Diogenes
in the tub is con- sidered the archetype of this figure.
Sloterdijk-Cynicism-the-Twilight-of-False-Consciousness
?
?
Cynicism: The Twilight of False Consciousness
Author(s): Peter Sloterdijk, Michael Eldred, Leslie A. Adelson
Source: New German Critique, No. 33, Modernity and Postmodernity (Autumn, 1984), pp. 190- 206
Published by: New German Critique
Stable URL: http://www. jstor. org/stable/488361
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? Cynicism- TheTwilight of False Consciousness*
Times are hard, but modern. Italian saying
And indeed one no longer saw anyone stand-
ing behind everything. Everything turned con-
tinually about itself. Interests changed hourly. There were no more goals . . . The leaders lost
their heads. They were drained to the dregs and calcified. . . Everyone in the land began to notice that things didn't work any- more . . . One path left open was to postpone
the collapse. . .
FranzJung, Die EroberundgerMaschinen,1921.
The discontent in culture has assumed a new quality: it appears as
universal, diffuse cynicism. The traditional critique of ideology stands by helplessly. It cannot find the lever that would enlighten this cyni- callyalertconsciousness. Moderncynicismpresentsitselfasthatstate of consciousness which follows naive ideologies and their enlighten- ment. In it lies the real reason for the complete exhaustion of ideology critique, for the latter has remained more naive than the consciousness
itsoughtitexpose. Itswell-behavedrationalitydidnotfollowthetwists and turns of modern consciousness toward a cunning, multi-faceted realism. The usual list of forms of false consciousness - lie, error, ideology - is incomplete. The current mind-set demands a fourth
addition: cynicism. Speaking of cynicism means trying to find a new
entrance into the old building of ideology critique.
It is not customary to designate cynicism as a universal and diffuse
*With the permission of the University of Minnesota Press, we are printing here the firsttwo chapters of PeterSloterdijk'stwo-volume KritikderzynischenVernunf(tFrankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1983). The complete translation will be forthcoming in Min- nesota's Theory and History of Literatureseries.
190
by Peter Sloterdijk
? PeterSloterdijk 191
phenomenon; in the common conception, cynicism is not diffuse but striking, not universal, but peripheral and highly individual. The
unusual adjectives indicate something of its new appearance, which at the same time makes it explosive and unassailable.
The ancient world knows the cynic (better: kynic) as a bird that flies solo, a provocative, stubborn moralist. Diogenes in the tub is con- sidered the archetype of this figure. In the picture book of social characters he creates distance with his mockery, a biting and evil individualist who pretends not to need anyone and who is loved by no
one because no one escapes unscathed his crudely unmasking gaze. His social origins point to an urban figure who received his cutting
edge in the bustle of the ancient metropolis. One could characterize him as the earliest example of a declassed or plebeian intelligence. His 'cynicial' turn against the arrogance and the moral secrets of an estab- lished, higher civilization presupposes a city setting with all its suc- cesses and shadows. Only in the city, under the pressure of public
speech and a general love-hate, can the cynic clearly emerge as the
negative profile of the city. And only the city can accept the cynic, who demonstratively turns his back on it, as one of its eccentrics, who attest
to the city's penchant for developed, urbane personalities.
The fertile ground for cynicism in modernity is to be found not only
in urban culture but also in the courtly sphere. Both are dies of an evil realism through which people learn the crooked smile of open im-
morality. In both, urbane, intelligent minds accumulate a worldly knowledge which moves elegantly between bare facts and conven-
tional facades. From the very bottom, the declassed, urban intelli-
gentsia, and from the top, the height of conscious statesmanship, serious thinking is invaded by signals attesting to a radical ironization
of ethics and of social convention. It is as if the general laws were only meant for the stupid, while those in the know smile with fatal clever-
ness. More precisely: the powerful smile this way, while the kynical
plebeians burst out in satirical laughter. In the vast space of cynical knowledge the extremes meet: Eulenspiegel meets Richelieu;Machiavelli
meets Rameau's nephew; the loud Condottieri of the Renaissance
meet the elegant cynics of the Rococo period; unscrupulous entre- preneurs meet disillusioned outsiders; jaded system strategists meet advocates of refusal without ideals.
Since bourgeois society began to bridge the knowledge of those at
the top and those at the bottom, ambitiously proclaiming to ground its worldview entirely on realism,the extremes have been coalescing.
Today the cynic appears as a mass figure, an average social characterin the elevated superstructure. This is the case, not only because ad-
vanced industrial civilization produces the embittered loner as a mass
? 192
Cynicism
phenomenon. Rather,thecitiesthemselveshavebecome diffuseclumps
whose power to create generally acceptedpubliccharacterhsas been lost.
The pressure towards individualization has dropped in the modern
climate of cities and mass media. The modern cynic - extant as a mass
phenomenon in Germany, since the FirstWorld War - is no longer an
outsider. But less than ever does he appear as a tangibly developed
type. The modern mass cynic loses his individual sting and spares him-
self the risk of exposure. He has long since ceased to subject his eccen-
tricity to the attention and mockery of others. The man with the clear
'evil eye' has disappeared in the crowd; anonymity now becomes the
large space for the cynical deviation. The modern cynic is an integrated asocial characterwhose deep-seated lack of illusions is a match for that
of any hippy. He does not regard his own clear, evil gaze as a personal
defect or as an amoral quirk to be privatelyjustified. Instinctively, he no longer understands his way of life as something evil, but as part of a
collective, realistic view of things. It is the widespread form in which enlightened people see to it that they are not taken for suckers. There
even seems to be something healthy in this attitude, as there is general- ly in the will to self-preservation. This is the stance of people who re- alize that the times of nalvete are gone.
Psychologically, the contemporary cynic can be understood as a borderline melancholic; he is able to keep his depressive symptoms under control and remains more or less capable of work. Indeed, the ability of the cynic to work is decisive in modern cynicism: in spite of
everything, after all, especially that. Society's key positions have long since belonged to a diffuse cynicism in boards, parliaments, commit-
tees, company leadership, editorialoffices,practices, faculties, law and newspaper offices. A certain elegant bitterness colors its activity. For
cynics are not dumb, and every now and then they certainly see the
nothingness to which everything leads. Their spiritual make-up has become elastic enough to make the constant doubt about their own
pursuits part of their quest for survival. They know what they do, but they do it because, in the short run, the objective situation and the instinct for self-preservation speak the same language and tell them it must be so. Others would do it anyway, perhaps worse. The new,
integrated cynicism thus even feels itself, understandably, both as vic- tim and as sacrificer. Behind the conscientiously hard fa,ade of col-
laboration there is a mass of vulnerable unhappiness and the need to
cry. Here is something of the mourning for a 'lost innocence,' for the better knowledge against which all one's actions and labors strive.
This our first definition: is conscious- yields cynicism enlightenedfalse
ness. It is the modernized, unhappy consciousness, atwhich Enlighten- ment has simultaneously labored successfully and in vain. It has learnt
? its lesson in Enlightenment,but it has not implementedit and prob- ablywasnotevenabletodo so. Well-placedandmiserableatthesame
time, this consciousnessis no longer vulnerableto any critiqueof
ideology;its falsenessis alreadyreflexivelybuffered.
'Enlightened false consciousness': such a formulation seems to
strike a blow against the tradition of Enlightenment. The sentence itselfiscynicisminacrystallinestate. Nonetheless, itclaimsobjective
validity;its content and its necessity are developed in this essay. Logical-
ly, we are dealing with a paradox, for how could enlightened con- sciousness be false? This is precisely the issue.
Acting against one's own better knowledge is the global situation in the superstructure today. One knows oneself to be without illusions
and yet dragged down by the 'power of things. ' What appears in reality as an objective state of affairs is thus what we consider in logic a
paradox and in literature a joke. This shapes a new consciousness
of 'objectivity. '
'Enlightened false consciousness' should not be understood as an
incidental phrase but as a systematic approach, as diagnostic model. It thus commits itself to a revision of enlightenment; it must uncover its
relationtothatwhichistraditionallycalled'falseconsciousness. ' Fur- ther, it must revise the course of Enlightenment and the labor of ideol- ogy critique, which made it possible for 'false consciousness' to re- absorb Enlightenment. If this essay had historical intentions, it would be to describe the modernization of false consciousness. However, my intention is not historical but physiognomic: the focus is the structure of a reflexively buffered false consciousness. I nevertheless want to demonstrate that this structure cannot be grasped without placing it in
a political history of polemical reflections.
Without sarcasm modern-day Enlightenment can have no healthy
relation to its own history. We can only choose between a pessimism -
reminiscent of decadence - loyal to its beginnings and a light-hearted
disrespect in pursuit of original tasks. As things stand, the only loyalty to Enlightenment consists in disloyalty. This can be partlyunderstood from the position of the heirs, who look back on 'heroic' times and are
necessarily more skeptically disposed to the results. To be an heir always carries a certain 'status-cynicism' with it, as we know from
stories about inheritance of family capital. The retrospective position, however, does not itself explain the particular tone of modern cyni- cism. Disillusionment with the Enlightenment is not merely a sign that epigones may and must be more critical than the founders. The pecu- liar hautgoutof modern cynicism is fundamental: a consciousness dis- eased with Enlightenment and instructed by historical experience refuses cheap optimism. New values? No thanks! With the passing of
PeterSloterdijk 193
? 194
Cynicism
defiant hopes, the listlessness of egoisms pervades. In the new cyni- cism, we see a detached negativity which scarcely allows itself any
hope, at most a little irony and self-pity.
