Date: Thu, 31 Aug 2000 11:18:47 +0200
From: Syphon Soul <haengen-AT-c2i.net>
Subject: Re: Nietzsche ist tot


> How so? And are these times really any different fundamentally than when
> Hesiod though he lived in the Age of Iron and somehow missed out on Golden
> Age? When Nietzsche criticized modernity, did he not do so because the
> masses would now be able to voice their resentment though democracy? The
> Greeks practiced a true democracy, but they lacked resentment, so it might
> be it is not democracy per se that N criticized, but the bitter, buzzing
> masses who would fail to affirm the Ubermench, and they have from both the
> left and the right, mostly because they are all so busy resenting the past.

  Mayhap have you a point, but the fact is, that the masses are rampant, society
is chains, and masks are worn no longer on the outside, but on the inside. We are
hiding from ourselves, our potential. I do not feel the same was true of Hesiod,
and his ilk. The masses are opiates for religion, destruction, and decadence, I
would say... But who am I to say that is bad. Let democracy exist all it wants, so
long as I have no part of it. What I fear the most is that I will find that it is
impossible to escape society. I yearn for alienation, something which has become
impossible, or nigh so. I wish to be the Ubermensch.... I can only do this alone.

> Don't these thoughts contradict N's preaching against the Last Man? Isn't
> the idea to create values and decide what is valuable and what isn't, to
> practice One Thing is Needful? Sure, many squander their freedom, but so
> what. The Ubermench will not.

   You yearn for this lord of Man, do you not? Alas, I fear he can never be a
universal term. I am far too much a solipsist for that.


> Forgive me, but what revolution are you speaking of, the great war that N
> proclaimed? Are we not fighting it now over values and tablets that no
> longer apply even though some warriors hold on to them with dear life? Let
> us not forget that pessimism is the doom and gloom over the failing of an
> ideal life, that it will never get better. Let us not forget that we can
> and never will live life in some ideal world, and to think we will is the
> source of resentment as well as its consequence. All we can concentrate on
> is the present and the reality of the present.

  Revolution, evolution.... see how the words seem alike... except that a
revolution is going against evolution.... that's all I mean.. a little pun, at
best. But yes, we are fighting over stone tablets... neo-religion is on the rise,
as fanatic and flagellant as ever. A war cannot be won over that which refuses to
be defeated. Idealism, is neccessary, alas... and it hurts me to find that N. does
not agree... but then again, the pain of true convictions always sting... or
rather... of true knowledge...


> Good point, but most use that narcotic "work" to avoid themselves in the
> day and that other drug "TV" to do the same at night. Those who hold the
> power now want it that way, so that going to work the next day will break
> the monotony of staying home. It's a perfect mechanism to keep the herd
> under control, and hasn't it always be close to this way? Of course, but it
> never stopped the potential Ubermench from flourishing.

  The potential Ubermensch, is always decadent in nature, though, because of his
being laced by society... often raised by those lesser to him... The power is
relative, the masses are doomed.


> Ah, yes, same here, but N did say we pass though many philosophies on our
> crooked path. In Dionysian terms, we die and are born again.

  And yet, I have arrived? Proves the ephemeron which is the folly of man clinging
to Time...

> This last line is my real reason for a reply. There has been much
> discussion here and there about being a reaction. What is that? What is
> wrong with it? What in life is not a reaction? In all sports, from ping
> pong to football, reactions are not only necessary, but quick reactions are
> esteemed. War in the military sense is reaction and anticipating reactions,
> and those who can plan the best strategy around this usually wins. Art and
> philosophy are both reactions. We can say the development of philosophy is
> a series of reactions (it is not that, it is this!), and art is a reaction
> even though we call it inspiration. Of course, "being a reaction" and
> reacting could be too different things, but no one, it would seem, can be
> only a reaction. Perhaps the difference is in if one creates via a reaction
> or not? But then, we could argue that even non-creation can be a crooked
> path to creation (convalescence?). This to me is what beyond good and evil
> is all about. If Nietzsche saw a hell, it was spelled L-A-S-T M-A-N, and he
> himself may have offered enough perspectives to prevent a conventional
> agreement on what he meant. Actually, he would rather be a buffoon than
> have a standard one-interpretation-fits-all. That's my guess anyway, and I
> don't expect anyone to say, "yes! that's right!" It is only right for me,
> and only at this moment. This understanding could die and another be reborn
> at any moment.

   Humanity is a reaction.... and thus is man. I yearn not to be, for I see myself
as quite inhuman. I wish to create, and destroy without the chains of past ages. I
facilitate it at times, alas the products are so subjective that I myself am sole
admirer of my work. I yearn to write a "Zeit und Sein"... the most 'active' book I
have ever read. I wish to change the world, not through physical action, or
democratic dabbling, but through drastic changes in perspective. And so I do,
often. I am quite aside from society, alas, not free, but cornered, caged, tied by
ressentiment and pity by these masses. Of course, I can will the existence of
these bonds out of existence, but to what an end, when I cannot be alone. Even in
a crowd I am not alone.

  I wish not to react, when those I react upon makes me filthy, diseased, and
weak.





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