Friedrich Nietzsche’s and Web Du Bois’s Points of View

Friedrich Nietzsche is well known for his book On the Genealogy of Morals in which he writes several essays addressing topics such as good, evil, bad, guilt, bad conscience, and much more. He targets what he calls the noble or master morality along with slave morality. More specifically within noble morality he discusses what defines a person as “good” or “bad.” W.E.B. Du Bois is known for his famous work in The Souls of Black Folk where he discusses the lives of Africans, how they are treated, and why they should not be viewed through such negative perspectives. A question that may arise throughout reading these two works would be, how might Friedrich Nietzsche respond to Du Bois writing and would he classify Du Bois and “good” or “bad” according to noble morality? It is most reasonable to conclude that Du Bois would have been viewed as “good” in terms of Nietzsche’s idea of noble morality because of his willingness to inform the whites and help the blacks. However, another plausible argument could be that Du Bois could have been seen in a “bad” perspective if Nietzsche were to claim that his attempts of helping his own race made him selfish.

One could argue that Du Bois’ strive for the wellbeing of his race is a way of helping others. His telling of stories about the people of his race, the Africans, in an effort to inform the world of what they have to go through is what makes him truthful. Du Bois’ effort to get the world to treat his race better is what makes him good. If one were to view Du Bois’ book through Nietzsche’s perspective, they would draw attention to the fact that, according to the noble morality, truthfulness is one of the main traits that Nietzsche uses to define a person as good. When referring to the “good” people he says that “they call themselves, for instance, “the truthful”… The truthful: in this phase of conceptual transformation it becomes a slogan and catchword of the nobility and passes over entirely into the sense of “noble”” (Nietzsche 29). It is clear to see from this part of On the Genealogy of Morals that Friedrich Nietzsche would have viewed Du Bois and his work as “good.”

However, it could also be argued that all Du Bois’ efforts to inform the people around him of the way his own race is being treated, makes him a somewhat egotistical person, one who focuses on work that will better themselves and their own people. Despite the fact that his writing did not focus on his own life in particular because he was very well educated, unlike the Africans he speaks of in his book, it is possible that Du Bois’ work could be interpreted as a somewhat selfish tactic to get himself recognized. Nietzsche says that “unegoistic actions were always habitually praised as good” but if Nietzsche were to read The Souls of Black Folk as if it were a strategy of Du Bois for making himself seem higher in status or a way of getting himself recognized then Nietzsche could, perhaps, have thought of him as egotistical and therefore “bad” (25). Yet, this is not a very likely argument for Du Bois is quite clear that he refers the all of the suffering Africans of his race, rather than himself or his own family.

Disregarding the topics that Du Bois discusses in The Souls of Black Folk, the manner in which he speaks is viewed as very respectful. He is sure to go about explain his points in a calm way, despite his controversial opinions on things such as Booker T. Washington’s speech. His disagreement with Washington was a very bold section of The Souls of Black Folk yet Du Bois addresses it in a very harmless and professional manner. He shows no signs of attacking any certain people, despite the fact that it is clear who he is suggesting was the wrongdoer toward the Africans. The tactic that he uses is befriending his readers in attempt to make them see that people of his race were not actually so bad. If Friedrich Nietzsche were to read The Souls of Black Folk in this way he would certainly find Du Bois to be “ good” and we know this because he states that “he is good who does not outrage, who harms nobody, who does not attack” (Nietzsche 46).

Despite all of Du Bois’ efforts to write a selfless, harmless, educated book, there were some aspects of him that he had no control over that may have caused Nietzsche to view him as “bad” or not “noble.” One of these traits would be that Du Bois was not a rich man. We never learn of Du Bois as having much wealth or power but Nietzsche says that “in the majority of cases, [the nobles] designate themselves simply by their superiority in power or by the most clearly visible signs of this superiority, for example, as “the rich,” “the possessors”” (Nietzsche 29). Although this is a small and uncontrollable argument that he had not way of changing, since W.E.B. Du Bois does not speak of himself as a noble or a man of great fortune, it could possibly be assumed that Nietzsche may have viewed him as “bad” in that aspect.

Continuing with the argument defending Du Bois’ “goodness” because of his truthfulness, Nietzsche most like would have favored Du Bois and viewed him in a positive perspective because of how realistic his writing is. Not as opposed to being false but as opposed to being spoken about in an indirect manner so as to confuse his readers. Du Bois was very clear in what he was saying throughout The Souls of Black Folk and he was brave to do so because many of his readers could have been extremely skeptical and not in agreement with his points, as mentioned earlier with his arguments against Booker T. Washington. “The root of the word coined for [truthful] is esthlos, signifies one who is, who possessed reality” (Nietzsche 29). The editor of On the Genealogy of Morals, Walter Kaufmann, mentions in the footnotes that the direct translation of this Greek word esthlos is good or brave. Therefore, Du Bois’ truthfulness in his writing is a strong reason as to why he most likely would have been viewed as “good” through Nietzsche’s perspective.

Despite his vast intelligence, Du Bois could do nothing to prevent the separation that Nietzsche and people of his time would have immediately seen upon first look at W.E.B. Du Bois. Apart from his not being wealthy, he was also a different race, a darker one and that, by default, could have caused him to be placed into the category of “bad” people. In The Genealogy of Morals, Nietzsche briefly mentions that “the Latin malus may designate the common man as the dark-colored, above all as the black-haired man… who was distinguished most obviously from the blond, that is Aryan, conqueror race by color” (Nietzsche 30). Therefore, there is a small chance that, when being viewed through this perspective, Du Bois may have been defined as “bad” in this sense.

As you can see, this idea of Nietzsche determining Du Bois’ writing to be “good” or “bad” according to his idea of noble morality could be debated in either direction depending on which traits he was looking at in Du Bois and from which perspectives. Du Bois’ truthfulness, intelligence, and the polite manner in which he addresses the problems he discusses could help Nietzsche to view him in a more positive or “good” perspective. On the other hand, certain traits that Du Bois expressed in his work such as his desire to help better his own people along with the facts that he was not rich and was not Aryan could have caused Nietzsche to act negatively, thus viewing Du Bois and “bad” but some of these things, as mentioned earlier, were things that Du Bois had no control over and therefore, do not provide as strong an argument. In the end, it is much more reasonable to assume that Nietzsche would have read Du Bois’ The Souls of Black Folk as “good.”