A Critique of Nihilism

"Freedom is the freedom to believe that two and two are four" George Orwell (Taken from 1984)

Whilst ideologies and beliefs can be said to be dangerous, the freedom to hold beliefs other than the state or mass public opinion are very important.  Most people will say that they don't believe in anything, and these days nihilism is very fashionable, and which is why it's hard to say whether nihilism stems from genuine dissent and scepticism, or whether it is just conforming to mass public opinion.  Such mass public opinion may be simply the hegemony of ideas passed down by the ruling classes to the middle and working classes, justifying ones own dissolution, ignorance, and oppression.

Whilst nihilism seeks to deny all social beliefs and values, in the process of denying it may set up its own personal ideology and dogma, and thus seek to impose this upon others, restricting personal or collective freedom and freedom of thought.  Nihilism denies social beliefs and values, but often doesn't take into account things which are related to beliefs and values, but which are also not synonymous and are separate aspects - things such as faith, creative imagination, integrity, conviction, solidarity, and mutual trust and love.

Nihilism is therefore is a form of egocentrism.  Such individualism or egocentrism could be the basis of libertarian and democratic thinking, but it could also be the basis for right-wing views such as Thatcherism or even Nazism.  Personally, I think that whilst it's foolish to throw the baby out with the bath water, and because there is some truth in everything, there are also contradictions in everything - including nihilism.  To be a thorough nihilist, one also has to be self-critical, but most nihilists are not prepared to do this.

So rather than rejecting everything and hypocritically setting personal belief systems up in the process, I'd rather focus on the positive side of nihilism, and which is about finding truths in all systems, whilst realising and taking into account social, political, and personal contradictions.

One critique of nihilism is that it is a bourgeois consciousness, and embodies the anti-values of the ruling classes, that there is no such thing as society and so on.  The ruling classes and those who support them don't have to have shared values and beliefs in order to organise and change society, because they are content with the system staying as it is to keep them in power.

Also, because nihilism supposedly elevates the individual above all social and shared values, and because it sets up its own dogma and lacks the corresponding self-criticism to be a thorough nihilist, it can very easily lead to being destructive, and very easily lead to being self-opinionated and to personal bigotry.

Nihilism can be conditioned or influenced by social, political, and psychological factors.  I'm also interested in where nihilism stands in terms of freewill and determinism.  On the basis on freewill everything is a choice, and so therefore even not choosing, or rejecting, is still a belief and a choice.  This is somewhat reductionist, as nihilism doesn't have to be destructive, and it can be a form of genuine and moderate scepticism; but I would also add that nihilism ends up becoming deterministic in its personal dogma and ideology, and so again, it ends up becoming the very thing that it is rejecting, albeit in a personalised form.