Journal of Philosophy of Emotion Podcast · Journal of Philosophy of Emotion

Article 2: Is Contempt Redeemable? by Ronald deSousa

·1 hr 12 min·4 clips

Bell’s “jiu-jitsu-like” move says contempt is warranted only when someone deserves contempt for superiority.

The episode opens with a philosophical problem: can contempt ever be morally acceptable, despite its bad reputation in philosophy and its tension with a duty of respect? De Souza frames the question through two main objections. One says contempt takes in a whole person rather than some deed or aspect of character; the other says that, when aimed this way, it denies the very personhood of its target. The discussion then widens to the rehabilitation of disfavored emotions in general, with shame, jealousy, and other shadowy emotions serving as examples of the broader effort to re-evaluate affective states once treated only as liabilities. Contempt itself is then split into stronger and weaker senses. Common contempt appears closer to a loss of respect, while strong contempt is a more radical rejection of the target from the respect normally due to a fellow human being. In that stronger sense, contempt does not admit of degrees: it withholds basic recognition respect and treats the target as having forfeited a claim to be regarded as a responsible autonomous agent. That contrast becomes central because the difference between the two forms can look gradual even though strong contempt, when reached, marks a qualitative break. De Souza then turns to Michel Mason, who is presented as offering necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for properly focused contempt: it must be directed at a person as a response to a violation of an interpersonal ideal, the violation must stem from a morally evaluable character trait, and the agent must be appropriately responsible for that trait's expression. The closing claim is careful. Mason's and Abramson's treatments are aimed at common contempt rather than strong contempt, and in that weaker sense contempt may be warranted, at least with respect to the two Kantian objections considered here. The more important the relationship and the more important what is at stake, the more exacting the conditions become, which creates a sliding scale rather than an all-or-nothing verdict.

As heard by us

A focused argument for treating contempt as defensible only in its narrower form.

Ronald de Souza frames the question well: can contempt be redeemed, or does it stay morally suspect no matter how carefully it is handled? The strongest part of the piece is the distinction between ordinary contempt and strong contempt, and the argument that the latter carries…

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Why you'd press play

Press play for a meticulous test of whether contempt can survive moral scrutiny without flattening its target.

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