Misanthropy
Misanthropy is the general hatred, dislike, or distrust of the human species, human behavior, or human nature. A misanthrope or misanthropist is someone who holds such views or feelings. Misanthropy involves a negative evaluative attitude toward humanity that is based on humankind's flaws. Misanthropes hold that these flaws characterize all or at least the greater majority of human beings. They claim that there is no easy way to rectify them short of a complete transformation of the dominant way of life. Various types of misanthropy are distinguished in the academic literature based on what attitude is involved, at whom it is directed, and how it is expressed. Either emotions or theoretical judgments can serve as the foundation of the attitude. It can be directed toward all humans without exception or exclude a few idealized people. In this regard, some misanthropes condemn themselves while others consider themselves superior to everyone else. Misanthropy is sometimes associated with a destructive outlook aiming to hurt other people or an attempt to flee society. Other types of misanthropic stances include activism by trying to improve humanity, quietism in the form of resignation, and humor mocking the absurdity of the human condition.
The negative misanthropic outlook is based on different types of human flaws. Moral flaws and unethical decisions are often seen as the foundational factor. They include cruelty, selfishness, injustice, greed, and indifference to the suffering of others. They may result in harm to humans and animals, such as genocides and factory farming of livestock. Other flaws include intellectual flaws, like dogmatism and cognitive biases, as well as aesthetic flaws concerning ugliness and lack of sensitivity to beauty. Many debates in the academic literature discuss whether misanthropy is a valid viewpoint and what its implications are. Proponents of misanthropy usually point to human flaws and the harm they have caused as a sufficient reason for condemning humanity. Critics have responded to this line of thought by claiming that severe flaws concern only a few extreme cases, like mentally ill perpetrators, but not humanity at large. Another objection is based on the claim that humans also have virtues besides their flaws and that a balanced evaluation might be overall positive. A further criticism rejects misanthropy because of its association with hatred, which may lead to violence, and because it may make people friendless and unhappy. Defenders of misanthropy have responded by claiming that this applies only to some forms of misanthropy but not to misanthropy in general.
A related issue concerns the question of the psychological and social factors that cause people to become misanthropes. They include socio-economic inequality, living under an authoritarian regime, and undergoing personal disappointments in life. Misanthropy is relevant in various disciplines. It has been discussed and exemplified by philosophers throughout history, like Heraclitus, Diogenes, Thomas Hobbes, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Arthur Schopenhauer, and Friedrich Nietzsche. Misanthropic outlooks form part of some religious teachings discussing the deep flaws of human beings, like the Christian doctrine of original sin. Misanthropic perspectives and characters are also found in literature and popular culture. They include William Shakespeare's portrayal of Timon of Athens, Molière's play The Misanthrope, and Gulliver's Travels by Jonathan Swift. Misanthropy is closely related to but not identical to philosophical pessimism. Some misanthropes promote antinatalism, the view that humans should abstain from procreation.
Definition
Misanthropy is traditionally defined as hatred or dislike of humankind. The word originated in the 17th century and has its roots in the Greek words μῖσος mīsos 'hatred' and ἄνθρωπος ānthropos 'man, human'. In contemporary philosophy, the term is usually understood in a wider sense as a negative evaluation of humanity as a whole based on humanity's vices and flaws. This negative evaluation can express itself in various forms, hatred being only one of them. In this sense, misanthropy has a cognitive component based on a negative assessment of humanity and is not just a blind rejection. Misanthropy is usually contrasted with philanthropy, which refers to the love of humankind and is linked to efforts to increase human well-being, for example, through good will, charitable aid, and donations. Both terms have a range of meanings and do not necessarily contradict each other. In this regard, the same person may be a misanthrope in one sense and a philanthrope in another sense.One central aspect of all forms of misanthropy is that their target is not local but ubiquitous. This means that the negative attitude is not just directed at some individual persons or groups but at humanity as a whole. In this regard, misanthropy is different from other forms of negative discriminatory attitudes directed at a particular group of people. This distinguishes it from the intolerance exemplified by misogynists, misandrists, and racists, which hold a negative attitude toward women, men, or certain races. According to literature theorist Andrew Gibson, misanthropy does not need to be universal in the sense that a person literally dislikes every human being. Instead, it depends on the person's horizon. For instance, a villager who loathes every other villager without exception is a misanthrope if their horizon is limited to only this village.