In the final analysis, it is a matter of the social and existential limits of
Enlightenment. The pressures to survive and the desire to assert one- self have humbled enlightened consciousness. It is ill from the com- pulsion to accept existing conditions which it doubts, to accommodate itself to them and finally even to conduct their business.
In order to survive, one has to attend the school of reality. Certainly. Those who mean well call it growing up, and there is some truth to that. But that is not all of it. Always a bit unsettled and irritable, the col- laborating consciousness looks around for its lost na;vetes, to which there is no return, since the attainment of consciousness is irrevers- ible.
Gottfried Benn, himself one of the prominent voices of modern
cynicism, has probably uttered the cynical formulation of the century, lucid and insolent: "To be stupid and have a job, that's happiness. "
Only the converse of the sentence reveals its full content: to be intelli- gent and to perform one's work in spite of it, that is unhappy con- sciousness in its modernized form, ill with Enlightenment. Being
"stupid" and trusting are no longer options, and innocence cannot be regained. Unhappy consciousness clings to the belief in the sheer weight of things, to which it is bound by its instinct for self-preserva- tion. In for a penny, in for a pound. At two thousand marksnet a month,
the counter-enlightenment quietly begins; it banks on the fact that everyone who has something to lose comes to terms privatelywith his
unhappy consciousness or engulfs it with 'engagements. ' Preciselybecause it is lived as a privatedisposition which absorbs the
world situation, the new cynicism is not as strikingly noticeable as
would befit its concept. It surrounds itself with discretion, as we shall
see, a key word of charmingly mediated alienation. The accommoda-
tion which knows about itself, having sacrificed its better knowledge to
'objective determinations,' no longer sees any need to expose itself
offensively and spectacularly. There is a nakedness which no longer has an unmasking effect and in which no 'bare fact' appears on whose
ground one could stand with spirited realism. The neo-cynical accom- modation to the given has an aura of plaintiveness; it no longer is self- confidently naked. For this reason it is also methodologically difficult to render this diffuse, hazy cynicism articulate. It has withdrawn into a mournful detachment which has internalized its knowl-
(Abgeklirtheit)
edge, useless for attacks, like a curse. The great offensives of cynical
impudence have become a rarity;ill humor has taken their place, and there is no energy left for sarcasm. Gehlen even thought that not even
? Peter Sloterdijk 195
the English can be cutting any more because the supplies of dissatisfac- tion have been used up and the rationing of stocks has begun. The peevishness which follows the offensives doesn't open its mouth wide
enough for enlightenment to take a step forward.
That is one of the reasons why, in the second part of this book, a dis-
proportionate amount of'cynical material' is taken from the Weimar Republic - aside from the older documents that are also given atten-
tion. In the historical section entitled TheWeimar I Symptom, attempt
a physiognomy of an epoch, a characterization of a decade whose first
heir was fascism and whose second heir we are.
Speaking of the Weimar Republic still means dealing with social
experience of the self. For citable reasons the Weimar culture was
cynically disposed to a highly unusual degree; it yielded an abundance of brilliantlyarticulatedcynicisms, which readliketextbook examples.
It experienced the pain of modernization more violently and ex-
pressed its disillusionment more coldly and more sharply than any
present could ever do. We discover in it strikingformulations of mod-
ern unhappy consciousness, burningly relevant even today. Indeed,
perhaps we can only today comprehend them in their full validity. A critique of cynical reason would remain an academic game with
glass beads if it failed to pursue the connection between the problem of survivaland the danger of fascism. In fact, the question of'survival,' of
self-preservation and self-assertion - to which all cynicisms provide answers - touches on the central problem of defending the status quo
and planning for the future in modern nation states. From various approaches, I attempt to determine the logical locus of German Fas- cism in the convolutions of modern, self-reflexive cynicism. So much can be said in anticipation; in German Fascism typically modern
dynamics of psycho-cultural fears of breakdown, regressive self-asser- tion and new-objective, rational coldness combined with a venerable
strain of military cynicism, which on German, and especially Prussian, soil enjoys an equally macabre and deep-rooted tradition.
Perhaps these thoughts on cynicism as the fourth configuration of false consciousness will help to overcome the peculiar speechlessness
of genuinely philosophical critique regarding so-called fascist ideol-
ogy. Philosophy as a ',discipline' does not have its own theory of 'theoretical fascism' because the latter is considered beneath all cri-
tique. The explanations of fascism as nihilism (Rauschning, etal. ) or as
the product of "totalitarianthinking" remain sweeping and imprecise. The "inauthentic," bastardized nature of fascist ideology has been suf-
ficiently emphasized, and all contents that it "represented" have long since been subjected to a critique by the individual sciences: psychol-
ogy, political science, sociology, historiography. For philosophy, the
? 196 Cynicism
programmatic statements of fascism do "not even" rate as serious, substantial ideology which would pose a serious challenge to a reflec- tive critique. But precisely here lies the weakness of the critique. Fix-
ated on 'serious opponents,' it neglects the taskof comprehending the
ideological pattern of'unserious,' shallow 'systems. ' To this day cri- tique is no match for the modern mixture of opinion and cynicism. But
since questions of social and individual self-preservation are discussed precisely in such combinations, there are good reasons to study their
composition. One has to approach questions of self-preservation in the same language as those of self-annihilation. The same logic of the
repudiation of morality seems to be effective in them. I call this the
of the structure,' of the self-denial of the ethics of 'cynical i. e. ,
logic
culture. Clarifying this will elucidate what it means to choose life.
high
Whoever speaks of cynicism draws attention to the limits of Enlight- enment. In this respect, the concern with the salient featuresof Weimar
cynicism - aside from the advantage of clarity - also promises to be
fruitful for the philosophy of history. The Weimar Republic represents in the course of German history not only the belated development of a
nation-state - heavily burdened by the Wilhelminian legacy, the spirit of a cynically illiberal government - but also a paradigm for 'failed
enlightenment. '
It has often been shown that, and why, the protagonists of repub-
lican Enlightenment at that time could not have been anything else but
a desperate, well-meaning minority (representatives of reason) vis-a- vis almost insurmountable odds: massive currents of anti-Enlighten-
ment and hatred of the intelligentsia; an arrayof anti-democratic and authoritarian ideologies which knew how to use the press to achieve their desired objectives; an aggressive nationalism bent on revenge; an unenlightenable mixture of hard-headed conservatisms, extended
petit-bourgeois (Biedermeiera)ttitudes, messianic sects, apocalyptic
political tendencies, and equally realistic and psychopathic rejections of the impositions of an uncomfortable modernity.
Diogenes in the tub is con- sidered the archetype of this figure. In the picture book of social characters he creates distance with his mockery, a biting and evil individualist who pretends not to need anyone and who is loved by no
one because no one escapes unscathed his crudely unmasking gaze. His social origins point to an urban figure who received his cutting
edge in the bustle of the ancient metropolis. One could characterize him as the earliest example of a declassed or plebeian intelligence. His 'cynicial' turn against the arrogance and the moral secrets of an estab- lished, higher civilization presupposes a city setting with all its suc- cesses and shadows. Only in the city, under the pressure of public
speech and a general love-hate, can the cynic clearly emerge as the
negative profile of the city. And only the city can accept the cynic, who demonstratively turns his back on it, as one of its eccentrics, who attest
to the city's penchant for developed, urbane personalities.
The fertile ground for cynicism in modernity is to be found not only
in urban culture but also in the courtly sphere. Both are dies of an evil realism through which people learn the crooked smile of open im-
morality. In both, urbane, intelligent minds accumulate a worldly knowledge which moves elegantly between bare facts and conven-
tional facades. From the very bottom, the declassed, urban intelli-
gentsia, and from the top, the height of conscious statesmanship, serious thinking is invaded by signals attesting to a radical ironization
of ethics and of social convention. It is as if the general laws were only meant for the stupid, while those in the know smile with fatal clever-
ness. More precisely: the powerful smile this way, while the kynical
plebeians burst out in satirical laughter. In the vast space of cynical knowledge the extremes meet: Eulenspiegel meets Richelieu;Machiavelli
meets Rameau's nephew; the loud Condottieri of the Renaissance
meet the elegant cynics of the Rococo period; unscrupulous entre- preneurs meet disillusioned outsiders; jaded system strategists meet advocates of refusal without ideals.
Since bourgeois society began to bridge the knowledge of those at
the top and those at the bottom, ambitiously proclaiming to ground its worldview entirely on realism,the extremes have been coalescing.
Today the cynic appears as a mass figure, an average social characterin the elevated superstructure. This is the case, not only because ad-
vanced industrial civilization produces the embittered loner as a mass
? 192
Cynicism
phenomenon. Rather,thecitiesthemselveshavebecome diffuseclumps
whose power to create generally acceptedpubliccharacterhsas been lost.
