Slavoj Zizek: Our public face is't our mask, our private inner truth is the real mask
Talk · rige hamo ·
published 2017-09-10 · 0:44:58 · 3,698 words
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capitalismcommunism-socialismideologydemocracyfascism-populismliberalism-political-correctnessecology-climatephilosophy-generalrevolution-violencesubjectivity
A single long Žižek talk arguing that the left must be radical against its own prejudices and 'kill many sacred cows.' He critiques Rawlsian merit-based inequality, reframes capitalism as a religious-metaphysical machine of circulation rather than private greed, defends a progressive 'Leitkultur' as the condition of multicultural coexistence, and argues that the true threat to Europe is internal right-wing populism rather than immigrants. He ends by recasting the intellectual's task: not to provide answers but to formulate the questions to which popular protests (Wall Street etc.) are the unconscious answer, and to defend the freedom to think rather than be blackmailed into immediate action.
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The ideas in it 17
in the order they first come up; click a row for what he does with the idea here
Foucauldian analysis of forms of domination (grouped with Homo Sacer etc.), 'doing great things' but needing a reference to the production process and exploitation.
After Walter Benjamin: capitalism is a form of religion/metaphysics in which a true capitalist serves the circulation of capital even at the cost of the world and of personal gain, not out of private egotism.
A shared set of basic cultural norms (including unwritten rules) that regulate the coexistence of different cultures; Žižek insists it is necessary for multiculturalism and can be progressive rather than merely right-wing.
Inversion of green/anti-utilitarian common sense: to be a good ecologist one needs more egotism, not less, because capitalism is not driven by private greed.
as “Cartesian Cogito”
Descartes' reflexive move (my culture appears ridiculous in others' eyes) as the beginning of true multiculturalism; the Cogito 'has no sex' and was popular with women.
Strategic maxim on Eurocentrism: affirm the European heritage the right wing claims to defend, and turn it against them as proof they are the threat.
Hegelian reversal applied to Europe: the real enemy of the European legacy is its own right-wing anti-immigrant populists, not the immigrant outsider.
Against both traditional vanguardism and pseudo-Maoist celebration of popular wisdom: every elevation of ordinary people into a source of answers is fraudulent.
His Heidegger-parody coinage ('why should we stay in Wall Street') mirroring 'Warum in der Provinz bleiben,' marking that intellectuals cannot simply defer to the people at protests.
In Negri/Hardt terms, those who 'found themselves on the wrong side of the wall'; via Berger's afterword to Platonov, they have answers to questions not yet posed.
Reversal of the vanguard model: ordinary protesters are not asking questions for intellectuals to answer; they are the answer, and intellectuals must pose the right question.
After Lévi-Strauss: not a question/enigma but an answer to a question we do not know, the model for treating popular demands as answers seeking their question.
Psychoanalytic: the symptom is an answer to a deadlock the patient does not understand; the analyst's job is to formulate the question, not supply knowledge.
as “the name of the enemy today is democracy”
Badiou's thesis, endorsed by Žižek: sticking to narrow party-state representative democracy prevents us from even seeing, let alone acting on, the real problem.
The Wall Street protests are valued not as a program but as the initial formal negation that delegitimizes capitalism and party-state democracy.
The refusal to speak the dominant language; Žižek casts the left's silence toward those in power as a non-appropriable symbolic violence and a threat.
Inversion of speech/silence: everything said can be co-opted by power, so silence is the active, non-recuperable form of symbolic violence.
Stories he reaches for 4
When a revolution seemed imminent, Marx wrote Engels worriedly that he hadn't yet finished Capital and asked 'Can't they wait a little bit?', Žižek's model for the freedom to think before acting.
“you already want a revolution, but I haven't yet finished my Capital. Can't they wait a little bit?”
Heidegger recounts withdrawing to his hut and asking a 75-year-old farmer whether to accept a Berlin chair; the farmer silently shakes his head, 'absolutely no.' Žižek reads it as the false mystique of ordinary people's wisdom (and suspects the farmer just told Heidegger what he wanted to hear).
