Claws and Slave Morality
Illustration by Copilot Designer Irvin Yalom, existential psychotherapist, thought it his primary duty to help his clients from being those who call themselves good because they have no claws. When you understand that ‘claws’ for him meant ‘power’ or ‘strength,’ the meaning of the statement becomes clear. Yalom was drawing on Nietzsche’s distinction between ‘master morality’ and ‘slave morality.’ For Nietzsche, the strong and powerful define ‘good’ as what is noble, life-affirming, and capable (including the capacity for aggression and harm – hence ‘claws’). The weak, by contrast, invert this: they perceive their powerlessness and the resultant restraint, humility or harmlessness as ‘good’ and they label the strong as ‘evil.’ Their morality is reactive, born of inability rather than affirmative choice. Yalom considered goodness without power as incomplete. Real moral or existential integrity demands the capacity for ‘claws’ and the conscious decision about their use. I wa...
