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Can't Tell Me Nothing {March 5, 2011 , 2:18 PM}  One phrase common to the ranks of embarrassed politicians, artists and academics is the squeal, “that quote was taken out of context!” This alibi should invariably arouse some suspicion: quotes are, after all, taken out of context by definition. Restating that fact does not always excuse the offending remarks, as many of them look just as nasty when popped back into context. But in the case of Jared Loughner and his purported affinity for the works of Nietzsche, Matt Feeney makes a sensible case for why we shouldn't blame the enigmatic philosopher for the nihilistic readings of his “angry nerd” followers. Though his Aphorisms allow for some dodgy interpretations (in context), there really is enough indefatigability urged in Nietzsche’s work to acquit him of the charge of outright nihilism, the kind that served as Loughner’s emotional gasoline. However, it might not have been nihilism that Loughner found attractive in the pages of Zarathustra and Beyond Good and Evil. He might have been drawn to Nietzsche for the same reasons that Bertrand Russell declared himself to be repulsed: “because he likes the contemplation of pain” and “because the men whom he most admires are conquerors, whose glory is cleverness in causing men to die.” Glorification of violent struggle. Then again, we know that Nietzsche had a common audience in both Adolf Hitler and Theodore Herzl; Mussolini and Emma Goldman read him with equal intensity. This is what subtracts from Feeney’s defense of the German Romantic; all great philosophers are stuck in his impressive position—informing the consciousness of history with the likelihood of being endlessly reinterpreted, completely misconstrued, or simply “taken out of context.” Hegel’s last words are said to have been, “there was only one man who understood me, and he did not understand me.” ---------- Post a Comment ---------- |
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