost in the direction of self-harm. It's pretty weird and I wasn't so aware before that it could actually revolve around it. What does that say when so many young women are in the mood for songs that, to put it less romantically, are about bad relationships, about relationships that end badly? What is it about — also with regard to this feminism, which may not be one?

ES: Yes, it is a feminism that doesn't really demand anything and is therefore devoid of substance. In the 2010s, there was also the phenomenon of Tumblr girls.¹¹ Back then, this was related to Lana Del Rey, who has certain similarities to Swift in this regard. In any case, this image of the tragic, sad “girl” was romanticized and glorified. It served as an alternative to the popular American girl, according to the motto: “I'm not like that, I'm struggling with life and suffering from world pain.” This was then really often accompanied by self-harm and it was then played down very heavily and almost became a trend, it became coolthat you hurt yourself — and that's all based on a narrative of tragedy: “No one really understands me.” Swift builds on this to a certain extent. There is something slightly nihilistic about her becoming a drama queen and says “It's me, hi, I'm the problem.”¹² or “You look like my next mistake”¹³. She already knows that this person is not good for her and yet she gets involved. There is little feminist integrity in it for me, then you can't actually claim feminism for them if you recognize these mechanisms and at the same time say: “Yes, I still want that. ”

PS: Yes, according to my subjective impression, this theme or the prevailing mood that we were talking about is really at least actually in three quarters of their songs The main aspect. So failed relationships with “boyfriends.” So there is also a certain monotony on the content level.

ES: Based on a spectacle of emotion, I'd say. So the excitement of falling in love and then the failure of the relationship that this becomes such a big spectacle is perhaps the reason why it is so dragging on for many.

HH: You call this a “spectacle of emotions” because the fans enjoy watching it, empathizing without really having to experience it themselves, right? It remains an interesting circle of contradictions. We actually experience them as absolutely inauthentic, but it is still possible that so many fans are living these relationships after all, because otherwise where does this great comprehensibility come from?

ES: Yes, maybe the basis for this is simply human emotion and interpersonal relationships. But perhaps the opposite is also true. After all, when it comes to a spectacle, it's often the case that you just find it exciting because you're not experiencing it yourself. In soap operas, for example, even the wildest things happen that are very unlikely or even impossible in reality. The pleasure or desire for it comes precisely from the fact that this extremely hyperstimulant exists, i.e. a superlative. These songs, which process this aspect of the relationship drama over and over again — or it is actually not even a processing, it is simply brought to the table very openly over and over again — give me the feeling that they always have something saturated and highly frequented. You can really get yourself into an emotion there. Although the interesting thing is that, statistically speaking, the younger generation has much fewer romantic relationships, there is a clear trend towards a decline in social and sexual relationships. Perhaps there is a trend — but that is now very speculative — that people do not experience such drama in their actual lives, but in Swift's music instead. You have the desire for it and this is a fantastic experience.

PS: Isn't Swift's conventionality also reflected in the fact that she actually only revisits the topics of stereotypical “women's literature” or “women's films” — I'm thinking of Rosamunde Pilcher or Hedwig Courths-Mahler, for example — who often follows exactly this plot, that a woman falls in love with a man who is actually not good to her and then goes through a very exciting and heartwarming development with him?

ES: Yes, although Swift shows a quality, because for her, it is always linked to feminist empowerment. It is not like classic love stories that follow a specific plot, a conservative plot that has been known for decades, but it is about being labelled as “feminist” in one way or another. And I personally find that dangerous because feminism, which was and is historically a revolutionary practice, is being appropriated for a market, i.e. it simply becomes a commodity. A political term is depoliticized, it gets its breath out; it is made compatible with what you were talking about.

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VI. Well-portioned eroticism

PS: Another very important aspect seems to me to be eroticism. We've already talked about the fact that we're dealing with music whose target group is primarily young women and perhaps homosexual men — that's the stereotype anyway, but we've already seen that it doesn't completely contradict reality, even though there are, of course, heterosexual male Swifties on the sidelines. And that brings me exactly to the aspect of eroticism. To get a bit personal: What irritated me when I saw her picture for the first time was that she is such a blatant pop star but doesn't seem very erotic to me personally. Well, she is definitely a beautiful woman, but it is important to understand that beauty and eroticism are not the same thing, sometimes even mutually exclusive. So there are — and I think Swift is one of them — that are almost “too beautiful.” So they definitely look attractive, but not erotic — which is definitely very unusual for a pop star. I then asked myself whether this was only due to my subjective taste, but I quickly realized that this was not the case. That is definitely a topic that is discussed very often.¹⁴ In fact, there are also objective criteria for eroticism. There are simply women who are considered erotic by almost all men, and other women are not, that is quite obvious. And Swift is simply not considered erotic by many men.