The pressure towards individualization has dropped in the modern
climate of cities and mass media. The modern cynic - extant as a mass
phenomenon in Germany, since the FirstWorld War - is no longer an
outsider. But less than ever does he appear as a tangibly developed
type. The modern mass cynic loses his individual sting and spares him-
self the risk of exposure. He has long since ceased to subject his eccen-
tricity to the attention and mockery of others. The man with the clear
'evil eye' has disappeared in the crowd; anonymity now becomes the
large space for the cynical deviation. The modern cynic is an integrated asocial characterwhose deep-seated lack of illusions is a match for that
of any hippy. He does not regard his own clear, evil gaze as a personal
defect or as an amoral quirk to be privatelyjustified. Instinctively, he no longer understands his way of life as something evil, but as part of a
collective, realistic view of things. It is the widespread form in which enlightened people see to it that they are not taken for suckers. There
even seems to be something healthy in this attitude, as there is general- ly in the will to self-preservation. This is the stance of people who re- alize that the times of nalvete are gone.
Psychologically, the contemporary cynic can be understood as a borderline melancholic; he is able to keep his depressive symptoms under control and remains more or less capable of work. Indeed, the ability of the cynic to work is decisive in modern cynicism: in spite of
everything, after all, especially that. Society's key positions have long since belonged to a diffuse cynicism in boards, parliaments, commit-
tees, company leadership, editorialoffices,practices, faculties, law and newspaper offices. A certain elegant bitterness colors its activity. For
cynics are not dumb, and every now and then they certainly see the
nothingness to which everything leads. Their spiritual make-up has become elastic enough to make the constant doubt about their own
pursuits part of their quest for survival. They know what they do, but they do it because, in the short run, the objective situation and the instinct for self-preservation speak the same language and tell them it must be so. Others would do it anyway, perhaps worse. The new,
integrated cynicism thus even feels itself, understandably, both as vic- tim and as sacrificer. Behind the conscientiously hard fa,ade of col-
laboration there is a mass of vulnerable unhappiness and the need to
cry. Here is something of the mourning for a 'lost innocence,' for the better knowledge against which all one's actions and labors strive.
This our first definition: is conscious- yields cynicism enlightenedfalse
ness. It is the modernized, unhappy consciousness, atwhich Enlighten- ment has simultaneously labored successfully and in vain. It has learnt
? its lesson in Enlightenment,but it has not implementedit and prob- ablywasnotevenabletodo so. Well-placedandmiserableatthesame
time, this consciousnessis no longer vulnerableto any critiqueof
ideology;its falsenessis alreadyreflexivelybuffered.
'Enlightened false consciousness': such a formulation seems to
strike a blow against the tradition of Enlightenment. The sentence itselfiscynicisminacrystallinestate. Nonetheless, itclaimsobjective
validity;its content and its necessity are developed in this essay. Logical-
ly, we are dealing with a paradox, for how could enlightened con- sciousness be false? This is precisely the issue.
Acting against one's own better knowledge is the global situation in the superstructure today. One knows oneself to be without illusions
and yet dragged down by the 'power of things. ' What appears in reality as an objective state of affairs is thus what we consider in logic a
paradox and in literature a joke. This shapes a new consciousness
of 'objectivity. '
'Enlightened false consciousness' should not be understood as an
incidental phrase but as a systematic approach, as diagnostic model. It thus commits itself to a revision of enlightenment; it must uncover its
relationtothatwhichistraditionallycalled'falseconsciousness. ' Fur- ther, it must revise the course of Enlightenment and the labor of ideol- ogy critique, which made it possible for 'false consciousness' to re- absorb Enlightenment. If this essay had historical intentions, it would be to describe the modernization of false consciousness. However, my intention is not historical but physiognomic: the focus is the structure of a reflexively buffered false consciousness. I nevertheless want to demonstrate that this structure cannot be grasped without placing it in
a political history of polemical reflections.
Without sarcasm modern-day Enlightenment can have no healthy
relation to its own history. We can only choose between a pessimism -
reminiscent of decadence - loyal to its beginnings and a light-hearted
disrespect in pursuit of original tasks. As things stand, the only loyalty to Enlightenment consists in disloyalty. This can be partlyunderstood from the position of the heirs, who look back on 'heroic' times and are
necessarily more skeptically disposed to the results. To be an heir always carries a certain 'status-cynicism' with it, as we know from
stories about inheritance of family capital. The retrospective position, however, does not itself explain the particular tone of modern cyni- cism. Disillusionment with the Enlightenment is not merely a sign that epigones may and must be more critical than the founders. The pecu- liar hautgoutof modern cynicism is fundamental: a consciousness dis- eased with Enlightenment and instructed by historical experience refuses cheap optimism. New values? No thanks! With the passing of
PeterSloterdijk 193
? 194
Cynicism
defiant hopes, the listlessness of egoisms pervades. In the new cyni- cism, we see a detached negativity which scarcely allows itself any
hope, at most a little irony and self-pity.
In the final analysis, it is a matter of the social and existential limits of
Enlightenment. The pressures to survive and the desire to assert one- self have humbled enlightened consciousness. It is ill from the com- pulsion to accept existing conditions which it doubts, to accommodate itself to them and finally even to conduct their business.
In order to survive, one has to attend the school of reality. Certainly. Those who mean well call it growing up, and there is some truth to that. But that is not all of it. Always a bit unsettled and irritable, the col- laborating consciousness looks around for its lost na;vetes, to which there is no return, since the attainment of consciousness is irrevers- ible.
Gottfried Benn, himself one of the prominent voices of modern
cynicism, has probably uttered the cynical formulation of the century, lucid and insolent: "To be stupid and have a job, that's happiness. "
Only the converse of the sentence reveals its full content: to be intelli- gent and to perform one's work in spite of it, that is unhappy con- sciousness in its modernized form, ill with Enlightenment. Being
"stupid" and trusting are no longer options, and innocence cannot be regained. Unhappy consciousness clings to the belief in the sheer weight of things, to which it is bound by its instinct for self-preserva- tion. In for a penny, in for a pound. At two thousand marksnet a month,
the counter-enlightenment quietly begins; it banks on the fact that everyone who has something to lose comes to terms privatelywith his
unhappy consciousness or engulfs it with 'engagements. ' Preciselybecause it is lived as a privatedisposition which absorbs the
world situation, the new cynicism is not as strikingly noticeable as
would befit its concept. It surrounds itself with discretion, as we shall
see, a key word of charmingly mediated alienation. The accommoda-
tion which knows about itself, having sacrificed its better knowledge to
'objective determinations,' no longer sees any need to expose itself
offensively and spectacularly. There is a nakedness which no longer has an unmasking effect and in which no 'bare fact' appears on whose
ground one could stand with spirited realism. The neo-cynical accom- modation to the given has an aura of plaintiveness; it no longer is self- confidently naked. For this reason it is also methodologically difficult to render this diffuse, hazy cynicism articulate. It has withdrawn into a mournful detachment which has internalized its knowl-
(Abgeklirtheit)
edge, useless for attacks, like a curse. The great offensives of cynical
impudence have become a rarity;ill humor has taken their place, and there is no energy left for sarcasm. Gehlen even thought that not even
? Peter Sloterdijk 195
the English can be cutting any more because the supplies of dissatisfac- tion have been used up and the rationing of stocks has begun. The peevishness which follows the offensives doesn't open its mouth wide
enough for enlightenment to take a step forward.
That is one of the reasons why, in the second part of this book, a dis-
proportionate amount of'cynical material' is taken from the Weimar Republic - aside from the older documents that are also given atten-
tion. In the historical section entitled TheWeimar I Symptom, attempt
a physiognomy of an epoch, a characterization of a decade whose first
heir was fascism and whose second heir we are.
Speaking of the Weimar Republic still means dealing with social
experience of the self. For citable reasons the Weimar culture was
cynically disposed to a highly unusual degree; it yielded an abundance of brilliantlyarticulatedcynicisms, which readliketextbook examples.
It experienced the pain of modernization more violently and ex-
pressed its disillusionment more coldly and more sharply than any
present could ever do. We discover in it strikingformulations of mod-
ern unhappy consciousness, burningly relevant even today. Indeed,
perhaps we can only today comprehend them in their full validity. A critique of cynical reason would remain an academic game with
glass beads if it failed to pursue the connection between the problem of survivaland the danger of fascism. In fact, the question of'survival,' of
self-preservation and self-assertion - to which all cynicisms provide answers - touches on the central problem of defending the status quo
and planning for the future in modern nation states. From various approaches, I attempt to determine the logical locus of German Fas- cism in the convolutions of modern, self-reflexive cynicism. So much can be said in anticipation; in German Fascism typically modern
dynamics of psycho-cultural fears of breakdown, regressive self-asser- tion and new-objective, rational coldness combined with a venerable
strain of military cynicism, which on German, and especially Prussian, soil enjoys an equally macabre and deep-rooted tradition.
