Slavoj Žižek on Marx, Hegel, Politics, Films, Burgers and Hot Dogs… and a lot more!
Interview · Crisis and Critique ·
2021 · 1:47:20 · 12,734 words
capitalismcommunism-socialismideologypsychoanalysishegel-dialecticsreligion-theologyecology-climatedemocracyrevolution-violencetechnology-ai-cyberspacecinema-art-culturescience-physicsconsciousness-mindgeopolitics-warphilosophy-generalsubjectivityethicseveryday-life
In this wide-ranging interview, Žižek discusses his recent books on freedom, arguing that the concept of freedom is internally inconsistent and often masks competing political demands. He develops a 'dark' vision of freedom rooted in Hegel's 'night of the world' and human madness, explores communism as a counter-revolutionary stabilization, defends principled pragmatism in politics, and speculates on quantum physics as a site where materialism confronts its own ontological limits. He also reflects on cinema as formal ideological analysis and answers rapid-fire either/or questions.
every located moment in this recording, click one to read it
The ideas in it 26
in the order they first come up; click a row for what he does with the idea here
as “fetishism”
Used in the sense of fetishizing free voting, treating democratic procedure as a fetish rather than recognizing exceptional situations where elections don't matter.
Freedom functions as a master signifier: not a concept that draws clear distinctions but one that merely designates a terrain of battle.
Not explicitly named in this talk but the structural logic is present in his discussion of freedom as a terrain that always already contains competing, incompatible demands.
as “big Other”
Implicit in his discussion of unwritten rules and social manners as the terrain where ideology actually operates today.
Žižek's self-description: emphasizing that concrete freedom requires unwritten rules, good manners, and social etiquette as the terrain where oppression or liberation actually operates.
Freedom detached from concrete social rules, experienced in moments of rupture, carnival, or occupation, not yet transcendental but a terrifying void of self-annihilating negativity.
A self-destructive, radical dimension of freedom that goes beyond humanist freedom, rooted in Hegel's night of the world and the madness constitutive of being human.
as “dark communism”
Žižek's term for a communism that acknowledges the need for stabilization, order, and even a certain dose of authoritarian measures after revolutionary rupture, rather than endless self-revolutionizing.
as “counter-revolution on our terms”
The idea that after revolutionary rupture, revolutionaries themselves must introduce a new stable order rather than leaving stabilization to the counter-revolutionary enemy.
Žižek's characterization of Marx's idea of communism as retaining capitalism's immense dynamic of constant self-revolutionizing while removing capitalist relations of production.
Freedom actualized through specific social institutions, laws, healthcare, education, and unwritten rules that enable people to effectively exercise their liberties.
Implicit in his argument that abstract freedom is not merely theoretical but becomes empirically testable in moments of public disorder, carnivals, and revolutionary rupture.
The standard cognitive-science position that metaphysical freedom doesn't matter, Žižek rejects it as too cynical because technological control makes the metaphysical question a practical political fact.
Not explicitly invoked but the logic of the gap between transcendental and positive reality structures his entire metaphysical argument.
Žižek's framing of the central tension between the hermeneutic horizon of meaning (transcendental) and the positive, natural-scientific account of reality.
Žižek's term for the irreducible gap between viewing reality as all-that-is (evolutionary, positive) and as always-already within a hermeneutic horizon (transcendental).
as “night of the world (die Nacht der Welt)”
Hegel's term for radical self-annihilating negativity, the abyss out of which horizons of meaning emerge, neither transcendental nor natural but a terrifying in-between.
Hegel's sublation, Žižek notes that Hegel does not simply sublate madness but insists it must remain as a permanent background possibility for being human.
A political stance that accepts compromises and engages concretely while maintaining principled goals, distinguished from opportunist abstention.
Žižek's pejorative term for pseudo-radical leftists who advocate pure revolution but stay safely outside concrete movements, then say 'I told you so' when they fail.
as “nomadic proletariat”
Badiou's term for homeless immigrant proletarians, Žižek is skeptical of privileging them as a revolutionary subject because material homelessness often intensifies ideological attachment to tradition.
Implicit in his discussion of quantum physics as the inconsistent ontological ground of appearance, reality that is not stable law-governed nature but chaotic, contingent emergence.
as “terrifying theology of evil god”
Žižek's reading of a formal motif in Hitchcock, an obscene agent inscribed into the camera form itself that intervenes into reality like an evil deity.
Žižek's term for the genre of detective novels written by women (Gillian Flynn, Tana French) that he considers the only authentic literary genre today.
Considered as a more substantial, self-destructive gap, Žižek ultimately prefers desire as qualified rather than drive as desire for nothing.
In the either/or segment, Žižek prefers desire over drive because desire is desire for something, while drive would be a self-destructive desire for the abyss.
Stories he reaches for 9
In spring 1794, after France was saved militarily, Robespierre desperately tried to stop the Terror and introduce a new stable order before the counter-revolution did it, he fought with the majority of Jacobins, sought allies, and ultimately preferred losing his head to compromising.
In the Encyclopedia, Hegel says the origin of the human mind emerging from natural organisms is madness, and madness must remain as a permanent background possibility; personal reconciliation is reconciliation with this madness you will never get rid of.
Lenin's criticism of Stalin in his testament was not about political line, too right-wing or too radical, but that Stalin lacked good manners and was too brutal.
Conservative liberals attacked Obamacare as limiting freedom because the state prescribes your doctor, but Obama didn't limit freedom; universal healthcare liberates you from constantly worrying about disease and thus gives you more real freedom.
Sartre wrote that under German occupation, the French had no concrete freedom but were more free than ever, because the order was imposed, not their own, giving them a radical abstract freedom.
The main hero of all Wagner's operas, from the Flying Dutchman to Amfortas in Parsifal, is the figure of the wandering Jew: wounded, wanting to die but unable to die. Wagner himself said the Dutchman is Ahasverus. The anti-Semite's art celebrates the tragic Jewish figure.
In the finale of Act 1 of Mozart's Don Giovanni, all the guests arrive at a party and start singing 'Viva la libertà!', but each group means something entirely different by freedom.
In Algeria and Egypt, educated young people organized vast demonstrations for freedom, won free elections, but Muslim fundamentalists won, and the original protesters grudgingly accepted military rule as better.
During Slovenia's independence movement 30+ years ago, different groups all chanted 'freedom' but meant incompatible things: right-wingers wanted nationalized property back, religious people wanted church access to media, trade unionists wanted workers' rights, gay people wanted sexual freedom.
Works invoked 23
Psycho film
Hitchcock film analyzed for its formal motif of camera approaching an uncanny object and an obscene agent intervening into reality.
Parsifal opera
Wagner opera featuring Amfortas as the wandering Jew figure, wounded, wanting to die but unable to die.
Žižek's collaboration with Sophie Fiennes, using film as a medium for thought and analysis.
Don Giovanni opera
Mozart opera used to illustrate how different groups singing 'Viva la libertà' each mean something different by freedom.
Being and Time book
Heidegger's work, Žižek argues Heidegger is the ultimate transcendental thinker who ignores the level of madness between nature and disclosure.
Short Cuts film
Robert Altman film, maybe the ultimate movie of the last half century; its form renders an optimistic dimension that vulgar leftist content-reading misses.
Christian Atheism book
Žižek's forthcoming book at the time of recording, to be published in April; he plans a US propaganda trip for it.
Encore (Seminar XX) book
Lacan's seminar, identified as the end of Lacan's peak period.
Hegel's work, the Anthropology section (Part 3 of Philosophy of Spirit) discusses madness as the origin of being human.
Lacan's seminar, identified as the beginning of Lacan's peak period, which extends to Encore.
Duck Soup film
Marx Brothers film, Žižek recently tried to re-watch it and it 'doesn't work' as much as expected; doubts the Marx Brothers can be reinvented each epoch.
Žižek's own book discussed at length, divided into freedom as such and human freedom; described as a 'dark book' that doesn't find echo because it challenges comfortable notions of freedom.
Blindness book
Saramago novel where people decide not to vote and bring down the entire system, example of the truly violent act being to do nothing.
Dark Deleuze book
Book that brought out the dark side of Deleuze, not the happy multiplicity but an extremely dark aspect. Žižek parallels this with his own dark freedom.
The Flying Dutchman opera
Wagner opera whose hero Wagner himself identified as Ahasverus, the wandering Jew.
Truffaut's book of conversations with Hitchcock, Žižek says it's the greatest thing Truffaut did, better than all his movies; Hitchcock says his films begin with formal procedures, not story.
Collection where Žižek proposed the need for a strong body (a new tetrad of people, movement, party, leader) able to make quick decisions and implement them with necessary harshness.
Early Hitchcock sound film where Žižek detects the formal motif of camera approaching an uncanny object that he traces through to Psycho.
Too Late to Awaken book
Žižek's recent book, more of a political intervention in the conjuncture.
Jena Realphilosophie book
Hegel's early text where he describes the night of the world (die Nacht der Welt), radical self-annihilating negativity.
Marxism and Form book
Fredric Jameson's book, the model for Žižek's claim that the true Marxist is always a formalist.
Book(s) by one of the hosts that gave Žižek ideas for his writing on quantum physics.
The Origin of Time book
Thomas Hertog's book on Hawking's theory that natural laws contingently emerged through Darwinian competition in the primordial universe.
People invoked 48
Collaborator on the Pervert's Guide to Cinema films.
Groucho Marx negative
Notes Groucho was pretty much anti-communist; doesn't idealize the Marx Brothers and doubts they can be reinvented each epoch like Marx, Nietzsche, or Hegel.
Narendra Modi negative
Cites Modi as the worst example of combining brutal capitalism with Hindu nationalism, dismissing Muslims as secondary, following the European model of strong sovereign nation states.
David Graeber negative
Reads Graeber's book on pirates with pleasure but doesn't buy his anarchist view that we can confront ecological crisis without stronger coordination.
Robert Pippin negative
Žižek argues Pippin ridiculously misreads Hegel as the thinker of total rational transparency and logos; Pippin's reading ignores the night of the world and the gap between transcendental and positive reality.
Mentioned in passing as a figure whose removal created a vacuum filled by worse forces.
Clara Schumann negative
Understands Clara's private reasons for pressuring Robert toward more profitable orchestral works but ultimately prefers Robert's compositions.
Vladimir Lenin positive
Žižek invokes Lenin's 'freedom of whom? freedom to do what?' as more important than ever; praises Lenin's contingency and improvisation learned from Hegel; calls himself a 'Leninist philosopher of manners.'
Richard Wagner positive
Calls Wagner a 'disgusting, fleazy guy' and 'stupidly anti-Semitic as a person' but praises his music as breathtaking, the greatest celebration of the tragic Jewish figure, with the wandering Jew as hero of all his operas.
Jacques Lacan positive
Prefers Lacan over Freud because he reads previous authors through Lacan; prefers early Lacan and the middle period (Seminar XI to Encore) over the very late Lacan whose final seminar is a 'suicidal note' saying 'I failed.'
Tenzin Gyatso negative
Criticizes Zeilinger for being a personal friend of the Dalai Lama who introduced spiritual dimensions into quantum physics interpretation.
Stephen Hawking positive
Opposed the notion of Big Bang as absolute beginning (too idealist); with Hertog developed the theory of Darwinian competition of natural laws in the primordial universe.
Founder of the Cheka, supposedly the toughest guy, but wrote that Rosa Luxemburg was too tough for him.
Thomas Hertog positive
Dutch physicist and Hawking's collaborator; wrote a book on the origin of time proposing that natural laws contingently emerged through Darwinian competition in the primordial universe.
Daniel Dennett negative
Žižek rejects Dennett's compatibilist position that metaphysical freedom doesn't matter, calls it too cynical given that wired-brain technology makes the metaphysical question a practical political fact.
Donald Trump negative
Mentions the possibility of Trump winning and continuing his march toward total radical change of the American political system; some leftists count on army intervention.
Yuval Noah Harari positive
Žižek often disagrees with Harari but credits him for noting that what was till now an abstract theoretical question about freedom is becoming a practical fact of control through technology.
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart positive
References the finale of Act 1 of Don Giovanni where all guests sing 'Viva la libertà' but each means something different by freedom.
Ludwig van Beethoven negative
Chosen against in the Wagner vs. Beethoven either/or, Žižek prefers Wagner.
Kohei Saito positive
Eco-Marxist from whom Žižek learned about Japan's silent degrowth opinion, people wanting to stop constant progress and enjoy small pleasures.
Tana French positive
Irish detective novelist whose work Žižek considers the best class analysis of today's Ireland, achieved through the detective novel form.
Louis Antoine de Saint-Just positive
Quotes Saint-Just's image of the revolutionary as a captain of a boat in a wild sea without a compass who has to improvise.
Alain Badiou positive
Agrees with Badiou that democracy can be the main obstacle to emancipation; cites Badiou on concrete analysis of concrete situations; disagrees on absolute distrust of voting and on the 'nomadic proletariat' as privileged subject.
Gillian Flynn positive
Cited as part of the 'feminine noir' genre, detective novels by women that Žižek considers the only authentic literary genre today.
François Furet positive
Historian who is otherwise critical but praises Marx for noting that Napoleon exported revolution through military conquest when it was no longer going in France.
Fredric Jameson positive
References Jameson's 'Marxism and Form' as the model for Marxist formalist analysis, the form of a work can contradict its content.
Wang Hui negative
Chinese friend who tried to convince Žižek that living with ordinary farmers taught wisdom, Žižek doesn't believe ordinary farmers possess deeper wisdom.
Friend with whom Žižek discussed Lacan's trajectory and concluded that Lacan peaks between Seminar XI and Encore.
Albin Kurti positive
Žižek supports Kurti's role in limiting Serbian nationalism even though Kurti is not a Marxist, an example of principled pragmatic engagement.
Maximilien Robespierre positive
Praises Robespierre's greatness in seeing the need to stop the Terror and introduce stable order before counter-revolution did it; preferred losing his head to compromising; always opposed exporting revolution.
Michel Foucault positive
Žižek says Hegel's account of madness as the origin of being human is 'more Foucauldian than Michel Foucault.'
Martin Heidegger negative
Žižek calls Heidegger the 'ultimate transcendental thinker', he ignores the level of madness between nature and transcendental disclosure; has only mystified things to say about Hölderlin's madness.
Mentions Argentina's anarcho-capitalist president who proposed legalizing organ selling as a 'consequent liberalism' that reveals the horror of abstract freedom.
François Truffaut negative
Prefers Hitchcock over Truffaut; says the greatest thing Truffaut did was his book of conversations with Hitchcock, better than all his movies.
Robert Altman positive
Short Cuts is maybe the ultimate movie of the last half century, its form renders an optimistic dimension that vulgar leftists miss by reading only content.
Joe Biden positive
Critical of Biden's Israel policy but praises him for being the first president to publicly support the auto workers' strike in Detroit.
Mentioned as 'sin zai' (presumably Kierkegaard) in the context of freedom, alongside Mozart and Wagner.
Žižek plans a public debate with West in New York; notes West is 'some kind of theologist and politically way to the left.'
Rosa Luxemburg positive
Prefers Luxemburg over Lenin in the either/or: praises her pragmatic plasticity, combining principled stands with using unique opportunities; notes she was tougher than people claim, even Dzerzhinsky was afraid of her.
Robert Schumann positive
Prefers Robert over Clara Schumann in the either/or, against the feminist temptation to say a woman was behind the successful man.
Alfred Hitchcock positive
Žižek analyzes Hitchcock formally, the camera movement inscribes a terrifying theology of evil god into the form itself, against the usual content-based reading.
Barack Obama positive
Praises Obamacare as expanding real freedom by liberating people from constant worry about healthcare; says Obama didn't limit freedom.
Anton Zeilinger negative
Nobel Prize quantum physicist whose work Žižek appreciates but criticizes for ruining it by invoking the Dalai Lama and spiritual dimensions.
Karl Marx negative
Žižek criticizes Marx's communism as 'capitalism without capitalism', retaining capitalism's dynamic of permanent self-revolutionizing; says early Marx contains shortcuts to Stalinism.
Sigmund Freud positive
Mentions 'all my mega love for Freud' but prefers Lacan as the lens through which to read Freud.
Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel positive
Central reference throughout: Hegel's night of the world, madness as origin of being human, Aufhebung that doesn't sublate madness, the gap between transcendental and positive reality.
Immanuel Kant positive
Cites Kant's question of why man is an animal which needs a master, man has a kind of wild, lawless fixation that is neither natural nor cultural.
Jean-Paul Sartre positive
Quotes Sartre's observation that under German occupation the French were more free than ever because the order was not their own, used to illustrate abstract freedom.