“he thoughtfully put his faithful hand on my shoulder. Ever so slightly he shook his head. That meant absolutely no.”
Lévi-Strauss's analysis of kinship treats the incest prohibition not as a puzzle but as an answer to a question we do not know, the structural model for Žižek's question/answer reversal in politics.
“The prohibition of incest is not a question, an enigma. It is an answer to a question, but we do not know which question.”
Orwell noted that the radical intelligentsia talk about revolution superstitiously, as if talking about it enough would prevent anything from really changing, now, Žižek warns, real change is imminent and we will be tested.
“most radical intelligentsia talks about revolution, but in this superstitious way, if we talk enough about it then maybe nothing will really change”
Works invoked 7
Capital book
Marx worried that revolution would come before he finished Capital, Žižek's warrant for the freedom to think and theorize before acting.
The Soul book
Collection of Platonov's excellent short stories (his later 1930s work) with John Berger's 'wonderful afterword' containing the multitudes line.
Homo Sacer book
Invoked among the 'great things' analyzing forms of domination but criticized for lacking a reference to the production process and exploitation.
The New Republic journal
Attacked Žižek for allegedly steering the Wall Street protests into anti-capitalist waters, insisting capitalism is fine and the protests are minor disruptions.
Meditations book
Descartes' opening reflexive move (other cultures ridiculous, then the reverse) is the beginning of true multiculturalism; yields the sexless Cogito.
Rorty's typology where the good Ironist is 'she' and the bad Fundamentalist is 'he', called out as secret patronizing.
Heidegger's 'horrible text' with the Todtnauberg old-farmer anecdote, used as a foil against the mystique of ordinary people's wisdom.
People invoked 27
Their 'multitude' terminology is borrowed to frame those who found themselves on the wrong side of the wall.
Bill Clinton negative
His 'where are your proposals?' demand is the dominant language the left must refuse to speak; formulating proposals now would mean accepting it.
David Cameron negative
Grouped with Merkel as proposing the wrong Leitkultur.
Geert Wilders negative
Dutch anti-immigrant politician; Žižek ironically disclaims any honorarium from him and names him as the internal threat to Europe.
Claude Lévi-Strauss positive
His reading of the incest prohibition as 'an answer to a question we do not know' is the structural model for the question/answer reversal applied to protests.
Marine Le Pen negative
French far-right figure named alongside Wilders and Haider as the internal threat that would un-make Europe.
John Rawls negative
Rejects the difference principle as 'madness': a meritocratic just order destroys the dignity of the worse-off and is precisely where violence explodes.
Richard Rorty negative
His Ironist/Fundamentalist typology (Ironist = 'she', good; Fundamentalist = 'he', bad) is called out as secret patronizing.
Alain Badiou positive
Endorses Badiou's 'crazy' Brazilian statement that 'the name of the enemy today is democracy', party-state democracy as the obstacle to seeing the problem.
Alluded to via 'Homo Sacer' among contemporary analyses of domination that Žižek praises but finds insufficient for lacking production/exploitation.
Andrei Platonov positive
Great Russian writer; Žižek increasingly likes his 1930s later texts; the collection 'The Soul' carries Berger's afterword with the multitudes line.
Via his friend Mladen Dolar: Orwell's text on the radical intelligentsia's superstitious talk of revolution, used to mark that real change will now test the left.
Recipient of Marx's worried letter about not having finished Capital before an imminent revolution.
Adolf Hitler negative
The 'tragedy of Hitler' is that he replaced Weimar's secular-Jewish Leitkultur of tolerance with its opposite, illustrating that a Leitkultur can be changed.
John Berger positive
Wrote a 'wonderful afterword' to Platonov's The Soul containing the line about multitudes as answers to questions not yet posed.
Žižek's friend who drew his attention to the Orwell text on the radical intelligentsia.
Michel Foucault positive
Alluded to via 'micro-physics of power' and 'forms of domination', grouped with Homo Sacer as 'doing great things' but needing a reference to production process and exploitation.
