Neonihilism is a novel theoretical phenomenon developed by Patric Plesa (Theory and Psychology, 33(4), 555–576, 2023; Theory and Psychology, 34(5), 611–629, 2024; Subjectivity and Neonihilism: Constituting a self in a meaningless world. Palgrave Macmillan, 2025), which builds on Thomas Teo’s (Outline of theoretical psychology: Critical investigations, Palgrave, 2018b) new nihilism, as a contemporary form of nihilism in the context of neoliberalism. Neonihilism has a historical and theoretical lineage to nineteenth-century nihilism, and its genealogy is traced to a North American neoliberal capitalist social matrix, defined by meaning and mental health crises, where it is contrasted to another contemporary phenomenon, namely, fashionable nihilism. The defining features of neonihilism are marked by hopelessness and meaninglessness in light of the meaning and mental health crises, when these problems are internalized as individual moral responsibilities rather than treated collectively as systemic inequities. Overcoming neonihilism becomes obfuscated by the commodification of the cryptic appeal of meaninglessness, which becomes fashionable nihilism. Distinguishing between neonihilism and fashionable nihilism via the concepts of irony vs satire opens the possibility for overcoming neonihilism through an art of nihilation, or an ars nihil.