What it argues
Freedom as an internally inconsistent, contested terrain rather than a universal goodCommunism as counter-revolution: stabilizing after revolutionary ruptureHegel's 'night of the world' as the zero-level of abstract freedom and human madnessQuantum physics as the ontological limit of appearance and materialismPrincipled pragmatism vs. opportunist radicalism in leftist politicsCinema form as carrying ideological content beyond authorial intentionThe danger of fetishizing democratic voting and popular authenticity
Dialectical moves 10
“The notion of freedom is in itself inconsistent — it only designates a certain terrain of the battle, not a clear distinction.”
Freedom is not a stable concept with a true core but a contested field where different political forces project incompatible demands.
“Quite often, even if people are fighting for freedom, what they actually want is even more oppression than in the existing regime.”
The demand for freedom can be a demand for stronger oppression, the apparent desire for liberation conceals a desire for authoritarian order.
“The biggest threat today to emancipatory movement is not capitalism, exploitation, fascism — it's democracy.”
Badiou's provocation that Žižek partially endorses: democracy's pacifying effect can be the main obstacle to emancipation in tense situations.
“The true way to revolutionize capitalism's permanent revolutionizing is to counter-revolutionize — to propose a new form of stability.”
Opposing capitalism's endless self-revolutionizing requires not more revolution but a counter-revolution that establishes a new stable social order.
“Marx's idea of communism was still capitalism without capitalism — capitalism's immense dynamic without capitalist relations of production.”
Communism as conceived by Marx still carries capitalism's logic of permanent self-revolutionizing, which is precisely what needs to be abandoned.
“Under German occupation we were totally under control, no concrete freedom — but we were more free than ever, because the order was not our own.”
Sartre's paradox: total external control produces a radical abstract freedom precisely because the imposed order is alien, not one's own.
“The origin of being human is madness — and madness must remain always in the background as a possibility; personal reconciliation is reconciliation with this madness.”
Hegel's point: being human is not the sublation of madness into reason but the permanent coexistence with madness as an irreducible background.
“In the abyss of human freedom, the ultra-repressed primordial chaos of nature is returning — what seems most human (radical freedom) is nature's own derailment coming back.”
Human radical self-annihilating freedom is not opposed to nature but is the return of nature's own primordial chaos, the deepest human and the deepest natural converge.
“The true Marxist is always a formalist — the form of a great work not only renders content but can contradict content and go against the author's intention.”
Formal analysis reveals that the ideological truth of a work is in its form, not its content, form can subvert its own explicit message.
“At its greatest, art defeats the artist — Wagner, stupidly anti-Semitic as a person, celebrates the wandering Jew as the hero of all his operas.”
The work of art at its greatest contradicts and overcomes the artist's private ideology, the form defeats the person.
Claims 25
asserts
The notion of freedom is in itself inconsistent — it does not have an essential core but designates a terrain of battle between competing, incompatible dimensions.concept of freedom
asserts
Quite often, people fighting for freedom actually want even more oppression than the existing regime provides — their authentic demand may be for a more oppressive order.popular demands for freedom
asserts
Except in exceptional situations, the majority of people do not really want freedom if it means taking responsibility for big decisions — they want to be told what to do.popular desire for freedom
asserts
Democracy can be the main obstacle to emancipation in tense situations because it has a pacifying effect that prevents necessary radical action.democracy and emancipation
asserts
New right-wing populism is a secondary phenomenon — a symptom of something going wrong in the basic liberal-democratic project itself, not an external threat.right-wing populism
asserts
Concrete freedom in everyday life requires specific social institutions — universal healthcare, free education, and unwritten rules of good manners — not just abstract legal rights.concrete freedom
asserts
Racism and sexism today survive primarily at the level of unwritten rules and everyday practices, not in overt declarations — that is where the fight must be rooted.unwritten rules and ideology
asserts
Communism should be reconceived as a counter-revolution — an effort to establish a new stable order after revolutionary rupture, opposing capitalism's permanent self-revolutionizing.communism as counter-revolution
reframes
Marx's idea of communism was still 'capitalism without capitalism' — retaining capitalism's immense dynamic of constant self-revolutionizing but without capitalist relations of production.Marx's communism
asserts
Robespierre's greatness was that he saw the need to stop the terror and introduce a new stable order before the counter-revolution did it — and he preferred losing his head to compromising.Robespierre and revolutionary stabilization
asserts
The metaphysical question of whether we are really free is no longer abstract — through wired-brain technology and digital control, it has become a practical fact of political life.freedom and technology
rejects
Hegel is not the thinker of total rational transparency but describes a radical self-annihilating negativity (the night of the world) that is neither transcendental nor natural but a terrifying in-between.Pippin's reading of Hegel
asserts
The origin of being human is madness — Hegel says madness must remain as a permanent background possibility, and personal reconciliation means reconciling with this madness.Hegel on madness and human nature
rejects
Heidegger ignores the level of madness between nature and transcendental disclosure — he has only mystified things to say about Hölderlin's madness.Heidegger on madness
asserts
Quantum entanglement proves that our paleo-temporal reality is not the ultimate horizon of being — there is at least one other level of reality where space and time do not function the same way.quantum physics and ontology
asserts
Natural laws are not eternal but contingently emerged through a Darwinian struggle among competing law-systems in the primordial universe after the Big Bang.contingency of natural laws
asserts
In the abyss of human freedom (the night of the world), the repressed primordial chaos of nature returns — human radical freedom is linked to nature's own derailment.freedom and quantum chaos
asserts
The true Marxist is always a formalist — the form of a great work of art can contradict its content and tell more than its author's explicit intention.Marxist formalist analysis
asserts
Detective novels written by women (Tana French, Gillian Flynn) are the only authentic genre where literature today is really a work of art.contemporary literature
asserts
We should not demand that local people sacrifice their struggle for freedom on behalf of global geopolitical interests — but we must always take account of the global context.global vs. local political struggles
asserts
A much stronger coordination above the level of the single nation-state will be necessary to confront ecological crisis and migrations properly.ecological governance
asserts
Lenin learned from Hegel the importance of contingency — the art of Leninism is doing a subtle analysis of each concrete situation to determine whether to act, abstain, or go all the way.Leninism and contingency
asserts
Wagner's operas, despite his personal anti-Semitism, celebrate the figure of the wandering Jew as their central hero — the artist defeats his own private ideology in the work of art.Wagner and anti-Semitism
rejects
Early Marx contains the theoretical shortcuts and possibilities for Stalinism — alienation theory and the German Ideology already harbor the seeds of authoritarian communism.early Marx
asserts
Late Lacan's final seminar is a suicidal note where he admits 'I failed' — his path into the Borromean knot and death drive led to a dead end.late Lacan
Quotes 14
“The notion of freedom is in itself inconsistent. This is why freedom is not a concept which allows us to draw the crucial right distinction — it only designates a certain terrain of the battle.”Slavoj Žižek · freedom as contested terrain
“Quite often, even if a people is fighting for freedom, what they actually want is even more oppression than in the existing regime.”Slavoj Žižek · freedom as desire for oppression
“The new right-wing populism is a secondary phenomenon — it's a sign, a symptom of something going wrong in the basic liberal democratic project itself.”Slavoj Žižek · populism as symptom of liberalism
“I'm more and more turning into a Leninist philosopher of manners, good manners.”Slavoj Žižek · unwritten rules and freedom
“Marx's idea of communism was still capitalism without capitalism — this immense capitalist dynamic but without the relations of production.”Slavoj Žižek · communism as capitalism without capitalism
“Under German occupation, we were totally under control, no concrete freedom. But we were more free than ever — because the order was not our own.”Slavoj Žižek · Sartre on abstract freedom
“The origin of being human is madness. Madness has to remain always in the background as a possibility. Personal reconciliation is precisely reconciliation with this madness that you will never get rid of.”Slavoj Žižek · Hegel on madness
“What if, in the abyss of human freedom, the ultra-repressed primordial chaos of nature is returning?”Slavoj Žižek · freedom and quantum chaos
“The true Marxist is always a formalist — the form in a great work of art not only perfectly renders content, but even contradicts content.”Slavoj Žižek · Marxist formalism
“At its greatest, art defeats the artist — Wagner, stupidly anti-Semitic, celebrates the wandering Jew as the hero of all his operas.”Slavoj Žižek · art defeats the artist
“I don't think that the majority of the people really want freedom. If by freedom you mean: we have a big dilemma, we have to decide now.”Slavoj Žižek · skepticism about popular desire for freedom
“Don't worry, it will come — the emergency state. You know, don't worry, it will come.”Slavoj Žižek · cynical reversal on emergency state
“Money. Fuck life. Because it's a hypocritical question — what is life without money?”Slavoj Žižek · money over life
“I'm not gay, but essentially there is not enough physical contact.”Slavoj Žižek · closing remark
Transcript 65 turns
Host
hello everyone, my name is frank ruda and i am here with my colleague and friend agon hamza and we're both very happy to welcome you to this new episode of the crisis and critique podcast under the title philosophy and its other scene today with a very special guest whom i'm about to introduce in a minute. but before that, let me quickly say that our next episode will be with cornel west, who's currently a presidential candidate in the race. i mean, hopefully. we in the race in the us and this will be recorded in january. if you like the work that we're doing here we would be grateful if you could subscribe to our youtube channel or to our spotify channel or become a patron and support us. we would massively appreciate that. today is very special for us because we have with us a very, very special guest, namely our friend and we, if i might dare, master, namely slavoj zizek. even though it itself became a sort of cliche that one cannot introduce slijige because he needs no introduction or any introduction that one uses and attempts. to be entertaining and funny or original will fall short of the wit and pointedness of the man himself, the man one tries to introduce, knowing very well of these deadlocks. and having failed at introducing slavoy several times before, i will try to fail better, but very briefly. i just want to mention very few things. it is clear and without any question that slavoy is one of the, if not the most important living hegelian philosopher. one the, if not the most important lakanian theorists and one of the, if not the most relevant communist thinker of our times. he's a senior researcher at the university of ljubljana, international director at the birkbeck institute for the humanities in london, and guest professor at several universities on this planet. the most recent extensions of his majestic and gigantic order are too late to awaken what lies ahead when there is no future from allen lane this year. freedom, a disease without cure from bloomsbury also this year. and about to come out is christian atheism, how to be a real materialist, also with bloomsbury. slavo, thank you so much for being with us today. we really are looking forward to this conference. conversation.
hello everyone, my name is frank ruda and i am here with my colleague and friend agon hamza and we're both very happy to welcome you to this new episode of the crisis and critique podcast under the title philosophy and its other scene today with a very special guest whom i'm about to introduce in a minute. but before that, let me quickly say that our next episode will be with cornel west, who's currently a presidential candidate in the race. i mean, hopefully. we in the race in the us and this will be recorded in january. if you like the work that we're doing here we would be grateful if you could subscribe to our youtube channel or to our spotify channel or become a patron and support us. we would massively appreciate that. today is very special for us because we have with us a very, very special guest, namely our friend and we, if i might dare, master, namely slavoj zizek. even though it itself became a sort of cliche that one cannot introduce slijige because he needs no introduction or any introduction that one uses and attempts. to be entertaining and funny or original will fall short of the wit and pointedness of the man himself, the man one tries to introduce, knowing very well of these deadlocks. and having failed at introducing slavoy several times before, i will try to fail better, but very briefly. i just want to mention very few things. it is clear and without any question that slavoy is one of the, if not the most important living hegelian philosopher. one the, if not the most important lakanian theorists and one of the, if not the most relevant communist thinker of our times. he's a senior researcher at the university of ljubljana, international director at the birkbeck institute for the humanities in london, and guest professor at several universities on this planet. the most recent extensions of his majestic and gigantic order are too late to awaken what lies ahead when there is no future from allen lane this year. freedom, a disease without cure from bloomsbury also this year. and about to come out is christian atheism, how to be a real materialist, also with bloomsbury. slavo, thank you so much for being with us today. we really are looking forward to this conference. conversation.
Slavoj Žižek
it's my honor to be here and just let me add something i didn't know about cornel west. this is a beautiful coincidence because i plan a short trip to the united states in april. two make propaganda for i really write too much for my next book, which will appear at the beginning of april, christian atheism. and it seems. cornel is. also some kind of theologist and politically way to the left. i'm glad he already also accepted and glad to announce that we will have somewhere in new york. a big, big public debate.
it's my honor to be here and just let me add something i didn't know about cornel west. this is a beautiful coincidence because i plan a short trip to the united states in april. two make propaganda for i really write too much for my next book, which will appear at the beginning of april, christian atheism. and it seems. cornel is. also some kind of theologist and politically way to the left. i'm glad he already also accepted and glad to announce that we will have somewhere in new york. a big, big public debate.
Host
wonderful.
wonderful.
Slavoj Žižek
good to hear.
good to hear.
Host
um,
um,
Interviewer
oh. that's excellent. thank you. thank you, frank, agon.. it's truly a great honor to have you here. so let us begin with your latest publications that frank just mentioned, namely the freedom book. and the too late to be awakened. the first one seemed to be more of a philosophical treatise while the second book is more of an intervention in the political conjuncture. to start with the freedom book. you divide it into two parts, freedom as such and human freedom. the latter deals with the mess and dilemmas of our social lives in which we are at the same time free and not free in many different ways. the former, however, appears to be more complicated as it deals with freedom on its own grounds, as it were. but it should be noted that it does not stand for the abstract. formal structure of freedom. it also stands for concrete social situations in which this abstraction is directly realized in what cannot but appear as an access that violates old particular rules. so our first question is, how can we attain any insight or concept of freedom as such? how does such an abstraction materially manifest? and are we here not to immediately confront an immense political issue, notably the question if it if it is a concept of freedom, a concept worth fighting for no matter what, has it not, for example, at least up to a certain extent and in certain contexts, has been appropriated by the far right ideologists or politics?
oh. that's excellent. thank you. thank you, frank, agon.. it's truly a great honor to have you here. so let us begin with your latest publications that frank just mentioned, namely the freedom book. and the too late to be awakened. the first one seemed to be more of a philosophical treatise while the second book is more of an intervention in the political conjuncture. to start with the freedom book. you divide it into two parts, freedom as such and human freedom. the latter deals with the mess and dilemmas of our social lives in which we are at the same time free and not free in many different ways. the former, however, appears to be more complicated as it deals with freedom on its own grounds, as it were. but it should be noted that it does not stand for the abstract. formal structure of freedom. it also stands for concrete social situations in which this abstraction is directly realized in what cannot but appear as an access that violates old particular rules. so our first question is, how can we attain any insight or concept of freedom as such? how does such an abstraction materially manifest? and are we here not to immediately confront an immense political issue, notably the question if it if it is a concept of freedom, a concept worth fighting for no matter what, has it not, for example, at least up to a certain extent and in certain contexts, has been appropriated by the far right ideologists or politics?
Slavoj Žižek
i. dis in what you just said. three mega questions, each of them deserves at least half an hour answer. i will not do this. but... i will try at least to. give a king. like what i'm saying. i would like to begin at the end. i'm sorry if i jumped a little bit up and down. the question ich. concept of freedom, a concept worth fighting for. i think that what we are witnessing today. it's not a fight about freedom in the sense of for freedom or against freedom. but the fight between different dimensions of the notion of freedom itself. for example, on one extreme. he is so crazy that i almost like him. me the new. argentinian president. who defines himself as anarcho-capitalist. he will, i think, not be able to. fulfill his program. but to actualize his program, but it's interesting when he was asked what to do in argentina. against to fight poverty see, and this is for me. a consequent liberalism at least a certain dimension of it he, as most of us probably know, he proposed to. not only legalized, but even solicit. great. parent, adult. ken, legally,. sell their organs like if somebody needs my kidney or whatever and their children. now. in an abstract sense, you can say, yes, this is an important extension of the notion of freedom. you can even trade freely dispose of this. but it's problematic. of course! but it gives an important insight. you know, there are, as i write in my freedom book, there are, i evoke there and sin zai. love. mozart and wagner. but i... always think about the finale of act one of don giovanni where the guests arrive to a part. organized by don giovanni and then. first don giovanni and then all others start. to think eviva la libertad!
i. dis in what you just said. three mega questions, each of them deserves at least half an hour answer. i will not do this. but... i will try at least to. give a king. like what i'm saying. i would like to begin at the end. i'm sorry if i jumped a little bit up and down. the question ich. concept of freedom, a concept worth fighting for. i think that what we are witnessing today. it's not a fight about freedom in the sense of for freedom or against freedom. but the fight between different dimensions of the notion of freedom itself. for example, on one extreme. he is so crazy that i almost like him. me the new. argentinian president. who defines himself as anarcho-capitalist. he will, i think, not be able to. fulfill his program. but to actualize his program, but it's interesting when he was asked what to do in argentina. against to fight poverty see, and this is for me. a consequent liberalism at least a certain dimension of it he, as most of us probably know, he proposed to. not only legalized, but even solicit. great. parent, adult. ken, legally,. sell their organs like if somebody needs my kidney or whatever and their children. now. in an abstract sense, you can say, yes, this is an important extension of the notion of freedom. you can even trade freely dispose of this. but it's problematic. of course! but it gives an important insight. you know, there are, as i write in my freedom book, there are, i evoke there and sin zai. love. mozart and wagner. but i... always think about the finale of act one of don giovanni where the guests arrive to a part. organized by don giovanni and then. first don giovanni and then all others start. to think eviva la libertad!