Jörg Haider negative
Austrian far-right figure named as an internal threat whose ascendance would mean Europe no longer being Europe.
Martin Heidegger negative
'That horrible text', the Todtnauberg/old-farmer anecdote from 'Why Stay in the Provinces?' is used as a foil against trusting ordinary people's wisdom.
Kostas Douzinas negative
Greek friend in London with whom Žižek got into a fight; the protesters say 'too early, not yet revolution,' exposing that they have no answers to what they want.
Bill Gates negative
His charity formula, forget ideological struggles, capitalists/state/charity get together and do something, is the petit-bourgeois blackmail to act without thinking.
Cited as an example of the Cogito's popularity with women.
Angela Merkel negative
Criticized for proposing the wrong (right-wing) Leitkultur; Žižek is not against Leitkultur as such but against hers.
Mao Zedong positive
Quoted approvingly: 'a leader should swim with the people, but he shouldn't drown with the people', used against both vanguardism and pseudo-Maoist populism.
Walter Benjamin positive
Source of the thesis that capitalism is a form of religion/metaphysics in which capital circulates beyond private gain.
Karl Marx positive
Freedom/unfreedom is decided at the level of economic and family relations (the apolitical); the letter to Engels worrying he hadn't finished Capital is the model for theory before action.
René Descartes positive
The Meditations' reflexive move (my culture ridiculous in others' eyes) is the beginning of true multiculturalism; the sexless Cogito.
What it argues
Killing the left's sacred cows — radical self-critiqueContingency vs merit: inequality, dignity, and resentmentCapitalism as religion: the anti-utilitarian inversionLeitkultur — the necessity and progressive possibility of a leading cultureDefending Europe's core against its internal right-wing threatThe intellectual's task: formulating questions, not answers (people-as-answer)Protest, silence, and the delegitimization of party-state democracy
Dialectical moves 10
“I am for Leitkultur absolutely.”
Reverses the standard liberal anti-Leitkultur stance: the target is not Leitkultur as such but the wrong, right-wing Leitkultur; a Leitkultur can be progressive.
“A true threat comes from within.”
Hegelian inversion: the real enemy of the European legacy is internal right-wing populism, not the external immigrant.
“you, anti-immigrant populist, you are the true threat to Europe. We are.”
Turns the right-wing claim to be defending Europe against itself: it is the left who defends Europe's legacy, the right who threatens it.
“they are the answer, but they don't know to what question they are the answer”
Inverts the vanguard model, people do not ask questions for intellectuals to answer; people are the answer and intellectuals must pose the question.
“to be a good ecologist, it's precisely... we need more egotism in a way”
Inverts the anti-utilitarian/green premise that ecology requires less ego: if capitalism is not driven by private greed, more egotism is what's needed.
“The prohibition of incest is not a question, an enigma. It is an answer to a question, but we do not know which question.”
Lévi-Strauss's reversal, endorsed as the structural model for treating popular demands as answers seeking their question.
“the analyst is not the one who is supposed to know, no, he just has to formulate a question”
Inverts the 'subject supposed to know': the analyst (and the intellectual) poses questions rather than dispensing answers.
“everything we say can be appropriated, our silence will remain a threat, cannot be appropriated”
Inverts speech and silence: speech is the vulnerable, co-optable form; silence is the active, non-recuperable one.
“It is here that violence explodes”
The supposedly just, merit-based Rawlsian order, not the arbitrary unequal one, is where violence erupts, because it destroys the loser's dignity.
“Don't even concede to the enemy what he claims”
Reframes the Eurocentrism debate: affirm the European heritage the right claims to defend, then turn it against them as proof they are the threat.
