Philosophizing with a Hammer (and Sickle)
Revolutionary Nietzscheanism bulletin
Believe it or not, Friedrich Nietzsche was born a hundred and eighty years ago yesterday. (I know: it really snuck up on all of us!) As soon as we realized it, we here at Radio Free Pizza considered it appropriate to briefly review how some of Nietzsche’s philosophy factored in to a couple of our past deliveries, and—much more importantly—to fill in whatever other details we can.
Returning customers may remember our coverage as having mainly referred to Nietzsche’s thought in the context of political philosophy—since, around here, politics is our beloved [sport-]ball: the circus of misdirection performed in the media, which serve as a de facto branch of government for the surface state. They might even recall our March dispatch first mentioning Nietzsche’s political philosophy, at least as Keegan Kjeldsen presents it on The Nietzsche Podcast. There we described the philosopher as critical of capitalism and socialism, and as quite likely to be so of fascism too: each for different reasons, but primarily due to their shared focus on utilitarianism and their impact on human individuality, culture, and social hierarchy.
For Nietzsche, capitalism didn’t reward genuine merit, and its focus on satisfying human desires weakened cultural values and society overall, creating a flawed hierarchy with undeserving leadership. Socialism, meanwhile, erased individuality and turned society into a production line, wherein the state became the sole outlet for individual ambition—which one only achieved at the cost of one’s personal identity. Fascism, in turn, the philosopher would have surely criticized for diminishing culture with its authoritarian idolatry of the state, and for substituting in place of that stifled culture only a shallow unity based on national identity.
So, the 19th-century philosopher criticized (or would have criticized) all three of the 20th century’s major political ideologies for their utilitarian foundations, their suppression of individuality, and their negative impact on culture and human potential. I doubt it comes as any surprise, then, that he also criticized the political philosophies that predated him by millennia, as we covered last month: Nietzsche’s critique of Plato, we learned, centers on a rejection of Plato’s political and moral philosophy. While the ideal society of The Republic echoes some authoritarian themes—with its philosopher-kings, hierarchical structure, and control over art and education—which therefore lead some modern thinkers to view Plato as a proto-fascist, Nietzsche would simply reject Plato’s abstract ideals and emphasis on rationality over sensory experience, seeing the elevation of the “realm of forms” as a denial of life’s richness, and a precursor to the Christian morality that Nietzsche also opposed for its devaluation of the sensory world and of individual vitality. That idealism places too much weight on moral prejudices, such as the notion of justice being tied to social harmony and the philosopher-king model, and Nietzsche therefore critiques it as an unrealistic attempt to impose rigid structures on a fluid, dynamic reality.
While Plato’s focus on education and censorship for the sake of morality might seem important, Nietzsche would argue it fosters conformity, suppressing individual creativity and the personal will to power.
Seems like nothing was ever good enough for Nietzsche.
But what more do we know about Nietzsche’s political philosophy? Surely you won’t be surprised to learn that the aforementioned Kjeldsen has already offered us a further analysis. At the start of last year, the host turned his attention again to the topic, beginning with his reading of Aphorism #463 from Human, All Too Human (1878).
That aphorism offers Kjeldsen an entry-point to a discussion of Nietzsche’s political philosophy during his middle period, running from Human, All Too Human to the first four books of The Gay Science (1882). This period represents a shift away from Wagnerian romanticism and metaphysics towards critique of morality and Christianity before culminating in the philosopher asserting the “death of God,” leading to Nietzsche’s later affirmative philosophy.
Still, Kjeldsen tells us (at ~26:34), his political opinions during his middle period don’t differ tremendously from later works, but here they’re more conciliatory towards modernity: he seems invested in contemporary questions, given his critiques of democracy. In Nietzsche’s view, democracy incentivizes political parties to simplify and distort their principles to appeal to the “lowest common denominator,” leading to the elevation of mediocre and narrow-minded values. Kjeldsen draws parallels between Nietzsche’s critique and modern phenomena like the media’s selective coverage and the oversimplification of political discourse.