Interviewer
it.
it.
Slavoj Žižek
really like uh going on for almost half a mean it but it is absolutely clear. yeah. each group. means another thing by freedom. now, i am not simply saying in a primitive pseudo-marxist way that nonetheless there is an essential core or that we should of freedom or that we should make a class analysis and distinguish different dimensions. no practically always when people are united. fighting for freedom. if you look at it closely, there are different dimensions in it. i remember a pathetic example. i'm not proud. of me today for participating in it. over 30 years ago. when, slovenia. my country was moving towards independence, the notion was always. also, freedom, freedom. but it was so clear that, for example, for some people, old right-wingers, freedom means we want to get back what was nationalized, what was taken from us. for. religious people, freedom meant full freedom of religion, which of course for them meant full access to the church. of the catholic church to public media and so on and so on. there were some trade union leftists for whom freedom meant more workers' rights. there were gay people, okay, at that time they were not called lgbt blast, but all these, let's call them sexual minorities. they wanted their freedom and of course at that moment. nobody. was attentive to how incompatible these notions of. freedom where, so the first thing is de. we should be here lenin's, you know. the infamous lenin. f. freedom. of whom? freedom to do. what? this is more important than ever. today. yeah. so i don't think. this is something that we can then in a primitive way dispel by introducing a distinction of authentic true freedom and false freedom and so on. the notion of freedom is in itself inconsistent. this is why now comes the first provocation. this is why i... don't know how this was meant, agonon, in your question. eric, eric. is a concept of freedom worth fighting for no matter what? i'm not only saying in the standard marxist way, no, because bourgeois freedoms can be tools of oppression, i even saying quite concretely. next. quite often. even if a people is fighting for freedom what they actually, although maybe not clear in their mind want. is. even more oppression than in the existing regime. so to go to the end to provoke you. i can well imagine. cad dict. dictatorial military intervention. we travel. necessary to protect freedom. it's another question, are they? enough to give you two examples that i always like to mention. remember some 15 years ago or 20, there were so-called free elections in algeria. and later in egypt, when was it 10 years ago, part of the arab spring, what happened there? the active minority mostly. middle class educated young people organized vast demonstrations for freedom. okay, then they got free elections. they didn't win muslim fundamentalist won. and the result was get the army with a grudging approach approval off. the very people who started, who began. protest. accepted that nonetheless the army rule is better. also, we should be here. absolutely against any taboos for example, yes, we all would like. palestinians to have freedom. but let me make and my support for palestine is well known, so i hope i will not be misunderstood. but let me imagine that somehow, i don't know why. they would conclude a weird peace day. gaza and israel, israel with rules and gaza. becomes a democratic state. not in any deep western sense, but in the sense that people really elect maybe not formally, but kind of the type of government they want. do we really think that this will be a government? which would fit our western notions of freedom probably a lot of oppression of women will remain and so on and so on and so on it's more and more. i am skeptical. about the idea that p. basically, when they are not manipulated. people majority of ordinary people know what they want and that this is an authentic demand for freedom. what if it is not? i'm skeptical about this. that's why to go absolutely to the end, i like this. i already spoke with some of my leftist friends in the united states. and we envisage the following possibility let us tell you never know but in this madness that we have now. that trump wins next elections. and let's say that he will not be more gentrified than, but that he will continue his march towards total radical change in american political system. do you know that there are already leftists in the united states who count on the army intervention here? because they remember something that i also noticed. remember the 6th of january when it was almost three years ago. but do you know which was today people don't like to hear this. when. the dream of the leftists was appropriated by the new populist right and what every leftist is. because were the dreams about the people penetrating the very seat of power when it happened. you know that the army, the top of the army. said clearly that they will not toler. such subversion of the public order. they said this discreetly, but... clearly. there is a long history, again, of democratic military coup. i have no problems here. there is, again, back to my lenini's point, there is no abstract. rule here. there are situations, yes, and sweet. then we know what happened later, but there are situations like syrria in greece where? vote! public vote really means something. here i. slightly disagree with otherwise our good friend al but you c how coll. absolute distrust of vote. no. but i also don't think that. free voting it should be fetishized. don't we feel this? if we have a spontaneous leftist sense that there are situations, you feel it in the air, where election matters. where. it is very important who w. then... but this is an exception. i agree this. then another pessimist point of mine, which i repeat also in the book, this is horrible, but except in exceptional situations. i don't think that the majority of the people really want freedom. if by freedom you mean we have a big dilemma we have now to decide now. and i understand people. i'm is a rule among them. i want... to get a clear indication from. orientation which is close to me what is... to be done. i don't want to do it myself. i want to be to be cynical, i want to be told this is the right thing to do. i want my freedom in normal, peaceful political state. to be a formality. aye! decide, but only formally. we should be against, very clear in this. finks. but on the top of all this i think that if and here batieu himself oscillates. for some time he said something which i quoted. often some ten years ago that the biggest threat today to emancipatory movement. it's not capitalism, exploitation, fascism, it's democracy. now, this may sound extreme in this abstract form, i don't agree, but he made a point. because when a situation is really tense. then uh... democracy a trust in democracy can be the main obstacle to emancipation because it has this pacifying effect. listen, we can do it peacefully. we don't need really to fight you. the existing mechanisms to mark. now. that's also why my book, freedom doesn't do too well no it's selling well but it doesn't find the echo you know why? because both of you if you were you agon and frank if you were stupid enough to read it at least a little bit you notice that it's a dark book, you know, there is a very good book on, i forgot the guy's name, but it's not that i despise him. it's my old age senility. you're know the guy who wrote a book, the dark deluze. yeah, and brought out how deleuze is not this happy agon. it's good that you brought a drink. i thought that you totally control my mind and you will show that book. no, what i want to say is that she brought out the other side where deleuze is not this happy multiplicity, you know. no no, there is an extremely dark aspect of delesh. i think the same holds for. frido. freedom! should not be sorry for using this. stupid jargonistic term. the master signifier. freedom is, as alain but you would have said, freedom today especially. is not. a sign which sorry a concept which allows us to draw the crucial right distinction. now, freedom is a term which is in itself it only designates a certain terrain of the battle. it's absolutely. crio. let me now just briefly. so where i see the... basic tension in this notion. i will not even lose the time with populists. although again. the first task of a true leftist today. oh. ich t. not follow to the end. the liberal democratic blackmail, which is forget about your socialist dreams today, the big struggle is us against. populist or other fundamentalists no while of course we should make. tactical alliances with liberals when we are fighting for women's rights, lgbt or whatever. also, of course all other things, pre-education, health and so on. we should never forget that. the new right wing. copul. e. a secondary phenomenon. it's a sign, a symptom of something going wrong. in the basic liberal democratic project itself. this, if we don't bear in mind this, result our soul. do that... to the dead. now... right. as for the notion of freedom, now i'm slowly returning up to the more philosophical core of your question. uh. i was well aware of the risk of opposing. prido mess sap. which in some sense means not in the human sense. not, sorry, freedom as a term of humanity, but even an anti-humanist freedom, radical, self-destructive freedom. and... concrete. frito. oh. now i will follow my closeis. lie. although it's not enough today i claim. you know... what we? who still want to be radical left. should emphasize again and again. is something that even many honest conservatives know today. to be. free it's possible only to be free in the sense of concrete freedom in everyday life. this is possible only within a well-defined. set off those rules, written, very important and unwritten rules. even good manners and don't tell me that i am naive with the notion of good manners. i'm more and more. turning into a leninist philosopher of manners, good manners. now you will laugh, but remember. so-called lenin's testament. when he. criticize this guy, that guy, and then the orgasmic moment is stalin, no? but what is his argument against stalin? not any political line. stalinist to right wing, to radical, no. it's read it. it stalin doesn't have good manners. he's too brutal and so on. but what i want to say again is that uh. this is what? i. to claim today. the point is not in this stalinist way to emphasize how bourgeois freedom is only abstract freedom in the sense of in principle you are free but in actuality you are exploited. we. should respect these liberal freedoms. we should thus add th which is we should fight. spot. concrete circumstances, laws. social manners, financial support, which enable people to actually enjoy this. freoms. for example. uh. general healthcare care. for liberals. conservative liberals, this was, i don't like, too much obama, but he did try something great, which was already too much for united states, obamacare. you remember why? okay he half succeeded then it was abolished by trump. the basic concerned idea was this limits our freedom. the state will prescribe to you, you should take this doctor, you will lose your freedom there. now this, here i'm on the side of obama. obama didn't limit your freedom. if you have money, you can still go to a better private doctor, but isn't it that we should all feel this that. today with all these new diseases, viruses, cancer, whatever, cancer is not new but all the diseases we are obsessed with, isn't it that? it. contributes immensely to your. t of freedom if you don't have to think about this all the time. i'm not a nostalgic of old socialism. but one thing i remember fondly and. hundreds of thousands in slovenia do. get. you were afraid to get cancer or whatever. but you could rely on it that if i get it there is state financed health which will within the scope of what is possible, take care of it. you know how immensely liberating was this? how much more freedom did it give to you? the same is with free education. liberals say, yes, you should be free to. realize your potentials and so on. yes but without free education, this is meaningless. you need this, you know. so, and especially, but i don't have time to go into it now, i must emphasize. unwritten rules of freedom especially today when very few, although now things are turning dark. very few people would be openly, directly racist. racism, sexism and so on survive at the level of unwritten rules, everyday practices and so on and so on. that is where our fight. root. b. our fights should be so this is one thing, but nonetheless. there are positions, moments and i think we are approaching such a moment where. more radical measures will be necessary. where it's not enough just to say respect freedoms, give them a socialist twist and so on, but where? and it's clear this is happening in the united states now, of all countries. where good. basic social edifice, the social path rich. maintains a society is disintegr. so we are approaching a moment where a certain dose of abstract freedom more radical freedom. will be necessary by abstract freedom i mean you no longer in your free activity you no longer can rely on the existing set of social laws, rules, manners.
really like uh going on for almost half a mean it but it is absolutely clear. yeah. each group. means another thing by freedom. now, i am not simply saying in a primitive pseudo-marxist way that nonetheless there is an essential core or that we should of freedom or that we should make a class analysis and distinguish different dimensions. no practically always when people are united. fighting for freedom. if you look at it closely, there are different dimensions in it. i remember a pathetic example. i'm not proud. of me today for participating in it. over 30 years ago. when, slovenia. my country was moving towards independence, the notion was always. also, freedom, freedom. but it was so clear that, for example, for some people, old right-wingers, freedom means we want to get back what was nationalized, what was taken from us. for. religious people, freedom meant full freedom of religion, which of course for them meant full access to the church. of the catholic church to public media and so on and so on. there were some trade union leftists for whom freedom meant more workers' rights. there were gay people, okay, at that time they were not called lgbt blast, but all these, let's call them sexual minorities. they wanted their freedom and of course at that moment. nobody. was attentive to how incompatible these notions of. freedom where, so the first thing is de. we should be here lenin's, you know. the infamous lenin. f. freedom. of whom? freedom to do. what? this is more important than ever. today. yeah. so i don't think. this is something that we can then in a primitive way dispel by introducing a distinction of authentic true freedom and false freedom and so on. the notion of freedom is in itself inconsistent. this is why now comes the first provocation. this is why i... don't know how this was meant, agonon, in your question. eric, eric. is a concept of freedom worth fighting for no matter what? i'm not only saying in the standard marxist way, no, because bourgeois freedoms can be tools of oppression, i even saying quite concretely. next. quite often. even if a people is fighting for freedom what they actually, although maybe not clear in their mind want. is. even more oppression than in the existing regime. so to go to the end to provoke you. i can well imagine. cad dict. dictatorial military intervention. we travel. necessary to protect freedom. it's another question, are they? enough to give you two examples that i always like to mention. remember some 15 years ago or 20, there were so-called free elections in algeria. and later in egypt, when was it 10 years ago, part of the arab spring, what happened there? the active minority mostly. middle class educated young people organized vast demonstrations for freedom. okay, then they got free elections. they didn't win muslim fundamentalist won. and the result was get the army with a grudging approach approval off. the very people who started, who began. protest. accepted that nonetheless the army rule is better. also, we should be here. absolutely against any taboos for example, yes, we all would like. palestinians to have freedom. but let me make and my support for palestine is well known, so i hope i will not be misunderstood. but let me imagine that somehow, i don't know why. they would conclude a weird peace day. gaza and israel, israel with rules and gaza. becomes a democratic state. not in any deep western sense, but in the sense that people really elect maybe not formally, but kind of the type of government they want. do we really think that this will be a government? which would fit our western notions of freedom probably a lot of oppression of women will remain and so on and so on and so on it's more and more. i am skeptical. about the idea that p. basically, when they are not manipulated. people majority of ordinary people know what they want and that this is an authentic demand for freedom. what if it is not? i'm skeptical about this. that's why to go absolutely to the end, i like this. i already spoke with some of my leftist friends in the united states. and we envisage the following possibility let us tell you never know but in this madness that we have now. that trump wins next elections. and let's say that he will not be more gentrified than, but that he will continue his march towards total radical change in american political system. do you know that there are already leftists in the united states who count on the army intervention here? because they remember something that i also noticed. remember the 6th of january when it was almost three years ago. but do you know which was today people don't like to hear this. when. the dream of the leftists was appropriated by the new populist right and what every leftist is. because were the dreams about the people penetrating the very seat of power when it happened. you know that the army, the top of the army. said clearly that they will not toler. such subversion of the public order. they said this discreetly, but... clearly. there is a long history, again, of democratic military coup. i have no problems here. there is, again, back to my lenini's point, there is no abstract. rule here. there are situations, yes, and sweet. then we know what happened later, but there are situations like syrria in greece where? vote! public vote really means something. here i. slightly disagree with otherwise our good friend al but you c how coll. absolute distrust of vote. no. but i also don't think that. free voting it should be fetishized. don't we feel this? if we have a spontaneous leftist sense that there are situations, you feel it in the air, where election matters. where. it is very important who w. then... but this is an exception. i agree this. then another pessimist point of mine, which i repeat also in the book, this is horrible, but except in exceptional situations. i don't think that the majority of the people really want freedom. if by freedom you mean we have a big dilemma we have now to decide now. and i understand people. i'm is a rule among them. i want... to get a clear indication from. orientation which is close to me what is... to be done. i don't want to do it myself. i want to be to be cynical, i want to be told this is the right thing to do. i want my freedom in normal, peaceful political state. to be a formality. aye! decide, but only formally. we should be against, very clear in this. finks. but on the top of all this i think that if and here batieu himself oscillates. for some time he said something which i quoted. often some ten years ago that the biggest threat today to emancipatory movement. it's not capitalism, exploitation, fascism, it's democracy. now, this may sound extreme in this abstract form, i don't agree, but he made a point. because when a situation is really tense. then uh... democracy a trust in democracy can be the main obstacle to emancipation because it has this pacifying effect. listen, we can do it peacefully. we don't need really to fight you. the existing mechanisms to mark. now. that's also why my book, freedom doesn't do too well no it's selling well but it doesn't find the echo you know why? because both of you if you were you agon and frank if you were stupid enough to read it at least a little bit you notice that it's a dark book, you know, there is a very good book on, i forgot the guy's name, but it's not that i despise him. it's my old age senility. you're know the guy who wrote a book, the dark deluze. yeah, and brought out how deleuze is not this happy agon. it's good that you brought a drink. i thought that you totally control my mind and you will show that book. no, what i want to say is that she brought out the other side where deleuze is not this happy multiplicity, you know. no no, there is an extremely dark aspect of delesh. i think the same holds for. frido. freedom! should not be sorry for using this. stupid jargonistic term. the master signifier. freedom is, as alain but you would have said, freedom today especially. is not. a sign which sorry a concept which allows us to draw the crucial right distinction. now, freedom is a term which is in itself it only designates a certain terrain of the battle. it's absolutely. crio. let me now just briefly. so where i see the... basic tension in this notion. i will not even lose the time with populists. although again. the first task of a true leftist today. oh. ich t. not follow to the end. the liberal democratic blackmail, which is forget about your socialist dreams today, the big struggle is us against. populist or other fundamentalists no while of course we should make. tactical alliances with liberals when we are fighting for women's rights, lgbt or whatever. also, of course all other things, pre-education, health and so on. we should never forget that. the new right wing. copul. e. a secondary phenomenon. it's a sign, a symptom of something going wrong. in the basic liberal democratic project itself. this, if we don't bear in mind this, result our soul. do that... to the dead. now... right. as for the notion of freedom, now i'm slowly returning up to the more philosophical core of your question. uh. i was well aware of the risk of opposing. prido mess sap. which in some sense means not in the human sense. not, sorry, freedom as a term of humanity, but even an anti-humanist freedom, radical, self-destructive freedom. and... concrete. frito. oh. now i will follow my closeis. lie. although it's not enough today i claim. you know... what we? who still want to be radical left. should emphasize again and again. is something that even many honest conservatives know today. to be. free it's possible only to be free in the sense of concrete freedom in everyday life. this is possible only within a well-defined. set off those rules, written, very important and unwritten rules. even good manners and don't tell me that i am naive with the notion of good manners. i'm more and more. turning into a leninist philosopher of manners, good manners. now you will laugh, but remember. so-called lenin's testament. when he. criticize this guy, that guy, and then the orgasmic moment is stalin, no? but what is his argument against stalin? not any political line. stalinist to right wing, to radical, no. it's read it. it stalin doesn't have good manners. he's too brutal and so on. but what i want to say again is that uh. this is what? i. to claim today. the point is not in this stalinist way to emphasize how bourgeois freedom is only abstract freedom in the sense of in principle you are free but in actuality you are exploited. we. should respect these liberal freedoms. we should thus add th which is we should fight. spot. concrete circumstances, laws. social manners, financial support, which enable people to actually enjoy this. freoms. for example. uh. general healthcare care. for liberals. conservative liberals, this was, i don't like, too much obama, but he did try something great, which was already too much for united states, obamacare. you remember why? okay he half succeeded then it was abolished by trump. the basic concerned idea was this limits our freedom. the state will prescribe to you, you should take this doctor, you will lose your freedom there. now this, here i'm on the side of obama. obama didn't limit your freedom. if you have money, you can still go to a better private doctor, but isn't it that we should all feel this that. today with all these new diseases, viruses, cancer, whatever, cancer is not new but all the diseases we are obsessed with, isn't it that? it. contributes immensely to your. t of freedom if you don't have to think about this all the time. i'm not a nostalgic of old socialism. but one thing i remember fondly and. hundreds of thousands in slovenia do. get. you were afraid to get cancer or whatever. but you could rely on it that if i get it there is state financed health which will within the scope of what is possible, take care of it. you know how immensely liberating was this? how much more freedom did it give to you? the same is with free education. liberals say, yes, you should be free to. realize your potentials and so on. yes but without free education, this is meaningless. you need this, you know. so, and especially, but i don't have time to go into it now, i must emphasize. unwritten rules of freedom especially today when very few, although now things are turning dark. very few people would be openly, directly racist. racism, sexism and so on survive at the level of unwritten rules, everyday practices and so on and so on. that is where our fight. root. b. our fights should be so this is one thing, but nonetheless. there are positions, moments and i think we are approaching such a moment where. more radical measures will be necessary. where it's not enough just to say respect freedoms, give them a socialist twist and so on, but where? and it's clear this is happening in the united states now, of all countries. where good. basic social edifice, the social path rich. maintains a society is disintegr. so we are approaching a moment where a certain dose of abstract freedom more radical freedom. will be necessary by abstract freedom i mean you no longer in your free activity you no longer can rely on the existing set of social laws, rules, manners.