Claims 15
asserts
Differences in wealth should be experienced as contingent (luck, tradition) rather than merit-based, because only contingency preserves the dignity of the worse-off and prevents resentment-violence.Rawlsian justice / meritocracy and inequality
rejects
Rawls's difference principle — inequality allowed when it benefits the worst-off and rewards labor — is madness, because a meritocratic just order is precisely where violence explodes.Rawls's theory of justice / the difference principle
reframes
Capitalism is not driven by private egotism or greed but is a religious-metaphysical machine in which capital must circulate even if the world falls apart and the capitalist gains nothing.the anti-utilitarian/Catholic critique of capitalism as greed
asserts
To be a good ecologist one needs more egotism, not less; the Catholic/anti-utilitarian attack on greed misreads what drives capitalism.ecology and anti-utilitarianism
asserts
Successful multiculturalism requires a Leitkultur — a shared set of basic cultural norms and unwritten rules — without which mere coexistence under a neutral legal frame fails.multiculturalism and cultural coexistence
reframes
The problem with Merkel and Cameron is not Leitkultur as such but the wrong, right-wing Leitkultur they propose; a Leitkultur can be progressive, as Weimar's secular-Jewish one was.the Leitkultur debate and right-wing cultural politics
asserts
Some things in the European tradition — feminism, equality, democracy, the Cartesian Cogito — are its true core and are worth fighting for.Eurocentrism and the European heritage
reframes
The true threat to Europe is internal — anti-immigrant right-wing populists like Wilders, Haider and Le Pen — not immigrants or Muslims.immigration and right-wing populism in Europe
asserts
Intellectuals today can neither play the traditional vanguard providing answers to the people nor celebrate ordinary people's wisdom in a pseudo-Maoist way; both are fakes.the role of intellectuals vis-à-vis popular protest
asserts
Intellectuals should formulate the questions to which ordinary people's protests are the unconscious answer, as in psychoanalysis where the symptom is an answer to an unknown question.the epistemology of intellectual/political work
asserts
The Wall Street and similar protests embody a first formal gesture of 'no' — an implicit delegitimization of both capitalism and traditional party-state representative democracy.contemporary protest movements
asserts
There should be no dialogue with those in power now, because dialogue forces the left to accept the dominant language; silence is a non-appropriable symbolic threat.political strategy toward power
asserts
Freedom or unfreedom of a society is decided at the level of economic and family relations — the sphere directly perceived as apolitical — not primarily at multi-party systems or press freedom (Marx).democracy and Marx on freedom
asserts
We must defend the freedom to think and not be blackmailed by petit-bourgeois guilt (the Bill Gates charity formula) into acting without theory.theory vs immediate activism
asserts
State and inter-state agencies are already planning geo-engineering — massive interventions into nature such as spraying metal particles to block sunlight — implicitly conceding that emissions reduction has failed; our task is to ask the right questions about the risks.geo-engineering and ecological politics
Quotes 16
“The left should really be radical even against its own prejudices.”Slavoj Žižek · radical self-critique
“I claim that if we have differences, they should be experienced as contingent.”Slavoj Žižek · contingency of inequality
“A proper capitalist's idea is even if the whole world falls apart, capital has to circulate”Slavoj Žižek · capitalism as religion
“Capitalism, as Walter Benjamin knew, it's a form of religion.”Slavoj Žižek · capitalism as religion
“to be a good ecologist, it's precisely... we need more egotism in a way”Slavoj Žižek · ecology needs more ego
“I am for Leitkultur absolutely.”Slavoj Žižek · Leitkultur defense
“I would like to live in a society where you don't have to argue why women shouldn't be raped.”Slavoj Žižek · dogmatic baseline norms
“you, anti-immigrant populist, you are the true threat to Europe. We are.”Slavoj Žižek · internal threat reversal
“A true threat comes from within.”Slavoj Žižek · Hegelian internal enemy
“they are the answer, but they don't know to what question they are the answer”Slavoj Žižek · people-as-answer
“everything we say can be appropriated, our silence will remain a threat, cannot be appropriated”Slavoj Žižek · silence as symbolic violence
“the name of the enemy today is democracy.”Slavoj Žižek · democracy as obstacle
“the key to freedom lies in the sphere which is directly perceived as apolitical, economic relations, family relations and so on and so forth.”Slavoj Žižek · freedom at the apolitical level
