As mentioned on the race episode, I thumbed through a book edited by Andrew Valls called Race and Racism in Modern Philosophy,
...James Winchester examines Nietzsche's views on race. Against those who charged that Nietzsche was a racist, Winchester shows that his relation to race is far too complex to be captured by this label. Although Nietzsche made some disturbing remarks on this score, he also departed from conventional racial thinking of his day by claiming, for example, that Jes constituted a strong race and Germans a mixed and weak one. These views, among others, do show that Nietzsche was a racialist--he believed that races were real and had great causal significance in shaping thought and culture. This view, combined with his assessment of the German and Jewish races, led Nietzsche to recommend "mixing" of the two in order to strengthen the German race. While Nietzsche sometimes thought in racial terms, his use of racial ideas was neither consistent nor well worked out."
Knowing that Nietzsche didn't have his shit together on this topic despite talking about it so much doesn't make me feel much better about him in this respect, but then again, I was already looking past the many unforgivable things he said about women, so the race issue doesn't require any further stretching of the brain on my part.
-Mark Linsenmayer
dmf says
March 30, 2012 at 10:10 amthis reminds me of conversations about how much the biography of philosophers should be read into, and or against, their writings/teachings, and for me there isn’t so much a general rule except to say that this should be demonstrated to be relevant or not as opposed to merely asserted.
For a living philosopher working on race folks may be interested in:
http://www.newappsblog.com/2012/03/multi-scale-political-affect-securitization-and-racial-anxiety.html
jay twitty says
March 31, 2012 at 9:09 amNietzsche didn’t much care for people in general did he? Didn’t like Germans. Nietzsche didn’t have his proverbial shit together on the class issue either. Actually, Nietzsche was a sick dick.
Bernardo Alonso Alonso says
June 23, 2012 at 6:04 amNietzsche was super racist. Hundreds and hundreds of Nietzsche’s original phrases reveal an explicit biological, social and personal criminal racist (inhuman, misoginist, sure!). These texts are usualy hidden or manipulate by ideologists. I give some texts now only in german and spanish, with citations under google search: “Nietzsche Rassist”
mattias says
March 11, 2017 at 6:46 pmwhat the hell…4-chan level of analysis of Nietzsche, got it completey wrong. I wish he were still around to deliver one of his gorgeously snarky rejections of bad thinking.
James says
March 31, 2017 at 7:45 pmThere are many examples of his racism and misogyny (like most European men at that time). Yes, he said some amazing things that have changed many lives, but it would be foolish to not consider his bias when reading his work. I always roll my eyes at people who replace Jesus with Nietzsche and quote him as some perfect all-knowing being. It is interesting how Christian practices show up even after people have left the fold.
Ryan Parker says
June 29, 2019 at 2:14 pmShow examples of where he’s “racist” and “misogynistic” and explain explain how it shows his personal problems with the groups he’s “targeting”.
omar says
May 25, 2019 at 11:35 pmIn defense of Nietzsche
Taking anyone’s work out context to serve your own purposes is often the trait of poor orators and writers when I need of “cred”. Nietzsche can’t be a racist in essence because racism or any ism for that fact is the in inescapable return of the same, the will to power and in short nihilism. Nietzsche defines nihilism as the “devaluation of the highest value”. His work is to serve hyperbolic critique that demands us to transcend our “humanity”. Nietzsche asks us to look at ourselves and to realize that we as a species have a problem with the herd mentality that we are eager to follow and we are often to eager to accept our condition, station and normative assumptions in life.
To understand him better…read Nietzsche: Philosopher, Psychologist, Antichrist a book by Walter Kaufmann
Nietzsche was an anti-humanist struggling with his internal anguish and his own inability to transcend nihilism.
Ryan Parker says
June 29, 2019 at 2:11 pmOnly observant comment I’ve read. Anti humanist though? I think he was so deeply in touch with humanity and history and human nature that he foresaw everything and wouldn’t have been able to do so unless he had been an avid proponent of the spirit of man.