Nonetheless, while Nietzsche experiments with modern ideas, Kjeldsen tells us (at ~29:03–29:27) that the philosopher primarily concerns himself with “timeless values that transcend the age, [owing to] his cyclical view of history [and to] his desire to bring our actual lives to the forefront of value, [motivating him] to wage a cultural war rather than a political one” to remove detrimental values and false assumptions from the culture before creating new values. In addition, Kjeldsen also examines (at ~44:35) Aphorism #439, containing his proposal for a caste system with a “working caste” and an “idle caste” dedicated to culture and leisure.
(One might wonder then why Nietzsche didn’t take more of a liking to Plato the ancient eugenicist!)
The philosopher argues that this system would allow for the production of higher culture and facilitate the emergence of genius among the idle caste, though Kjeldsen tells us how this apparently contradicts his arguments elsewhere that the state is inherently hostile to cultural development and that true culture often emerges during times of political weakness. (Maybe the state would only facilitate cultural genius in peacetime?) That said, the host sees a valid comparison to be drawn between Nietzsche’s ideas here and modern ideologies of meritocracy and technocracy for how the latter funnels the professionally credentialed into a present-day idle caste, broadly preserving hierarchy while still allowing for a degree of social mobility—though he of course acknowledges the potential flaws in their various implementations. These ideas, it seems, might represent some offhand effort from Nietzsche to reconcile his aristocratic leanings with the emerging forces of modernity.
Though Nietzsche surely critiques the liberal and leftist ideologies of democracy and egalitarianism, Kjeldsen also discusses Nietzsche’s thoughts on nationalism—particularly his concept of the “good European,” which envisions a pan-European identity transcending national boundaries that he believes will, among other achievements, put an end to antisemitism. As the host tells us, Nietzsche sees the dissolution of nations as inevitable due to factors like increased mobility, cultural exchange, and the weakening of national dynasties, all of which the philosopher views as producing the opportunity for a unified European civilization.
Kjeldsen concludes the episode with a discussion (at ~1:28:19) of Nietzsche’s critique in Aphorism #480 of both left-wing (socialist) and right-wing (nationalist) political ideologies, with the philosopher arguing that both sides appeal to different forms of laziness and envy, catering to the desires of the masses rather than promoting higher culture. The host connects this critique to the importance Nietzsche sees in cultivating a true nobility dedicated to the production of culture.
While some might read the philosopher’s politics here as conservative, his critique of right-wing nationalism appeared again on The Nietzsche Podcast later last year, in which that critique of nationalism—along with those of left-wing liberal democracy and of egalitarian socialism—all receive further details.
Here, Kjeldsen discusses the different interpretations of Nietzsche’s politics, ranging from those who embrace his “aristocratic radicalism” to those who dismiss it entirely. The host argues, however, that Nietzsche’s perspectivism and his concept of the will to power are interconnected, with the latter giving rise to the former and leading to a view of the world as a battleground of competing forces, each with its own equally justified perspective. At the same time, Nietzsche asserts the will to power as a fundamental truth, creating a paradox within his philosophy: after all, if it’s that fundamental, why should he then call for revaluation of values?
In pursuit of that answer, and of its link to Nietzsche’s political philosophy, Kjeldsen first presents (at ~4:25) the philosopher’s rejection of both traditional morality and universal truths, seeing the former as human projections onto the world and the latter as contingent and perspectival—a temporary victor on the battlefield of competing forces. (Kjeldsen dutifully notes [at ~7:40] that, for his consequent rejection of implementing idealistic measures to alter or improve mankind, Nietzsche’s political ideas are counter-revolutionary.) Out of the war of all against all, the state emerges as a power-structure enabling the weak to constrain the strong. For Nietzsche, laws aim merely to preserve society, rather than to engender its further progress, while leaders in various eras use ideas like virtue, glory and justice to disguise the will to power.