Perhaps these thoughts on cynicism as the fourth configuration of false consciousness will help to overcome the peculiar speechlessness
of genuinely philosophical critique regarding so-called fascist ideol-
ogy. Philosophy as a ',discipline' does not have its own theory of 'theoretical fascism' because the latter is considered beneath all cri-
tique. The explanations of fascism as nihilism (Rauschning, etal. ) or as
the product of "totalitarianthinking" remain sweeping and imprecise. The "inauthentic," bastardized nature of fascist ideology has been suf-
ficiently emphasized, and all contents that it "represented" have long since been subjected to a critique by the individual sciences: psychol-
ogy, political science, sociology, historiography. For philosophy, the
? 196 Cynicism
programmatic statements of fascism do "not even" rate as serious, substantial ideology which would pose a serious challenge to a reflec- tive critique. But precisely here lies the weakness of the critique. Fix-
ated on 'serious opponents,' it neglects the taskof comprehending the
ideological pattern of'unserious,' shallow 'systems. ' To this day cri- tique is no match for the modern mixture of opinion and cynicism. But
since questions of social and individual self-preservation are discussed precisely in such combinations, there are good reasons to study their
composition. One has to approach questions of self-preservation in the same language as those of self-annihilation. The same logic of the
repudiation of morality seems to be effective in them. I call this the
of the structure,' of the self-denial of the ethics of 'cynical i. e. ,
logic
culture. Clarifying this will elucidate what it means to choose life.
high
Whoever speaks of cynicism draws attention to the limits of Enlight- enment. In this respect, the concern with the salient featuresof Weimar
cynicism - aside from the advantage of clarity - also promises to be
fruitful for the philosophy of history. The Weimar Republic represents in the course of German history not only the belated development of a
nation-state - heavily burdened by the Wilhelminian legacy, the spirit of a cynically illiberal government - but also a paradigm for 'failed
enlightenment. '
It has often been shown that, and why, the protagonists of repub-
lican Enlightenment at that time could not have been anything else but
a desperate, well-meaning minority (representatives of reason) vis-a- vis almost insurmountable odds: massive currents of anti-Enlighten-
ment and hatred of the intelligentsia; an arrayof anti-democratic and authoritarian ideologies which knew how to use the press to achieve their desired objectives; an aggressive nationalism bent on revenge; an unenlightenable mixture of hard-headed conservatisms, extended
petit-bourgeois (Biedermeiera)ttitudes, messianic sects, apocalyptic
political tendencies, and equally realistic and psychopathic rejections of the impositions of an uncomfortable modernity. The sores of the
World War became infected again and again in the smoldering crisis; Nietzscheanism flourished as the most developed style of thinking marked by a German-narcissistic irritabilityand a moody, arrogant, 'protestant'relation to the 'bad reality. 'In a climate of crisis-likeexcite-
ment there developed a pervasive psycho-political atmosphere of resentment and anxiety about the future, of tenuous pseudo-realisms
and makeshift spiritual responses. If there was ever an era which
as Conversatio-n Enlightenment
IdeologyCritiqueas Continuationofa MiscarriedConversatiownithOtherMeans
? PeterSloterdijk 197
demanded an historical psychopathology, it is the one and a half decades between the fall of the Kaiserreichand the establishment of National Socialism.
First impressions must be given their due here: whoever sought to
carry on enlightenment in such a society was fighting a losing battle. The forces of enlightenment were too weak, for a number of precise
reasons. The Enlightenment had never been able to form an effective
alliance with the mass media, and was political maturity (Miindigkeit)
never an ideal of the industrial monopolies and their associations. How could it have been?
Obviously, the Enlightenment is defeated by forces opposed to it. However, it would be wrong to view this only as a question of the
arithmetics of power. For Enlightenment is also defeated by a qualita- tiveresistance located in the consciousness of its enemies. The latter, outraged, resist the invitation to discussion, to the "decadent" (zerset- zend)talk about truth; even talking itself is resented, because it ques- tions conventional views, values and forms of self-assertion. The inter- pretation of this resistance as the basis of ideology has become one of the main motifs of Enlightenment.
Modernity is not the firsthistorical context in which Enlightenment faces an opposing consciousness which is increasingly resilient to it. In principle, the front can be traced back to the days of the Inquisition. If it is true, as the workers' movement taught, that knowledge is power, then it is also true that not every knowledge is welcomed with open arms. Because there are no truths which can be occupied without a struggle, and because every knowledge must choose its place amidst dominant and oppositional forces, the means by which knowledge is accorded validity seem almost more important than the knowledge itself. In modernity, Enlightenment is revealed as a tactical complex. The demand that what is reasonable also be generalizable draws
Enlightenment into the maelstrom of politics, pedagogy and pro-
paganda. Here Enlightenment consciously represses the acid realism of older doctrines of wisdom, which considered it a certainty that
stupidity belonged to the masses and reason only to the few. Modern elitism has to encode itself democratically.
It is not our task to unfold historically the darkening of the Enlight-
enment. We know that in the 18th and 19th centuries, in spite of much
resistance and contradiction, it knew how to deal mostly productively and with an eye to the future with the ferment of self-doubt as it con-
sidered its own achievements and plans. In spite of all hardships and setbacks it could still believe it had the law of progress on its side. Great names of that time stand for great achievements: Watt, Pasteur, Koch, Siemens. One can reject their achievements but that would be more a
? 198
Cynicism
gesture of ill humor than of justice. The press, the railway, social welfare, penicillin - who could deny that these are remarkable in- novations in the 'garden of humanity'? However, since the technical horrors of the 20th century, from Verdun to the Gulag, from Ausch- witz to Hiroshima, experience mocks optimism. Historical conscious- ness and pessimism seem to boil down to the same thing. And the catastrophes which have not yet happened, which smolder in the undergrowth, feed the omnipresent doubts about civilization. The late 20th century rides on a wave of negative futurism. "The worst was
expected," it "only" has to happen.
I would like first to focus on the theme of on unfulfilledEnlightenment
one point: the question concerning the means of power available to Enlightenment vis-a-vis an opposing consciousness. It is already in a
certain way incorrect to ask about "means of power," since Enlighten- ment is essentially concerned with free consent. That is the "lesson" which cannot be learned under a pressure thatlies outside reason. One of its axes is reason; the other is the free conversation of those striving for reason. Voluntaryconsensus is both its methodological kernel and its moral ideal. This means the opposing consciousness changes its position under no other influence than that of cogent argument.
This is a sublimely peaceful event, when, under the fire of plausible
reasons, old, superceded opinions are surrendered. Enlightenment thus harbors within itself, so to speak, an original utopia - an epis- temological idyl of peace, a beautiful and academic vision: that of free
dialogue among those freely interested in knowledge. Here, impartial individuals, not enslaved to their own consciousness, not repressed by social conditions, come together for a dialogue aiming at truth, under the laws of reason. The truth which Enlighteners want to disseminate arises through the force, without coercion, of stronger arguments. The protagonist or discoverer of an enlightened thought took this step only earlier and usually by surrendering a former opinion of his own.
Accordingly, Enlightenment proceeds in two steps: the acceptance
of the better position and the departure from the previous opinion. This gives rise to an emotional ambivalence: gain and loss. The utopia
of a gentle, critical dialogue foresees this difficulty. The loss becomes bearable in the consciousness that it can be accepted voluntarily and
collegially as the price of commonality. The 'loser' may view himself as the realwinner. The conversation of Enlightenment is thus essentially
a struggle of opinions and an exploratory dialogue among persons who, from the start,submit themselves to rules of peace, since they can
emerge from the encounter only as winners, winners in knowledge and
solidarity. For this reason, the surrender of one's preconceptions is considered bearable.
? PeterSloterdijk 199
An academic idyl, as I said; at the same time, it remains the regula- tive idea of any enlightenment which does not want to surrender the
goal of reconsiliation. The fact that reality is different will come as no
surprise. In Enlightenment's confrontations with preceding con- sciousnesses, truth is the last thing at issue: hegemony, class interests, established doctrines, desires, passions, and the defense of'identities. '
These preconditions affectthe conversationof Enlightenment so strong- ly that it would be more appropriate to talk of a war of consciousness
than of a dialogue of peace. The opponents have not agreed to a peace treaty, but rather confront one another in a competition aimed at re-
pression and annihilation. And they are not free in relation to the powers which make their consciousness speakjust so and in no other
way.
Faced with these sober facts, the conversation model consciously
behaves unrealistically. It allows the arch-pragmatic statement,primum
vivere, to hold For at least it knows deindephilosophari, only conditionally.
that situations will recur again and again where the only thing which
can help life further is 'philosophizing. '
It is inviting to poke fun at the 'methodological anti-realism' of the
dialogue idea, and part of this book indeed tries to give the derisory laughter about every form of foolish idealism its due. However, when all contradicitons have been taken into account, one will return to this beginning, of course with a consciousness which has gone through all the hells of realism. One of the last tasks of philosophy is to preserve the healing fiction of a free dialogue.
Of course, Enlightenment itself is the first to realize that rational and verbal dialogue alone will not see it through. No one can feel the stagnations, the distorted conditions of life, the ruptures, the mis-
carriage of conversation more keenly. At the beginning of ideology critique there is also astonishment about the opponent's stubborn
resistance to hearing - an astonishment which quickly gives way to a
realistic awakening. Whoever does not want to hear lets others know it.
