http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/StrawNihilist

Friedrich Nietzsche, On Truth and Lies in an Extra-Moral Sense , On Truth and Lies in an Extra-Moral Sense "In some remote corner of the universe, poured out and glittering in innumerable solar systems, there once was a star on which clever animals invented knowledge. That was the highest and most mendacious minute of 'world history' - yet only a minute. After nature had drawn a few breaths the star grew cold, and the clever animals had to die."

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The Straw Nihilist (also known as the Straw Pessimist) is an extreme version of The Cynic and a specific type of The Philosopher who delivers Despair Speeches and Breaks People by Talking about Life, The Universe, and Everything (or at least how meaningless it is to fight for any of them), often Chewing the Scenery about how the hero/audience lives on an Insignificant Little Blue Planet and morality never existed in the first place. Often Above Good and Evil, due to the Straw Nihilist's Armor Piercing Questions about "What Is Evil?".

The basis for the Straw Nihilist is usually extreme scientific empirical materialism: we're all nothing but matter and energy and eventually the universe is going to die as if we never existed, so what's the point in trying to hope and fantasize in a world full of suffering and destruction where morality is dictated by force? Your consciousness is merely an electrochemical reaction inside a dying chemical reactor called the brain which, out of animalistic instincts to protect itself from pain, creates the illusion of meaning and significance in a reality that has none. Good, evil, morality, and thought are nothing but illusions, with no absolute standard in the universe by which to prove their absolute existence as immutable physical laws.

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These are one of the inhabitants of the cynical side of the Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism. Their ability to play existential mind games and force the audience into ethical dilemmas make them a popular sage in the Ontological Mystery genre and amoral Crapsack Worlds. Sometimes they serve as Mr. Exposition, while other times, everything they say is a Fauxlosophic Narration or even a Red Herring, or they're a mix of all of them. But if done badly, they can end up looking like a gratuitous scene of Wangst, making people only get puzzled on why they haven't been Driven to Suicide yet.

The Straw Nihilist's behavior is often expected to be like that of The Hedonist or The Sociopath, since, if he doesn't subscribe to morality, he has no restraint in pursuing his instinctual desires. Hedonism can serve as a justification on why he has not killed himself yet, because he's having too much fun. In more straightforward Science Fiction and Fantasy stories, they are usually Chaotic Evil villains who are always preaching hate and plotting destruction, and can get really over the top in their behavior. They also often use No Good Deed Goes Unpunished, Being Good Sucks and Go Mad from the Revelation as Freudian Excuses on why they have a nihilistic outlook on life.

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We use "Straw" as part of the title because it's a stereotype that rarely applies to real nihilists. Note that nihilism in its simplest form is the belief that life is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value. Nihilism, by itself, is NOT something that can cause someone to commit suicide or go insane. Indeed, most philosophers who specialise in the subject are rather neurotypical instead of the self-harming and/or psychotic types often portrayed in fiction, and it is possible for one can have a nihilistic outlook on the world at large, and still adhere to personal moral values. See The Anti-Nihilist for examples of such subversions.

Hollywood Atheist is a similar stereotype leveled against any people who don't believe in God or religion, assuming that they are all nihilistic (and by this trope, therefore amoral) by default. Compare the Übermensch, The Social Darwinist, and The Fatalist. Contrast The Anti-Nihilist, who also thinks life has no inherent meaning yet reaches inverse conclusions about morality and the value of life. See also The Unfettered—what they end up as because of their dedication to their philosophy—and Virtue Is Weakness, who believes that morality is a flaw rather than pointless (though some villains believe both).

This trope mostly applies to a negative portrayal of existential nihilism. For an approximation of moral nihilisim, see Above Good and Evil and Blue-and-Orange Morality.