Host
can i come in there? can i come in there? i mean, with the... just because you propose in freedom exactly thereby to reposition what we mean by communism. that is, you explicitly say, perhaps the time has come to reconceive. communism as a counter-revolution, as an effort to establish a new stable order. and if we understand this correctly, i mean, the background of that point is that capitalism is a social organization or form of social organization that perpetually self-revolutionizes itself, but not always in a good way, right? also in very critical.
can i come in there? can i come in there? i mean, with the... just because you propose in freedom exactly thereby to reposition what we mean by communism. that is, you explicitly say, perhaps the time has come to reconceive. communism as a counter-revolution, as an effort to establish a new stable order. and if we understand this correctly, i mean, the background of that point is that capitalism is a social organization or form of social organization that perpetually self-revolutionizes itself, but not always in a good way, right? also in very critical.
Slavoj Žižek
ways.
ways.
Host
and. and hence the moment we try to, let's say, what we're confronted with, to revolutionize it, again, we're strangely seem to be confronted with a paradox that by opposing this self-revolutionizing tendency, by means of a revolution, we end up unwillingly reproduce what we try to overcome. i mean, somehow your critique, i think, of china or contemporary china, at least some versions of it, might exist. point point in that direction. so the true way you seem to be saying to revolutionize that permanent revolutionizing is to counter-revolutionize means to propose a new form of stability, a new form of social order, a new form of let's say social bond, so to speak. um so we were wondering, would would you say that this is still um marxist old line, right? i mean, as you know
and. and hence the moment we try to, let's say, what we're confronted with, to revolutionize it, again, we're strangely seem to be confronted with a paradox that by opposing this self-revolutionizing tendency, by means of a revolution, we end up unwillingly reproduce what we try to overcome. i mean, somehow your critique, i think, of china or contemporary china, at least some versions of it, might exist. point point in that direction. so the true way you seem to be saying to revolutionize that permanent revolutionizing is to counter-revolutionize means to propose a new form of stability, a new form of social order, a new form of let's say social bond, so to speak. um so we were wondering, would would you say that this is still um marxist old line, right? i mean, as you know
Slavoj Žižek
oh.
oh.
Host
i.
i.
Slavoj Žižek
no no.
no no.
Host
no, sorry, what they mean? that mar marx has this idea, right that the french revolution brings into the world an incomplete revolution and thereby continues endlessly in a badly infinite way. and he thought one has to complete the revolution. you seem to reshift and refocus things, right? so it's not simply a different spin on marxist idea, but you seem to be proposing something else. so a, let's say, emancipatory counter-revolution, if i may. i believe use it. i will tell you why. because
no, sorry, what they mean? that mar marx has this idea, right that the french revolution brings into the world an incomplete revolution and thereby continues endlessly in a badly infinite way. and he thought one has to complete the revolution. you seem to reshift and refocus things, right? so it's not simply a different spin on marxist idea, but you seem to be proposing something else. so a, let's say, emancipatory counter-revolution, if i may. i believe use it. i will tell you why. because
Slavoj Žižek
you know, the problem when you get this abstract freedom, which means a moment when... the legal order, vacc and so on. is uh and again so that you will not accuse me of being a neo-fascist leftist you know, who gave me this idea? you will not believe me. alain badiou. we debated once's cultural revolution and he told me, when i told him, but nonetheless, then mao ordered the attack on shanghai commune and so on. and he said, yes, these ecstatic moments, exactly, because i would say of abstract freedom. has to be stopped at a certain level. and the point is... i this is again my dark communism or dark freedom. who will do it? will we leave it to the enemies to do it? or will we, the revolutionaries? get the courage. to it. that's why now, i will evoke an example which may sound strange because robespierre and van w. are usually dismissed as the madman who wanted to go on and on. now, i read recently a couple of excellent new biographies of robespierre who showed that but... when in the spring of 94. not val me, val me was sorry of, 1794. revolution won with the big defeat of the english and others in the north in dutch territory. but point. the homeland france was saved. and from that point on, the big worry of robespierre was how how to stop the terror? not allowing the counter-revolution to do it and he did desperate things. he got in fight with the majority of jacobins and so on, he saw clearly that if jacobins don't do it to introduce a new relatively stable order. then... the opponent will. do. he and so on. and he was desperately looking for allies here, there and so on and it was too late. and again, here comes the true greatness.
you know, the problem when you get this abstract freedom, which means a moment when... the legal order, vacc and so on. is uh and again so that you will not accuse me of being a neo-fascist leftist you know, who gave me this idea? you will not believe me. alain badiou. we debated once's cultural revolution and he told me, when i told him, but nonetheless, then mao ordered the attack on shanghai commune and so on. and he said, yes, these ecstatic moments, exactly, because i would say of abstract freedom. has to be stopped at a certain level. and the point is... i this is again my dark communism or dark freedom. who will do it? will we leave it to the enemies to do it? or will we, the revolutionaries? get the courage. to it. that's why now, i will evoke an example which may sound strange because robespierre and van w. are usually dismissed as the madman who wanted to go on and on. now, i read recently a couple of excellent new biographies of robespierre who showed that but... when in the spring of 94. not val me, val me was sorry of, 1794. revolution won with the big defeat of the english and others in the north in dutch territory. but point. the homeland france was saved. and from that point on, the big worry of robespierre was how how to stop the terror? not allowing the counter-revolution to do it and he did desperate things. he got in fight with the majority of jacobins and so on, he saw clearly that if jacobins don't do it to introduce a new relatively stable order. then... the opponent will. do. he and so on. and he was desperately looking for allies here, there and so on and it was too late. and again, here comes the true greatness.
Host
h.
h.
Slavoj Žižek
know clearly that history is moving towards a new dictatorship per. and he said, no, it's better for us to lose our heads. than to do this and i think that. one of his last speeches when he was already losing in convent, it here breaking where he said i am well aware that very soon i will lose my head. these are my last words and so on and so on. don't. you, pr once, also mentioned this when you said... we need strong leader. and then when the situation is stabilized, maybe it's a good idea to cut off the head of this leader you mentioned, you know. so my idea is a crazy one. but this was the problem of soviet union that they were not able to do it after the victory in the civil war, you know. by counter how to do a proper counter-revolution, a counter-revolution on our terms. by counter-revolution, i don't mean... ooh, the bad guys are back in power. i mean... a new daily a new form of peaceful daily life. that's the truth. merler. and again, if you don't do it, he saw it clearly, robespierre, then you get napoleon war and so on. it goes to the great honor of robespierre. that he was always opposed to exporting revolutions. while some, i think even francois furet, who is otherwise critical, praises marx, who said that. napoleon's formula boss. since revolution was no longer going in france, exported changing into military conquest, exported all around. in this sense what i... miss in mar is dead. this logic of permanent self-reolution, i think. marx, at least following his standard statement, wants it to go on even in communism. sometimes marx writes as if good thing about bourgeoisie is constant self-reizing, unfortunately, capitalist form of production, relations of production are a limit to it, so let's cut this off to get this constant self-reizing even. in an even more radical form. that for me the problem with marksx, if you ask me that for him i will put it now as i developed already in my books. i will put it now in very clear form that marxist idea of communism was still! capitalism without capitalism that is to say this immense capitalist dynamic but without of course, capital is the relations of production and so on and so on. and you know where i see in a more apolitical than political sphere, some hopes for this today, some countries like japan. and i'm not talking here about political talk, but ordinary people. in japan, they did, i learned this from kohei saito, the eco-marxist in the last 10, 15 years, there is a silent opinion. like nobody puts it publicly. or at least not too much debt. wait a minute. we have some kind of a relatively good standard. why go on with new and new? why don't we learn just to? not in a decadent sense, but small pleasures of life, culture, writing, in a more peaceful way to enjoy life. it's also ecologically better and so on and so on. this tiredness of constant emergency state of constant progress. so this idea, i must say, this idea fascinates me but before we go on let me just finish this point that crucially for me, the first man freedom, crucially is for me the beautiful quote from sartter that i used in my book. when sartter wrote that under german occupation, we were totally under control, no concrete freedom. but we were more free than ever. why? because, again, there was order, but it was not our own order. so we were more abstractly free. we have to do it. and here, if you permit me to ask myself a question, no? here we really touch the problem of earth. uh what is freedom basically in what sense? agon, in your part of the question you said something wonderful. how can we attain any insight or concept of freedom as such? yes, that's for me the point. as you agon put it in a very hegelian way. abstract freedom is not something in the air as opposed to concrete forms. there are forms of of bad and good. social revolutions but also public disorder, carneles orgies were abstract freedom becomes empirically. testable orb. reality reality that we can for a brief moment experience. and... but if you permit me. i would like, permit me another detour, this is for me crucial, very important. now we cover the nonetheless social aspect of freedom but the second chapter of my book which is for me, sorry for this term, metaphysically the crucial, is a much more naive question. it is. but are we basically free or not? i go here into the topic usually covered by cognitive sciences, brain sciences, and so on and so on. i reject. the usual compatibilis version. which is basically for me too cynical according to this version. it doesn't matter what freedom is metaphysically. are we really free or? are all our acts determined by by not unconscious, because unconsciousness is psychic phenomenon, by neuronal processes and so on. the standard answer is the one by daniel dennett. who says, listen! of course, we all want to feel free to do what we want. what we desire and so on. but it's a totally different question. are we? when we feel free and so on, are we? effectively free or is this still part of the global natural determinism. what i'm really fighting for is big. question. what why? now, i don't agree with dennet and others who i otherwise appreciate. that this is irrelevant. i think that the horror potential horror of today. technological. development which are of course embedded in. logic of capitalist reproduction if the this. metaphysical dimension. are we free or not? ich directly intervening into our reality. not only publicity, but different forms of now wired brain controlling our brain and so on. here something which till now. but just a theoretical point, like you could say. who cares if i'm metaphysically free or not? it's becoming a fact of our political life. through again, different ways we are wired. different ways. we are controlled and manipulated precisely when we experience ourselves as totally free. here, although i often don't agree with him, but yuval harari, the big bestseller guy. i often don't agree with him, but he nonetheless said something pertinent here. well, he says, what was till now, till the last decade? an abstract theoretical question like you know you could still enjoy your life, live normally and then engage in metaphysical debates i'm not really free freedom is my user's illusion but today no longer with the latest technology these theoretical dilemmas become practical facts of the reason of my level of my control and so on. and here now we come. if you permit me, to my big metaphysical. fine. and i think this is freedom at its most radical. let me go back to, is this the last that you have, the robert pipin debate. what's the last one? yes. yeah, it was the last one. yep. what peeping d there? he does it. he's not an idiot. he did it in a very nice systematic way and so on. but to cut a long story short, after writing years ago, very good, short tech. on why kegel. can be saved against hi decker. he now came to take k the g on position. he i think ridiculously, miss. richitz hegel. the thinker of locos. logos in the sense of total knowability of reality, in the sense that reality is all that can be fully know in a. predicative discourse, judgments and so on and b self-reflection brought to the end gives us absolute knowing. nature becomes totally transparent to us and so on and so on. uh. keeping read the culmination of western metaphysics whose basic premise is the identity of being and loveless. and he. pink. death. heidegger's in sein zeit and later, i will not go into details, is nonetheless resides in demonstrating, making it clear that there is a dimension of our being human. which precedes this level of logical thinking. it is that in order to think, to grasp reality and so on, to us as mortal finite beings, we reality is already disclosed to us. in the certain manifestness which is not predicative logical, but it's part of our an aspect of our concrete engagement in life world. now, for reasons i don't want to take too much of your time. i don't want to go into it now. i don't agree with this. the effort of all of my last books. where i am... practically obsessed with the problem of the relationship between transcendental and positive notion of reality. is that. when uh that heidegger himself. when he speaks about history of being and so on. oh. is from time to time. intrigued by the fact because heidegger is, by which fact, heidegger is not a subjective idealist. no? disclosure of being for us as finite human end die dich. doesn't mean that this disclosure is a divine-like act. which creates reality in a quite naive way. heidegger and after him people say of course! i would. outside the history of being, the different disclosures of reality. of course, things exist in the world. but they are not beings in the sense of part of our hermeneutic. cor. but i think. this is not enough. heidegger is for me the ultimate transcendental thinker, although his notion of transcendentalism is not this kantian logical. it is that. transcendental simply means that whenever we encounter reality, there is always already a hermeneutic horizon which determines how we perceive reality. but... heidegger himself occasionally has doubts. for example, when he asks but how he does this, but how could we emerge out of nature? how we need the question prohibited by people. in the sense of but. what would have been nature reality outside us? i think. death. that my. that this is the ultimate parallax. even either you look at reality as all that is. and. develop in evolutionary psychology or primitive marxism, how we emerge out of nature through work, whatever. or you remain a transcendentalist and you say we cannot go. behind! the horizon of meaning into which we are thrown. this horizon is a beautiful german word unintergebar. i think. death. toat it sucks. that. when the kegel is absolutely not. this type of total rationalist. there are many i i will not even lose time read my books but uh. i think that what hegel, sorry that i was so long, but this is my message, what hegel describes at a couple of levels, as for example already in his jena realphilosophie f. be. but i don't like the word. mystical because it's not mystical but this experience of what hegel called using the well-known mystical term the die nacht der welt, the night of the world. this radical self annihilating negativity. this is precisely something in between it is deep a piece out of which different horizons emerge. so it's not yet transcendental, it's something much more horrifying, but at the same time it's no longer nature. nature, the way... external reality. this. in between point here i think maybe pipin misunderstood me. this is the gap. and okay. pein would have said, but this is just a brief moment and hegel mediates in logic this gap. no, i claim he does not. that's why, for example, my eternal other, at the beginning of anthropology, part3 of. philosophy of spirit in his encyclopedia when hegel. talks about. to put it in primitive terms, how out of natural organisms, human mind emerges, he gives a beautiful, more foucauldian than michel foucault answer, madness, that the origin of being human is madness. animal running amo becoming and then that's the beauty hegel doesn't simply sublate aufheung this. he said that for us to be human, madness has to remain always in the background as there. possibility and for hegel, what he calls personal reconciliation. is precisely a reconciliation with this madness that you will never get rid of it. and. as you probably know, in his in i developed this how hegel was not always hegelian enough. he doesn't say this when he speaks about sexuality. where is too primitive. she speaks as if there is natural copulation and then with culture it gets cultivated, you know? instead of just hitting a woman with a stone and raping her, i write poems, i seduce her. no. hegel should have known that there is something in between this. tristan and is all the mortal passion we. madness. so what culture, cultivation of sexuality. cultivate it's not nature, it's already an unnatural excess. and then i link this with kant, who says that why is man an animal which needs a master? because he said kant in contrast to animals man has a kind of a wild fixation of what term does he use like wildness like lawless violently. this is again, this mid level neither one nor and my weight is this this is the level for which... heidegger, for heidegger doesn't exist. heidegger ignores this level. he, although he was in communication with dead bernard. but the swiss psychiatrist. heidegger doesn't enter this domain he has some mystified things for example when felderlin went crazy heidegger of course in a pseudo-poetical way says he found a refuge in the safety of madness and some poetry like that but but do you see what i mean here? this is for me also the original, this madness, zero level of freedom. and then i go a step further. and claim that it's not simply that we have natural balance and then human madness. this human madness must be somehow rooted in, under quotation marks, the madness, derailment of nature itself. and here enters quantum physics. now we go on, but i should give you a hint of what is now my. let's call it make a physical.