Enlightenment is reminded how easily speaking one's mind can lead
to and cannot be with so easi- camps prisons.
Author(s): Peter Sloterdijk, Michael Eldred, Leslie A. Adelson
Source: New German Critique, No. 33, Modernity and Postmodernity (Autumn, 1984), pp. 190- 206
Published by: New German Critique
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? Cynicism- TheTwilight of False Consciousness*
Times are hard, but modern. Italian saying
And indeed one no longer saw anyone stand-
ing behind everything. Everything turned con-
tinually about itself. Interests changed hourly. There were no more goals . . . The leaders lost
their heads. They were drained to the dregs and calcified. . . Everyone in the land began to notice that things didn't work any- more . . . One path left open was to postpone
the collapse. . .
FranzJung, Die EroberundgerMaschinen,1921.
The discontent in culture has assumed a new quality: it appears as
universal, diffuse cynicism. The traditional critique of ideology stands by helplessly. It cannot find the lever that would enlighten this cyni- callyalertconsciousness. Moderncynicismpresentsitselfasthatstate of consciousness which follows naive ideologies and their enlighten- ment. In it lies the real reason for the complete exhaustion of ideology critique, for the latter has remained more naive than the consciousness
itsoughtitexpose. Itswell-behavedrationalitydidnotfollowthetwists and turns of modern consciousness toward a cunning, multi-faceted realism. The usual list of forms of false consciousness - lie, error, ideology - is incomplete. The current mind-set demands a fourth
addition: cynicism. Speaking of cynicism means trying to find a new
entrance into the old building of ideology critique.
It is not customary to designate cynicism as a universal and diffuse
*With the permission of the University of Minnesota Press, we are printing here the firsttwo chapters of PeterSloterdijk'stwo-volume KritikderzynischenVernunf(tFrankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1983). The complete translation will be forthcoming in Min- nesota's Theory and History of Literatureseries.
190
by Peter Sloterdijk
? PeterSloterdijk 191
phenomenon; in the common conception, cynicism is not diffuse but striking, not universal, but peripheral and highly individual. The
unusual adjectives indicate something of its new appearance, which at the same time makes it explosive and unassailable.
The ancient world knows the cynic (better: kynic) as a bird that flies solo, a provocative, stubborn moralist. Diogenes in the tub is con- sidered the archetype of this figure. In the picture book of social characters he creates distance with his mockery, a biting and evil individualist who pretends not to need anyone and who is loved by no
one because no one escapes unscathed his crudely unmasking gaze. His social origins point to an urban figure who received his cutting
edge in the bustle of the ancient metropolis. One could characterize him as the earliest example of a declassed or plebeian intelligence. His 'cynicial' turn against the arrogance and the moral secrets of an estab- lished, higher civilization presupposes a city setting with all its suc- cesses and shadows. Only in the city, under the pressure of public
speech and a general love-hate, can the cynic clearly emerge as the
negative profile of the city. And only the city can accept the cynic, who demonstratively turns his back on it, as one of its eccentrics, who attest
to the city's penchant for developed, urbane personalities.
The fertile ground for cynicism in modernity is to be found not only
in urban culture but also in the courtly sphere. Both are dies of an evil realism through which people learn the crooked smile of open im-
morality. In both, urbane, intelligent minds accumulate a worldly knowledge which moves elegantly between bare facts and conven-
tional facades. From the very bottom, the declassed, urban intelli-
gentsia, and from the top, the height of conscious statesmanship, serious thinking is invaded by signals attesting to a radical ironization
of ethics and of social convention. It is as if the general laws were only meant for the stupid, while those in the know smile with fatal clever-
ness. More precisely: the powerful smile this way, while the kynical
plebeians burst out in satirical laughter. In the vast space of cynical knowledge the extremes meet: Eulenspiegel meets Richelieu;Machiavelli
meets Rameau's nephew; the loud Condottieri of the Renaissance
meet the elegant cynics of the Rococo period; unscrupulous entre- preneurs meet disillusioned outsiders; jaded system strategists meet advocates of refusal without ideals.
Since bourgeois society began to bridge the knowledge of those at
the top and those at the bottom, ambitiously proclaiming to ground its worldview entirely on realism,the extremes have been coalescing.
Today the cynic appears as a mass figure, an average social characterin the elevated superstructure. This is the case, not only because ad-
vanced industrial civilization produces the embittered loner as a mass
? 192
Cynicism
phenomenon. Rather,thecitiesthemselveshavebecome diffuseclumps
whose power to create generally acceptedpubliccharacterhsas been lost.
The pressure towards individualization has dropped in the modern
climate of cities and mass media. The modern cynic - extant as a mass
phenomenon in Germany, since the FirstWorld War - is no longer an
outsider. But less than ever does he appear as a tangibly developed
type. The modern mass cynic loses his individual sting and spares him-
self the risk of exposure. He has long since ceased to subject his eccen-
tricity to the attention and mockery of others. The man with the clear
'evil eye' has disappeared in the crowd; anonymity now becomes the
large space for the cynical deviation. The modern cynic is an integrated asocial characterwhose deep-seated lack of illusions is a match for that
of any hippy. He does not regard his own clear, evil gaze as a personal
defect or as an amoral quirk to be privatelyjustified. Instinctively, he no longer understands his way of life as something evil, but as part of a
collective, realistic view of things. It is the widespread form in which enlightened people see to it that they are not taken for suckers. There
even seems to be something healthy in this attitude, as there is general- ly in the will to self-preservation. This is the stance of people who re- alize that the times of nalvete are gone.
Psychologically, the contemporary cynic can be understood as a borderline melancholic; he is able to keep his depressive symptoms under control and remains more or less capable of work. Indeed, the ability of the cynic to work is decisive in modern cynicism: in spite of
everything, after all, especially that. Society's key positions have long since belonged to a diffuse cynicism in boards, parliaments, commit-
tees, company leadership, editorialoffices,practices, faculties, law and newspaper offices. A certain elegant bitterness colors its activity. For
cynics are not dumb, and every now and then they certainly see the
nothingness to which everything leads. Their spiritual make-up has become elastic enough to make the constant doubt about their own
pursuits part of their quest for survival. They know what they do, but they do it because, in the short run, the objective situation and the instinct for self-preservation speak the same language and tell them it must be so. Others would do it anyway, perhaps worse. The new,
integrated cynicism thus even feels itself, understandably, both as vic- tim and as sacrificer. Behind the conscientiously hard fa,ade of col-
laboration there is a mass of vulnerable unhappiness and the need to
cry. Here is something of the mourning for a 'lost innocence,' for the better knowledge against which all one's actions and labors strive.
This our first definition: is conscious- yields cynicism enlightenedfalse
ness. It is the modernized, unhappy consciousness, atwhich Enlighten- ment has simultaneously labored successfully and in vain. It has learnt
? its lesson in Enlightenment,but it has not implementedit and prob- ablywasnotevenabletodo so. Well-placedandmiserableatthesame
time, this consciousnessis no longer vulnerableto any critiqueof
ideology;its falsenessis alreadyreflexivelybuffered.
'Enlightened false consciousness': such a formulation seems to
strike a blow against the tradition of Enlightenment. The sentence itselfiscynicisminacrystallinestate. Nonetheless, itclaimsobjective
validity;its content and its necessity are developed in this essay. Logical-
ly, we are dealing with a paradox, for how could enlightened con- sciousness be false? This is precisely the issue.
Acting against one's own better knowledge is the global situation in the superstructure today. One knows oneself to be without illusions
and yet dragged down by the 'power of things. ' What appears in reality as an objective state of affairs is thus what we consider in logic a
paradox and in literature a joke. This shapes a new consciousness
of 'objectivity. '
'Enlightened false consciousness' should not be understood as an
incidental phrase but as a systematic approach, as diagnostic model. It thus commits itself to a revision of enlightenment; it must uncover its
relationtothatwhichistraditionallycalled'falseconsciousness. ' Fur- ther, it must revise the course of Enlightenment and the labor of ideol- ogy critique, which made it possible for 'false consciousness' to re- absorb Enlightenment. If this essay had historical intentions, it would be to describe the modernization of false consciousness. However, my intention is not historical but physiognomic: the focus is the structure of a reflexively buffered false consciousness. I nevertheless want to demonstrate that this structure cannot be grasped without placing it in
a political history of polemical reflections.
Without sarcasm modern-day Enlightenment can have no healthy
relation to its own history. We can only choose between a pessimism -
reminiscent of decadence - loyal to its beginnings and a light-hearted
disrespect in pursuit of original tasks. As things stand, the only loyalty to Enlightenment consists in disloyalty. This can be partlyunderstood from the position of the heirs, who look back on 'heroic' times and are
necessarily more skeptically disposed to the results. To be an heir always carries a certain 'status-cynicism' with it, as we know from
stories about inheritance of family capital. The retrospective position, however, does not itself explain the particular tone of modern cyni- cism. Disillusionment with the Enlightenment is not merely a sign that epigones may and must be more critical than the founders. The pecu- liar hautgoutof modern cynicism is fundamental: a consciousness dis- eased with Enlightenment and instructed by historical experience refuses cheap optimism. New values? No thanks! With the passing of
PeterSloterdijk 193
? 194
Cynicism
defiant hopes, the listlessness of egoisms pervades. In the new cyni- cism, we see a detached negativity which scarcely allows itself any
hope, at most a little irony and self-pity.
