Taking pleasure in the misfortune of others – Foreign Journals

Most of us feel sadness when we see someone in pain, a feeling called empathy. But what about when we take pleasure in someone’s disappointment, pain, or even suffering, something we rarely admit openly, even to ourselves? What writer David Barash and editor Sam Dresser are talking about here is not the pleasure of inflicting pain (sadism) or indifference to the suffering of others (psychopathy), but the satisfaction, often accompanied by joy, that comes from seeing or recognizing someone else’s problems. It’s not easy to admit the satisfaction that comes from seeing someone else’s suffering, it’s shameful; but emotions and tendencies (envy, envy, impulsivity) don’t disappear just because we don’t take pride in them.
For example, schadenfreude is the tendency to take pleasure in the misfortune of others, whether they are relatives or strangers. There is research evidence that the tendency to schadenfreude is inversely related to a person’s self-esteem. In other words, the more successful people are, the less they care about the bad news about others; they are not affected by the performance of “down there” and therefore are no better off if these people experience misfortune. The opposite is also true: those who are less successful are more likely to feel threatened by others and are therefore more likely to take pleasure in their own misfortunes.
Relatedly, gloating is based on the principle of justice and the insistence on punishing the guilty, so when the evildoers get their due retribution, the gloating person will feel a sense of satisfaction. This is the classic Hollywood ending, justice wins, the bad guys suffer for their crimes, and then the audience is relieved.
But in the end, this kind of schadenfreude did not get good coverage in the media. It even led to criticism and a warning from the Bible: “Do not rejoice when your enemy falls; do not rejoice when he falls, lest he see the Lord and see that he does evil, and his anger turns away from him.” Arthur Schopenhauer also described schadenfreude as the most evil human emotion: “Envy is a human thing, and to rejoice in the misfortune of others is an evil thing.”
In a scientific context, a 2011 functional magnetic resonance imaging study of baseball fans of two legendary rivals, the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox, found that the pleasure centers of team members were activated when the opposing team suffered a setback. Similarly, another study conducted in 2006 showed that brain areas were actively activated when people (on behalf of criminals) were punished. Notably, this study found that men were more susceptible to this effect than women.
Another message is that funerals are not just a way to express grief and respect for the deceased. Instead, they offer the opportunity to take comfort that what happened to the deceased did not happen to those attending the funeral. In his book When Bad Things Happen to Good People (1981), American Rabbi Harold Kushner described schadenfreude as “the relief we feel when bad things happen to other people instead of to us,” explaining that people usually “don’t want something bad to happen to them.” But they can’t help but feel an awkward sense of gratitude that bad things happened to other people instead of to them.
What about the opposite of schadenfreude? In fact, there’s a word in Pali and Sanskrit specifically for these feelings: mudita. It refers to a Buddhist practice that aligns with that philosophy/religion’s focus on compassion, but goes a step further to include kindness toward others. While mudita embraces the selfless joy that comes from recognizing another’s happiness or success, schadenfreude is the exact opposite.
As a final note, now that schadenfreude has come to light, how should people respond to this feeling? One possibility is to openly acknowledge them whenever and wherever we experience them, because after all, they are normal. On the other hand, not everything that is natural is good and praiseworthy. Perhaps it is best to adopt the famous quote from the Greek philosopher Socrates, “Know thyself,” so that you are not surprised when schadenfreude emerges. As a human being, you experience these feelings.

David B. Barash and Sam Dresser
Mind Magazine
Translated and summarized by: Wafa Hani Omar
original