bad faith

is a form of internal denial, of denying to oneself that something is happening, and the happening is a choice I make. For example, 'I can't stop and talk to you because I have to do x' or 'I can't spend time with my family because I have to work long hours to bring in the money' count as refusals to recognize the choices that are open to me.

For Sartre bad faith is a form of internal denial, of denying to oneself that something is happening, and the happening is a choice I make. It is a refusal to recognize the choices that are open to me. In everyday life we hear and probably perform such refusals all the time: 'I can't stop and talk to you because I have to do x'... 'I could not have a career because I had to look after the children'... 'I can't spend time with my family because I have to work long hours to bring in the money.' Such statements deny all options

is the attitude whereby we try to flee from anguish by attempting to understand ourselves from the outside as an other or as a thing.

If I am my anguish in order to flee it, that presupposes that I can decenter myself in relation to what I am, that I can be anguish in the form of 'not being it', that I can dispose of a nihilating power at the heart of anguish itself. This nihilating power nihilates anguish in so far as I flee it and nihilates itself in so far as I am anguish in order to flee it. This attitude is what we call bad faith.' (Sartre, J.P. 1943 p.44)

bad faith, n.All

bad faith