In the final analysis, it is a matter of the social and existential limits of
Enlightenment. The pressures to survive and the desire to assert one- self have humbled enlightened consciousness. It is ill from the com- pulsion to accept existing conditions which it doubts, to accommodate itself to them and finally even to conduct their business.
In order to survive, one has to attend the school of reality. Certainly. Those who mean well call it growing up, and there is some truth to that. But that is not all of it. Always a bit unsettled and irritable, the col- laborating consciousness looks around for its lost na;vetes, to which there is no return, since the attainment of consciousness is irrevers- ible.
Gottfried Benn, himself one of the prominent voices of modern
cynicism, has probably uttered the cynical formulation of the century, lucid and insolent: "To be stupid and have a job, that's happiness. "
Only the converse of the sentence reveals its full content: to be intelli- gent and to perform one's work in spite of it, that is unhappy con- sciousness in its modernized form, ill with Enlightenment. Being
"stupid" and trusting are no longer options, and innocence cannot be regained. Unhappy consciousness clings to the belief in the sheer weight of things, to which it is bound by its instinct for self-preserva- tion. In for a penny, in for a pound. At two thousand marksnet a month,
the counter-enlightenment quietly begins; it banks on the fact that everyone who has something to lose comes to terms privatelywith his
unhappy consciousness or engulfs it with 'engagements. ' Preciselybecause it is lived as a privatedisposition which absorbs the
world situation, the new cynicism is not as strikingly noticeable as
would befit its concept. It surrounds itself with discretion, as we shall
see, a key word of charmingly mediated alienation. The accommoda-
tion which knows about itself, having sacrificed its better knowledge to
'objective determinations,' no longer sees any need to expose itself
offensively and spectacularly. There is a nakedness which no longer has an unmasking effect and in which no 'bare fact' appears on whose
ground one could stand with spirited realism. The neo-cynical accom- modation to the given has an aura of plaintiveness; it no longer is self- confidently naked. For this reason it is also methodologically difficult to render this diffuse, hazy cynicism articulate. It has withdrawn into a mournful detachment which has internalized its knowl-
(Abgeklirtheit)
edge, useless for attacks, like a curse. The great offensives of cynical
impudence have become a rarity;ill humor has taken their place, and there is no energy left for sarcasm. Gehlen even thought that not even
? Peter Sloterdijk 195
the English can be cutting any more because the supplies of dissatisfac- tion have been used up and the rationing of stocks has begun. The peevishness which follows the offensives doesn't open its mouth wide
enough for enlightenment to take a step forward.
That is one of the reasons why, in the second part of this book, a dis-
proportionate amount of'cynical material' is taken from the Weimar Republic - aside from the older documents that are also given atten-
tion. In the historical section entitled TheWeimar I Symptom, attempt
a physiognomy of an epoch, a characterization of a decade whose first
heir was fascism and whose second heir we are.
Speaking of the Weimar Republic still means dealing with social
experience of the self. For citable reasons the Weimar culture was
cynically disposed to a highly unusual degree; it yielded an abundance of brilliantlyarticulatedcynicisms, which readliketextbook examples.
It experienced the pain of modernization more violently and ex-
pressed its disillusionment more coldly and more sharply than any
present could ever do. We discover in it strikingformulations of mod-
ern unhappy consciousness, burningly relevant even today. Indeed,
perhaps we can only today comprehend them in their full validity. A critique of cynical reason would remain an academic game with
glass beads if it failed to pursue the connection between the problem of survivaland the danger of fascism. In fact, the question of'survival,' of
self-preservation and self-assertion - to which all cynicisms provide answers - touches on the central problem of defending the status quo
and planning for the future in modern nation states. From various approaches, I attempt to determine the logical locus of German Fas- cism in the convolutions of modern, self-reflexive cynicism. So much can be said in anticipation; in German Fascism typically modern
dynamics of psycho-cultural fears of breakdown, regressive self-asser- tion and new-objective, rational coldness combined with a venerable
strain of military cynicism, which on German, and especially Prussian, soil enjoys an equally macabre and deep-rooted tradition.
Perhaps these thoughts on cynicism as the fourth configuration of false consciousness will help to overcome the peculiar speechlessness
of genuinely philosophical critique regarding so-called fascist ideol-
ogy. Philosophy as a ',discipline' does not have its own theory of 'theoretical fascism' because the latter is considered beneath all cri-
tique. The explanations of fascism as nihilism (Rauschning, etal. ) or as
the product of "totalitarianthinking" remain sweeping and imprecise. The "inauthentic," bastardized nature of fascist ideology has been suf-
ficiently emphasized, and all contents that it "represented" have long since been subjected to a critique by the individual sciences: psychol-
ogy, political science, sociology, historiography. For philosophy, the
? 196 Cynicism
programmatic statements of fascism do "not even" rate as serious, substantial ideology which would pose a serious challenge to a reflec- tive critique. But precisely here lies the weakness of the critique. Fix-
ated on 'serious opponents,' it neglects the taskof comprehending the
ideological pattern of'unserious,' shallow 'systems. ' To this day cri- tique is no match for the modern mixture of opinion and cynicism. But
since questions of social and individual self-preservation are discussed precisely in such combinations, there are good reasons to study their
composition. One has to approach questions of self-preservation in the same language as those of self-annihilation. The same logic of the
repudiation of morality seems to be effective in them. I call this the
of the structure,' of the self-denial of the ethics of 'cynical i. e. ,
logic
culture. Clarifying this will elucidate what it means to choose life.
high
Whoever speaks of cynicism draws attention to the limits of Enlight- enment. In this respect, the concern with the salient featuresof Weimar
cynicism - aside from the advantage of clarity - also promises to be
fruitful for the philosophy of history. The Weimar Republic represents in the course of German history not only the belated development of a
nation-state - heavily burdened by the Wilhelminian legacy, the spirit of a cynically illiberal government - but also a paradigm for 'failed
enlightenment. '
It has often been shown that, and why, the protagonists of repub-
lican Enlightenment at that time could not have been anything else but
a desperate, well-meaning minority (representatives of reason) vis-a- vis almost insurmountable odds: massive currents of anti-Enlighten-
ment and hatred of the intelligentsia; an arrayof anti-democratic and authoritarian ideologies which knew how to use the press to achieve their desired objectives; an aggressive nationalism bent on revenge; an unenlightenable mixture of hard-headed conservatisms, extended
petit-bourgeois (Biedermeiera)ttitudes, messianic sects, apocalyptic
political tendencies, and equally realistic and psychopathic rejections of the impositions of an uncomfortable modernity.
Diogenes in the tub is con- sidered the archetype of this figure. In the picture book of social characters he creates distance with his mockery, a biting and evil individualist who pretends not to need anyone and who is loved by no
one because no one escapes unscathed his crudely unmasking gaze. His social origins point to an urban figure who received his cutting
edge in the bustle of the ancient metropolis. One could characterize him as the earliest example of a declassed or plebeian intelligence. His 'cynicial' turn against the arrogance and the moral secrets of an estab- lished, higher civilization presupposes a city setting with all its suc- cesses and shadows. Only in the city, under the pressure of public
speech and a general love-hate, can the cynic clearly emerge as the
negative profile of the city. And only the city can accept the cynic, who demonstratively turns his back on it, as one of its eccentrics, who attest
to the city's penchant for developed, urbane personalities.
The fertile ground for cynicism in modernity is to be found not only
in urban culture but also in the courtly sphere. Both are dies of an evil realism through which people learn the crooked smile of open im-
morality. In both, urbane, intelligent minds accumulate a worldly knowledge which moves elegantly between bare facts and conven-
tional facades. From the very bottom, the declassed, urban intelli-
gentsia, and from the top, the height of conscious statesmanship, serious thinking is invaded by signals attesting to a radical ironization
of ethics and of social convention. It is as if the general laws were only meant for the stupid, while those in the know smile with fatal clever-
ness. More precisely: the powerful smile this way, while the kynical
plebeians burst out in satirical laughter. In the vast space of cynical knowledge the extremes meet: Eulenspiegel meets Richelieu;Machiavelli
meets Rameau's nephew; the loud Condottieri of the Renaissance
meet the elegant cynics of the Rococo period; unscrupulous entre- preneurs meet disillusioned outsiders; jaded system strategists meet advocates of refusal without ideals.
Since bourgeois society began to bridge the knowledge of those at
the top and those at the bottom, ambitiously proclaiming to ground its worldview entirely on realism,the extremes have been coalescing.
Today the cynic appears as a mass figure, an average social characterin the elevated superstructure. This is the case, not only because ad-
vanced industrial civilization produces the embittered loner as a mass
? 192
Cynicism
phenomenon. Rather,thecitiesthemselveshavebecome diffuseclumps
whose power to create generally acceptedpubliccharacterhsas been lost.
