A Response To the Promp - Essay Example

He believes that to be unhelpful, and wants the readers to focus on confronting the fact that everyone’s mind works differently and following the same morals - regardless of their perception of life - can be considered as dangerous. This, he thinks, is a much better approach as everyone should not be judged similarly, peoples’ situation in life is different thus, their thoughts about what is right and what is wrong may differ, too. One of the themes that is most talked about in his book is about the master-slave morality.

He believes that the good and evil forces in the world are in a constant struggle against each other. The definition of good and evil is different for the rich and the poor. The aristocrats are the ones with the power, the wealth and even the health and are, thus, considered as good. This reminds one of Aristotle’s ethics which stated that only the noble could achieve moral excellence; the poor had no hope of doing that. The bad are those who were poor, unwell and weak, which would be the slaves in Nietzsche’s time.

This was master-morality. In reference to the master-morality came the slave-morality, this seemed to be a contrast to the master-morality. The concept behind this is that the good are those who are meek and submissive; they are not worldly and are pious. These are, of course, the people who are a part of the lower caste group. The evil, on the other hand, are those who are rich and cruel, are worldly and egotistical. Nietzsche considered slave morality to be pessimistic as well as fearful; he believed it to be of value to only those who suffered from similar circumstances.

In his book, he says that slave-morality was introduced by the slaves themselves who were resentful of their low station in life. He argues that this concept of equality allowed the slaves to be in peace with their current conditions without being hateful towards themselves. Believing that those who were successful or wealthy were bad allowed them to be content with their own lack of progress in the society, allowed them not feel inferior about themselves when compared to the rich. They tried to convince themselves that their position in society was by choice that they were meek because they wanted to be, and should not be thought of as weak.

He writes about how slave-morality is the reason behind nihilism, which has taken over Europe. There are tensions due to the contradictory nature of the master-slave morality, which is an issue as both have values which are followed by most of the Europeans. Nietzsche says that the extraordinary people should not be ashamed of their individuality when concerning the morality which is followed by the general public. It may work for them but can be harmful for the exceptional people. However, he also says that morality in itself is not bad for the public, but it should not be forced on people.

Those people, who do not find it right, should not be forced to follow it, but instead choose to believe in their own version of morality. The master-slave morality should not be followed to the point. Of course, there are some very successful people who are rich and that may lead them to be selfish or cruel or possessing any other number of bad qualities, but one cannot just write them off. The fact of the matter is that they are successful and rich, they must be doing something right to achieve that.

So there is a positive and negative side – both – in master morality. On the other hand, if these people are thriving by doing bad things such as stealing,