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Posted by Fyodor on 8/20/2007, 12:48 pm, in reply to "Re: Zarathustra 18: Old and Young Women" "Supposing truth is a woman - what then? Are there not grounds for the suspicion that all philosophers, insofar as they were dogmatists, have been very inexpert about women? that the gruesome seriousness, the clumsy obtrusiveness with which they have usually approached truth so far have been awkward and very improper methods for winning a woman's heart? What is certain is that she has not allowed herself to be won: - and today every kind of dogmatism is left standing dispirited and discouraged." (F.Nietzsche, Beyond Good And Evil, Preface). "Courageous, unconcerned, scornful, coercive - so wisdom wisheth us; she is a woman, and ever loveth only a warrior." (F.Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Part I, 7) --Previous Message--
71.32.92.X
Nietzsche was rarely too far from women or "woman" in his writing: even if his flesh rarely touched them. What philosopher before Nietzsche extended as much time and ink discussing the feminine and what is female? Plato, Bacon, Spinoza, Descartes, Kant, Hegel, Hobbs, Mill, Marx? Altogether might fill a small chapter, and certainly tell us less about women than what these great minds needed woman to be. And, as Fritz reminds us: who are we to think we've been somehow exempted of this need?
: I’m not sure you’re making much progress when
: you concede that Nietzsche may not have been
: a vicious misogynist after all but only a
: stooge to the prejudices of his century.
: Either way your attitude is offensively
: condescending. Are you willing to consider
: the possibility that it’s really your views
: on gender that represent a fawning
: submission to the reigning dogmas of your
: age? If (in your opinion, not mine) even a
: genius like Nietzsche isn’t immune to the
: intellectual inertia and docility that
: enforce blind fealty to prevailing
: prejudices, won’t you at least be humble
: enough to admit that the same might also be
: true of you? That would after all explain
: your refusal to make any attempt to
: understand his views on gender and evaluate
: them on their merits, as opposed to
: scrounging around for some ad hominem reason
: to reject them. In any case, your diagnosis
: is wrong. A reading of the discussion of
: gender in Beyond Good and Evil makes it
: plain that he believes that in opposing
: gender equality he is bucking one of the
: dominant intellectual and social trends of
: his day—and doing so in part because he’s
: convinced that the sort of equality toward
: which his contemporaries aspire is demeaning
: and harmful to women. Neither a conformist
: nor a misogynist, he offers a critique of
: our modern prejudices about gender that in
: my opinion warrants our consideration no
: less than any of his other iconoclastic
: analyses.
:
: --Previous Message--
: --Previous Message--
: I always get annoyed at commentators who
: turn
: cheeky and supercilious when they discuss
: any aspect of Nietzsche's teaching that
: flies in the face of our reigning
: prejudices, as though every idol is fair
: game except the beloved idols of our own
: age. So Nietzsche's dissent from the
: ideology of gender equality gets him
: denounced as flawed and misogynous,
: inflammatory labels that serve as handy
: substitutes for any effort to understand his
: teaching and evaluate its merits. Not only
: that, but his alleged misogyny gives us
: permission to speculate about how this
: horrible vice may have ruined his prospects
: for a happy life with Lou, which in turn may
: have further inflamed that very same vice.
: Why take these cheap shots instead of
: engaging in careful exegesis and analysis?
: Any possibility of gaining insight into
: Nietzsche's teaching on women and men is
: thereby foreclosed, but at least we get to
: wallow in the conceit that we are somehow
: superior to one of the greatest philosophers
: of all time.
:
: OK. In fact Nietzsche's views on women are
: nothing special, they were the commmon
: opinions of most in the 19th century. Just a
: point where to me Nietzsche doesn't stand
: out. He was a genius, but he was also I
: think, like us all, an ordinary person with
: some prejudices of his time. Far more modern
: was Plato in the Republic, where Socrates
: boldy postulates an intellectual and
: philosophical equality between men and women
: as ruling guardians in his ideal regime...
: Thomas
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