The pressure towards individualization has dropped in the modern
climate of cities and mass media. The modern cynic - extant as a mass
phenomenon in Germany, since the FirstWorld War - is no longer an
outsider. But less than ever does he appear as a tangibly developed
type. The modern mass cynic loses his individual sting and spares him-
self the risk of exposure. He has long since ceased to subject his eccen-
tricity to the attention and mockery of others. The man with the clear
'evil eye' has disappeared in the crowd; anonymity now becomes the
large space for the cynical deviation. The modern cynic is an integrated asocial characterwhose deep-seated lack of illusions is a match for that
of any hippy. He does not regard his own clear, evil gaze as a personal
defect or as an amoral quirk to be privatelyjustified. Instinctively, he no longer understands his way of life as something evil, but as part of a
collective, realistic view of things. It is the widespread form in which enlightened people see to it that they are not taken for suckers. There
even seems to be something healthy in this attitude, as there is general- ly in the will to self-preservation. This is the stance of people who re- alize that the times of nalvete are gone.
Psychologically, the contemporary cynic can be understood as a borderline melancholic; he is able to keep his depressive symptoms under control and remains more or less capable of work. Indeed, the ability of the cynic to work is decisive in modern cynicism: in spite of
everything, after all, especially that. Society's key positions have long since belonged to a diffuse cynicism in boards, parliaments, commit-
tees, company leadership, editorialoffices,practices, faculties, law and newspaper offices. A certain elegant bitterness colors its activity. For
cynics are not dumb, and every now and then they certainly see the
nothingness to which everything leads. Their spiritual make-up has become elastic enough to make the constant doubt about their own
pursuits part of their quest for survival. They know what they do, but they do it because, in the short run, the objective situation and the instinct for self-preservation speak the same language and tell them it must be so. Others would do it anyway, perhaps worse. The new,
integrated cynicism thus even feels itself, understandably, both as vic- tim and as sacrificer. Behind the conscientiously hard fa,ade of col-
laboration there is a mass of vulnerable unhappiness and the need to
cry. Here is something of the mourning for a 'lost innocence,' for the better knowledge against which all one's actions and labors strive.
This our first definition: is conscious- yields cynicism enlightenedfalse
ness. It is the modernized, unhappy consciousness, atwhich Enlighten- ment has simultaneously labored successfully and in vain. It has learnt
? its lesson in Enlightenment,but it has not implementedit and prob- ablywasnotevenabletodo so. Well-placedandmiserableatthesame
time, this consciousnessis no longer vulnerableto any critiqueof
ideology;its falsenessis alreadyreflexivelybuffered.
'Enlightened false consciousness': such a formulation seems to
strike a blow against the tradition of Enlightenment. The sentence itselfiscynicisminacrystallinestate. Nonetheless, itclaimsobjective
validity;its content and its necessity are developed in this essay. Logical-
ly, we are dealing with a paradox, for how could enlightened con- sciousness be false? This is precisely the issue.
Acting against one's own better knowledge is the global situation in the superstructure today. One knows oneself to be without illusions
and yet dragged down by the 'power of things. ' What appears in reality as an objective state of affairs is thus what we consider in logic a
paradox and in literature a joke. This shapes a new consciousness
of 'objectivity. '
'Enlightened false consciousness' should not be understood as an
incidental phrase but as a systematic approach, as diagnostic model. It thus commits itself to a revision of enlightenment; it must uncover its
relationtothatwhichistraditionallycalled'falseconsciousness. ' Fur- ther, it must revise the course of Enlightenment and the labor of ideol- ogy critique, which made it possible for 'false consciousness' to re- absorb Enlightenment. If this essay had historical intentions, it would be to describe the modernization of false consciousness. However, my intention is not historical but physiognomic: the focus is the structure of a reflexively buffered false consciousness. I nevertheless want to demonstrate that this structure cannot be grasped without placing it in
a political history of polemical reflections.
Without sarcasm modern-day Enlightenment can have no healthy
relation to its own history. We can only choose between a pessimism -
reminiscent of decadence - loyal to its beginnings and a light-hearted
disrespect in pursuit of original tasks. As things stand, the only loyalty to Enlightenment consists in disloyalty. This can be partlyunderstood from the position of the heirs, who look back on 'heroic' times and are
necessarily more skeptically disposed to the results. To be an heir always carries a certain 'status-cynicism' with it, as we know from
stories about inheritance of family capital. The retrospective position, however, does not itself explain the particular tone of modern cyni- cism. Disillusionment with the Enlightenment is not merely a sign that epigones may and must be more critical than the founders. The pecu- liar hautgoutof modern cynicism is fundamental: a consciousness dis- eased with Enlightenment and instructed by historical experience refuses cheap optimism. New values? No thanks! With the passing of
PeterSloterdijk 193
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Cynicism
defiant hopes, the listlessness of egoisms pervades. In the new cyni- cism, we see a detached negativity which scarcely allows itself any
hope, at most a little irony and self-pity.
In the final analysis, it is a matter of the social and existential limits of
Enlightenment. The pressures to survive and the desire to assert one- self have humbled enlightened consciousness. It is ill from the com- pulsion to accept existing conditions which it doubts, to accommodate itself to them and finally even to conduct their business.
In order to survive, one has to attend the school of reality. Certainly. Those who mean well call it growing up, and there is some truth to that. But that is not all of it. Always a bit unsettled and irritable, the col- laborating consciousness looks around for its lost na;vetes, to which there is no return, since the attainment of consciousness is irrevers- ible.
Gottfried Benn, himself one of the prominent voices of modern
cynicism, has probably uttered the cynical formulation of the century, lucid and insolent: "To be stupid and have a job, that's happiness. "
Only the converse of the sentence reveals its full content: to be intelli- gent and to perform one's work in spite of it, that is unhappy con- sciousness in its modernized form, ill with Enlightenment. Being
"stupid" and trusting are no longer options, and innocence cannot be regained. Unhappy consciousness clings to the belief in the sheer weight of things, to which it is bound by its instinct for self-preserva- tion. In for a penny, in for a pound. At two thousand marksnet a month,
the counter-enlightenment quietly begins; it banks on the fact that everyone who has something to lose comes to terms privatelywith his
unhappy consciousness or engulfs it with 'engagements. ' Preciselybecause it is lived as a privatedisposition which absorbs the
world situation, the new cynicism is not as strikingly noticeable as
would befit its concept. It surrounds itself with discretion, as we shall
see, a key word of charmingly mediated alienation. The accommoda-
tion which knows about itself, having sacrificed its better knowledge to
'objective determinations,' no longer sees any need to expose itself
offensively and spectacularly. There is a nakedness which no longer has an unmasking effect and in which no 'bare fact' appears on whose
ground one could stand with spirited realism. The neo-cynical accom- modation to the given has an aura of plaintiveness; it no longer is self- confidently naked. For this reason it is also methodologically difficult to render this diffuse, hazy cynicism articulate. It has withdrawn into a mournful detachment which has internalized its knowl-
(Abgeklirtheit)
edge, useless for attacks, like a curse. The great offensives of cynical
impudence have become a rarity;ill humor has taken their place, and there is no energy left for sarcasm. Gehlen even thought that not even
? Peter Sloterdijk 195
the English can be cutting any more because the supplies of dissatisfac- tion have been used up and the rationing of stocks has begun. The peevishness which follows the offensives doesn't open its mouth wide
enough for enlightenment to take a step forward.
That is one of the reasons why, in the second part of this book, a dis-
proportionate amount of'cynical material' is taken from the Weimar Republic - aside from the older documents that are also given atten-
tion. In the historical section entitled TheWeimar I Symptom, attempt
a physiognomy of an epoch, a characterization of a decade whose first
heir was fascism and whose second heir we are.
Speaking of the Weimar Republic still means dealing with social
experience of the self. For citable reasons the Weimar culture was
cynically disposed to a highly unusual degree; it yielded an abundance of brilliantlyarticulatedcynicisms, which readliketextbook examples.
It experienced the pain of modernization more violently and ex-
pressed its disillusionment more coldly and more sharply than any
present could ever do. We discover in it strikingformulations of mod-
ern unhappy consciousness, burningly relevant even today. Indeed,
perhaps we can only today comprehend them in their full validity. A critique of cynical reason would remain an academic game with
glass beads if it failed to pursue the connection between the problem of survivaland the danger of fascism. In fact, the question of'survival,' of
self-preservation and self-assertion - to which all cynicisms provide answers - touches on the central problem of defending the status quo
and planning for the future in modern nation states. From various approaches, I attempt to determine the logical locus of German Fas- cism in the convolutions of modern, self-reflexive cynicism. So much can be said in anticipation; in German Fascism typically modern
dynamics of psycho-cultural fears of breakdown, regressive self-asser- tion and new-objective, rational coldness combined with a venerable
strain of military cynicism, which on German, and especially Prussian, soil enjoys an equally macabre and deep-rooted tradition.