Examples:

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Anime and Manga

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Films—Animation

Owlman becomes one in Justice League: Crisis on Two Earths after he finds out that every time anyone makes any kind of choice, it creates multiple parallel universes: one where they choose Option A, one where they choose Option B, etc. This causes him to decide that free will doesn't exist and all choices are meaningless. Except one: He decides to destroy the entire multiverse by blowing up Earth Prime , simply because he sees it as the one and only real, meaningful choice anyone could possibly make Batman ties Owlman up to his own bomb and sends both to another Earth that is completely frozen over and devoid of life. Owlman manages to untie himself with enough time to abort the bomb's countdown and save himself, but instead he just smiles and says, " It doesn't matter ," letting the bomb explode and kill him. Which in fact is no twist at all but only highlighting the conflict between Owlman and Batman. Owlman only chose to let himself die because he knew that another Owlman would choose to save himself. However, the movie only shows the one who lets himself die and does not show the one who saves himself. Does this make every choice meaningless or make every choice meaningful?

Lotso in Toy Story 3 feels that toys are " just trash waiting to be thrown away! "

in Toy Story 3 feels that toys are " " Professor Screweyes from We're Back! A Dinosaur's Story. In a deleted scene, he claims that he believes that the world is senseless and cruel because, when he was a kid, a crow pecked his eye out, and he dedicated his life to scaring other people.

The Lion King (2019): Hakuna Matata is interpreted this way in the movie. There is no "circle of life" or anything beyond the here and now, only a "line of meaningless indifference". Nothing really matters beyond living comfortably and choosing your own happiness over any meaningful purpose. Timon and Pumbaa abandon this attitude when they follow Simba to save the Pride Lands.

Films—Live-Action

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Live-Action TV

Podcasts

The Adventure Zone: Balance: According to John, its avatar, the Hunger believes that all life is pointless and horrible, and that as a result it must be destroyed.

Professional Wrestling

Raven used to be a happy rich kid but then he fell into depression, believing himself a no good man and that the existence of a hell to be damned to is the best thing he can hope for, since he knows there is nothing that could save him from it. So he goes around antagonizing people he feels are the same way or people who aren't that he resents for not being the same way, either telling them that they should be, or in the case of Incorruptible Pure Pureness, lecturing them on how such a mindset will make them as depressed as him when they realize how rare it is.

Religion and Mythology

Inverted in most religions which claim there is a higher meaning in existence and because of that the life we have now is meaningless, disdainful and that to abandon all desire is the best anyone can hope for.

Occurs many places in The Bible, perhaps rather surprisingly, most prominently in the Book of Ecclesiastes: "Meaningless! Meaningless!" says the Teacher. "Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless... I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind." However, he eventually comes to this conclusion: "Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man."

Many Christian and Neoplatonist critics of Gnosticism accused it of being fundamentally this, claiming that its beliefs in the world being a lie created by the Demiurge and his archons lead to a disregard of conventional morality and an at best pessimistic world view, dominated by paranoia and hopelessness. Whether Gnosticism is actually this, "conventionally religious moral" (since the idea that at least some humans are inherently divine and that there is a real God out there awaiting for your is kind of a big deal in most Gnostic traditions) or antinihilistic is of course up to the individual, though some surviving texts and statements are indeed the sort of thing you'd expect to see from your stereotypical "the world is meaningless bwahhh!!!" kind of person.

Roleplay

Yu-Gi-Oh! East Academy: The Cult of Apophis's philosophy revolves around the fact that the world is worthless and must be extinguished. Marcus tries to Deconstruct this philosophy.

Standup Comedy

Tabletop Games

Anima: Beyond Fantasy has Edamiel, a Beryl that after no emotions were able to fill her, even joy that was what she represented, embraced oblivion.

Many Abyssals in Exalted end up here or somewhere very much like it.

In the Greyhawk fantasy roleplaying setting for Dungeons & Dragons, Tharizdun is the God of Omnicidal Maniacs and has many of these traits; it's just that instead of sitting around preaching about it, he's chained in the Far Realm driving people mad and plotting to destroy everything, everywhere.

Shar, the goddess of bitterness and oblivion, is the Forgotten Realms goddess of nihilism. Her adherents are not permitted to hope, or to plan for the future without a dispensation from her priesthood.

The Rakdos guild in Magic: The Gathering have spells like Nihilistic Glee . They're also the 'hedonist' and 'sociopath' guild; their general theme is being the life of the party... and, sometimes, its death.