Accordingly, the philosopher rejects idealistic notions of rights and sovereignty. Instead of grounding his thoughts in these fundamentals of political theory, Kjeldsen tells us (at ~9:31–10:13), Nietzsche’s own politics in fact reflect his commitment to an unexpected value:
What Nietzsche expresses in his politics is a sentiment common to much of Nietzsche’s writing. And perhaps oddly enough, given the aristocratic radicalism of Nietzsche’s political views, that sentiment is freedom. What we mean by freedom here is not “freedom” as we usually conceive of it in the political sense: it’s “free-spiritedness,” as Nietzsche coins it, which involves the ability to come to conclusions without the external pressures of society and culture, to escape from those pressures, and thus to arrive at the unity of one’s actions and their desires, where one’s will and one’s character are aligned.
Therefore, such a free-spiritedness would be the core of any new values that Nietzsche would advocate for creating, and which he’d support any state cultivating among its citizenry. Certainly these values aren’t the concern of those whom Kjeldsen cites (at ~18:56–19:27) as evidence of how “we’re always living out the same drama […] There are always those obsessed with their national character, or absorbed with an identity as a class revolutionary, the mass person: the social order is always delegitimizing itself, and the traditional ideas are always losing their luster.”
Accordingly, we can feel confident that Nietzsche wouldn’t share either right-wing concerns for keeping the national character free of foreign influence, nor left-wing interests in liberating the masses. Meanwhile, the kind of freedom for which the philosopher advocates would presumably exceed that which we find under liberal democracy—within the context of which, Kjeldsen reminds us (at ~21:10), “oligarchy returns even now,” lending some further weight to Nietzsche’s cyclical view of history.
Beneath that oligarchy, Kjeldsen adds later (at ~45:24), our society has entered a “well-managed analytical utilitarian era [with] a renewed faith in the idealism of democracy, [of] socialism, and [of] universal human value: a new moralism based on these ‘Last Man ideals,’ in many respects”—ideals, that is, which contradict or otherwise fail to recognize the will to power, from which the new values of our free-spirited state would surely originate, and to which all its cultural achievements would surely trace their inspiration. Perhaps in the interest of discovering these, Kjeldsen invites the audience (at ~55:29–1:08:59) to engage with Nietzsche’s challenging ideas—emphasizing his call for self-determination and for accepting one’s own nature, without being coerced by the voice of the collective or moral fictions—and to so discover what new truths they “have a right to possess,” and in the process become who they truly are.
As we mentioned above, Kjeldsen would surely hasten to clarify that he considers Nieztsche’s political ideas to be counter-revolutionary.
So, why do you suppose we subtitled this “[the] revolutionary Nietzscheanism bulletin”?
No, not just because I’m looking for another subculture like MAGA Communism that attempts to synthesize the contradictory. I’ve also done it to showcase a pair of Nietzschean personalities with commentaries that spend considerable time unpacking the philosopher’s politics. These personalities, however, unpack it in the interest either of uniting it with socialism, of bridging the divide between them, of critiquing their narrow overlap, or, otherwise, of articulating their inherent antagonism—and yet, despite (or because of) that apparent contradiction, Kjeldsen has interviewed both.
First, Devin Gouré appeared as a guest to describe how he interprets Nietzsche’s philosophy from a left-wing perspective. He and Kjeldsen discuss how to interpret Nietzsche from a leftist view, given the philosopher’s skepticism of political ideologies. However, key areas of overlap include critiquing capitalism as a source of alienation. Gouré cites the work of both Gilles Deleuze and Antonio Negri as two avenues through which to reconcile Nietzschean thought with that of Marx. In contrast, he critiques a reactionary right-wing trend of appropriating Nietzsche for how its racism, social Darwinism, and patriarchal perspective depart from the philosopher’s substance and style, and similarly repudiates those conservative commentators like Jordan Peterson who gravitate towards Nietzsche as cynical ‘Last Man’ attempts to revive traditional values, which the philosopher would surely reject.
For those interested in how Gouré might further articulate his Left Nietzscheanism, we can turn to his summer 2023 appearance on Acid Horizon.