“use the opportunity study, start to think. It's necessary more than ever because society is more and more falling apart around us and we don't have answers, we don't even have the questions.”Slavoj Žižek · think before acting
“Don't even concede to the enemy what he claims.”Slavoj Žižek · strategic non-concession
“You should be Marxists, you know in what sense?”Slavoj Žižek · Marxist thinking, not rushing
Transcript 1 turns
Slavoj Žižek
Rehabilitate with all these things, they are doing great things, all these analysis of micro-physics of power, forms of domination, Homo Sacer, blah blah blah, but a reference to production process and exploitation is needed. Now to conclude, I mean, I claim that if we really want to rethink our situation today, we should also kill many sacred cows. The left should really be radical even against its own prejudices. The first one, you know this problem, hierarchy. Let me now give you just three provocative ideas. One, I claim that the most dangerous idea, and here I radically disagree with John Rawls, is this idea that, you know, inequality is... try to imagine a society which would have worked the way John Rawls wanted it to work. That is to say, that inequality is allowed on two conditions, if I simplify it. First, that if I gain much more than you, you should gain at least a little bit more, that is to say, that it profits also those on the bottom. And second point, it shouldn't be simply inherited or what, but as much as possible based on my labor, labor achievements, whatever. I claim this is madness. I claim that if we have differences, they should be experienced as contingent. Why? Because this is the only way that differences are made tolerable because of the logic, all-pervasive capitalist logic of envy and resentment. Let’s say I am poor, you are rich. Let’s say... no, I’ll be poor, you be rich. No, but I’m a good liberal, condescending liberal. Why don’t you... okay, let’s pretend that you are rich from today, so you know, I totally agree with you. You know why? Because what I really hate about political correct liberals is, did you notice how when they describe in a book like a bad guy and a good guy, like Rorty, Ironist and Fundamentalist, Ironist is the "she," Fundamentalist is the "he." You know, like, the good are the women? No, I think this is secret patronizing. My God, I think it’s great if you can be really evil. No, okay, another... okay. No, what I want to say is this. Let’s say that we live in a society where the fact that you are rich and I am poor depends on chance, tradition, or whatever. Then I can still save my dignity, because I can say to myself, oh you see that total idiot, he is much more stupid than me but he was lucky, he is rich. So you know, really my, my narcissism survives. Now imagine that I live in a Rawlsian just society. Then I would have to admit that you are really more intelligent, better, if you are rich. It is here that violence explodes. So we should be here much more brutally open. Second thing, we should stop with this Catholic total bullshit against utilitarianism in the sense of today’s capitalism is egotist, greed, and so on. You know, no. Capitalism, as Walter Benjamin knew, it’s a form of religion. And I mean it in a literal sense, a form of metaphysics, in the sense that a true capitalist doesn’t work for his or her egotistic good. A proper capitalist’s idea is even if the whole world falls apart, capital has to circulate and so on and so on. It has nothing to do with his private gains, consumption, and so on. So no, I claim that to be a good ecologist, it’s precisely... we need more egotism in a way. Third point, now this will be a little bit maybe more problematic for you. Leitkultur. I am for Leitkultur absolutely. Don’t misunderstand me, no, no, no. I was... I didn’t get any special honorarium for a certain popular Dutch politician, Geert Wilders. Yeah, yeah, but you know what I’m saying, that what I don’t like in the idea of multiculturalism is this liberal... if you have this radical multiculturalism, it’s the idea that different cultures coexist, intermingle, all we need is some neutral legal frame to allow their coexistence. No, the fact is that if you look at all examples of more or less successful multiculturalism, you will always find a Leitkultur, but not in the sense of one is the top. In the sense of, for us to coexist, we all have to accept a certain set of basic cultural norms of tolerance, blah blah blah, and so on. This is absolutely crucial. What I... and I am even for dogmatism here. In what sense? Let’s take rape. I would like to live in a society where you don’t have to argue why women shouldn’t be raped. You know what I mean? I would like to live in a society where when someone advocates rape, he simply appears in the best case a bad joke, in the worst case a complete idiot or whatever. In other words, what I’m saying is let’s not underestimate the necessity for, let’s call it, a set of... and