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[name redacted]Philosophy 2050 – 601
 
February 24, 2009Rationalization of Religious Tyranny for the
 
“Common Good” of the People
 
Preceding the dialogue are the quotes.
 
“What is good? All that heightens the feeling of power in man, the will topower,
 
power itself. What is bad? All that is born of weakness. What is happiness?The feeling
 
that power is growing, that resistance is overcome.” – FriedrichNietszche. (1)
 
“We may be confused about the distinction between tolerance and the refusal
 
of evaluation, thinking that tolerance of others requires us not to evaluate what they
 
do.” – Martha Nussbaum. (2)What would happen when they meet in the afterlife, discussing the philosophyof 
 
tolerance and integration? Religious freedom and freedom
 
 from
 
religion?Following is the dialogue exchange between Nietzsche and Nussbaum.
 
Nietzsche: I argued about the benefits of master and slave morality. What is
 
that? Masters create values what they consider good for the masses to embrace.
 
Slaves are suspicious of the values promulgated by the masters, be it in corporate
 
business, religion and government. When oppression is terrible enough, slaves rebel to
 
counterattack the master responsible for certain (and perhaps forcibly) imposed
 
 
 
values, like in revolt. Masters demand obedience by making life
 
inextricably
 
communal
 
to establish in homogeneity, wherever it is in the mortal world. Let meillustrate the point.
 
The cultural dominance of a very strange group what is now calledThe Church of Jesus
 
Christ of Latter-Day Saints – I’ll call it Mormon Church – inUtah. There is a degree of 
 
pervasive influence in America and abroad, which is thegoal of the Church to create
 
its own brand of values through proselytizing andpropaganda to enforce dominance
 
throughout the world. The masters dictate thesevalues with rigid rules and procedures
 
through fire-and-brimstone and tedious faith-promoting sermons to instill the
 
congregation with insistent obedience amid guilt andfear of Hellfire if they err from the doctrinal authority of a theocratic oligarchycomprised of octogenarian men. Any dissent that
 
challenges the Church’s veracity inorganizational structure, history and divinity is crushed with effortless
 
ferocity byharassment or disciplinary council that authorizes excommunication, disfellowship,and
 
ostracization. This oppressive cultural atmosphere may root in the societaldisharmony
 
and distrust of the Gentile people who do not belong or refuse to conformto Mormon
 
faith or values. When religion dominance – Mormon in particular – isfirmly established, it
 
destroys everything in its path in the single-minded quest toenslave the majority and become tyrannical
 
in process, as Islam do in the Middle Eastand Southeast Asia as a theocracy. This is the
 
self-conceived justification of mastermorality to befit the wanton need of the rulers to
 
control the masses. What do you sayto the others who feel so oppressed they might be
 
compelled to revolt in insurrection,Mrs. Nussbaum?
 
 
 
Nussbaum: I quote by recollection. “When we recognize the ‘diverse frailtiesof 
 
humankind’ and the way in which these are brought out by social circumstances,we
 
recognize that few human beings are so firm that they can resist temptations to
 
wrong… [D]amage has set in earlier, and the character is deformed by what it has
 
encountered. [A] human being like us, with diverse frailties and weaknesses, who has
 
encountered circumstances – whether personal or social – that bring out those
 
weaknesses in the worst possible way. [T]his creates incentives to … think hard about
 
those circumstances, so we do not put people under pressures that many agents
 
cannot stand.” Does that make sense, Mr. Nietzsche? (Nussbaum)
 
Nietzsche: I reply. “A morality of the ruling group … is most alien and
 
embarrassing to the present taste in the severity of its principle that one has dutiesonly
 
to one’s peers; that against beings of a lower rank, against everything alien, onemay
 
behave as one pleases or ‘as the heart desires’…” I want to emphasize the pointon the
 
opposition of good and evil. “Into evil one’s feelings project power and
 
dangerousness, a certain terribleness, subtlety, and strength that does not permit
 
contempt to develop. According to slave morality, those who are ‘evil’ thus inspirefear;
 
according to master morality it is precisely those who are ‘good’ that inspire, andwish
 
to inspire, fear, while the ‘bad’ [e.g. truth-seekers, apostates, atheists, skeptics,
 
nonconformists and the unconverted] are felt to be contemptible.” (Nietzsche)
 
Nussbaum: We might have something in common. You propounded masterand
 
slave morality. Machiavelli advocated the concept of master morality in
 
The Prince
, but I’m sure that
 
was not his intention. He was a cynical scholar who saw
of 00

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