Here, Gouré and the mononymous Justin present their readings of Nietzsche as leftists, discussing: the lessons that the philosopher’s critiques of revenge and of reactive resentment can teach social justice movements; if “Left Nietzscheans” should support democracy given Nietzsche’s skepticism of its leveling tendencies for promoting mediocrity; if democracy might simply be incompatible with his hierarchical thinking; and if the tensions that limit efforts to align Nietzsche with contemporary leftist ideals might make them ultimately incompatible.
As if attempting to answer all those questions at once, Gouré tells us (at ~58:15–59:34):
I think that the Left should have commitments to democracy as an institution, and also particularly should have a commitment to not running it together with liberalism into the combination of “liberal democracy” […] and this is somewhere where Nietzsche has proven very important for democratic theory over the past several decades […] providing us with a model of unruly disruptive creative freedom that creates productive adversarial encounters in democracy, and the target is kind of a […] deliberative democracy where we all sit down and legitimize power by talking about our principles and what ought to be done […] The Nietzschean model comes in to provide an idea of democracy [that] is grounded in […] disruption of what constitutes the idea of the good life, or [of] “the morally right” that at any given time might be ideologically governing the decisions of a particular state.
Gouré offered yet further details on his Left Nietzscheanism last autumn on 1Dime Radio, which we featured in our July bulletin on MAGA Communism.
Gouré first describes his academic journey—starting with an interest in political theory and French poststructuralism, and later exploring Marxist thought and the Frankfurt School’s engagement with Nietzsche—before he and the host turn to the relevance and implications of Friedrich Nietzsche's philosophy for the left, particularly focusing on concepts such as the will to power, slave morality, and the role of tragedy and affirmation in emancipatory politics. Arguing that Nietzsche’s ideas have already influenced the left through thinkers like the aforementioned Deleuze, Michel Foucault, and the postmodern tradition, Gouré suggests that—while Nietzsche is often associated with aristocratic and reactionary tendencies—his critique of modernity and instrumental reason can offer valuable insights for leftists, particularly in terms of addressing issues of gender, race, and sexuality that may be overlooked by a strictly class-centric approach.
Importantly, Gouré argues that Nietzsche’s genealogy of morals exposes the dangers of a morality founded on resentment and the negation of life, and that leftists must confront this challenge to move beyond a purely negative approach, to embrace affirmation as a way to sustain hope and emancipatory possibilities, and to avoid falling into paralysis. Moreover, he maintains that Nietzsche’s will to power—situated here as a fundamental principle of organic life and the affirmation of existence—should not be understood as a crude desire for power accumulation, but rather as a recognition of the excess and creative possibilities inherent in life itself, with which leftists can more powerfully affirming human potential. Nonetheless, Gouré warns that the philosopher’s critique of slave morality and his recognition of power relations as ubiquitous shouldn’t be seen as an endorsement of fixed hierarchies, but rather as a call to negotiate and transform these asymmetries into more productive orders, paradoxically suggesting that progressives embrace a form of “moral perfectionism” that affirms cultural greatness and human potentialities as a condition for realizing an egalitarian society.
The second of the aforementioned Nietzschean personalities examining the philosopher’s politics through a socialist lens—Daniel Tutt—appeared on The Nietzsche Podcast this past spring.
Here, Tutt tells Kjeldsen about his journey into philosophy through Nietzsche, the fusion of Marx and Nietzsche in his work, Nietzsche’s critique of socialism and the left, the philosopher’s influence on various political movements, and his role in contemporary Marxist thought. Tutt explains (at ~3:43) how he sees Nietzsche as emerging at the endpoint of a certain form of romantic thought, before their conversation turns (at ~14:30) to the influence of Nietzsche on various political movements, such as the May 1968 movement in France, the socialist libertarianism uprising in Italy in 1977, the American Civil Rights Movement, and the Chinese Cultural Revolution under Mao’s wife, Jiang Qing.