But at this point I've made another discovery and I have to admit that various of her songs actually made me think, because she also addresses this in various songs herself. She certainly shows herself in erotic poses there — but at the same time makes it a topic that she is just playing a role to please a man. I found it interesting how simple these methods actually are, with which a woman can present herself as erotic. Of course, this has a lot to do with clothing — such as clothing that highlights the breasts — or certain ways of looking at you. I actually found these videos a bit instructive. And that's when I would see a new quality in her, that it's just a pop star who really doesn't rely on eroticism anymore. And that has nothing to do with her appearance, but with her nature, i.e. that she makes it clear that eroticism is essentially the product of a particular performance and that she is perhaps really the first successful female pop star to refrain from this type of performance. I find that remarkable.

HH: I can understand your statements — although that's just eine Perspective is. But yes, if you asked 1,000 straight men: “Who is more sexually attractive, Madonna in the 80s or Taylor Swift? “, then this would simply not be a competition, then 950 of them would vote for Madonna. And that is simply because it was part of Madonna's self-production right from the start: She knew that she was sexually attractive to many men and effectively exploited this as part of her production and art production. I find that absolutely legitimate. And Swift didn't want to go that route. From every perspective, from any sexual orientation, it looks good. She is, in Paul's words, “beautiful.” But she doesn't want to market herself sexually — which is also absolutely legitimate, but is perhaps only noticeable because up to now this has been more of an exception in the pop industry for women who have sold a lot. But it's actually true: In certain videos, she presents herself in this stereotypical cliché way — but in doing so, she conveys a very different message than most women in the pop industry have so far.

ES: I think the criterion of eroticism or sex appeal was the decisive factor when it came to female celebrities until the early 2000s. And that was also a marketing criterion. But I think that there has been a change in the narrative and that this is no longer the only decisive factor for women's careers, to be the object of desire for heterosexual men. I would say that now we are dealing with a completely different discourse, now it is primarily about the liberal feminism that it represents. But what I find exciting is that it comes down to something similar in practice. It's not like she only appears fully clothed now and you can't see a piece of skin. Billie Eilish, for example, saw such an explicit refusal much more in comparison at the beginning of her career. But when Swift does that, when she shows herself that way, she does it based on a completely different narrative, then she does it as self-empowerment: “Nobody tells me how to dress.” This moment is woven into the discourse anew. But I can't imagine that Swift is not aware that this, of course, still includes the aspect of male desire. Because what is perceived as erotic as sexy is, in our given reality, strongly determined by a masculine definition of desire, you can't just release yourself just as much as the rest of the world knows that this is of course appealing to heterosexual men.

PS: There is one song in particular where what I mean is very clear Look what you made do.¹⁵ This is also another form of pastiche. All sorts of male fantasies are portrayed in a video. I think that was really successful. There is, of course, a certain ambiguity; I think it succeeded for two reasons, so to speak. Once I found it successful as a man because I find it really erotic. But I also find it successful as a philosopher, as it were, because it was very instructive, because it made me understand a great deal about the nature of erotic staging. It's not just about lightweight or absent clothing — that's how Swift is almost permanent. But that is not the point, it is indirectly very, very clear in the video. She could also undress completely naked, but it wouldn't necessarily be erotic without the appropriate gestures. For example, it also has a lot to do with the camera, where it focuses, how the woman looks at the camera. In this video, for example, I noticed that looking directly at the camera, combined with appropriate clothing, looks very erotic. Or even other camera settings. And it is, of course, not least about fantasies and scenarios that are hinted at; eroticism is something mental, not just a physical phenomenon. You could now analyse that for hours. I think that this is definitely a step forward that a new type of woman is emerging, I definitely think that is not bad, even though she picks me up much less as a private person than any Madonna songs that actually appeal to me a lot.

ES: When the lyrics read “Look what you made me do,” then I ask myself: What is the feminist message there? Of course, a woman is not responsible for the patriarchal structures into which she was born. But this line of text does imply that you deny any responsibility. This once again glorifies passivity. After all, it also has a certain form of agency power. Instead, however, she says “Look what you've brought me to” — without, despite realizing it, changing anything about it. Or how is the message of the song to be understood?

