Stalin applause, no one dares stop first
joke · Soviet/historical ·
retold in 8 talks
Stalin receives fifty generals; they applaud and no one dares to stop; people collapse; finally Stalin says 'okay enough.' Žižek uses this to joke about his own audience: 'don't applaud too much now, save your energy for when we communists come to power.'
≤2000talks it is told in, per year2026
As told 6
“nobody dared to stop applauding. And it went on for minutes, some of them dropped down and finally Stalin with his greatness said okay enough comrades.”
“There were not many and nobody dared to be the first to stop the applause. And it was so painful, it went on for half an hour.”
“I accept this applause because it's not me who matter. I embody here only what is most noble in you I'm just a modest element”
What it carries
one story, many jobs: the ideas this anecdote is deployed to argue, one tally mark per use (an idea page shows the same relation from the other end, as its shelf of stories)
contents · one story, 3 jobsuses
my stalinism / benevolent stalinism
×4
the big Other
×3
prohibition of the prohibition
×2
Its cast and sources
populated by
George Balanchine2Sergio Leone2Anton Webern2Ambrose Bierce1Karl Kraus1Eve Ensler1Éric Rohmer1Joe Ashkenazi1
alongside works
Every retelling 6
Stalin receives fifty generals; they applaud and no one dares to stop; people collapse; finally Stalin says 'okay enough.' Žižek uses this to joke about his own audience: 'don't applaud too much now, save your energy for when we communists come to power.', illustrating authoritarian power,ideology,Stalinism
When old Stalin received generals who gave him a medal, the applause went on for half an hour because no one dared be the first to stop. One general collapsed. Stalin coldly observed it, then said 'Okay, stop'. Žižek tells it as a personal fantasy, his dream of such commanding authority., illustrating Stalinist terror,big Other,power and compulsion
Žižek accepts the closing applause in Stalinist fashion: 'I accept this applause because it's not me who matter, I embody here only what is most noble in you, I'm just a modest element.', illustrating ideology,Stalinism,big Other
When the audience applauds, Žižek tells them to wait until 'we old hardliners take power, then you will have to applaud a lot, so spare your energy for people's democracy.', illustrating Stalinist coercive enthusiasm,irony about left authoritarianism
The audience fell silent for a few seconds, unsure whether to applaud, a 'properly Stalinist misunderstanding' where people wait for the leader's signal for supposedly spontaneous applause., illustrating transgressions are regulated,ideology,Stalinism
At a 1935 Moscow meeting, a man dares to say he disagrees with Stalin; another man shouts 'Don't you know it's prohibited to criticise Stalin!' Žižek's thesis: the second man would disappear even faster, publicly announcing the prohibition destroys it, since the prohibition must remain unannounced to function., illustrating prohibition of the prohibition,ideology functioning through the unsaid,Stalinism