Still, Tutt maintains (at ~22:10) that in Nietzsche, “what we find here is a romantic anti-capitalism […] diametrically opposed to Marxism.” Accordingly, he describes (at ~25:00) a concern that fusing Nietzsche’s concepts with Marxist class analysis could lead to retaining a minimal form of slavery, given the philosopher’s belief in the necessity of rank order, Concerns of this type characterize Tutt’s further discussion (at ~1:22:10) of the future of Marxism in relation to Nietzsche’s ideas. Though he argues for a Marxism that puts the question of working-class emancipation back on the table and addresses the persistence of wage labor and immiseration in capitalist society—and who doesn’t?—he nonetheless sees Nietzsche as a parasite on the political left, and he therefore works in his own book to invite a pugilistic relationship with the philosopher while still acknowledging his profound insights.
Tutt offered further details to his perspective on Nietzsche two years ago to Doug Lain of Sublation Media, which we also featured in our aforementioned bulletin on MAGA Communism.
Tutt discusses (at ~4:01) Lukács’s analysis of Nietzscheanism as a bourgeois ideology that emerged in the late 19th century to justify the decadence of the imperialist age. He argues that Nietzsche’s philosophy sought to create a comprehensive worldview that relegated the working class to an appendage of cultural production, maintaining a commitment to high art and conceptual production for a select few. Therefore, Nietzscheanism has deep connections to the ideological project of the bourgeois class—owing, Tutt explains (at ~38:53), to the philosopher’s lack of class consciousness and understanding of the working-class worldview. To present a real-world case—one that might have enlightened Nietzsche—showing how a proletarian cultural movement can develop an ideological power from below, Tutt offers (at ~40:05) the case study of the “We Are the Poors” movement in South Africa, as discussed by Jan Raymond.
Importantly, Lain argues here for the ability of everyday people to develop intellectually and contribute to theorizing their own liberation. That, in Tutt’s view, is a capacity that Marxists often neglect—so much so that we can easily imagine their inability to theorize about the lived experiences of the contemporary proletariat lends itself to charges of elitism that paradoxically excludes working-class intellectuals. On the whole, their analysis of the impact of Nietzscheanism on the Marxist Left emphasizes the potential pitfalls of individualism and anti-humanism.
Believe it or not, Tutt also appeared last December on the same 1Dime Radio mentioned above.
Here, Tutt throws cold water on any designs I might have had to lump him in with “the revolutionary Nietzscheans”: while affirming the philosopher’s profound cultural effects, Tutt finds that, despite his critiques of modernity and of capitalism, Nietzsche’s philosophy aligns with the interests of the ruling class and reinforces existing hierarchies, and—owing not least to the philosopher’s critique of the egalitarian tradition—his thinking represents a reactionary agenda that often serves to undermine solidarity and class consciousness among the oppressed.
Nonetheless, some of his ideas—like slave morality, resentment, and the will to power—have potential implications for leftist politics and revolutionary movements. The host 1Dime makes (at ~31:42) some of these connections himself: “you could say the powerless [proletarian] majority are innocent and that they’re inherently good because of their position […] and rich people are inherently morally bad,” he says, illustrating the slave morality at work in some strains of leftist thought.
For that and other reasons, Tutt argues that Nietzsche’s philosophy ultimately shuts down the possibility of political revolution and the rationalist kernel of Marxism. Therefore, he advocates for supplementing Nietzsche’s insights with Marxist dialectics and a commitment to working-class emancipation, rejecting the abandonment of political revolution in favor of mere cultural subversion. Overall, he presents a nuanced critique of “Left Nietzscheanism,” calling for a more grounded and materialist approach to revolutionary politics while nonetheless recognizing the value of Nietzsche’s psychological and philosophical contributions when appropriated judiciously—though Tutt warns us still that an over-reliance on Nietzschean vitalism and a rejection of Enlightenment rationality can generate an impotent revolutionary praxis that reinforces existing hierarchies in the service of bourgeois interests.
(If that last part makes you think of “pan-leftist counter-gangs,” then we’re on the same page.)
So, that’s gotta be about all we can say about “Revolutionary Nietzscheanism,” right?
