Earlier, I wrote that the opposite of the emotion of mudita is greed.
Now, I’m writing that the opposite of mudita is schadenfreude.
Both statements are true. Emotions are not objects. They don’t operate according to the laws of physics. They are concepts that emerge out of the complexity of human culture, which is itself emergent out of the complexity of the consciousness of human individuals. Emotion can’t be expected to behave in a linear manner.
Greed is the opposite of mudita in the sense that mudita is a prosocial emotion, while greed is antisocial. Schadenfreude shares mudita’s social quality as a feeling provoked by the emotional conditions of other people, its emotional tone is a mirror image of mudita.
While mudita delights in the pleasure of others, schadenfreude delights in others’ suffering.
Schadenfreude can be cruel, but it also often takes on a tone of justice. Consider the recent reaction to the difficulty Donald Trump is having drinking a glass of water. In the middle of speech, in front of cameras and a large audience, Trump struggled to bring a glass of water to his mouth, and had to use both hands to raise the glass so that he could take a sip.
Most Americans reacted to Trump’s problem with glee, rather than with concern that the President of the United States might have a serious medical condition. The context for that glee, however, is that Donald Trump has consistently used his power in order to inflict misery on the least powerful members of American society, and done so with an obvious sense of indifference to the feelings of others.
Trump’s power has been an instrument of cruelty, and to see that power slip for a moment was a relief for those who had despaired at Trump’s apparent immunity to the ordinary system of checks and balances in American government. When Trump could not summon the strength to lift a little glass of water, it made Trump vulnerable for a moment, symbolically putting him in the place of the millions of vulnerable people he has abused.
Schadenfreude takes delight in the misery of others not because of a simple sadism, but because people feel despair when people with power can inflict cruelty without fear of consequences. Understood in this light, schadenfreude is the emotion of relief we feel when, for a moment, the world seems to have an inherent moral order after all.
