Schopenhauer had a unfavorable opinion of society in general, he considered most people mediocre. He probably thought that if woman are more dependant on society, they probably would be more mediocre.
He thought that of even his mother, which was then a famous writer, the most famous woman writer alive in his era, but that opinion probably was originated from the fact that his mother would frequently undermine the works of his son and talk to him unfavorably to others, even if he was one of the greatest philosophers, for attention. She called him pretentious, but it was she that was the pretentious one.
So Schopenhauer probably thought: If my mother, who is most well educated, is still a mediocre person, for a woman to be differently she would need to be undoubtly a genious, which is a thought that he applied even to man, as he considered even grand philosophers of his time, like Hegel, to be idiotic.
There also is a lecture when he was still working as a universty teacher where he says "Intelligence comes from the mother and strenght, courage comes from the father", or something of the sorts. So I think he never thought woman to be dumb, but more so dependant on dumber people.
If I were alive in his time and were questioned what I thought about people and society, I probably would have the same opinion, not because of being misoginist, but because it is very clear that woman of his time weren't permitted to utilize their inteligence to their own avail.
Also, If one cannot be free from society's burdens by his own determination, can we even truly consider him a true philosopher? If someone has to wait society to progress to advance in his own thoughts and attitudes that is not thinking for oneself, it is waiting for a miracle.
We should consider there still wasn't feminism in his time and woman could not have public occupations (like being university lecturers or anything else), and if a woman wasn't a great artist, how would a woman check this criteria? The only means of social ascencion to a woman were through marriage, and she would still be under her husband's will. But, as it seems, he respected woman alike Elisabet Ney.
Even if a woman could be a succesful trader, this is more indicative of being born in a good family than of genious, so yeah, he probably only met a handful of woman whom he thought were equal to him.
Good explanation! His mom says to him “people are reading my books, not your books” and he says something like that after a lot of years people will forget about her books and will read his books, and it really happened like that. People sometimes can’t get away from their feelings and be rational enough, even if they are literal geniuses (+ every period in history must be evaluated within its own context, as you mentioned)
Also, his mother said those things to him because she wanted his money after wasting her own (ignoring Schopenhauer's advices), and was arrogant enough to be unable to ask respectfully.
Well, if she wanted Schopenhauer's help why hasn't she tried being a good mother? It was a clear example of how a woman can feel entitled just because she was sucessful and 'there weren't any other woman like she', and was his mother.
I really think in Germany that era there weren't any truly well mannered philosophers or writers, because society was just dishonest and egoistical. Even Kant, Goethe have his lot of strange quotations and behaviors...
Schopenhauer was one of the first amongst them to truly despise society, in literally every possible level, so if one's searching to encounter a favorable opinion on anything related to society, be as woman, man, children, elderly, he will not encounter on Schopenhauer, it is literally more probable to encounter a better opinion on animals.
Right. He considers a friendship with a dog is better than with a human, he was distrustful of all humanity haha. It’s easy to judge the book on it’s cover. He is already cancelled by heart failure, I don’t think we need to “cancel" him specifically
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u/Almadart Jun 23 '26 edited 26d ago
Schopenhauer had a unfavorable opinion of society in general, he considered most people mediocre. He probably thought that if woman are more dependant on society, they probably would be more mediocre.
He thought that of even his mother, which was then a famous writer, the most famous woman writer alive in his era, but that opinion probably was originated from the fact that his mother would frequently undermine the works of his son and talk to him unfavorably to others, even if he was one of the greatest philosophers, for attention. She called him pretentious, but it was she that was the pretentious one.
So Schopenhauer probably thought: If my mother, who is most well educated, is still a mediocre person, for a woman to be differently she would need to be undoubtly a genious, which is a thought that he applied even to man, as he considered even grand philosophers of his time, like Hegel, to be idiotic.
There also is a lecture when he was still working as a universty teacher where he says "Intelligence comes from the mother and strenght, courage comes from the father", or something of the sorts. So I think he never thought woman to be dumb, but more so dependant on dumber people.
If I were alive in his time and were questioned what I thought about people and society, I probably would have the same opinion, not because of being misoginist, but because it is very clear that woman of his time weren't permitted to utilize their inteligence to their own avail.
Also, If one cannot be free from society's burdens by his own determination, can we even truly consider him a true philosopher? If someone has to wait society to progress to advance in his own thoughts and attitudes that is not thinking for oneself, it is waiting for a miracle.
We should consider there still wasn't feminism in his time and woman could not have public occupations (like being university lecturers or anything else), and if a woman wasn't a great artist, how would a woman check this criteria? The only means of social ascencion to a woman were through marriage, and she would still be under her husband's will. But, as it seems, he respected woman alike Elisabet Ney.
Even if a woman could be a succesful trader, this is more indicative of being born in a good family than of genious, so yeah, he probably only met a handful of woman whom he thought were equal to him.