this cannot be politically correct commandments. It must be a set of, let’s call them, unwritten rules which regulate the very coexistence of different cultures, blah blah blah. This is where the battle is won. So again, my problem with all those from Angela Merkel to David Cameron, Leitkultur, is no, they... that it’s the wrong Leitkultur they are proposing. I’m not against Leitkultur as such. Leitkultur can be a very progressive one. This is the tragedy of Hitler. The tragedy for... not for Hitler. Namely, look at Weimar Germany. Whatever we say about it critically, it obviously had a different Leitkultur, basically it was secular Jewish Leitkultur with tolerance, acceptance, and Hitler radically changed the German Leitkultur. What do I mean by this? Ah, let me even add another provocation here. Eurocentrism. Well, we have this far... this right-wing anti-immigrant freaks who claim we defend the European legacy. I totally disagree with this ridiculous, ridiculous masochist liberal attitude. No, we are guilty, Europe, colonization, we killed millions, blah blah blah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s true, but nonetheless, I think it’s much more effective and shocking. Once they almost beat me when I advocated this, the right-wingers. It clearly hurts them to tell them, no, you got it wrong. There are good things in European tradition. Feminism, equality, democracy, and so on. And our point should be you, anti-immigrant populist, you are the true threat to Europe. We are. And so I mean this, now I am slowly returning to Jan van Eyck Academie here. There is, maybe it’s not, I’m not sure, but okay, but nonetheless, I claim there are some things in European tradition which are the very core of European tradition and which are worth fighting for. The idea which you find in Descartes, wonderful idea, this is the beginning of true multiculturalism for me. Remember when Descartes at the beginning of his meditations says, this is how I began really to think, that first other cultures appeared to me ridiculous, but then I asked myself, but what if in the eyes of other cultures my own culture is ridiculous, and so on? This, this is why incidentally Cartesian Cogito was so popular with women. Don’t you... it’s not only Queen Christina of Sweden. It’s many others. They said Cogito has no sex, at least in principle. So what I’m saying is that our... we should be much more aggressive here. Don’t even concede to the enemy what he claims. What we should say is that no, yes, we should say yes, European heritage, Judeo-Christian civilization is under threat today by you, exactly by you, all that is great you are threatening, not by poor Muslims or whoever here. They are not a threat. They are, in the worst of cases, some narrow group who tries to impose, but they are not a threat. And here I am a Hegelian. A true threat comes from within. They are... imagine Europe where, how do you call this guy, Geert Wilders would be the prime minister here, where, I don’t know, he died, okay, but Haider in Germany, Le Pen in France. My God, pathetically I claim this would no longer have been Europe in any sense. So we should be here much more aggressive. So again, now really to conclude with the texts, namely sorry, not with... what does this mean in all these battles? What is our duty and yours here? You know, situation has changed. That is to say, a, we no longer can play the game of traditional vanguard intellectuals who, you know, ordinary people are now protesting and we will provide the answer. I doubt it. I doubt it. Also on the other hand we should not in a pseudo-Maoist way celebrate the ordinary people. Oh, there is so much wisdom in them, we intellectuals should just learn. No, you will say Mao. Ah, but Mao as you must know was much more wise. You know when he did that swimming? You know what Mao said? He said a leader should swim with the people, but he shouldn’t drown with the people. No, seriously, what I am saying is that let’s be frank. We should not... every false elevation of ordinary people is a fake. Recently I reread that horrible text by Heidegger, you know, Warum in der Provinz bleiben, why should we stay in province. You know when Heidegger was called to Berlin in '34 and here is the scene. Sorry, I quote Heidegger. Recently I got an invitation to teach at the University of Berlin. On that occasion I left Freiburg and withdrew to the cabin, Todtnauberg, his famous hut there. I listened to what the mountains and the forest and the farm lands were saying. And I went to see an old friend of mine, a 75-year-old farmer. He had read about the call to Berlin in the newspapers. What would he say? Slowly he fixed the sure gaze of his clear eyes on mine and keeping his mouth tightly shut, he thoughtfully put his faithful hand on my shoulder. Ever so slightly he shook his head. That meant absolutely no. No, the ordinary wisdom told... Now first I claim one