Well, not quite yet, no, because—wouldn’t you know it—The Nietzsche Podcast’s Kjeldsen appeared on the aforementioned 1Dime Radio just last month.
1Dime interviews Kjeldsen about the political philosophies of Nietzsche, Machiavelli, Marx, and other thinkers—among them Ibn Khaldun, to whose thought Kjeldsen provides (at ~19:53–22:29) a nice introduction that helpfully illustrates Nietzsche’s political approach:
Libertarians or anarchistic-type political thinkers […] always reduce everything down to the individual, right? […] But what Khaldun points to is that [cooperation] isn’t something rationally deliberated. It’s an immediate material reality: “We will all cooperate or we will die in the desert” […] Then when I read a couple of Nietzsche’s early unpublished essays, like the Greek state, he talks about the state as this “objectivation of instinct” […] You could say an objectification or a reification of instinct. He calls it the iron clamp that basically directs or focuses all of the instincts of the individual. And Nietzsche treats that as […] an actual power that you have to reckon with […] I think if you read Ibn Khaldun […] it’s the willingness to view yourself as having value for a power that is greater or beyond yourself—that is worth preserving beyond who you are—and that’s not something you necessarily rationally deliberate. It's the kind of thing that you come to. There’s a great passage […] where Nietzsche is sort of experimenting with more explicit political statements in the time of Human, All Too Human, where he says, “Well, if you want a republic to survive, you can only let people who have children make the political decisions because only they will have the stake in the future, right?” That’s very funny: he kind of sounds like J .D. Vance there […] But again, that’s not necessarily something Nietzsche supports. He’s approaching it from that same angle of trying to say, “Okay, how do you get people who view the society, the collective project that you’re engaged in, as something that they self-identify with?”
Evidently 1Dime appreciates the comparison, telling us (at ~25:55) that Kjeldsen’s mention of Human, All Too Human has reminded him “about one of the aphorisms in there […] where he says that there’s a gift and a curse to having a society with strong cohesion, because a society with strong religious cohesion tends […] to have more durability […] but they also obstruct free thinking,” with the result of diminishing a society’s capacity for innovation and adaptation.
That thought in turn reminds Kjeldsen (at ~27:53) to mention a useful connection here to Plato’s Republic:
There’s another passage where he’s saying, “If you want to have a tutelary government […] a state that exists for the purposes of educating the populace to virtue. The masses aren’t adequate to rule, but the nobility will sort of bring them up and teach them […] if you want to maintain this, the leader has to actually promote religion in the society, because there are some ways that religion can comfort the heart that the leader can’t […] it would actually be really bad […] to not have some sort of metaphysical framework” […] He directly references Machiavelli, who in the Discourses on Livy says it often behooves the leaders of society to, what would you say, promote piety in those old sort of traditional religious virtues.
Of course, two intellectuals discussing Nietzsche couldn’t leave us with the impression that the philosopher approves of Christianity as the religious framework maintaining social cohesion. But their discussion of Nietzsche’s critique of Christianity and slave morality proves particularly useful for our purposes: Kjeldsen explains (at ~36:07) how Nietzsche view Christianity as a “cult of revenge” that instilled a sense of guilt and resentment in European values, justifying suffering and providing a sense of meaning while also becoming a source of weakness and self-denial. That said, 1Dime raises (at ~43:09) the question of whether Nietzsche believed Christianity empowered or disempowered the poor and working-class movements:
Nietzsche thinks that this Christian narrative that encourages people to set the good life aside and to have a guilty conscience and to believe in the afterlife, etc. He thinks that this empowers socialism […] he thinks it empowers the poor. And it gives them also a whole moral system where they can say […] “The weak shall inherit the earth […] we are good because we’re weak, the powerful are bad because they’re powerful,” etc. He thinks this empowers the poor. Whereas I think the opposite […] working-class movements can say, “We’ll turn the other cheek: we can’t be authoritarian. We can’t be like the bad guys.” And really movements that have failed, I think, have this sort of thinking, whether it be protest movements that are saying, “Let’s obey all the laws. We’re good because we have the right cause. It’s the powerful people who do the bad things like violence” […] Allende, I think is a good, interesting, failed socialist movement, because he wanted to play by the rules […] He was trying to say, “We’re not like our opposition,” and then got destroyed. So I don’t know what you think about this reading, because I think this is something Nietzsche was wrong about. Nietzsche thought that this sort of slave morality, which he thinks is present in Christianity, empowers the poor.
