Paul Ricoeur illustrates one approach to Nietzsche -- as one of the three masters of suspicion, along with Marx and Freud. They are seen as unmasking potential claims to authentic morality, on the grounds of concealed economic, psychological or antilife motivation. They are seen as presenting challenges which claims to authentic morality must face and hopefully refute, in theory and practice.
The basis of morality for the sermon on the Mount and Plato's Gorgias is that revenge (replying to a slap on the cheek by returning the blow) is not justice. (In Plato's case that did not lead to pacifism). The thug Callicles says that is a wimpish attitude. Nietzsche seems to me to be saying the same, with the addition that the wimps sanctify their cowardice and in revenge try to master their masters by imposing the shackles of idealism on them.
Socialists, like all members of the oppressed, must case by case (not in abstract universality, as Nietzsche does, face the possibility that their morality is the product of psychological adjustment to institutional oppression. And they must try to cultivate the warrior virtues which success in the struggle for liberation requires. But they should not look for inspiration to Nietzsche's individualist elitism.
Aneurin Bevan, member of the oppressed Welsh nation, leader of the British social democrats and architect of the British national health service (who was literally kicked down the stairs in a Tory gentlemen's club), wrote in his memoirs that middle class young men asked themselves "What shall I do in life?". Bevan and his friends asked "How can we get power?" Nietzsche's elitism poses the first question, socialism answers the second. They express very different attitudes, and I don't see how one helps the other.
At least, even if Bevan did turn the fourth cheek at the time, he got -- personal and communal -- justice by persisting in founding the National Health Service. Another eminent figure had a very different reaction to a similar situation.
Conor Cruise O'Brien's "States of Ireland" is divided into two parts. The first begins with outrage at the burning of Catholic churches in the six counties and ends with O'Brien being kicked in the head by a gang of Loyalists. The second begins with the political opinion that a British withdrawal from the six counties would lead to a bloodbath and ends with calling for all-out war against those engaged in the National struggle.
As (Labour Party) Minister for posts and telecommunications he introduced censorship of the state television network, and was only defeated after a long battle in his attempt to install holus bolus BBC1 as the proposed second channel of the Irish state television. Later he wrote an article with the title "Why I am a liberal". There may be something there for another thread on LBOtalk.
James Daly
----- Original Message ----- From: "Charles Brown" <cbrown at michiganlegal.org> To: <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org> Sent: Tuesday, July 03, 2007 9:22 PM Subject: [lbo-talk] Nietzsche
: Furthermore, on this thread, making the claim that Marx's thought and N's
: thought are significantly in conflict, especially concerning the issue of
: class, is not treating Marx "dogmatically". To say so evinces ignorance of
: the meaning of "dogmatic". I'm just giving an accurate reprise of Marx's
: thought (and, obviously, favoring it over N.'s thought).