Simone De Beauvoir - Dishonest or Inauthentic Orientations towards Human Freedom

875 Words2 Pages

Simone De Beauvoir - Dishonest or inauthentic orientations towards human freedom.

The adventurer

Beauvoir says that everyone is free, but how one approaches their freedom is often irrational and/or paradoxical. Few men are ‘truly’ free and can firmly grasp reality, glorifying themselves as well as others. Beauvoir offers five types of men who are dishonest about their perception of their freedom. These men develop what Beauvoir calls bad faith. The sub-man, serious man, the nihilist, the adventurer, and the passionate man. These types of men are all around us and are often portrayed in movies. This analysis will evaluate the adventurer’s attitude. We shall see under what circumstances a young adventurer declares himself free and explore how he manages his new insight. While Beauvoir claims this man is close to morality, the adventurer is pretentious and ultimately turns into his tyrannical enemy.

A man first transitions into becoming the adventurer by abandoning all values he had previously been operating with. “What’s the point?” Says the young adventurer “this is stupid!” In this way he is similar to the nihilist. This man reaches the epiphany that the point is whatever he says it is. He is in control. He becomes aware of his freedom and is mesmerized by his breakthrough. This man is sick of being pushed around by society and annoyed with being forced into religious ties. He realizes that only he controls his destiny. He decides to establish himself.

If this man wants to eat a cookie before dinner, he will eat the cookie simply because he chooses to. The cookie is irrelevant. He begins to form new values with his choice as the guiding force. No more blindly obeying codes previously laid down in the past, this man has see...

... middle of paper ...

...ernment. Now he is trying to control the people to give himself pleasure.

To climb out of the hole the adventurer dug himself, he must admit he is not truly free nor has he achieved morality. He must recognize the reality of the shared world he lives in. Otherwise he will find his end as a tyrant. Only by recognizing human beings as ends in themselves can he accomplish true freedom. He must transition out of this adventurer character he has created.

Beauvoir’s entertains the notion of freedom throughout the Ethics of Ambiguity. Beauvoir does not offer the ultimate truths of how one should live their life, she offers ways to evaluate human-beings and/or human-becomings. She offers the aforesaid criteria as a means to be aware of self-conscious freedom. I can only bring about freedom if I recognize the reality of my peers. According to Beauvoir, this is morality.

Open Document