PS: Yes, that's the message. You almost forced me, i.e. you as “The Man” — there is also this video where she portrays herself as a “typical man” as a counterpart (link) — that I have to play all these roles just to please you. Well, I don't think the message is that profound at all, you can certainly do that these days in the bravo Read if they still exist. Of course: This video has an ambiguity, it definitely picks up heterosexual men for now with the various scenes that are shown there. But at the same time, it has certainly succeeded in questioning me and other men in the sense that it can also have an effect on me and other men: What do I actually find erotic? Am I not actually very manipulable? At the same time, she's already doing things differently in her other videos because she doesn't use exactly these gestures and codes. I would highlight that.

HH: I think that 70 to 80% of Swift's fan base actually consists of women. Most of these women must desire her in some way. I think that's part of this kind of fanship, whether you define it as sexual desire or as another kind, they want a piece of it, so to speak. I wonder whether this massive female desire directed at Taylor Swift could even contribute to a redefinition of eroticism in the medium or long term; that it is no longer defined so one-sidedly by male desire.

On the subject of desire, I Look What You Made Me Do looked at it and compared it with Nobody No CrimeWhat I know better. These two songs have similar motives. A love triangle is told, including cheating and so on. And it ends, unsaid, with the murder of a woman of a man. It's a kind of living revenge fantasy. That is actually the same as what is actually in Look What You Made Me Do goes: That she finally takes revenge on her ex-boyfriends and can live out who she actually is. And that is not a feminist motive, because everything continues to revolve around these men. From Swift's perspective, another type of feminism is hardly possible either, because it has no connection to the everyday struggles of 95 to 99% of women on this planet and simply cannot have because of the billions it has accumulated.

ES: Perhaps we should differentiate between desire and eroticism. I think straight women's feminine desire regarding Swift has a lot to do with identification. Freud differentiates between these basic types of desire: sexual and identifical. In this sense, it is already an authorization. I can also recognize feminism when you recognize your own autonomy or patriarchal repression. Perhaps this is the first basal step on the path of liberation. This is where identification takes place in order to find a vocabulary for it in the first place and to make it intelligible.

Another aspect is that she also has a very large queer fan base. And there is definitely a desire, even among gay men, but I don't know how erotic it is or whether it's more about identification or representation. In particular, you have a motif of “angry but nice” or even the term “wholesome”, which can barely be translated into German — healthy, sincere, lovable. This “wholesome” character is just popular, but it's not necessarily about eroticism. Nevertheless, it will certainly become an erotic object for many, not just for heterosexual men.

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VII. Nietzscheanism for the People

PS: But the paradox lies precisely in the fact that it is still heard and well found by all these “normal women” (nurses, nurses, cashiers, etc.). I think that in order to understand this, such a Marxist understanding has its limits. But that is precisely the peculiarity of the ideology of our time, that people are really completely steeped in and firmly convinced of an ideology that does not suit their material living situation at all. In order to understand the paradox, or even stronger: absurdity, you certainly have to draw on other theorists, such as Freud, whom you have already mentioned, in order to understand this specific attractiveness of the “leader figure,” as he described in Crowd psychology and ego analysis describes. Or even Nietzsche. What does Taylor Swift have to do with Nietzsche?

HH: What strikes me time and again in my very unsystematic way of reading Nietzsche is his deep hatred of what will later be referred to as “mass culture.” I don't share this hate, but I'm impressed by how tough it is and how much Nietzsche expresses himself in it. Nietzsche's hatred of newspaper readers and especially newspaper readers is very well known: “Of course, there are enough stupid women's friends [...] [,] who want to bring the woman down to 'general education, 'probably even to read newspapers and politicize. ”¹⁶ So if people read newspapers at all, especially women, then the mail goes off for Nietzsche, that doesn't work at all. What he can't bear is the idea that if 10,000 people have read the same newspaper articles, they will think and feel roughly the same way about a particular topic at that moment.¹⁷ And it's not just about 10,000 people, but maybe 50,000 or 100,000 people or more. And to get to the present tense, it's now about millions of people who listen to a Swift song and then have roughly the same emotional experience. Because these songs do not allow for a wide range of feelings, the affective reaction they are supposed to evoke is relatively simple. And this hatred of mass culture is not on the margins of Nietzsche's work, but right at the center.

