Most ought to know the concept of Nihilism, which is life-annulment and/or self-hatred.
A large portion, perhaps a majority, perhaps 99% of humanity, have degrees of self-hatred, self-contempt, and resentiment. I will argue and demonstrate that these feelings (of inferiority) are directly wrought from upbringing, genetics, and specifically, the reproduction of the (lower-inferior) slave castes of the world. In other words, Nihilism is an ideology produced by the slave classes, over time, that have evolved along with humanity and human history, as methods with ‘coping’ with reality, a specific reality insuch that people are enslaved throughout life.
You know what I mean, innately. So this will not require much of an argument on my behalf. Let’s call it “The Matrix” for the popular analogy. People live their lives in such ways that dissatisfaction and other self-doubts creep up and accumulate. Are you living the life you want? Do you feel restrained, in general? Are you free, or not? Aren’t you limited in various ways in life? Are you a victim? Do you identify as liberal-left? Are you “in control” of your own destiny? Do you have a faith, a morality, a sense of self-responsibility? Are you content with life? If you died tomorrow, or today, could you imagine being satisfied with what you had done or accomplished in life?
Perhaps there is a method that humanity could measure these “negative” feelings of life, the overall dissatisfaction and contempt. People refer to these as “negative” energy. Some people “suck the life” out of others, parasitically, a negative influence. Others, rarer, are more “positive”. The ones, usually younger, with a zeal for life, hopes, dreams, desires, idealism which has not yet confronted reality. Idealism and Nihilism mix well together. But a main point of this post is to clarify the differences between “negative” ideals and “positive” ideals.
Perhaps all ideals are Nihilistic in the sense that they express a discontent and dissatisfaction for “the way the world is” right now, currently. Who is ever truly and enduringly contented with life? And how does an individual become discontented in life anyway? Isn’t it by means of higher knowledge and wisdom, that the world could “be a better place”, or that any individual could reconfigure life and existence “to your own favor”? These are Platonic ideals spawning from the ‘Utopian’ concept. That is what is meant by “First Philosophy” of the Greeks. That life is not “as you wished it were”, and indeed, can never truly become.
This is the nature of Idealism. Idealism is very much alike Nihilism, because both represent a discontentment and dissatisfaction with “reality right now”. And this is a biological and genetic compulsion, an impulse, a reflex, an instinct. Because all life, all biology, operates and functions in such a way as to 1) propagate itself, and 2) manipulate environments according to its own benefit. The 2nd point is called ‘Adaptation’. And when organisms do propagate, known as sexual success, then the 1st point is called ‘Evolution’. Thus the Idealistic and Nihilistic components of life, are ultimately biological and genetic, innate within life.
Nihilism however is a different context, the “negative” force, the “bad attitudes” of life, the self-hatred which marks illness, disease, and mortality. People are weak. People are slaves. People struggle for power, control, authority, morality, throughout life. Every person, individual, has a different means to fight, compete, and gain ‘control’ in life. These struggles mean different things to different people. An “accomplishment” for one, is not the same for another.
To begin this thread or discussion, Nihilism is the avid rejection of reality, when idealism is confronted by and with realism. Ideals do not mesh with Reality. Ideal and Real do not mix. Nihilism is the absolute rejection of reality. Thus Nihilism represents a mix of self ‘hatred’, contempt, and fatalism, that clings onto some ideals. I will provide you with a few very popular examples:
The first major form of Nihilism is “belief in afterlife”, the Judeo-Christian concepts of Heaven and Hell.
The second major form of Nihilism is “Nirvana”, the ideal of being “at absolute peace”, annulling or rejecting reality (which is chaotic and conflicting).
The third form of Nihilism is Hedonism, rejecting reality and life by means of drugs, modern lifestyles, and frivolous (impotent) sex.
All of these, across the world, are the crutches and injections that most the world’s population use as means to ‘escape’ from reality. And perhaps it cannot be avoided, hedonism and decadence enjoyed in moderation only. But disease, illness, Nihilism demonstrate an addiction to these concepts. Just as Christians or Jews cannot imagine the universe and existence without (Abrahamic) god. Without an eternal, spiritual sky-daddy. Because to do so, to imagine existence, forced to confront reality, without a parental/authority figure, would force each and every individual, or society, into that direct confrontation.
You would become forced to take responsibility for yourself, completely, for the first time. You would be forced to fight and compete for your Autonomy, your self-locomotion, your destiny, all the subsequent choices of your lifetime. No excuses, no victimizaiton, no hope left, except to confront ‘Agon’ for the first or final time.
Imagine for a moment, a Christian or Jew, deprived of their god. What would life be like without that catharsis, without the indoctrinated hope and faith? Could people, the populace, survive without it? Can the populace become sober, and, for how long? How long until the relapse into drugs and pleasure-seeking?
Has humanity ever, really, managed to escape it?