A glorificação da morte como modo de vida

Abstract

This article discusses the intellectual bases of the glorification of self-sacrifice such as it appears in kamikaze techniques and, more recently, in the waves of suicide attacks occurred in Lebanon in the 1980th. I argue that in both cases the yearning for destruction rests upon a radical rejection of the characteristically modern idea that as far as dignity is concerned every single human life amounts to the same, regardless individual aspirations and achievements. This rejection, whose origin can be traced back to the German philosophical thought of the 19th century, succeeded to gain respectable spokespersons in the period between wars. These spokesperson strove to restore the high pattern of morality which, according to them, the modern civilizing Project had demeaned by holding the mediocrity of bourgeois life in high regard, that is, by bestowing dignity to a way of life which limits itself to everyday affairs, without any commitment with both “higher ideals”, and the national and cultural “roots” of a “people”.