The hidden Hegel within Nietzsche

The master-slave dialectic for Hegel is the driving force of history, its annulment is the end of history. The equalization of master-slave for Nietzsche brings with it a dissolving of their contradicting values (morality).

Is Nietzsche merely continuing the Hegelian necessity?

I think what Nietzsche foresaw that Hegel didn’t is that through destroying the dichotomies of master-slave; a transitionary period of nihilism would be initiated which leads into absolute spirit after its completion. Nihilism would create the fertile grounds for a revaluation of values, where the highest values devalue themselves and it is through this negation that new values can emerge. These values are part of an absolute morality (free from the contradictory values of master/slave) that is a constituent part of absolute spirit. I think Hegel was too preoccupied with the historical aspect of his system and Nietzsche picked it up on moral grounds where he expounded the moral implications of master/slave fading away.

This would be a Nietzschean objection: absolute morality is free from master/slave values but through creating new values it still perpetuates a moral system that is objective and not free for the individual; the difference of this morality compared with the old one is that it expels the dialectical opposition but still places objective moral principles that confine subjects in its morality.

I think that we have to accept, as social beings, the fundamental essence of morality is slavish; it unifies people and acts as an authority of value-positing for a ‘power’. It is a power structure you cannot rid a social group of because the social body is always comprised of power relations (a will to power); you can’t escape this element or else you go into moral-relativism which leads-again-into nihilism. The subjective morality Nietzsche advocates is a tumultuous transition of a process that gradually solidifies an objective morality. We can’t be morally subjective tenably; ‘will to power’ will always designate an object morality through a process of contradictions being resolved through time (subjective morality engenders the fecundity for antagonisms that reach a dialectical completion into a ‘universal’ morality). This newly completed morality will (possibly) never degrade into nihilism because it is not tensionally conflicting itself in a dialectic. I think Nietzsche’s greatest alluding task was creating the principles for which we could articulate and implement the process (unbeknownst to him) that fruitions this objective morality.

Nietzsche was a child of his times; a product of the historical milieu that manifested his individuality. He was a being in a specific point in history that found within his profound thought a kernel of an historical becoming. The thought he was trying to get away from (Hegelian Dialectics) was actually the very reality he was situated in. The events and philosophy that preceded him allowed him to elucidate what Hegel couldn’t: the coming of nihilism and the moralistic consequences that accompanied the end of the master/slave dialectic. Hegel had made the mistake of placing absolute spirit at the end of history; he could not foresee the moralistic implications and the turmoil that ‘the end’ would cause to ‘spirit’ from becoming absolute; spirit will have to go through an anguish of nihility, where it detaches itself from what constrained it, and then reconfigures itself in a process that will bring about its absolute completion. The thought of Nietzsche was able to continue Hegelian thought in a route that was not historically available for Hegel: this is why both thinkers should not be taken in conflicting terms; the alliance of their thought can be critically and genealogically used to unveil the hidden mechanisms of our society and reality.

 

---

Note: The Nietzschean “overman” is a bridge towards the Hegelian “absolute spirit”

Advertisement

Fascism, Castration and Nietzsche

Fascism is a defensive ideology, its power is within fear: the fear of castration.

In Freudian psychoanalysis castration anxiety is a fear of emasculation and of losing the penis which is the very symbolizer of masculinity. In this case the penis symbolizes the ideological structures that compromise superiority, race, domination and heritage which are all structures that support fascism and are all rooted in the violent hyper-masculinity of fascist ideology.

Fascism finds its potency with a perceived threat; an outside force that wishes to destroy it. The threat propels the passions of hatred and ignites prejudice. The attack is towards a way of life and an established identity. The foreign intruder is perceived as wishing to destroy the establishment and dethrone (castrate) the ones who are in power. At all costs the fascists way of life must be preserved because it includes the very means of power that gives that life meaning and purpose. Fascism finds its meaning and purpose in dominance. The subjugation of all life for one ruling group is the sadistic purpose of all fascist ideology, and fascists will fight for this “right to power” because without it they are castrated and left with humiliation and loss.

There exists a position within some misinterpretations of Nietzschean thought that states fascism is a master morality, this is completely false, fascism is probably the highest form of slave morality that can exist. Fascism in appearance seems to be an affirmation but affirmation is not its source, the source is in fear. In religion, there exists a life-threatening fear of God, this fear stops man from what can affirm his life and enables him to thwart the life within him to achieve eternity in the afterlife. Fascism works similarly by replacing the threat of God with the threat of the outside world. Christianity seeks paradise in the afterlife, fascism seeks paradise within life in the form of a dominant utopian ethno-state. The way to reach this paradise is through violence and control which are part of weak and life-limiting forces.

The Nietzschean ‘will to power’ is a becoming of power in the form of a will. The becoming is between two forces, reactive (negating) and active (affirmative), the one that rules over the other has the highest will to power. The qualities of weak and strong does not determine the strong (active) force prevailing over the weaker (reactive) one, what matters for the success of the forces is the power of the will.

The difference between active and reactive forces can be elucidated with the ‘eternal return’: if you will something, will it as if it would return in life eternally. Active forces always make a successful return because they bring with them life-affirmation while reactive ones die because they eventually destroy themselves.

Fascism is a reactive force because it cuts life off from what it can do (active forces affirm life to its full potential). The fascists are not just dominating everyone else, their ideology is also dominating them. In this way fascism becomes sadomasochistic, the members extend control towards others and their values extend control towards themselves. The worship of ideological principles constrain members to a mould that they can’t escape from. They are in a cycle of domination and submission. The bondage of fascism limits the life-potential of its members by subjugating them to ideals and convictions that negate life-affirming wills for a will that is contrived through the power of fear.

Fascism is wholly a negation, its power is in destruction, it has no positivity which life-affirmative creation can come from because it is a philosophy of death that creates perpetual tension and violence. Fascism replaces the slave morality of Christianity for a new one that is not (entirely) based on the worship of a God but the worship of land, race and history that completely dominate an individuals life and fixates it on abstractions that manifest ideological slavery. The property of Fascism then becomes the violent residue of the worst aspects of a slave morality and the worst aspects of mankind as a whole.