My fave philosopher
2009-Sep-06, Sunday 08:45 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ssurgulSo, I found a very interesting, poorly-made documentary regarding a compare/contrast diatribe of Nietzsche's philosophy and how the Nazis got it right and wrong. It's rather interesting to philosophy geeks like me, to be sure. It was written and narrated by Stephen Hicks, PhD and produced in 2006. http://www.netflix.com/Movie/Nietzsche_and_the_Nazis/70064793?trkid=1166337
But what's far more chilling about it is that the case laid out for what the Nazi's believed in, based exclusively on historical documents and writings and such, is almost verbatim what the NeoCons have laid out as 'The Way' over the last 10 years specifically or so. The five main ideals the speaker says the Nazis stood for were:
1. Collectivism (over individualism)
2. Instinct and passion (over intellectualism/reason)
3. War and zero-sum conflict (over production/win-win trade)
4. Authoritarianism (over individual liberties)
5. Socialism (over capitalism)
Now, apart from the last (only on face value here; when you delve into what the Nazis were pushing for with item 5, you see that much of their ideals are, indeed, what the NeoCon Fundies are all pushing for most strongly) there is absolutely nothing separating Uncle Adolf from George W. Bush and his business-cronies that he put into power. And yes, yes, I know. It's still a stretch to compare the two, but in the system of former Checks and Balances we had here prior to GW's nightmare regime, he pushed the limits of what he could have achieved toward those same idealogies right to the edge of possibility.
And, yes, on the topic of what the final outcome of the doc actually was regarding the linkage between Nietzsche and the Nazis, he didn't really say. They disagreed in 5 key ways, and they agreed in 5 key ways. However, from my own reading of N. and my own philosophy training, I would tend to agree with most scholars that while N. proposed a lot of startling things, and while he would have praised the efforts of the Nazi Will to Power, what they based their beliefs and efforts on was bad, bad, bad interpretation and deliberate misreading and misquoting of the texts they built their ideology on.
But what's far more chilling about it is that the case laid out for what the Nazi's believed in, based exclusively on historical documents and writings and such, is almost verbatim what the NeoCons have laid out as 'The Way' over the last 10 years specifically or so. The five main ideals the speaker says the Nazis stood for were:
1. Collectivism (over individualism)
2. Instinct and passion (over intellectualism/reason)
3. War and zero-sum conflict (over production/win-win trade)
4. Authoritarianism (over individual liberties)
5. Socialism (over capitalism)
Now, apart from the last (only on face value here; when you delve into what the Nazis were pushing for with item 5, you see that much of their ideals are, indeed, what the NeoCon Fundies are all pushing for most strongly) there is absolutely nothing separating Uncle Adolf from George W. Bush and his business-cronies that he put into power. And yes, yes, I know. It's still a stretch to compare the two, but in the system of former Checks and Balances we had here prior to GW's nightmare regime, he pushed the limits of what he could have achieved toward those same idealogies right to the edge of possibility.
And, yes, on the topic of what the final outcome of the doc actually was regarding the linkage between Nietzsche and the Nazis, he didn't really say. They disagreed in 5 key ways, and they agreed in 5 key ways. However, from my own reading of N. and my own philosophy training, I would tend to agree with most scholars that while N. proposed a lot of startling things, and while he would have praised the efforts of the Nazi Will to Power, what they based their beliefs and efforts on was bad, bad, bad interpretation and deliberate misreading and misquoting of the texts they built their ideology on.