ES: Well, I would defend Marx because I think that the Marxist concept of ideology can cover this aspect that you mentioned quite well. With Nietzsche, I find that a bit difficult. But I believe that one could criticize her position in the cultural struggle with Nietzsche — not only among her but also her opponents — with the help of concepts of resentment and slave morality. But at the same time I ask myself to what extent Nietzsche is a good choice as an anti-feminist. If I disregard this aspect and simply look at what remains for Taylor Swift's analysis, you can build on Nietzsche's analysis of mass culture that modernity is creating new gods for itself. You think that you have left Christianity behind, but as a supposedly atheistic society, you no longer understand that you create new deifications of your own, towards which you also place yourself in a new relationship of dependence. Perhaps this perspective helps to understand how there is a form of control again, that people want their own submission; that is, the problem of voluntary submission.

PS: Yes, Taylor Swift is an expression of our time in the sense that, speaking from a Nietzschean perspective, there is obviously a stark absence of meaning and orientation figures, but at the same time also a strong desire to be fascinated or carried along by some leading figures. You can really see that on both sides of this cultural struggle, including Trump or Musk, for example, that there is a very comparable cult of personality there. I find this exciting and, in turn, fascinating, but also unsettling and frightening at the same time. So I'm not so afraid of this specific fan culture for now, it is also quite likeable compared to other fan cultures — but this fundamental willingness to submit to authoritarian leaders and structures... Sure, Taylor Swift embodies a very gentle and indirect authority, she is also, fortunately perhaps, not a political leader, that looks completely different with the two men I've mentioned and that's when it gets really dangerous, frightening and threatening. But there is a fundamental willingness on both sides to make this, to speak with Kierkegaard, “leap into faith,” to practice this dedication and fascination and to find in it a form of freedom — which is, of course, complete pseudo-freedom, the opposite of freedom — that seems to me to be a disturbing expression of the blatant irrationality of our era, which arouses serious fears. In this respect, I would say that Taylor Swift is often portrayed as a great source of hope. But if it is really our biggest hope, perhaps our only hope, then we are really living in a very hopeless time.

ES: Nihilism is also a good bullet point. The tendency towards musical, stylistic and thematic repetition, that little new substance is being created there, as an expression of a nihilism that can actually no longer imagine anything for the future.

PS: I also came across a very short but interesting YouTube video, where it is almost understood as the embodiment of the “last person” (link). In truth, she is perhaps only an appearance of an “overwoman,” but rather an expression of profound nihilism. But what makes this nihilism even more difficult to understand or even more difficult: To whom Swift, which some colleagues like to refer to in order to substantiate her “profundity,”¹⁸ Nietzsche also alludes to or at least seems to allude to again and again. It's about that famous phrase “What doesn't kill me makes me stronger.” I'm even on two songs — Cruel Summer and Cassandra — in which she quotes him, varying slightly in each case; which is of course also remarkable that she apparently came across this sentence and then immediately muddled it into two song lyrics. And she was awarded a prize and also quoted this sentence in her acceptance speech, but without mentioning the name Nietzsche (link). I think that this sentence as a motto of their own self-image and that of their fan base is actually very central in the sense of: “We are all women and queer people who have had a very difficult time, but who come out stronger and look forward to these various traumas and so on that we have been exposed to. ”¹⁹ This kind of “Nietzscheanism for the people”²⁰ Nietzsche certainly wouldn't have liked it, but for now I think it's good or at least better than other ways of dealing with such experiences. But of course, this attitude remains abbreviated because it remains completely stuck in this neoliberal thinking of individual self-empowerment, but yet in certain situations of “oppression” — or in any case: discrimination — it seems to me to open up a certain leeway to be able to deal with it, even though this does not now reveal a larger social perspective and thus ultimately fails. Although I have the assumption that Swift is not actually referring to Nietzsche with this quote, but to a song by a colleague called Kelly Clarkson, which was released back in 2011. His first chorus line is exactly “What doesn't kill you makes you stronger” (link). In any case, I believe that it is Clarkson's and not Swift's credit to have brought this saying so heavily into today's pop culture. I also listened to this song by Clarkson and that once again made me vividly aware of the paradox we were talking about. Well, I found him really strong, especially because of her strong voice. Music experts often say that Swift's voice is actually quite average, at least not particularly powerful.²¹ So this is really a song that has power, carried by a powerful female voice with a great deep response; really an objectively better pop song in every respect, especially since in the following line of the chorus, Nietzsche is quoted again on a very profound level, namely with “Just me, myself and I” the beginning of Ecce homo (link). Well, he is really also very Nietzschean, both in terms of lyrics and music. I find it remarkable and sad that Clarkson, even though she is also very successful, is in the second row compared to Swift.

