Superman, overman underman

If you have studied philosophy you will know who wrote this theory and have you own viewpoint on it.  I am going to look at it and give my take on it.  It most likely will be similar to many others, but hey this is my blog and I get to write my viewpoints.

Nietzsche wrote this theory in his work Thus Spoke Zarathustra in the year 1883.  It is a book that read like a fictional novel.  He filled this work it what feels like to me to be allegory's.  For me it made the whole book a slow read.  Not as bad as a straight forward  philosophy type of book, but still slow. However, if you look through his complete works, he was developing this theory or chain of thoughts at least over a very extended period.  It was not until later on in the aforementioned book that he laid it out more completely.  The problem for this was that Nazis Germany took it as their own thanks to his sister rewriting it to fit the needs of someone she admired, of course this was after the death of her brother.  She had gained control of all his writings.   It has taken decades for the real, original writings to make it back into the academic world for studying.  All I can say is that this is a good thing.  Friedrich Nietzsche has been misunderstood and misinterpreted for a very long time.

So how do I view his overman/underman theory?  I think that when you read it in the story form, I think it was an attempt to put forth an idea that individualism needed to come back into vogue. Instead of being sheep to the churches and governments will, to think for oneself.   I think he was so frustrated with what he saw at that time in history with Germany's government and others and the Churches influence that he came up with his story and hide his philosophy in it.  I do not believe that the modern accepted convention on what he meant is accurate.  I fully believe in my reading and re-reading he was approaching this not as Superior person forcing others down and those accepting being inferior to the other.  But I look at it more as it being a individual and how you interact with others.

Lets start with the overman.  In main stream thinking, this was Nietzche's person who would be more self centered and only concerned with themselves at the cost of others they interact with, whether work, home or play.   But he would also do all he could to enhance humanity at the same time.  So I guess as I understand all my collegiate textbooks he was both for the greater good of humanity and for himself along the way.  I say this because he is going to establish his own values and he is going to apply them to others, not even realizing that he is imposing his will and value on others.  But at same time he, in my opinion does not do it in the "I am superior to you so obey" like I have read.  It was this type of interpretation that led to the Nazis adopting it this philosophy.   For me it is rather a form of confidence and desire to control ones own destiny against the outside influence of the government, the churches and the employers that try to force you to bend to their needs.  So the superman is a person in my thinking that refuses to be controlled but stands up for themselves, there beliefs, their family, their needs. He strives to achieve and to push beyond what he is allowed and expected to do.

His view on the underman was a little more clear cut for me as I can identify with him at different times in my life.  He is the guy that lets other hold him down from achieving.  Who  accepts his position in life and feels that he has to do whatever he is told.  He feels there is no recourse.  Frankly he is afraid. He lets fear of loosing  what he has prevent him from getting what he wants, even what he deserves.   He does not question authority and in a way lets other make his decisions for him.

But lets take this to the next step in how I see it, it is a internal thing.  The viewpoint of "Who am I"  That is what I really think Nietzsche was trying to get at.  I think he was trying to say how we perceive our self and how we see ourselves is how we will interact with others.  If we see ourselves as weak, under-educated or anything in a negative way we project that.  In projecting that we allow others to treat us as we think we should be.  In the case of being negative and feeling  worth less than others we become his underman, as I laid out above.   IF we are see in our self as a confident, educated, able to get things done type of person, as an example, then we become the overman.   If we carry that a step further and push back against those that do not believe in a person or in what they can do, and achieves and goes beyond, to me they are moving into the area he was trying to express as superman.

For me it all comes down in this theory that Nietzsche was putting forth a self realization philosophy. That we are only who we see our self as and that is how others will also see us.  That we are capable of more than what outside influence decide what we are or try to make us.  That it was not, as in his story, for some other entity to decide but for us, ourselves to decide.  That there is no shame in what you decide whether underman - overman or superman as long as it was your own choice.

Another way to look at it in simplistic terms is the underman has not mastered himself, but is more or less submissive to themselves.  The overman, has master himself to a certain point but is still somewhat in bondage to themselves.  The Superman has attained self-mastery and is holding themselves in a high state of value to themselves.  They have become fully self-aware.

This is just my take and interpretation of this one small part of Nietzsche's writings.