Existentialism

Existentialism – Take Two

We've briefly looked at existentialism before last semester, but not in the capacity of the effect it has on politics.

This time, it wasn't about some deep philosophical debate on how one should feel if, in the words of those amazingly profound lyricists from Linkin Park, “nothing really matters.”

We instead focused on the ramifications of nihilism and existentialism when those thoughts occur to the average, downtrodden guy – if you're being oppressed, rise up and crush your oppressor. There's nothing to lose. If there truly is no universal moral code, and no eternal metaphysical consequence for your actions, who's to stop you from beating your slavemasters and their families to death? You have nothing to lose but your own dignity if you continue to allow yourself to be a victim. If your existence can only ever be as meaningful or meaningless as you choose to make it, then the only way you can let yourself down is to not make that choice in the first place. You have nothing else to answer to.

If you're reading this, you probably think that I'm confusing nihilism and existentialism, using the words interchangeably. I used to, because I didn't understand the difference. While they are indeed very distinct, I still think they're worth mentioning side by side because in my mind existentialism is the natural progression from nihilism.

A nihilist would hold that there is no meaning to existence.

A existentialist would hold that there is no inherent meaning to existence (defying the Kantian idea of ethical maxims and such) and that it is down to you, the individual, to give it meaning.

Existentialism is then, to me, is a more mature and sophisticated iteration of the sentiment expressed by nihilists. 'There is no point in being alive' is the cold realisation that most teenagers feel as though they have uncovered for the very first time in the history of humankind while they're preoccupied with wading through some sticky angsty mire. As you grow up a bit, you realise that you will only stay as miserable and grouchy as you allow yourself to be and to use a pretty apt cliché, 'Life is what you make it.'

What nihilism looks like.

It is then that you probably pull your head of your arse. You're at least twenty years old by that point and you've wasted a good few years being absolutely intolerable to be around. You emerge from the other side of puberty wheezing, acne scarred and for all intents and purposes, an existentialist. You perhaps still know that, objectively, there is no 'point' to existence – but that its down to you to stop whining about it and carve out a point for yourself. Why are you worrying about anyone else?

So nihilism is an awkward, angsty teenager. Existentialism knows better.

Good faith and bad faith

Good and bad 'faith' here isn't used in a religious sense, but is instead a term coined by Jean-Paul Sartre to explain acting in a way that is consistent with your own beliefs and character. It's therefore highly subjective – to pick on Kant again, it's not saying act in a way that you think would hold up to the universal scrutiny of others. In fact, it's saying the polar opposite – act only in a way that holds up to the scrutiny of yourself.

This means that potentially you can, in the eyes of an existentialist, get away with some pretty grim stuff so long as your conscience doesn't bat an eyelid. If you truly believe that it's okay, then you're still acting in good faith. Then there's the argument that your conscience is simply a internalisation of what society thinks you should do – 'the policeman in your head' – and that it's not really you.

Something that Sartre particularly despises and writes about in his preface to Frantz Fanon's 'The Wretched of the Earth' is dull compliance with something you think is wrong, of being an accomplice. Whether you're literally spying on your neighbour and dobbing them in to the Gestapo or simply not rising up with the rest of the insurgents and no longer allowing your people to be oppressed, you're scum - according to Sartre. Both of those actions or inactions will be borne out of fear of physical pain inflicted by those who are threatening you, but that's not a good enough reason.

Frantz Fanon wrote about the French occupation of Algeria and their treatment of the native people there. He said that violence is the only true means of shaking off such subjugation. Sartre noted that in yet another act of bad faith that soldiers delude themselves in to being able to physically commit these atrocities in the first place by reducing the status of the natives to cattle, to animals not deserving of rights or respect.

When you do this, you breed the negative characteristics that come out of desperation like violence and thieving and then make the false assumption that these are inherent traits of these people, which perpetuates the oppression further and, even worse, lets the slavemasters feel justified in doing whatever they can to retain power. The slavemasters engineer things in such a way to make the natives turn their violent feelings on each other, and they remain too fractional and afraid to take a stand against their real enemy.

Nietzsche

Nietzsche is the stereotypical existentialist. He wrote that “God is dead”: something that initially sounds melodramatic and confrontational for the sake of being confrontational. A more optimistic reading is that the death of God and religion means that human beings are free to make their own choices, which is incredibly exciting. It gives us the freedom to find value for ourselves and not be bound up in Catholic guilt or fear of retribution for not living in a way according to outdated scripture.

Human nature is not universal for Nietzsche. Our natures are all different and therefore it follows that different people can find and follow different conceptions of ‘excellence.’ This creates room for different moralities, and Frantz Fanon’s use of violence as a means of liberation.

Facticity

Facticity is an ugly word that describes the parts of ourselves which are simply given: our gender, our age, the wealth of our family, the way we look. They’re parts of the inauthentic self – the self that society sees and wants you to be.

It’s hard not to define someone by these criteria. Tthink about who you are, and you’ll probably hear yourself thinking that you’re a 20-something student or whatever you are. It’s shorthand, of course – you can’t intimately know every person you come across, and so this is just a lazy way of getting across what this person might be like. Newspapers do this all the time; the victim in a story was a 30 year old mother of two, or a 40 year old doctor. This is because to exist, you’re ‘being in the world’ – a certain type of engagement. But you don’t have to settle simply to exist and stick to whatever society expects of you.

Transcendence

You are defined not only by your facticity but by your choices. Because you have a choice, you can re-create yourself and refuse to be defined by your past, which you can do nothing about.

The Ubermensch was supposed to be the ultimate realisation of this before the word was hijacked completely by the Nazis. The idea was that these people would overcome what has so far defined us as human, carving out their own place in the world solely according to their own will. They transcend.

The Outsider

Graham wrote a very good seminar paper on The Outsider by Albert Camus. I didn't read the book myself, but I'm wishing that I did because it seems to sum everything up rather well, or maybe that was just Graham's writing. The main character is the titular 'Outsider' – a Patrick Bateman type who seems incapable of experiencing ordinary emotions and is confused and often distressed by the pointlessness of the world and of other people's actions. A marriage proposal, the death of his mother, and even his trial for the murder of a stranger he killed for no reason at all don't seem to particularly sway him, and he remains incredibly disassociated throughout the book. He simply doesn't care about anything – to nick a quote from Graham: “Nothing matters in the world beyond the meaning we give it, and since Meursault (the Outsider) doesn’t seem to give anything meaning, nothing matters.”

He doesn't lie. He doesn't say that he regrets the murder, because he truly does not. He's not trying to conform to society or hide the fact that he's just a husk of a human being. He is a “man prepared to die for the truth,” even though that's not a necessarily positive thing in this case. He is a true existentialist because at least he is not lying to himself. He's acting in good faith.

So, to conclude, acting in good faith isn't always going to guarantee a happy ending and because existentialism pretty much destroys the idea of an afterlife and the myriad complications of doing what you think is 'the right thing' based on some arbitrary system of metaphysical reward, don't look forward to harps and pearly gates just because you think you've been noble and true to yourself.

Bit of a downer, but then again, if Hell doesn't exist either, you can do whatever you like within (your own) reason, and this is precisely the reason why existentialism and liberation can go hand in hand.