nihilism

The rejection of all traditional values, authority, and institutions. The term was coined 1862 by Ivan Turgenev in his novel Fathers and Sons, and was adopted by the Nihilists, the Russian radicals of the period. Despairing of reform, they saw change as possible only through the destruction of morality, justice, marriage, property, and the idea of God. Since then nihilism has come to mean a generally negative and destructive outlook.