That might explain why Fidel Castro’s daughter reports that the Cuban communist leader had rediscovered his Christian faith before the end of his life. Their interview doesn’t cover Castro, of course, but it might surprise you that Stalin and Mao come up (at ~1:05:19), with 1Dime contrasting the tyrannical purges of the former against the Cultural Revolution of the latter. “Mao genuinely believed that if you gave power to the people, they would build a communist [society].” But unfortunately, “it really was people bullying each other. It was fundamentally very ugly […] when you just give people the authority […] they might just use it as a way to legitimize their feeling of power, their enjoyment of power, and that drive for power can be even greater among powerless people.”
On that thought, Kjeldsen elaborates on Nietzsche’s idea that weakness corrupts, not power. He explains that Nietzsche’s conception of power, emphasizing that true power comes from abundance and fullness, not from competition or struggle: a powerful person is not obsessed with their enemies or competition, but rather operates from a place of excess, unconcerned with proving themselves. This contrasts with weakness, which Nietzsche links to a reactive mindset—constantly seeking revenge, recompense, or validation from others. His critique of resentment highlights that people trapped in reactive mindsets, where they cannot act on feelings of frustration or slight, are ultimately consumed by those festering grievances. This contrasts with the active, healthy individual, who would act from a place of strength and autonomy and would be indifferent to slights or competition—like someone so wealthy they don’t think about money. This indifference is what allows for the creation of great art and leisure, and a truly powerful individual focuses on creation and self-expression rather than being trapped in reactive cycles. Accordingly, the simple attainment of power doesn’t mean someone embodies Nietzsche’s ideal of strength or vitality: instead, power corrupted by weakness, as seen in historical figures like Hitler or Pol Pot, is often a self-destructive force.
Of course, 1Dime acknowledges the point, but still offers (at ~1:19:25) the interesting corollary that “ultimately you cannot really test your own virtues, your own principles, without power.”
In reflecting on Nietzsche’s always complex, often contrarian, and sometimes contradictory views, we’re left with a philosophy that defies traditional political categorization. His critiques of capitalism, socialism, and fascism arise from his concern for individuality, culture, and human potential, placing him at odds with both conservative and progressive ideologies. Nietzsche’s aristocratic radicalism, his rejection of utilitarianism, and his skepticism toward egalitarianism all challenge leftist movements, while his focus on hierarchy and power dynamics raises concerns about reinforcing elitist structures. Yet, his ideas have inspired both radical leftists and reactionary conservatives, making him a figure of enduring debate among political thinkers.
At the core of Nietzsche’s political thought lies a commitment to freedom—not the liberal democratic kind, but the “free-spiritedness” to break from societal constraints and create new values. This freedom, rooted in individual will and creativity, is not about dominance or competition, but self-mastery and cultural flourishing. His rejection of slave morality and his concept of the will to power offer valuable tools for revolutionary thought, but only if adapted carefully to avoid reproducing the very hierarchies that leftists aim to dismantle.
Ultimately, Nietzsche’s legacy in revolutionary discourse remains ambivalent: a thinker whose ideas can both challenge and complement revolutionary aims, while demanding a critical and cautious approach. Those seeking a Nietzschean revolution must move beyond simply wielding a hammer, let alone a hammer and a sickle: they must transform the very values and tools inherited from the past, discovering in Nietzsche not just a new politics, but a deeper understanding of freedom beyond the confines of ideology. You can be sure that, here at Radio Free Pizza, we’ll be keeping a close eye on their progress at it.