know clearly that history is moving towards a new dictatorship per. and he said, no, it's better for us to lose our heads. than to do this and i think that. one of his last speeches when he was already losing in convent, it here breaking where he said i am well aware that very soon i will lose my head. these are my last words and so on and so on. don't. you, pr once, also mentioned this when you said... we need strong leader. and then when the situation is stabilized, maybe it's a good idea to cut off the head of this leader you mentioned, you know. so my idea is a crazy one. but this was the problem of soviet union that they were not able to do it after the victory in the civil war, you know. by counter how to do a proper counter-revolution, a counter-revolution on our terms. by counter-revolution, i don't mean... ooh, the bad guys are back in power. i mean... a new daily a new form of peaceful daily life. that's the truth. merler. and again, if you don't do it, he saw it clearly, robespierre, then you get napoleon war and so on. it goes to the great honor of robespierre. that he was always opposed to exporting revolutions. while some, i think even francois furet, who is otherwise critical, praises marx, who said that. napoleon's formula boss. since revolution was no longer going in france, exported changing into military conquest, exported all around. in this sense what i... miss in mar is dead. this logic of permanent self-reolution, i think. marx, at least following his standard statement, wants it to go on even in communism. sometimes marx writes as if good thing about bourgeoisie is constant self-reizing, unfortunately, capitalist form of production, relations of production are a limit to it, so let's cut this off to get this constant self-reizing even. in an even more radical form. that for me the problem with marksx, if you ask me that for him i will put it now as i developed already in my books. i will put it now in very clear form that marxist idea of communism was still! capitalism without capitalism that is to say this immense capitalist dynamic but without of course, capital is the relations of production and so on and so on. and you know where i see in a more apolitical than political sphere, some hopes for this today, some countries like japan. and i'm not talking here about political talk, but ordinary people. in japan, they did, i learned this from kohei saito, the eco-marxist in the last 10, 15 years, there is a silent opinion. like nobody puts it publicly. or at least not too much debt. wait a minute. we have some kind of a relatively good standard. why go on with new and new? why don't we learn just to? not in a decadent sense, but small pleasures of life, culture, writing, in a more peaceful way to enjoy life. it's also ecologically better and so on and so on. this tiredness of constant emergency state of constant progress. so this idea, i must say, this idea fascinates me but before we go on let me just finish this point that crucially for me, the first man freedom, crucially is for me the beautiful quote from sartter that i used in my book. when sartter wrote that under german occupation, we were totally under control, no concrete freedom. but we were more free than ever. why? because, again, there was order, but it was not our own order. so we were more abstractly free. we have to do it. and here, if you permit me to ask myself a question, no? here we really touch the problem of earth. uh what is freedom basically in what sense? agon, in your part of the question you said something wonderful. how can we attain any insight or concept of freedom as such? yes, that's for me the point. as you agon put it in a very hegelian way. abstract freedom is not something in the air as opposed to concrete forms. there are forms of of bad and good. social revolutions but also public disorder, carneles orgies were abstract freedom becomes empirically. testable orb. reality reality that we can for a brief moment experience. and... but if you permit me. i would like, permit me another detour, this is for me crucial, very important. now we cover the nonetheless social aspect of freedom but the second chapter of my book which is for me, sorry for this term, metaphysically the crucial, is a much more naive question. it is. but are we basically free or not? i go here into the topic usually covered by cognitive sciences, brain sciences, and so on and so on. i reject. the usual compatibilis version. which is basically for me too cynical according to this version. it doesn't matter what freedom is metaphysically. are we really free or? are all our acts determined by by not unconscious, because unconsciousness is psychic phenomenon, by neuronal processes and so on. the standard answer is the one by daniel dennett. who says, listen! of course, we all want to feel free to do what we want. what we desire and so on. but it's a totally different question. are we? when we feel free and so on, are we? effectively free or is this still part of the global natural determinism. what i'm really fighting for is big. question. what why? now, i don't agree with dennet and others who i otherwise appreciate. that this is irrelevant. i think that the horror potential horror of today. technological. development which are of course embedded in. logic of capitalist reproduction if the this. metaphysical dimension. are we free or not? ich directly intervening into our reality. not only publicity, but different forms of now wired brain controlling our brain and so on. here something which till now. but just a theoretical point, like you could say. who cares if i'm metaphysically free or not? it's becoming a fact of our political life. through again, different ways we are wired. different ways. we are controlled and manipulated precisely when we experience ourselves as totally free. here, although i often don't agree with him, but yuval harari, the big bestseller guy. i often don't agree with him, but he nonetheless said something pertinent here. well, he says, what was till now, till the last decade? an abstract theoretical question like you know you could still enjoy your life, live normally and then engage in metaphysical debates i'm not really free freedom is my user's illusion but today no longer with the latest technology these theoretical dilemmas become practical facts of the reason of my level of my control and so on. and here now we come. if you permit me, to my big metaphysical. fine. and i think this is freedom at its most radical. let me go back to, is this the last that you have, the robert pipin debate. what's the last one? yes. yeah, it was the last one. yep. what peeping d there? he does it. he's not an idiot. he did it in a very nice systematic way and so on. but to cut a long story short, after writing years ago, very good, short tech. on why kegel. can be saved against hi decker. he now came to take k the g on position. he i think ridiculously, miss. richitz hegel. the thinker of locos. logos in the sense of total knowability of reality, in the sense that reality is all that can be fully know in a. predicative discourse, judgments and so on and b self-reflection brought to the end gives us absolute knowing. nature becomes totally transparent to us and so on and so on. uh. keeping read the culmination of western metaphysics whose basic premise is the identity of being and loveless. and he. pink. death. heidegger's in sein zeit and later, i will not go into details, is nonetheless resides in demonstrating, making it clear that there is a dimension of our being human. which precedes this level of logical thinking. it is that in order to think, to grasp reality and so on, to us as mortal finite beings, we reality is already disclosed to us. in the certain manifestness which is not predicative logical, but it's part of our an aspect of our concrete engagement in life world. now, for reasons i don't want to take too much of your time. i don't want to go into it now. i don't agree with this. the effort of all of my last books. where i am... practically obsessed with the problem of the relationship between transcendental and positive notion of reality. is that. when uh that heidegger himself. when he speaks about history of being and so on. oh. is from time to time. intrigued by the fact because heidegger is, by which fact, heidegger is not a subjective idealist. no? disclosure of being for us as finite human end die dich. doesn't mean that this disclosure is a divine-like act. which creates reality in a quite naive way. heidegger and after him people say of course! i would. outside the history of being, the different disclosures of reality. of course, things exist in the world. but they are not beings in the sense of part of our hermeneutic. cor. but i think. this is not enough. heidegger is for me the ultimate transcendental thinker, although his notion of transcendentalism is not this kantian logical. it is that. transcendental simply means that whenever we encounter reality, there is always already a hermeneutic horizon which determines how we perceive reality. but... heidegger himself occasionally has doubts. for example, when he asks but how he does this, but how could we emerge out of nature? how we need the question prohibited by people. in the sense of but. what would have been nature reality outside us? i think. death. that my. that this is the ultimate parallax. even either you look at reality as all that is. and. develop in evolutionary psychology or primitive marxism, how we emerge out of nature through work, whatever. or you remain a transcendentalist and you say we cannot go. behind! the horizon of meaning into which we are thrown. this horizon is a beautiful german word unintergebar. i think. death. toat it sucks. that. when the kegel is absolutely not. this type of total rationalist. there are many i i will not even lose time read my books but uh. i think that what hegel, sorry that i was so long, but this is my message, what hegel describes at a couple of levels, as for example already in his jena realphilosophie f. be. but i don't like the word. mystical because it's not mystical but this experience of what hegel called using the well-known mystical term the die nacht der welt, the night of the world. this radical self annihilating negativity. this is precisely something in between it is deep a piece out of which different horizons emerge. so it's not yet transcendental, it's something much more horrifying, but at the same time it's no longer nature. nature, the way... external reality. this. in between point here i think maybe pipin misunderstood me. this is the gap. and okay. pein would have said, but this is just a brief moment and hegel mediates in logic this gap. no, i claim he does not. that's why, for example, my eternal other, at the beginning of anthropology, part3 of. philosophy of spirit in his encyclopedia when hegel. talks about. to put it in primitive terms, how out of natural organisms, human mind emerges, he gives a beautiful, more foucauldian than michel foucault answer, madness, that the origin of being human is madness. animal running amo becoming and then that's the beauty hegel doesn't simply sublate aufheung this. he said that for us to be human, madness has to remain always in the background as there. possibility and for hegel, what he calls personal reconciliation. is precisely a reconciliation with this madness that you will never get rid of it. and. as you probably know, in his in i developed this how hegel was not always hegelian enough. he doesn't say this when he speaks about sexuality. where is too primitive. she speaks as if there is natural copulation and then with culture it gets cultivated, you know? instead of just hitting a woman with a stone and raping her, i write poems, i seduce her. no. hegel should have known that there is something in between this. tristan and is all the mortal passion we. madness. so what culture, cultivation of sexuality. cultivate it's not nature, it's already an unnatural excess. and then i link this with kant, who says that why is man an animal which needs a master? because he said kant in contrast to animals man has a kind of a wild fixation of what term does he use like wildness like lawless violently. this is again, this mid level neither one nor and my weight is this this is the level for which... heidegger, for heidegger doesn't exist. heidegger ignores this level. he, although he was in communication with dead bernard. but the swiss psychiatrist. heidegger doesn't enter this domain he has some mystified things for example when felderlin went crazy heidegger of course in a pseudo-poetical way says he found a refuge in the safety of madness and some poetry like that but but do you see what i mean here? this is for me also the original, this madness, zero level of freedom. and then i go a step further. and claim that it's not simply that we have natural balance and then human madness. this human madness must be somehow rooted in, under quotation marks, the madness, derailment of nature itself. and here enters quantum physics. now we go on, but i should give you a hint of what is now my. let's call it make a physical.
Interviewer
i'm so sorry. can we interrupt you? because we have quite a lot of material to cover and very.
i'm so sorry. can we interrupt you? because we have quite a lot of material to cover and very.
Slavoj Žižek
now get your questions from me third the answer sent own yet.
now get your questions from me third the answer sent own yet.
Interviewer
we will come to quantum physics.
we will come to quantum physics.
Slavoj Žižek
we a bit.
we a bit.
Interviewer
but... but what i want to do is what i want to ask you now is something concerning your conception of politics, which has caused quite some reproaches and critiques. one of them is that you constantly change your position in regard to different or different concrete situations. but we can roughly categorize these reproaches into three groups. the first one would be the truly violent act is to do nothing, that is refusal to act. i'm quoting you here now. and some of the examples would be, say, not to give money to the banks, not to engage into charity work. do not buy politically conscious coffee at your local coffee shop, etc. the second group would be accept the impossible and do. all you can go all the way go to the end that with that
but... but what i want to do is what i want to ask you now is something concerning your conception of politics, which has caused quite some reproaches and critiques. one of them is that you constantly change your position in regard to different or different concrete situations. but we can roughly categorize these reproaches into three groups. the first one would be the truly violent act is to do nothing, that is refusal to act. i'm quoting you here now. and some of the examples would be, say, not to give money to the banks, not to engage into charity work. do not buy politically conscious coffee at your local coffee shop, etc. the second group would be accept the impossible and do. all you can go all the way go to the end that with that
Slavoj Žižek
it's like...
it's like...
Interviewer
revolution, an uprising and so on. and then there is the third category, which would be like adopting a more what you call principled pragmatic posture. suppose someone who is at least prepared to do something by accepting some of the compromises that accompany the readiness to take over the state power. say what aristide did in haiti and alvaro garcia leera did in bolivia. there is another thesis that what you have proposed once, i think in the second volume of the idea of communism book. a proposal which perhaps remained at the level of a hypothesis you argued that we need a strong body that is able to make quick decisions and implement them with all their necessary harshness. so this body is, in your words, a new tetrad, a tetrad of people, movement party leader. can you elaborate shortly on these different options and how they are connected and or conjuncturally over-determined?
revolution, an uprising and so on. and then there is the third category, which would be like adopting a more what you call principled pragmatic posture. suppose someone who is at least prepared to do something by accepting some of the compromises that accompany the readiness to take over the state power. say what aristide did in haiti and alvaro garcia leera did in bolivia. there is another thesis that what you have proposed once, i think in the second volume of the idea of communism book. a proposal which perhaps remained at the level of a hypothesis you argued that we need a strong body that is able to make quick decisions and implement them with all their necessary harshness. so this body is, in your words, a new tetrad, a tetrad of people, movement party leader. can you elaborate shortly on these different options and how they are connected and or conjuncturally over-determined?