Perhaps these thoughts on cynicism as the fourth configuration of false consciousness will help to overcome the peculiar speechlessness
of genuinely philosophical critique regarding so-called fascist ideol-
ogy. Philosophy as a ',discipline' does not have its own theory of 'theoretical fascism' because the latter is considered beneath all cri-
tique. The explanations of fascism as nihilism (Rauschning, etal. ) or as
the product of "totalitarianthinking" remain sweeping and imprecise. The "inauthentic," bastardized nature of fascist ideology has been suf-
ficiently emphasized, and all contents that it "represented" have long since been subjected to a critique by the individual sciences: psychol-
ogy, political science, sociology, historiography. For philosophy, the
? 196 Cynicism
programmatic statements of fascism do "not even" rate as serious, substantial ideology which would pose a serious challenge to a reflec- tive critique. But precisely here lies the weakness of the critique. Fix-
ated on 'serious opponents,' it neglects the taskof comprehending the
ideological pattern of'unserious,' shallow 'systems. ' To this day cri- tique is no match for the modern mixture of opinion and cynicism. But
since questions of social and individual self-preservation are discussed precisely in such combinations, there are good reasons to study their
composition. One has to approach questions of self-preservation in the same language as those of self-annihilation. The same logic of the
repudiation of morality seems to be effective in them. I call this the
of the structure,' of the self-denial of the ethics of 'cynical i. e. ,
logic
culture. Clarifying this will elucidate what it means to choose life.
high
Whoever speaks of cynicism draws attention to the limits of Enlight- enment. In this respect, the concern with the salient featuresof Weimar
cynicism - aside from the advantage of clarity - also promises to be
fruitful for the philosophy of history. The Weimar Republic represents in the course of German history not only the belated development of a
nation-state - heavily burdened by the Wilhelminian legacy, the spirit of a cynically illiberal government - but also a paradigm for 'failed
enlightenment. '
It has often been shown that, and why, the protagonists of repub-
lican Enlightenment at that time could not have been anything else but
a desperate, well-meaning minority (representatives of reason) vis-a- vis almost insurmountable odds: massive currents of anti-Enlighten-
ment and hatred of the intelligentsia; an arrayof anti-democratic and authoritarian ideologies which knew how to use the press to achieve their desired objectives; an aggressive nationalism bent on revenge; an unenlightenable mixture of hard-headed conservatisms, extended
petit-bourgeois (Biedermeiera)ttitudes, messianic sects, apocalyptic
political tendencies, and equally realistic and psychopathic rejections of the impositions of an uncomfortable modernity. The sores of the
World War became infected again and again in the smoldering crisis; Nietzscheanism flourished as the most developed style of thinking marked by a German-narcissistic irritabilityand a moody, arrogant, 'protestant'relation to the 'bad reality. 'In a climate of crisis-likeexcite-
ment there developed a pervasive psycho-political atmosphere of resentment and anxiety about the future, of tenuous pseudo-realisms
and makeshift spiritual responses. If there was ever an era which
as Conversatio-n Enlightenment
IdeologyCritiqueas Continuationofa MiscarriedConversatiownithOtherMeans
? PeterSloterdijk 197
demanded an historical psychopathology, it is the one and a half decades between the fall of the Kaiserreichand the establishment of National Socialism.
First impressions must be given their due here: whoever sought to
carry on enlightenment in such a society was fighting a losing battle. The forces of enlightenment were too weak, for a number of precise
reasons. The Enlightenment had never been able to form an effective
alliance with the mass media, and was political maturity (Miindigkeit)
never an ideal of the industrial monopolies and their associations. How could it have been?
Obviously, the Enlightenment is defeated by forces opposed to it. However, it would be wrong to view this only as a question of the
arithmetics of power. For Enlightenment is also defeated by a qualita- tiveresistance located in the consciousness of its enemies. The latter, outraged, resist the invitation to discussion, to the "decadent" (zerset- zend)talk about truth; even talking itself is resented, because it ques- tions conventional views, values and forms of self-assertion. The inter- pretation of this resistance as the basis of ideology has become one of the main motifs of Enlightenment.
Modernity is not the firsthistorical context in which Enlightenment faces an opposing consciousness which is increasingly resilient to it. In principle, the front can be traced back to the days of the Inquisition. If it is true, as the workers' movement taught, that knowledge is power, then it is also true that not every knowledge is welcomed with open arms. Because there are no truths which can be occupied without a struggle, and because every knowledge must choose its place amidst dominant and oppositional forces, the means by which knowledge is accorded validity seem almost more important than the knowledge itself. In modernity, Enlightenment is revealed as a tactical complex. The demand that what is reasonable also be generalizable draws
Enlightenment into the maelstrom of politics, pedagogy and pro-
paganda. Here Enlightenment consciously represses the acid realism of older doctrines of wisdom, which considered it a certainty that
stupidity belonged to the masses and reason only to the few. Modern elitism has to encode itself democratically.
It is not our task to unfold historically the darkening of the Enlight-
enment. We know that in the 18th and 19th centuries, in spite of much
resistance and contradiction, it knew how to deal mostly productively and with an eye to the future with the ferment of self-doubt as it con-
sidered its own achievements and plans. In spite of all hardships and setbacks it could still believe it had the law of progress on its side. Great names of that time stand for great achievements: Watt, Pasteur, Koch, Siemens. One can reject their achievements but that would be more a
? 198
Cynicism
gesture of ill humor than of justice. The press, the railway, social welfare, penicillin - who could deny that these are remarkable in- novations in the 'garden of humanity'? However, since the technical horrors of the 20th century, from Verdun to the Gulag, from Ausch- witz to Hiroshima, experience mocks optimism. Historical conscious- ness and pessimism seem to boil down to the same thing. And the catastrophes which have not yet happened, which smolder in the undergrowth, feed the omnipresent doubts about civilization. The late 20th century rides on a wave of negative futurism. "The worst was
expected," it "only" has to happen.
I would like first to focus on the theme of on unfulfilledEnlightenment
one point: the question concerning the means of power available to Enlightenment vis-a-vis an opposing consciousness. It is already in a
certain way incorrect to ask about "means of power," since Enlighten- ment is essentially concerned with free consent. That is the "lesson" which cannot be learned under a pressure thatlies outside reason. One of its axes is reason; the other is the free conversation of those striving for reason. Voluntaryconsensus is both its methodological kernel and its moral ideal. This means the opposing consciousness changes its position under no other influence than that of cogent argument.
This is a sublimely peaceful event, when, under the fire of plausible
reasons, old, superceded opinions are surrendered. Enlightenment thus harbors within itself, so to speak, an original utopia - an epis- temological idyl of peace, a beautiful and academic vision: that of free
dialogue among those freely interested in knowledge. Here, impartial individuals, not enslaved to their own consciousness, not repressed by social conditions, come together for a dialogue aiming at truth, under the laws of reason. The truth which Enlighteners want to disseminate arises through the force, without coercion, of stronger arguments. The protagonist or discoverer of an enlightened thought took this step only earlier and usually by surrendering a former opinion of his own.
Accordingly, Enlightenment proceeds in two steps: the acceptance
of the better position and the departure from the previous opinion. This gives rise to an emotional ambivalence: gain and loss. The utopia
of a gentle, critical dialogue foresees this difficulty. The loss becomes bearable in the consciousness that it can be accepted voluntarily and
collegially as the price of commonality. The 'loser' may view himself as the realwinner. The conversation of Enlightenment is thus essentially
a struggle of opinions and an exploratory dialogue among persons who, from the start,submit themselves to rules of peace, since they can
emerge from the encounter only as winners, winners in knowledge and
solidarity. For this reason, the surrender of one's preconceptions is considered bearable.
? PeterSloterdijk 199
An academic idyl, as I said; at the same time, it remains the regula- tive idea of any enlightenment which does not want to surrender the
goal of reconsiliation. The fact that reality is different will come as no
surprise. In Enlightenment's confrontations with preceding con- sciousnesses, truth is the last thing at issue: hegemony, class interests, established doctrines, desires, passions, and the defense of'identities. '
These preconditions affectthe conversationof Enlightenment so strong- ly that it would be more appropriate to talk of a war of consciousness
than of a dialogue of peace. The opponents have not agreed to a peace treaty, but rather confront one another in a competition aimed at re-
pression and annihilation. And they are not free in relation to the powers which make their consciousness speakjust so and in no other
way.
Faced with these sober facts, the conversation model consciously
behaves unrealistically. It allows the arch-pragmatic statement,primum
vivere, to hold For at least it knows deindephilosophari, only conditionally.
that situations will recur again and again where the only thing which
can help life further is 'philosophizing. '
It is inviting to poke fun at the 'methodological anti-realism' of the
dialogue idea, and part of this book indeed tries to give the derisory laughter about every form of foolish idealism its due. However, when all contradicitons have been taken into account, one will return to this beginning, of course with a consciousness which has gone through all the hells of realism. One of the last tasks of philosophy is to preserve the healing fiction of a free dialogue.
Of course, Enlightenment itself is the first to realize that rational and verbal dialogue alone will not see it through. No one can feel the stagnations, the distorted conditions of life, the ruptures, the mis-
carriage of conversation more keenly. At the beginning of ideology critique there is also astonishment about the opponent's stubborn
resistance to hearing - an astonishment which quickly gives way to a
realistic awakening. Whoever does not want to hear lets others know it.
Enlightenment is reminded how easily speaking one's mind can lead
to and cannot be with so easi- camps prisons.
