NIHILISM IS NATURAL
February 10, 2009
I don't know why I never thought of this before. It's been right in front of me all along. I may have come close to it, but I can't recall that I've just come right out and said it. For that matter, I can't recall if I've ever heard anyone else say it either. What am I talking about it? The utter naturalness of nihilism.
I'm talking of course about the way that we are all nihilists at birth. Yes, we are born nihilists. We only become Jews, Muslims, Christians and Hindus after much conditioning. To say that we are such and such is merely to reflect the amount of social drivel that has been poured into our otherwise innocent minds.
We are born nihilists, with virtually nothing in our minds. I mentioned in one of my essays that we made it all up, all the customs and conventions, all the laws and rules of etiquette. We pulled it right out of our proverbial asses. None of that stuff exists in nature. It is social, not natural. God and love, right and wrong, good and evil and so on, are all purely social abstractions. But it is perfectly natural to come into this world without a single belief in your head.
We are therefore born nihilists, and our return to it in adulthood is surely an indication (whatever else it may be) that we have found our true selves. We are not doctors, lawyers, teachers, athletes or entertainers. These titles merely represent the games that we have chosen to play (or been coaxed into playing). What we are, at the deepest level of our being (the primal level), can fairly be described in terms of nihilism. And I mean nihilism in its purest form, not the philosophical variety, which, like any other philosphy (or religion) is something we must acquire.
What I would really like to know is whether or not anyone else has ever said this? Did Nietzsche ever touch on this? If he did, I guess I missed it.