HH: Where in Cassandra There are also two modified Nietzsche quotes in a row from 2024, which indicates that she deliberately quoted Nietzsche there. It initially says, “What doesn't kill you makes you aware”²² — an interesting shift compared to the original — and it's called directly, interestingly enough again on Ecce homo alluding to the subtitle of the book: “What happens if it becomes who you are? ”²³ Although this is also a free-floating carrier of meaning, I would say. But otherwise I agree with you, Paul: If Swift was the only hope, then it would actually look really bad — but I don't think she is. But we will probably have to find out at another opportunity who could be hopefuls instead.

ES: However, it is also due to Nietzsche's own aphoristic writing style to a certain extent that individual sentences can be used phrasewise in this way. And sometimes you can see a lot in an aphorism and sometimes very little — that depends not least on what you make of it.

Last but not least, who I wanted to bring into the game as an alternative to Swift is Mexican singer Natalia Lafourcade. In my opinion, it shares a lot with Nietzsche's philosophy of life, even though it doesn't quote him. In her music, she gets more out of it than Swift, especially when it comes to the topic of separation that Lafourcade often deals with. For example, she has a song that starts with the line: “I thank death for teaching me life” (link). It is not about natural death as a factual phenomenon, but the many small dying processes that pervade life; that something dies at every stage and that you learn something from it for life. I see a lot more Nietzsche in there. That would be my final word: You also make it much more substantial than Taylor Swift.

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Source of the article image template: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Taylor_Swift_%286966830273%29.jpg

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footnotes

1: Note: When buying directly, the cards are sometimes cheaper, but you usually have to buy them on the secondary market, where they cost significantly more (see e.g. this report).

2: See, for example this series of articles, this item about their “authenticity,” this anthology, which is only about their practice of re-recording old songs, this anthology and those. For a German-language article, cf. this.

3: Cf. this Article by Susan Andrews, this by Jessica Flanigan and this by Catherine M. Robb (unabridged version).

4: See the introduction to Principles of the Philosophy of Law (works Vol. 7. Frankfurt a. M. 1986, p. 26.

5: See these two very good, albeit apologetic, music-theoretical analyses of their work (here and there).

6: French anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss introduced this concept to language theory (cf. Introduction to the work of Marcel Mauss. Transated by Henning Ritter. In: Marcel Mauss: Sociology and anthropology, Vol. 1. Wiesbaden 2010, pp. 7—41; 39) .7

7: “I laughed in your face and said, 'You're not Dylan Thomas, I'm not Patti Smith. It's not the Chelsea Hotel, we're idiots of the moment. ”

8: Cf. Postmodernism — on the logic of culture in late capitalism. Translated by Hildegard Föcking & Sylvia Klötzer. In: Andreas Reckwitz and others (eds.): Aesthetics and Society. Basic texts from sociology and cultural studies. Berlin 2015, pp. 335—350; 342—344.

9: Cf. On the genealogy of morality, paragraph I, 5.

10: See analyses cited in footnote 5.

11: The page Tumblr was a predecessor of today's popular social media-Platforms.

12: “Hi, it's me, I'm the problem” (Anti-Hero).

13: “You look like my next mistake” (Blank Space).

14: See, for example, the article Successful, beautiful — and unsexy by Michalis Pantelouris (link).

15: Other examples include Lavender Haze and Bejeweled.

16: Beyond good and evil, Aph 239.

17: See this study Nietzsche, the aristocratic rebel by Marxist historian Domenico Losurdo (translated by Erdmute Brielmayer. Hamburg 2009, pp. 449—456).

18: See e.g. this Article in the zeit.

19: For this position, see also the song I Can Do It With A Broken Heart.

20: In the preface, Nietzsche speaks of Beyond good and evil of Christianity as “Platonism for the 'people'” (link).

21: See e.g. those and those assessment.

22: “They say: What doesn't kill you makes you more aware.”

23: “What happens when that becomes who you are? “; Cf. Ecce Homo, title page.

Taylor Swift — Superwoman or Last Man?

A Nietzschean Critique of the Most Successful Pop Star of Our Time

Taylor Swift is one of the most important “idols” of our time. Reason enough for our regular authors Henry Holland, Paul Stephan and Estella Walter to pick up on the Nietzschean “hammer” and get to grips with the hype a bit: Does Swift deserve the cult around her that goes down to philosophy? Is it grossly overrated? And what explains the discrepancy between appearance and reality, spectacle and life?

You can watch the entire unabridged conversation on the Halcyonic Association for Radical Philosophy YouTube channel (link).

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