Slavoj Žižek
thanks. well, my first answer, very friendly. screw you. you ask a mega complex question and then i noticed that you added, can you elaborate shortly? no, i will try to. sorry if this will... found as a strange excuse, but my position is here alin's one. concrete analysis of concrete situation. there are situations and i follow here our friend alain but you. c said, there are situations. where where? uh. who be. active in doesn't matter how critical way it's a fake it strengthens the system. there are situations where situations where the system is able to reabsorb it. you know, in my violence book, i quote as a wonderful example. that saramago's novel, what was the title? i forget, blindness. okay, where simply people decide not to vote. end. they bring down the entire system. then there are situations that it when again. you have to take the risk and to go. all the way. through eat. there definitely are such situations and i think it's not simply. contingent which one do we choose? that's the art of leninism. you have to do a subtle analysis of a situation. not with not theist idea, let act now when we have a chance to. win? no, we never have a chance to win fully, simply. but there are. can that we referring to, i don't know which of you quoted that beckett, you know. that we have to. lose fail in a productive way which nonetheless changes the entire. ph. then uh. principle pragmatic posture. yes, that's what we should do. but this princip pragmatic posture, i hope we all agree, has a limit. the limit is that. the world is. so fucked up in such a mess today. that it's wrong to think that we this. low realistic social democracy we will come somewhere now, as i always repeat we should get ready for an emergency state. emergency state will come. and when people said, but you are raising panic and so on, my answer is this cynical reversal. don't worry, it will come the emergency state, you know, don't worry, it will come. no... uh... also this, as you call it, principled pragmatic stance. here also one has to be a leninist in what sense? the art ich. so, rules. here again, in spite of all my disagreements with him, i agree with alain that you. it's very important which particular topic we choose. often. it should not be a big princip topic, but something apparently modest. for example, he failed, i know, but for obama, he was correct to focus on health. think them. you're know. and even with all my critique of biden now, i have a theory. i will not go into it why. he's doing now such catastrophic things apropos israel nonetheless he detected correctly that today it's important. because capital is more organized than ever, especially in these so-called neo-feudal forums. we should fight for new era of syndicates trade unions, you know and whatever you say about biden when united auto workers when a strike, he was the first president in the entire history of the united states who went there, detroit, i don't know where, and publicly supported. the strike of auto workers. so again, with this pragmatic principle pragmatism, it's very important. to truth. the specific field where you hit something. of course, another obvious topic here is ecology and so on. and just one more thing, we should not confuse what you call principle. pragmatism with. won i call opporte. principal opportunism. i found this in many. p-radical left. cool. still advocate some pure revolution, but whenever you have a concrete movement, instead of engaging with it. although you know it will be. it will end in failure. you know, they pretend to. stay outside in their safe usually academic position and then enjoy the oh, i told you so. you know, that's why i naively, i hate when people tell me i sit in my academic armchair. sorry, i engage wherever i can. i support adam. what you are doing although albin kurti is not a marxist in the sense, but at that concrete situation he plays a positive role limiting serb nationalism you know's like don't be afraid. to engage. concretely, even if it's a limited struggle, there is always a trend. you. it will. lead fair. this is a wonderful repro. does it, maybe you know better, frank. is it marx or engels? who made a wonderful note how concrete public unrest explodes usually in some marginal like was it in france somewhere where where those in power, i even don't know when, 48 or later, raised tremendously taxes on salt. and they said, yes, this is how it works. it's apparently a small element, but if it's the right element, it will. explode further. now. yeah. the fourth. vers. i don't think this is even in. to be added to the others. it's just my. general point. that since we are approaching. newew catastrophes the polemic. here my problem is that since we are approaching new catastrophes, i don't think that the solution will be you know, as some people, and i read them with pleasure, like david graeber. i cannot but advise you to read his new book on pirates, you know, this pirate republic. it's wonderful, but i don't buy his generally his anarchist view. i think that just to confront properly ecological crisis, migrations and so on, a much stronger coordination. much higher than the level of a single national state will be necessary. and to conclude with a political point, this is why, unfortunately, although it's so fashionable to criticize europe. good day. even the worst eurocentrists, what they are taking. from europe now. especially those who criticize it is the worst part of european legacy, strong fully sovereign nation states. european right-wingers emphasize this then. let's take the worst example, modi, india. she is precisely combining the most brutal. capitalism with hindu nationalism dismissing others muslims as secondary. even in a way china can be said. from what i follow there to be doing this. the reason for this oppression of strengthening of tibetans and uyghurs is precisely they are already possessed by the european model of strong sovereign nation state. so again, i'm not, when i say... strong body, quick decisions. i'm not talking about stronger nation states. i'm even worse here i'm talking about. larger bodies because how can we even think of of course coping properly with ecological crisis without something like this without much stronger executive which should be controlled but at the same time it should be effective let's stop that's my tragic vision let's stop the idea that. yeah. we should trust in the people know what what they want. for example, i always like this. wang hui, my chinese friend, even tried to convince me. he was sent after tan mien for a year or two or before to the countryside. and he tried to convince me that how. living with ordinary farmers he learned something blah blah blah yeah why not but i don't think they ordinary farmers in the countryside possess some deeper wisdom. i'm here a universalist wisdom can wisdom in the sense of proper historical insight can emerge here or there or anywhere. i don't believe in. privileged historical subject here, a very friendly reproach to our good friend al but you needn't he use the theorem of r? what was his term? homeless immigrant proletarians or? nomadic. nomadic proletariat. now the idea is beautiful one. they are nomadic, they don't even have a home. so they fit perfectly. marxian definition. i'm more of a pessimist, as experience has taught us. they. maybe without change in the sense of limited to some patriotic ideology. but they usually precisely to counter counteract this material homelessness. they are all the more transfixed on their traditional ideological chains, religious and so on. so i'm not against them. no, i'm just saying. do not privilege them. okay.
thanks. well, my first answer, very friendly. screw you. you ask a mega complex question and then i noticed that you added, can you elaborate shortly? no, i will try to. sorry if this will... found as a strange excuse, but my position is here alin's one. concrete analysis of concrete situation. there are situations and i follow here our friend alain but you. c said, there are situations. where where? uh. who be. active in doesn't matter how critical way it's a fake it strengthens the system. there are situations where situations where the system is able to reabsorb it. you know, in my violence book, i quote as a wonderful example. that saramago's novel, what was the title? i forget, blindness. okay, where simply people decide not to vote. end. they bring down the entire system. then there are situations that it when again. you have to take the risk and to go. all the way. through eat. there definitely are such situations and i think it's not simply. contingent which one do we choose? that's the art of leninism. you have to do a subtle analysis of a situation. not with not theist idea, let act now when we have a chance to. win? no, we never have a chance to win fully, simply. but there are. can that we referring to, i don't know which of you quoted that beckett, you know. that we have to. lose fail in a productive way which nonetheless changes the entire. ph. then uh. principle pragmatic posture. yes, that's what we should do. but this princip pragmatic posture, i hope we all agree, has a limit. the limit is that. the world is. so fucked up in such a mess today. that it's wrong to think that we this. low realistic social democracy we will come somewhere now, as i always repeat we should get ready for an emergency state. emergency state will come. and when people said, but you are raising panic and so on, my answer is this cynical reversal. don't worry, it will come the emergency state, you know, don't worry, it will come. no... uh... also this, as you call it, principled pragmatic stance. here also one has to be a leninist in what sense? the art ich. so, rules. here again, in spite of all my disagreements with him, i agree with alain that you. it's very important which particular topic we choose. often. it should not be a big princip topic, but something apparently modest. for example, he failed, i know, but for obama, he was correct to focus on health. think them. you're know. and even with all my critique of biden now, i have a theory. i will not go into it why. he's doing now such catastrophic things apropos israel nonetheless he detected correctly that today it's important. because capital is more organized than ever, especially in these so-called neo-feudal forums. we should fight for new era of syndicates trade unions, you know and whatever you say about biden when united auto workers when a strike, he was the first president in the entire history of the united states who went there, detroit, i don't know where, and publicly supported. the strike of auto workers. so again, with this pragmatic principle pragmatism, it's very important. to truth. the specific field where you hit something. of course, another obvious topic here is ecology and so on. and just one more thing, we should not confuse what you call principle. pragmatism with. won i call opporte. principal opportunism. i found this in many. p-radical left. cool. still advocate some pure revolution, but whenever you have a concrete movement, instead of engaging with it. although you know it will be. it will end in failure. you know, they pretend to. stay outside in their safe usually academic position and then enjoy the oh, i told you so. you know, that's why i naively, i hate when people tell me i sit in my academic armchair. sorry, i engage wherever i can. i support adam. what you are doing although albin kurti is not a marxist in the sense, but at that concrete situation he plays a positive role limiting serb nationalism you know's like don't be afraid. to engage. concretely, even if it's a limited struggle, there is always a trend. you. it will. lead fair. this is a wonderful repro. does it, maybe you know better, frank. is it marx or engels? who made a wonderful note how concrete public unrest explodes usually in some marginal like was it in france somewhere where where those in power, i even don't know when, 48 or later, raised tremendously taxes on salt. and they said, yes, this is how it works. it's apparently a small element, but if it's the right element, it will. explode further. now. yeah. the fourth. vers. i don't think this is even in. to be added to the others. it's just my. general point. that since we are approaching. newew catastrophes the polemic. here my problem is that since we are approaching new catastrophes, i don't think that the solution will be you know, as some people, and i read them with pleasure, like david graeber. i cannot but advise you to read his new book on pirates, you know, this pirate republic. it's wonderful, but i don't buy his generally his anarchist view. i think that just to confront properly ecological crisis, migrations and so on, a much stronger coordination. much higher than the level of a single national state will be necessary. and to conclude with a political point, this is why, unfortunately, although it's so fashionable to criticize europe. good day. even the worst eurocentrists, what they are taking. from europe now. especially those who criticize it is the worst part of european legacy, strong fully sovereign nation states. european right-wingers emphasize this then. let's take the worst example, modi, india. she is precisely combining the most brutal. capitalism with hindu nationalism dismissing others muslims as secondary. even in a way china can be said. from what i follow there to be doing this. the reason for this oppression of strengthening of tibetans and uyghurs is precisely they are already possessed by the european model of strong sovereign nation state. so again, i'm not, when i say... strong body, quick decisions. i'm not talking about stronger nation states. i'm even worse here i'm talking about. larger bodies because how can we even think of of course coping properly with ecological crisis without something like this without much stronger executive which should be controlled but at the same time it should be effective let's stop that's my tragic vision let's stop the idea that. yeah. we should trust in the people know what what they want. for example, i always like this. wang hui, my chinese friend, even tried to convince me. he was sent after tan mien for a year or two or before to the countryside. and he tried to convince me that how. living with ordinary farmers he learned something blah blah blah yeah why not but i don't think they ordinary farmers in the countryside possess some deeper wisdom. i'm here a universalist wisdom can wisdom in the sense of proper historical insight can emerge here or there or anywhere. i don't believe in. privileged historical subject here, a very friendly reproach to our good friend al but you needn't he use the theorem of r? what was his term? homeless immigrant proletarians or? nomadic. nomadic proletariat. now the idea is beautiful one. they are nomadic, they don't even have a home. so they fit perfectly. marxian definition. i'm more of a pessimist, as experience has taught us. they. maybe without change in the sense of limited to some patriotic ideology. but they usually precisely to counter counteract this material homelessness. they are all the more transfixed on their traditional ideological chains, religious and so on. so i'm not against them. no, i'm just saying. do not privilege them. okay.
Host
no.
no.
Slavoj Žižek
so that.
so that.
Host
wonderful. can we jump ahead a little and shift gear a little bit because we would like to
wonderful. can we jump ahead a little and shift gear a little bit because we would like to
Slavoj Žižek
learning we can do it briefly about this your learning your lenin's point, you know. or, you ran the show i'm sorry.
learning we can do it briefly about this your learning your lenin's point, you know. or, you ran the show i'm sorry.
Host
no, no, i just so i thought we could jump ahead a bit and talk about your engagement with quantum physics. that's question seven in the questions. and in the sense, i think that it touches upon what you already raised in your... in taking up our conversation with robert pipin because it appears to us that that quantum physics for you brings the domain or realm of appearance to its very constitutive limits or formalizes the very constitutive limits in such a way that it sort of confronts us with the very inconsistent structure that is constitutive for appearance as appearance. i mean, if we can put it in this he hegelian jargon put differently, i mean, because it is still physics, right? it's not simply mathematics. so we move through appearance to somewhere where we attain an access to the, let's say, incoherent or inconsistent ontology of appearance itself. if we understand correctly. so in some sense, we're talking about the very constitutional sphere that makes whatever being into what it is, whatever appearance into what it is. but that sphere itself, and that seems to be, let's say, the ontological twist of quantum physics, is not stable, is not simply one form, is not simply not even a stable form of contradiction or a stable form of law. principles, as, i don't know, for example, in stalinist classical, as you pointed out in many of your books, in the old stalinist dialectic materialist universe, where there were just stable laws and principles that accounted for transformation and the constitution of reality. but rather quantum physics presents us, if we understand correctly, with a contradiction or with an inconsistency in the very discourse of science itself. and that... inconsistency sort of is, let's say, mappable onto or corresponds, one could say as hegel says, entsprechung to an inconsistency in reality itself.
no, no, i just so i thought we could jump ahead a bit and talk about your engagement with quantum physics. that's question seven in the questions. and in the sense, i think that it touches upon what you already raised in your... in taking up our conversation with robert pipin because it appears to us that that quantum physics for you brings the domain or realm of appearance to its very constitutive limits or formalizes the very constitutive limits in such a way that it sort of confronts us with the very inconsistent structure that is constitutive for appearance as appearance. i mean, if we can put it in this he hegelian jargon put differently, i mean, because it is still physics, right? it's not simply mathematics. so we move through appearance to somewhere where we attain an access to the, let's say, incoherent or inconsistent ontology of appearance itself. if we understand correctly. so in some sense, we're talking about the very constitutional sphere that makes whatever being into what it is, whatever appearance into what it is. but that sphere itself, and that seems to be, let's say, the ontological twist of quantum physics, is not stable, is not simply one form, is not simply not even a stable form of contradiction or a stable form of law. principles, as, i don't know, for example, in stalinist classical, as you pointed out in many of your books, in the old stalinist dialectic materialist universe, where there were just stable laws and principles that accounted for transformation and the constitution of reality. but rather quantum physics presents us, if we understand correctly, with a contradiction or with an inconsistency in the very discourse of science itself. and that... inconsistency sort of is, let's say, mappable onto or corresponds, one could say as hegel says, entsprechung to an inconsistency in reality itself.
Slavoj Žižek
yeah.
yeah.
Host
and so is that, would you agree with that rendering? is that why a dialectical material disposition needs to engage with quantum physics? because it moves from appearance to exactly that kind of level.
and so is that, would you agree with that rendering? is that why a dialectical material disposition needs to engage with quantum physics? because it moves from appearance to exactly that kind of level.
Slavoj Žižek
yeah, yeah, perfect question. i will try again not to, or i'm almost cynically tempted to say, why don't you two guys go to sleep and allow me to go on for hour? i awaken you. no, perfect question. let me clarify things. s. do you know that you frowned? gave me. an idea. for many things that i write about quantum physics, when didn't you publish even a book, old i forget titles, with something like was it materialism without matter or what? idealism.
yeah, yeah, perfect question. i will try again not to, or i'm almost cynically tempted to say, why don't you two guys go to sleep and allow me to go on for hour? i awaken you. no, perfect question. let me clarify things. s. do you know that you frowned? gave me. an idea. for many things that i write about quantum physics, when didn't you publish even a book, old i forget titles, with something like was it materialism without matter or what? idealism.
Host
out.
out.
Slavoj Žižek
yeah.
yeah.