Both misanthropes and their critics agree that negative features and failings are not equally distributed, i.e. that the vices and bad traits are exemplified much more strongly in some than in others. But for misanthropy, the negative assessment of humanity is not based on a few extreme and outstanding cases: it is a condemnation of humanity as a whole that is not just directed at exceptionally bad individuals but includes regular people as well. Because of this focus on the ordinary, it is sometimes held that these flaws are obvious and trivial but people may ignore them due to intellectual flaws. Some see the flaws as part of human nature as such. Others also base their view on non-essential flaws, i.e. what humanity has come to be. This includes flaws seen as symptoms of modern civilization in general. Nevertheless, both groups agree that the relevant flaws are "entrenched". This means that there is either no or no easy way to rectify them and nothing short of a complete transformation of the dominant way of life would be required if that is possible at all.
Types
Various types of misanthropy are distinguished in the academic literature. They are based on what attitude is involved, how it is expressed, and whether the misanthropes include themselves in their negative assessment. The differences between them often matter for assessing the arguments for and against misanthropy. An early categorization suggested by Immanuel Kant distinguishes between positive and negative misanthropes. Positive misanthropes are active enemies of humanity. They wish harm to other people and undertake attempts to hurt them in one form or another. Negative misanthropy, by contrast, is a form of peaceful anthropophobia that leads people to isolate themselves. They may wish others well despite seeing serious flaws in them and prefer to not involve themselves in the social context of humanity. Kant associates negative misanthropy with moral disappointment due to previous negative experiences with others.Another distinction focuses on whether the misanthropic condemnation of humanity is only directed at other people or at everyone including oneself. In this regard, self-inclusive misanthropes are consistent in their attitude by including themselves in their negative assessment. This type is contrasted with self-aggrandizing misanthropes, who either implicitly or explicitly exclude themselves from the general condemnation and see themselves instead as superior to everyone else. In this regard, it may be accompanied by an exaggerated sense of self-worth and self-importance. According to literature theorist Joseph Harris, the self-aggrandizing type is more common. He states that this outlook seems to undermine its own position by constituting a form of hypocrisy. A closely related categorization developed by Irving Babbitt distinguishes misanthropes based on whether they allow exceptions in their negative assessment. In this regard, misanthropes of the naked intellect regard humanity as a whole as hopeless. Tender misanthropes exclude a few idealized people from their negative evaluation. Babbitt cites Rousseau and his fondness for natural uncivilized man as an example of tender misanthropy and contrasts it with Jonathan Swift's thorough dismissal of all of humanity.
A further way to categorize forms of misanthropy is in relation to the type of attitude involved toward humanity. In this regard, philosopher Toby Svoboda distinguishes the attitudes of dislike, hate, contempt, and judgment. A misanthrope based on dislike harbors a distaste in the form of negative feelings toward other people. Misanthropy focusing on hatred involves an intense form of dislike. It includes the additional component of wishing ill upon others and at times trying to realize this wish. In the case of contempt, the attitude is not based on feelings and emotions but on a more theoretical outlook. It leads misanthropes to see other people as worthless and look down on them while excluding themselves from this assessment. If the misanthropic attitude has its foundation in judgment, it is also theoretical but does not distinguish between self and others. It is the view that humanity is in general bad without implying that the misanthrope is in any way better than the rest. According to Svoboda, only misanthropy based on judgment constitutes a serious philosophical position. He holds that misanthropy focusing on contempt is biased against other people while misanthropy in the form of dislike and hate is difficult to assess since these emotional attitudes often do not respond to objective evidence.