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- 😈 What is Schadenfreude?
😈 What is Schadenfreude?
On "pleasure derived by someone from another person's misfortune."
The Germans have a knack for coining words that describe fundamental human emotions.
Perhaps it’s the particular way that they combine words.
For example, Lebensabschnittpartner (life — until death — partner) is the German word for ‘life partner’.
That one is a bit clunky, but there are other examples of long German words that express deep philosophical & psychological notions:
Weltschmerz (world — pain): feeling the pain of the world on your shoulders (see below)
Bildungsroman (formative education — novel): a novel that details the psychological development of the principal character
Fernweh (distance — pain): the yearning desire to go on a long-distance journey
I could go on and on about cool German words, but today’s newsletter is focused on a particularly insightful one: schadenfreude.
What is Schadenfreude?
Simply put, schadenfreude is pleasure felt at the pain of others.
The term can also refer to a sense of self-satisfaction derived from the failures or troubles experienced by others.
Some psychologists who study schadenfreude have argued that the feeling is made up of three distinct emotions:
Aggression-based schadenfreude relates to threats to group identity.
For example: someone enjoys seeing the suffering of another person who is part of an “out-group” whose interests are opposed to those of the “in-group” that the schadenfreude-feeler is a member of.
Rivalry-based schadenfreude is more personal.
If you and your co-worker are vying for the same promotion, you feel satisfied when they make a mistake during a company-wide meeting.
And justice-based schadenfreude relates to a sense of “justice” being achieved through something bad happening to another person.
“He’s had all his opportunities handed to him… he deserved to have that car accident!”
Some studies have found that people with lower self-esteem reported experiencing schadenfreude more frequently and intensely.
Those researchers found that:
It’s safe to assume that we experience schadenfreude because we can interpret a bad thing happening to another person as something that affirms our own identity or self-worth.
Just as with many other negative emotions, we can try to use our understanding of it to try to improve ourselves.
Rather than enjoying their suffering, we can try to empathize and reflect on what it is about ourselves that makes us enjoy their pain.
Or… we can just be like Nelson from the Simpsons and embrace the schadenfreude.
Auf wiedersehen!
ART OF THE DAY
Pang Xunqin. "The Girl on the Couch," 1930.