Host
idealism idealism without idealism and the other side of that is materialism without matter yes yeah because i think this is
idealism idealism without idealism and the other side of that is materialism without matter yes yeah because i think this is
Slavoj Žižek
for me, the peak achievement of quantum physics. it begins with einstein but it doesn't go far enough. because let's... still, let's face it, till modern physics, einstein and then quantum physics. but i simplified, but the basic intuitive approach to reality was it's empty space and some small balls jumping up and down there. and then these balls keep each other combined blah blah, blah. but so this is why this traditional materialist always felt threatened when you speak about waves. ah no matter are you are you approaching idealism and unfortunately. that's why we have to fight here, not simply accept quantum physics. i. trust quantum physicists as such, but do you know that many of them, even the guy who is not an idiot. zeilinger, one of the three who got the last year nobel prize. oh my god, i liked so much what he was saying, but then he ruined almost everything by saying, you know, i'm a personal friend of dalai lama and he taught me that there is maybe another spiritual dimension, you know, because the problem is that many quantum physicists. inter. print. this wonderful result. for example, it's now proven that's why they got the nobel prize, the three guys last year. it's proven. wh? quantum physics only. speculated about death. you know that if you it two. an entity into two correlative parts. neutron whatever and then you change one they are correlative. if one is negative the other one is positive. if you do something to the first part, the second part will move in a predictable way. if i push down here, it's up there. but the enigma is how can this happen? when it happens faster than the speed of light. because for einstein, the speed of light is the ultimate limit of movement in our material universal, sorry, of speed. nothing can move faster. here, obviously, the information. from one. sub particle to another got. faster. now, as we all know, einstein's answer was there must be some hidden variables. they proved that it's not this. but now instead of saying, okay. and this is the top of quantum physics speculation today. it is that... our paleotemporal reality. it's not the ultimate horizon of being. there are others, at least one, this quantum wave level of reality. weeks. again in which space and time do not function in the same. well. but again, the problem is that there are already now some hindu obscur other entering the state and saying, ah, you see, this is the spiritual dimension. in materiality, of course, it's material reality the speed of life. no, no, no, but spiritually we are in instant contact and so on. here! but i believe you see how i return to the old fashioned altisarian topic of struggle between materialism and idealism in science, here we have it. uh. and i would like to draw your attention. to book. from i briefly met him, a dutch guy called. thomas hertog. he wrote a book which is pretty good on the origin of time, something like this. he was in the last years of stephen hawking's life, his friend and secretary. and they were developing a wonderful new theory now, i cannot judge are these pure speculations and so on. and. that's earth. it's not as simple as people thought. you have a big bank. although it goes to stephen hawking. materialist convictions that he opposes. the notion of big bang as the absolute beginning. this is too idealist because then theologists enter, ah, what was the big bang? big bang is the point of interest. no, but his idea is a wonderful one. and he tried to prove it. scientifically. i don't know if it's true, but as they say, it's a non vero e benro. that. in this primordial chaos. after immediately after the big. bank and this goes nicely to what you frank said about eternal natural laws and so on no that there was it's a very risky short circuit. but he dar it her talk linking big bang to tard. by darwin, i mean... struggle, competition, survival of the fittest. isn't this a wonderful idea that? in the ultra primordial universe there were different natural laws competing. it was our universe with its natural laws it was a different world maybe without time draft space it was an opposite one and that isn't this a wonderful idea how our natural laws. are not simply eternal. they in our universe contingently emerge. through some. of course, not conscious spontaneous darwinian. tr i love these speculations. now i'm reading the book and what i'm trying to do obviously because this is not my scientific domains i am now desperately reaching my friends around. a monk. quantum scientists to ask them a simple question. are these guys taken seriously or not, you know, is this? but you see how nice is this when we speculate about, we write books about contingency necessity, the contingent origins of necessity, but it happens here. no. this would be my ultimate, i mean, scientific debate. so my ultimate madness would be here. to speculate that in the abyss of human freedom. what i described a death. totally self-destructive knight of the world. it is as if the ultra repressed primordial aspect of nature. that chaos. you know, without even loss of nature being established is coming back, is returning. these are my mega speculations. i know they are problematic, but in my old age when whenever i look around myself, i see only feet. speak ukraine, russia, speaking in gaza, you know, not to mention other things. i deeply i'm sorry we don't have time to go into, but in one of the questions where you have to sleep about work today, no. i deeply agree with, it was your, frank, i see here, point. death you know, war is not simply war. we have even more cruel wars than the ones that we talk about, but because of the global context, political situation, some words are perceived as. a threat to global peace and some are treated as localized events. now, it's not so difficult to understand, but one has to understand it. why ukraine, russia is perceived because of nato, the east, blah, blah, blah, as this, or why the israeli. gaza war is perceived as such. no. i agree with you. that one should you see, always. be aware, i cannot but call it of a global political constellation. it's never that why i got in trouble in my talk in. frankfurt. when i mentioned context, and i was immediately accused, oh, you are justifying hamas. this is madness. books were written, correct books, about the context, the historical situation which gave rise to hitler. you don't relativize hitler's still ultra evil blah blah. and this doesn't justify hitler. but hitler was able to emerge only against the background of the situation crisis of the 20s. and crucial to measure the impact of wars when are they perceived as global threats or not in this way. you know, otherwise otherwise otherwise we either relativize everything or we simply essentialize. now, you are right to point out, for example, in central africa, burkina faso and so on. it's is, i think the true tragedy of that. with. hands what and we see it clearly now. really keeping the central western part of western africa in ne-colonial subordination. and since there was no progressive alternative, we get now isis or whoever and even russians' wagner group. don't. again, can i
for me, the peak achievement of quantum physics. it begins with einstein but it doesn't go far enough. because let's... still, let's face it, till modern physics, einstein and then quantum physics. but i simplified, but the basic intuitive approach to reality was it's empty space and some small balls jumping up and down there. and then these balls keep each other combined blah blah, blah. but so this is why this traditional materialist always felt threatened when you speak about waves. ah no matter are you are you approaching idealism and unfortunately. that's why we have to fight here, not simply accept quantum physics. i. trust quantum physicists as such, but do you know that many of them, even the guy who is not an idiot. zeilinger, one of the three who got the last year nobel prize. oh my god, i liked so much what he was saying, but then he ruined almost everything by saying, you know, i'm a personal friend of dalai lama and he taught me that there is maybe another spiritual dimension, you know, because the problem is that many quantum physicists. inter. print. this wonderful result. for example, it's now proven that's why they got the nobel prize, the three guys last year. it's proven. wh? quantum physics only. speculated about death. you know that if you it two. an entity into two correlative parts. neutron whatever and then you change one they are correlative. if one is negative the other one is positive. if you do something to the first part, the second part will move in a predictable way. if i push down here, it's up there. but the enigma is how can this happen? when it happens faster than the speed of light. because for einstein, the speed of light is the ultimate limit of movement in our material universal, sorry, of speed. nothing can move faster. here, obviously, the information. from one. sub particle to another got. faster. now, as we all know, einstein's answer was there must be some hidden variables. they proved that it's not this. but now instead of saying, okay. and this is the top of quantum physics speculation today. it is that... our paleotemporal reality. it's not the ultimate horizon of being. there are others, at least one, this quantum wave level of reality. weeks. again in which space and time do not function in the same. well. but again, the problem is that there are already now some hindu obscur other entering the state and saying, ah, you see, this is the spiritual dimension. in materiality, of course, it's material reality the speed of life. no, no, no, but spiritually we are in instant contact and so on. here! but i believe you see how i return to the old fashioned altisarian topic of struggle between materialism and idealism in science, here we have it. uh. and i would like to draw your attention. to book. from i briefly met him, a dutch guy called. thomas hertog. he wrote a book which is pretty good on the origin of time, something like this. he was in the last years of stephen hawking's life, his friend and secretary. and they were developing a wonderful new theory now, i cannot judge are these pure speculations and so on. and. that's earth. it's not as simple as people thought. you have a big bank. although it goes to stephen hawking. materialist convictions that he opposes. the notion of big bang as the absolute beginning. this is too idealist because then theologists enter, ah, what was the big bang? big bang is the point of interest. no, but his idea is a wonderful one. and he tried to prove it. scientifically. i don't know if it's true, but as they say, it's a non vero e benro. that. in this primordial chaos. after immediately after the big. bank and this goes nicely to what you frank said about eternal natural laws and so on no that there was it's a very risky short circuit. but he dar it her talk linking big bang to tard. by darwin, i mean... struggle, competition, survival of the fittest. isn't this a wonderful idea that? in the ultra primordial universe there were different natural laws competing. it was our universe with its natural laws it was a different world maybe without time draft space it was an opposite one and that isn't this a wonderful idea how our natural laws. are not simply eternal. they in our universe contingently emerge. through some. of course, not conscious spontaneous darwinian. tr i love these speculations. now i'm reading the book and what i'm trying to do obviously because this is not my scientific domains i am now desperately reaching my friends around. a monk. quantum scientists to ask them a simple question. are these guys taken seriously or not, you know, is this? but you see how nice is this when we speculate about, we write books about contingency necessity, the contingent origins of necessity, but it happens here. no. this would be my ultimate, i mean, scientific debate. so my ultimate madness would be here. to speculate that in the abyss of human freedom. what i described a death. totally self-destructive knight of the world. it is as if the ultra repressed primordial aspect of nature. that chaos. you know, without even loss of nature being established is coming back, is returning. these are my mega speculations. i know they are problematic, but in my old age when whenever i look around myself, i see only feet. speak ukraine, russia, speaking in gaza, you know, not to mention other things. i deeply i'm sorry we don't have time to go into, but in one of the questions where you have to sleep about work today, no. i deeply agree with, it was your, frank, i see here, point. death you know, war is not simply war. we have even more cruel wars than the ones that we talk about, but because of the global context, political situation, some words are perceived as. a threat to global peace and some are treated as localized events. now, it's not so difficult to understand, but one has to understand it. why ukraine, russia is perceived because of nato, the east, blah, blah, blah, as this, or why the israeli. gaza war is perceived as such. no. i agree with you. that one should you see, always. be aware, i cannot but call it of a global political constellation. it's never that why i got in trouble in my talk in. frankfurt. when i mentioned context, and i was immediately accused, oh, you are justifying hamas. this is madness. books were written, correct books, about the context, the historical situation which gave rise to hitler. you don't relativize hitler's still ultra evil blah blah. and this doesn't justify hitler. but hitler was able to emerge only against the background of the situation crisis of the 20s. and crucial to measure the impact of wars when are they perceived as global threats or not in this way. you know, otherwise otherwise otherwise we either relativize everything or we simply essentialize. now, you are right to point out, for example, in central africa, burkina faso and so on. it's is, i think the true tragedy of that. with. hands what and we see it clearly now. really keeping the central western part of western africa in ne-colonial subordination. and since there was no progressive alternative, we get now isis or whoever and even russians' wagner group. don't. again, can i
Interviewer
to. j.
to. j.
Slavoj Žižek
immediately just my position is here double if you agree at the same time, we should take into account global context. but what we should not do is to demand of local people who are caught in war. to sacrifice their struggle for freedom. on behalf of global interest. for example, you remember, it's just south of your place, avon, you remember when greece and macedonia made that compromise. even many of my leftist friends said, oh, they played the game of nato. the point was then to include, yeah, but what should we say to macedonians? no, you should insist in this crisis and get even caught in a war not to serve nato. or whatever. fuck you or offer them a better solution. you know, that's the balance. take into account the global situation but do not repeat the old mistake even in communist movement when interdict its traditional forum. it was, yeah, yeah, women's rights, but don't push it too far. after the revolution, it will be done, you know. sorry, i finished.
immediately just my position is here double if you agree at the same time, we should take into account global context. but what we should not do is to demand of local people who are caught in war. to sacrifice their struggle for freedom. on behalf of global interest. for example, you remember, it's just south of your place, avon, you remember when greece and macedonia made that compromise. even many of my leftist friends said, oh, they played the game of nato. the point was then to include, yeah, but what should we say to macedonians? no, you should insist in this crisis and get even caught in a war not to serve nato. or whatever. fuck you or offer them a better solution. you know, that's the balance. take into account the global situation but do not repeat the old mistake even in communist movement when interdict its traditional forum. it was, yeah, yeah, women's rights, but don't push it too far. after the revolution, it will be done, you know. sorry, i finished.
Interviewer
yeah, well. we would like to move to a slightly different area or domain, in part also because this podcast is called philosophy and its other scene. you are one of the very few philosophical thinkers who actually use the medium of film, and we do not mean documentaries, as a medium for thought and analysis. we are obviously here thinking of the two already existing perverts guides to cinema ideology films that you have done in collaboration with sophie fiennes. what does it mean for you to present your thought in a form of art that you describe yourself as a perverse, also as the ultimate pervert art. why is it crucial to present thought, to articulate thought in a per artistic medium?
yeah, well. we would like to move to a slightly different area or domain, in part also because this podcast is called philosophy and its other scene. you are one of the very few philosophical thinkers who actually use the medium of film, and we do not mean documentaries, as a medium for thought and analysis. we are obviously here thinking of the two already existing perverts guides to cinema ideology films that you have done in collaboration with sophie fiennes. what does it mean for you to present your thought in a form of art that you describe yourself as a perverse, also as the ultimate pervert art. why is it crucial to present thought, to articulate thought in a per artistic medium?
Slavoj Žižek
it's. it's a very interesting question. you know why? because what i will say now, i will just report on my experience. i didn't first have an idea why do i need movies and then start to analyze them. it began with enjoying the movies. a brief answer. first. let me be frankly self-critical. i think that more than half of what i write about movies i purely exploit movies as an example to illustrate some theoretical point then there is about 25-30%. where i? do an analysis of a movie but more. black2. analyze an ideological phenomenon. i don't dwelt specifically with the movie. no. only rarely, but i hope sometimes i do something more, which is i effectively analyze a movie by this i mean i analyze it forum. in the sense that, as all good marxists know, beginning with fred jameson's marxism and form. the true marxist is always formalist. in the sense of earth. the forum in a great work of art not only perfectly renders content, but even contradicts content. it tells more than content it can go even against the explicit intention of its author and this is what i think i do. in my, let's call them, i'm ashamed to say this best anal list. i have here a couple of examples. i did some, i will not go to the standard stuff, but okay. dr with hitchcock i think that the proper way, and json agrees here with me, to read hitchcock is not to begin with anxiety, death, guilt, murder and then, but to see the content of his films. and it's clear if you read. fitchkop's conversations with francois truffaut, he said this. he said, it all begins with a certain scene camera movement and so on. what if camera moves like this, like that and and then he invents the story to be able to use the formal procedures. so at my best, when i analyze hitchcock is, i focus on some purely formal motives, like the one that i detect from his murder from 31 or2 when one of his early sound movies, to psycho. bert and so on. this idea of how camera approaches an an uncanny object. and then all of a sudden, it jumps up. you get this, god's view, god hitcock skull, and then all of a sudden some obscene agent, which is like an evil god, intervenes into reality. let me know understand, but what i'm saying is that. we get here a certain inscribed into the form itself, a certain. terrifying theology of evil god. which r even against the usual reading of the film, the intention and so on and so on. and to go further, that's why, as many of my readers know, the ultimate maybe movie of the last half a century is maybe, i'm not sure, but nonetheless, for me, robert altman's short cuts. because, you know, vulgar leftists. and read it, you know, it, eight, nine parallel stories about ordinary people in these depressive suburbs of los angeles, contingent encounters among them. they read it as a... portrayal of the despair, spiritual void, hopelessness of peter classes now. where there is an optimist dimension in the form itself, this contingent encounters some bad, some good. you know, it's a kind of almost lazy and pluralistic universe at the level of form without presenting any positive hero. at the level of form. altmann! renders the positive. counterpart. the optimistic dimension. and again, what i'm really obsessed with. if. how? sometimes today. i will make a jump to literature. even if we are dealing with a traditional genre. but the forum... can change its status. make it a true work of art. my example that i like to quote lately is, you know, tana french, the new irish. lady detect her excellent stories, what does she do? he offers. at the level of content. the best class analysis of antagonisms of today's ireland. but you cannot say, why does she still follow the detective novel form? wouldn't it be better to directly do it? no, it would have been vulgar to direct. you know, that's the beauty that through this... the tour. through the forum of detective novel, which has imminently nothing to do with. antagonisms of today's ireland. is a way to depict this antagonism much more. accurately then through some direct realist analysis, which i'm even ready to go so far. traditional realist writing is either lost in some postmodern metafiction or bullshit. but i think that but they. i'm going to the end. and it's important to know that all the. new writers, gillian flynn and so on in the united states, they we me. the new, they call it feminine noir. their are police procedures and these are detective novels superficially, they still follow the formula hudan it like at the end you learn the truth but this is, i think, the only authentic genre where literature. novels are really a work of art. i think that novels, i am already tempted to generalize this, novels which want to be directly works of art. adam fake. bull. maybe it goes a little bit also for science fiction, but my privileged domain today are detective novels written by women and so that i will at least appear as the good. feminist, i would like to say that the same goes, and this is the problem for us who are all of three. okay, not all. old, i am an old white man. isn't it that also so many good books about hegel are today written by women. so at least here, i'm not saying this as a keep feminist, promote women. no, i envy them. i hate them. they can be better than me, you know.. i like it that. good books on hegel and good detective novels are today written by we.