. They're also the 'hedonist' and 'sociopath' guild; their general theme is being the life of the party... and, sometimes, its death. Planescape: The Bleak Cabal are a subversion, as they are generally nice fellows despite their belief that the universe makes absolutely no sense, though they occasionally wake up with such a bad feeling of nihilism that they'll spend the entire day in bed, unable to care about doing anything at all. Furthermore, there's the Doomguard, whose members know that the entropy of everything is inevitable—in fact, the core of Doomguard philosophy is that trying to hinder entropy is inherently futile and some of its more extreme members even try to hasten along the process. Again, they're not inherently evil and some of them are even good aligned, believing that destruction of the old is necessary for new things to grow and thrive.

Warhammer: Archaon, Chosen of Chaos fits the actual Nietzsche mold fairly closely, believing that human society is irredeemably corrupt, and that a new form of society most be built. Of course, he thinks this should be done by killing everyone and turning the world over to Eldritch Abominations. He also held to the unrelenting pessimism, calling all human gods lies/liars, and believing this to such an extent that he was horrified to discover a Physical God had reincarnated to stop him—despite the fact that he had just won the fight. Dark Heresy, the RPG of Warhammer 40,000, has the Pilgrims of Hayte, a cult based around the notion that life is meaningless and thus willing to end it on a scale as large as possible. The outer layers believe that they worship Chaos for its closely fitting ideology while the inner circle knows that Chaos is just as strict, unforgiving and ultimately meaningless a master as the Emperor—and thus, a tool to be used. Which they relatively often get away with, if you consider "despoiling 3/4 of a planet and then abandoning your cult to its fate when the cavalry arrives" to be "getting away with it." Warhammer 40,000 is rife with Straw Nihilists in its setting, especially among Chaos, the Necrons, and sometimes a few Imperials. It's obvious why. The Iron Warriors from 40000 turned into this after years and years of brutal siege warfare and being used as the Imperium's battered workhorse legion without so much as a thanks. To them, there is zero glory in war, victory is all that matters and everything and everyone is just a resource to be expended in pursuit of it.



Theatre

The Narrator, while not an active character in the story, tends to fall into this in her monologues in Finale.

Hamlet, despite predating Nietzsche, preaches nihilism with the best of them. The famous "To be or not to be" soliloquy summarizes it, but he eventually subverts actually becoming a straw nihilist by drawing purpose from his father's death.

King Lear: Probably one of the greatest expressions of nihilism in western art. To begin with, only Edgar is this, and most definitely a straw nihilist. The other characters are just varying degrees of stupid or selfish. But by the fourth act... Good god. 'When we are born, we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools'. Albany is just about the only character who comes out of the play with even the slightest shred of idealism in tact, and he's now most firmly on the cynical end of the spectrum.

Macbeth doesn't start off this way, but by the end? The titular character's soliloquy following Lady Macbeth's death ("Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow") is one of the more eloquent statements of the idea. His motives in the last act are his giving in to this trope, made all the more terrifying because the amoral universe was of his own creation.

Othello: The operatic version turned Iago, a villain who normally did it For the Evulz, into one of these with his Villain Song "Credo in un Dio crudel" (I believe in a cruel God).

Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street gives a rousing number, "Epiphany," devoted to the worthlessness of the human race and how we all deserve to die. From which point on he cuts a bloody swath in accordance with those precepts. Accompanied by dramatic chorus about moralizers and hypocrites.

Brecht and Weill's Threepenny Opera has Jonathan Jeremiah Peachum, the King of Beggars, who is often taken for a mere miser but who despairs of even money's doing him any good in the end. One of his musical numbers features the chorus (translating from the German) 'You've got it just right/The World is poor, and Man is terrible'; another is titled (translating as per super) "Song of the Futility of All Human Striving."

Richard in Thrill Me justifies his gradually larger crimes by this ideal-he's superior to everyone else, so why should the normal rules apply to him?

The Theatre version of Wicked shows Fiyero trying to act as this sort of nihilist. Unusually, he's fairly upbeat about the complete lack of value in reality, thought, or philosophy, as if a simple Hedonist. And then he has lines like: Fiyero: If only because dust, is what we come to, nothing matters, but knowing nothing matters~

The operatic version of Woyzeck has The Doctor, who gives us this little gem. The Doctor: Haven't I told you that the urethral sphincter is subordinate to the will?

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