When Bad Things Happen to Other People Read Online Free PDF

Schadenfreude presupposes malice. Let’s see what can be inferred from Kafka.
    2.        A presupposition of malice
    In her 1996 translation of Kant’s  The Metaphysics of Morals , Mary Gregor consistently renders the German “ Schadenfreude ” as “malice.” Though this must be considered an important error, Gregor might reasonably try to defend herself by maintaining that Kant himself seems to view  Schadenfreude , like the envy and ingratitude with which he associates it, as presupposing malice. A discrepancy between Kant and Kafka emerges here.
    Briefly put, malice signifies the intention to harm another person or the wish that another person suffer harm. Kafka’s implicit belief that his own blameworthiness (for  Schadenfreude ) was of a different kind than his father’s blameworthiness (for malice) only makes sense if Schadenfreude does not presuppose malice. The text gives no more reason to conclude that Kafka understands Schadenfreude to presuppose malice than to conclude that he sees no interesting difference between acting and watching. For Kafka, seeing suffering and simultaneously approving of it does not clearly indicate a moral failing.
    Kafka views his father’s transgression as more significant than his own. Why should we agree with Kafka here? Because Schadenfreude arises from a judgment of appropriate instances of suffering, Schadenfreude does not clearly involve a disposition to take pleasure in all the bad things that may happen to other people. Although Schadenfreude may include malice, it needn’t presuppose malice.
    The pleasure of Schadenfreude springs from a person’s beliefs about the appropriateness of suffering. Our views of appropriateness can change from situation to situation. To insist that Schadenfreude presupposes malice is to insist our views of appropriateness do not change.
    Beyond that, it is hardly difficult to imagine other reasons for Kafka’s Schadenfreude which do not presuppose malice. Kafka may well have believed that Elli “had it coming to her.” Alternatively, the injury his father had inflicted on the boy’s self-esteem left him with a feeling of inferiority, and insults to Elli may well have allowed him to feel superior to someone , if only for a moment.
    I will leave off with Kafka in what remains of this subsection in order to fill out this point. Other usages would seem to bear out the claim that Schadenfreude can be an episodic emotional response that does not presuppose malice. In  Paradise News,  by the British novelist and literary critic David Lodge, we read:
    We were not encouraged by our episcopal masters to disturb the faith of the ever-dwindling number of recruits to the priesthood by exposing them to the full, cold blast of modern radical theology. The Anglicans were making all the running in that direction, and we derived a certain Schadenfreude from contemplating the rows and threatened schisms in the Church of England provoked by bishops and priests who denied the doctrine of the Virgin Birth, the Resurrection, and even the divinity of Christ.5
    This usage depicts Schadenfreude as a function of mischief or playfulness, not malevolence. The careful reference “a certain  Schadenfreude ” suggests that Lodge understands how much confusion surrounds the moral appraisal of this pleasure.
    It is certainly true, however, that for many thinkers Schadenfreude does presuppose something morally objectionable, if not outright malice. H. Richard Niebuhr, an eloquent proponent of agape, or love of neighbor, would not condone the professions of Kafka and David Lodge. Playful spontaneity holds little appeal for many moralists, including Niebuhr. Their seriousness may well stem from reservations about what underlies much mischief, namely using others to amuse ourselves. Niebuhr exhorts us to focus on the welfare of others and forget our own needs:
    Love is rejoicing over the existence of the beloved one; it is the desire that he be rather than not