it's. it's a very interesting question. you know why? because what i will say now, i will just report on my experience. i didn't first have an idea why do i need movies and then start to analyze them. it began with enjoying the movies. a brief answer. first. let me be frankly self-critical. i think that more than half of what i write about movies i purely exploit movies as an example to illustrate some theoretical point then there is about 25-30%. where i? do an analysis of a movie but more. black2. analyze an ideological phenomenon. i don't dwelt specifically with the movie. no. only rarely, but i hope sometimes i do something more, which is i effectively analyze a movie by this i mean i analyze it forum. in the sense that, as all good marxists know, beginning with fred jameson's marxism and form. the true marxist is always formalist. in the sense of earth. the forum in a great work of art not only perfectly renders content, but even contradicts content. it tells more than content it can go even against the explicit intention of its author and this is what i think i do. in my, let's call them, i'm ashamed to say this best anal list. i have here a couple of examples. i did some, i will not go to the standard stuff, but okay. dr with hitchcock i think that the proper way, and json agrees here with me, to read hitchcock is not to begin with anxiety, death, guilt, murder and then, but to see the content of his films. and it's clear if you read. fitchkop's conversations with francois truffaut, he said this. he said, it all begins with a certain scene camera movement and so on. what if camera moves like this, like that and and then he invents the story to be able to use the formal procedures. so at my best, when i analyze hitchcock is, i focus on some purely formal motives, like the one that i detect from his murder from 31 or2 when one of his early sound movies, to psycho. bert and so on. this idea of how camera approaches an an uncanny object. and then all of a sudden, it jumps up. you get this, god's view, god hitcock skull, and then all of a sudden some obscene agent, which is like an evil god, intervenes into reality. let me know understand, but what i'm saying is that. we get here a certain inscribed into the form itself, a certain. terrifying theology of evil god. which r even against the usual reading of the film, the intention and so on and so on. and to go further, that's why, as many of my readers know, the ultimate maybe movie of the last half a century is maybe, i'm not sure, but nonetheless, for me, robert altman's short cuts. because, you know, vulgar leftists. and read it, you know, it, eight, nine parallel stories about ordinary people in these depressive suburbs of los angeles, contingent encounters among them. they read it as a... portrayal of the despair, spiritual void, hopelessness of peter classes now. where there is an optimist dimension in the form itself, this contingent encounters some bad, some good. you know, it's a kind of almost lazy and pluralistic universe at the level of form without presenting any positive hero. at the level of form. altmann! renders the positive. counterpart. the optimistic dimension. and again, what i'm really obsessed with. if. how? sometimes today. i will make a jump to literature. even if we are dealing with a traditional genre. but the forum... can change its status. make it a true work of art. my example that i like to quote lately is, you know, tana french, the new irish. lady detect her excellent stories, what does she do? he offers. at the level of content. the best class analysis of antagonisms of today's ireland. but you cannot say, why does she still follow the detective novel form? wouldn't it be better to directly do it? no, it would have been vulgar to direct. you know, that's the beauty that through this... the tour. through the forum of detective novel, which has imminently nothing to do with. antagonisms of today's ireland. is a way to depict this antagonism much more. accurately then through some direct realist analysis, which i'm even ready to go so far. traditional realist writing is either lost in some postmodern metafiction or bullshit. but i think that but they. i'm going to the end. and it's important to know that all the. new writers, gillian flynn and so on in the united states, they we me. the new, they call it feminine noir. their are police procedures and these are detective novels superficially, they still follow the formula hudan it like at the end you learn the truth but this is, i think, the only authentic genre where literature. novels are really a work of art. i think that novels, i am already tempted to generalize this, novels which want to be directly works of art. adam fake. bull. maybe it goes a little bit also for science fiction, but my privileged domain today are detective novels written by women and so that i will at least appear as the good. feminist, i would like to say that the same goes, and this is the problem for us who are all of three. okay, not all. old, i am an old white man. isn't it that also so many good books about hegel are today written by women. so at least here, i'm not saying this as a keep feminist, promote women. no, i envy them. i hate them. they can be better than me, you know.. i like it that. good books on hegel and good detective novels are today written by we.
Host
sorry. okay.
sorry. okay.
Slavoj Žižek
okay.
okay.
Host
w i like your books on hegel as well, i must say. i think they're quite okay. so you're not doing.
w i like your books on hegel as well, i must say. i think they're quite okay. so you're not doing.
Slavoj Žižek
too badly.
too badly.
Host
you will become a woman. okay, but. so let's jump to the very end. we usually end the podcast with a series of either or questions. okay and you can... elaborate on your choice but you don't have to and some are sillier than others
you will become a woman. okay, but. so let's jump to the very end. we usually end the podcast with a series of either or questions. okay and you can... elaborate on your choice but you don't have to and some are sillier than others
Slavoj Žižek
your standard joke, you know i can elaborate, but you don't have to, which is, you know my old joke. can i pay? for dinner no can i and you know that i will pay but yeah okay let's go exactly. so let's.
your standard joke, you know i can elaborate, but you don't have to, which is, you know my old joke. can i pay? for dinner no can i and you know that i will pay but yeah okay let's go exactly. so let's.
Host
let's begin with the first one.
let's begin with the first one.
Slavoj Žižek
goodbye our drive. you know, for a long time i was tempted by drive, as if drive is more substantial no. now i think that... desire is a desire for something and drive are both two versions to isolate a certain more substantial gap which would be desired for nothing. desire for a abyss, purely self-destructive desire. so it would be desire but a qualified desire. okay, freud lacon. with all my mega love forud. i would say lac camp. because i nonetheless... read previous authors, freud, hegel, through. la con. so i would say la combe. so even if it's, it's through la comp. bagau beethoven. these buildings. point you i'm sorry beethoven, i love wagner. i think wagner precisely because if there ever was a disgusting, fleazy guy, it's him. but my god, what he does in his music is so breathtaking and like the greatest. celebration of a tragic jewish figure. you find it in wagner, although he was stupidly anti-semitic as a person. but look, who is the hero of main hero of all wagner's operas, from fliegende hollander to to amfortas in parsifal is the figure of a wandering jew. a hero wounded who wants to die but cannot die and wagner has. deep it. he said the flying dutchman is ahasver, the wandering jew. so you see, you get that art at its greatest. you get in. in the work of art the artist himself defeats himself, his private bull. the french revolution or the russian revolution. i'm sorry, here i will disappoint you, french. because russian revolution, although learningin was the greatest, improvise that, you know. and this is isn't this admitted a beautiful paradox that lenni who is considered how the electrical material is, i mean, necessity and so on. at the same time, people, idiots usually take... take hegel as this absolute necessity. what learning learned from hegel is precisely contingency. how even if it doesn't fit marxist dogma, you can do a revolution in there where it wasn't even imaginable to do it and so on. but nonetheless, learning remained too much philosophical determinism. what i like in saint just and robespierre is that wonderful, you know when i don't know who, i think saint just says that revolutionary is like a captain of a boat in wild sea without compass who just has to improvise. so french revolution. okay, schumann, robert or clara. i'm sorry to disappoint feminists, but here i'm for robert. because you know, it's often today in our city feminist times the temptation to say behind a successful man there may be a woman. what i usually say provocatively is, okay, then. then let's rehabilitate elisabeth förster-nietzsche. the true source of. but you know, no. i understand, clara, because of private reasons. det, you know. schuman was comfortably composing and spending money, blah, blah, but clara had to take care of money household. so no longer the key was putting pressure et him, et robert. don't do that bullshit. about your small piano pieces to orchestral staff concerts, it will bring us more money and so on. so no, nonetheless, unfortunately here it's robert. okay, max, carlo or the brothers. this may be a better surprise for you. still k. because it quite surprised me, i read some biographies and not don't idealize marx brothers. groucho himself. was pretty much anti-communist and so on and so on don't idealize them so yes they are nice and so on although recently i tried to the again some of their mega feats like d soup. ! it doesn't work. so much. i don't, i'll put it like this. marks, i have my critical point. but marx is eternal in the sense that every epoch can reinvent him. you always found, existentialists found something in marx, altzsche, hegelians. i unfortunately doubt that marx brothers are at the level of ernst lubitsch or those mega great who can be reinvented each epoch. françois truffaut or hitchcock. why should even be a choice here? i respect truffaut, some good movies. but... too much of a simple opportunity doesn't have. okay, i'll put it like this. the greatest thing that truffaut did is his book on conversation with hitchcock better than all the movies. the early marks of yoli laccon. definitely early lacon. because early march. not just all those philosophical manuscripts but also german ideology and so on. i think if you look for the theoretical shortcuts, options, possibilities for stalinism, you find them in early marx. i never, although when i was young, it was this young, it was this obsession with alienation, early marx and so on. no, no, no. while early laccon. she it's not simple line from imaginary symbolic real f.
goodbye our drive. you know, for a long time i was tempted by drive, as if drive is more substantial no. now i think that... desire is a desire for something and drive are both two versions to isolate a certain more substantial gap which would be desired for nothing. desire for a abyss, purely self-destructive desire. so it would be desire but a qualified desire. okay, freud lacon. with all my mega love forud. i would say lac camp. because i nonetheless... read previous authors, freud, hegel, through. la con. so i would say la combe. so even if it's, it's through la comp. bagau beethoven. these buildings. point you i'm sorry beethoven, i love wagner. i think wagner precisely because if there ever was a disgusting, fleazy guy, it's him. but my god, what he does in his music is so breathtaking and like the greatest. celebration of a tragic jewish figure. you find it in wagner, although he was stupidly anti-semitic as a person. but look, who is the hero of main hero of all wagner's operas, from fliegende hollander to to amfortas in parsifal is the figure of a wandering jew. a hero wounded who wants to die but cannot die and wagner has. deep it. he said the flying dutchman is ahasver, the wandering jew. so you see, you get that art at its greatest. you get in. in the work of art the artist himself defeats himself, his private bull. the french revolution or the russian revolution. i'm sorry, here i will disappoint you, french. because russian revolution, although learningin was the greatest, improvise that, you know. and this is isn't this admitted a beautiful paradox that lenni who is considered how the electrical material is, i mean, necessity and so on. at the same time, people, idiots usually take... take hegel as this absolute necessity. what learning learned from hegel is precisely contingency. how even if it doesn't fit marxist dogma, you can do a revolution in there where it wasn't even imaginable to do it and so on. but nonetheless, learning remained too much philosophical determinism. what i like in saint just and robespierre is that wonderful, you know when i don't know who, i think saint just says that revolutionary is like a captain of a boat in wild sea without compass who just has to improvise. so french revolution. okay, schumann, robert or clara. i'm sorry to disappoint feminists, but here i'm for robert. because you know, it's often today in our city feminist times the temptation to say behind a successful man there may be a woman. what i usually say provocatively is, okay, then. then let's rehabilitate elisabeth förster-nietzsche. the true source of. but you know, no. i understand, clara, because of private reasons. det, you know. schuman was comfortably composing and spending money, blah, blah, but clara had to take care of money household. so no longer the key was putting pressure et him, et robert. don't do that bullshit. about your small piano pieces to orchestral staff concerts, it will bring us more money and so on. so no, nonetheless, unfortunately here it's robert. okay, max, carlo or the brothers. this may be a better surprise for you. still k. because it quite surprised me, i read some biographies and not don't idealize marx brothers. groucho himself. was pretty much anti-communist and so on and so on don't idealize them so yes they are nice and so on although recently i tried to the again some of their mega feats like d soup. ! it doesn't work. so much. i don't, i'll put it like this. marks, i have my critical point. but marx is eternal in the sense that every epoch can reinvent him. you always found, existentialists found something in marx, altzsche, hegelians. i unfortunately doubt that marx brothers are at the level of ernst lubitsch or those mega great who can be reinvented each epoch. françois truffaut or hitchcock. why should even be a choice here? i respect truffaut, some good movies. but... too much of a simple opportunity doesn't have. okay, i'll put it like this. the greatest thing that truffaut did is his book on conversation with hitchcock better than all the movies. the early marks of yoli laccon. definitely early lacon. because early march. not just all those philosophical manuscripts but also german ideology and so on. i think if you look for the theoretical shortcuts, options, possibilities for stalinism, you find them in early marx. i never, although when i was young, it was this young, it was this obsession with alienation, early marx and so on. no, no, no. while early laccon. she it's not simple line from imaginary symbolic real f.
Host
often if you.
often if you.
Slavoj Žižek
retroactively read early lacon you find wonders.
retroactively read early lacon you find wonders.
Host
you.
you.
Slavoj Žižek
the late marks or late laccon. we. if on one condition. if by late lacon, you don't mean just from 70s on, but really the conclusion, last years. i would say late marks. because, you know, i talked with my friend mladen dolar about this, maybe even with you. and we came to the result that laccon reaches his top at between seminar11 and then till encore logic of fantasy and so on. but the very last years when he goes into death. uhnox and all that stuff he is following a path. and this is why the most tragic text of le laccon for me is his just a couple of sentences, his very last seminar, which is really a suicidal note, where he said, i failed. so i would say late month.
the late marks or late laccon. we. if on one condition. if by late lacon, you don't mean just from 70s on, but really the conclusion, last years. i would say late marks. because, you know, i talked with my friend mladen dolar about this, maybe even with you. and we came to the result that laccon reaches his top at between seminar11 and then till encore logic of fantasy and so on. but the very last years when he goes into death. uhnox and all that stuff he is following a path. and this is why the most tragic text of le laccon for me is his just a couple of sentences, his very last seminar, which is really a suicidal note, where he said, i failed. so i would say late month.
Host
thanks okay, silly one, burger or hot dog? what about?
thanks okay, silly one, burger or hot dog? what about?
Slavoj Žižek
in luxembourg i jumped that. sorry lenin or learning, learning. i never... and i was never tempted to idealize rosa luxemburg first, she wasn't even so soft and humanish as they claim. do you that i react in a letter of the guy who is supposed to be the toughest, felix dzerzhinsky. the founder of cheka. you know that he wrote in one of his letters that it was too tough for him because he was afraid of ro van. no, i think rosa luxemburg left this in good sense, not opportunism, but pragmatic how to combine. principle stands with extreme. in good sense, pragmatic plasticity, use the unique opportunity and so on. rosa luxembembourg.
in luxembourg i jumped that. sorry lenin or learning, learning. i never... and i was never tempted to idealize rosa luxemburg first, she wasn't even so soft and humanish as they claim. do you that i react in a letter of the guy who is supposed to be the toughest, felix dzerzhinsky. the founder of cheka. you know that he wrote in one of his letters that it was too tough for him because he was afraid of ro van. no, i think rosa luxemburg left this in good sense, not opportunism, but pragmatic how to combine. principle stands with extreme. in good sense, pragmatic plasticity, use the unique opportunity and so on. rosa luxembembourg.
Host
okay, silly one, burger or hot dog? ter, which is the first one? a burger or hot dog?
okay, silly one, burger or hot dog? ter, which is the first one? a burger or hot dog?
Slavoj Žižek
ber, berg. yeah you know, because because hot dog there is something oh my god i will now show my personal side. eating hot dog it's too close to fellatio to me and i don't like eating my favorite is oh my god what i'm saying double k burger. whenever i eat it, i am tempted to eat two, three of them, which is not good for me. one last one, money or life? money. fuck life.
ber, berg. yeah you know, because because hot dog there is something oh my god i will now show my personal side. eating hot dog it's too close to fellatio to me and i don't like eating my favorite is oh my god what i'm saying double k burger. whenever i eat it, i am tempted to eat two, three of them, which is not good for me. one last one, money or life? money. fuck life.
Host
thank.
thank.
Slavoj Žižek
because know why? because it's a hypocritical question. because i were to say life, it would be a, life is nonetheless more basic. but what is life without money? you know, i hate people who say money is not everything. yes, you can say this when you have enough money. you know. no, no, no, i
because know why? because it's a hypocritical question. because i were to say life, it would be a, life is nonetheless more basic. but what is life without money? you know, i hate people who say money is not everything. yes, you can say this when you have enough money. you know. no, no, no, i
Host
industry.
industry.
Slavoj Žižek
i think that money here stands for all good things, for new options. some kind of a freedom you know for example i and i would need money for this you know i ask myself frankly if french would not be problem. they are everywhere and people who i love, where i would like to lead. in a big city in a really expensive hotel and they some of them they also have special entrance for permanent guests. like a noble two three rooms you know why? because there permanent so they do when you want laundry the bed you have room service all the time but at the same time you have a place of your own but at the same time you are alone. okay, i know. such a room costs. 20,000 per month minimum. but that is... my idea of happiness. you are all the time free. to do nothing, to sleep and to work. all the time. so it
i think that money here stands for all good things, for new options. some kind of a freedom you know for example i and i would need money for this you know i ask myself frankly if french would not be problem. they are everywhere and people who i love, where i would like to lead. in a big city in a really expensive hotel and they some of them they also have special entrance for permanent guests. like a noble two three rooms you know why? because there permanent so they do when you want laundry the bed you have room service all the time but at the same time you have a place of your own but at the same time you are alone. okay, i know. such a room costs. 20,000 per month minimum. but that is... my idea of happiness. you are all the time free. to do nothing, to sleep and to work. all the time. so it
Host
money. that was absolutely amazing. thank you so much, slavoy.
money. that was absolutely amazing. thank you so much, slavoy.
Slavoj Žižek
case both of you, i hope we will finally meet at some point, you know, because there is not enough, i'm not gay, but i essential there is not enough physical contact. thank.
case both of you, i hope we will finally meet at some point, you know, because there is not enough, i'm not gay, but i essential there is not enough physical contact. thank.