can only imagine what the old farmer was really thinking. I claim something like he knew, he tried desperately to guess what Heidegger wanted to hear from him. Probably he guessed it correctly, that Heidegger wanted to have confirmed his... the no. So again, today we will not learn from ordinary people. If I may put it in German but referring to ongoing demonstrations, warum sollen wir in Wall Street bleiben, or something like this, no? We... we cannot trust the people. We don’t know, intellectuals. So where are we? Is it a blind man leading a blind man? No, I proposed a formula, I wondered if you will find acceptable this formula. I propose a simple formula which turns it around. Recently reading a book, a very good one in English, if you don’t read Russian you should get it. You know who is Andrei Platonov. You had here some meetings on him. The great Russian writer. There is a collection of his short stories which are excellent. I more and more like Platonov from the 30s, his later texts. There is a collection called The Soul, where John Berger wrote a wonderful afterword. Where, okay, unfortunately in Negri-Hardt terms, he refers to multitudes of those who found themselves on the wrong side of the wall. And here is what he writes. The multitudes have answers to questions which have not yet been posed, and they have the capacity to outlive the walls. The questions are not yet asked because to do so requires words and concepts which ring true, and those currently being used to name events have been rendered meaningless: democracy, freedom, productivity and so on. With new concepts, the questions will soon be posed, for history involves precisely such a problem of questioning. Soon, question mark, within a generation. So I think he proposes a wonderful reversal that let’s call them naively people, ordinary people, it’s not that they ask us questions and we will provide the answers. No, they are the answer, but they don’t know to what question they are the answer. And we intellectuals should just help them and ourselves to ask the right question. What do I mean by this? Claude Lévi-Strauss wrote something wonderful, I think already '49 or '53, in his great analysis of the kinship. That the prohibition of incest is not a question, an enigma. It is an answer to a question, but we do not know which question. And I claim it’s something similar with the demands of all protesters today, Wall Street and so on. Intellectuals should not take the protesters as people who ask questions and that we intellectuals should provide answers. People demonstrating have answers, but we should be ready to propose, to formulate questions to which people are answers. As in psychoanalysis where the patient knows the answer, his symptoms are answers, but doesn’t know to what. You know, you have a symptom, it’s an answer to a deadlock, you just don’t know to what. And the analyst is not the one who is supposed to know, no, he just has to formulate a question. I find this a much more productive scheme for what goes on today. Our task is not to provide definitive answers, but I don’t know what, when people ask me ecology, what to do? I don’t know. I only know that the great work of the criticism of ideology to be done, I know that things are happening which frighten me. For example, do you know what is geo-engineering? Do you know that the state, inter-state agencies are already meeting to do geo-engineering, which means they accept that all this bullshit about reducing emissions failed? So the idea is that mega, unimaginably large interventions into nature will be necessary. One idea for example is to spray into the air millions, billions of particles of iron or some other metals to block sunrays from penetrating. These are totally crazy ideas. Maybe it will be necessary. What we should do is simply to ask questions, which are the risks involved and so on and so on and so on. So again, our task I claim is simply this, is to ask the right questions. What do I mean by this? For example, precisely now with all these protests there is now a big battle about who will appropriate these protests. For example, I was attacked, they always attack me, but now again in The New Republic, where they claim that capitalism is good, these are just the minor disruptions of capitalism, and they claim that I am the bad guy because I want to steer Wall Street into anti-capitalist waters. But I claim that this is... now let me reach to conclude really seriously, this is the great thing about all these protests. They answer a very clear... they have a clear insight, which is what? That we have a certain political democratic system. And there is obviously first a certain level of economic processes, epitomized by crisis and so on, which simply are out of control if you limit politics to traditional party-state politics. The result is that we have a certain level of public rage which for structural reasons cannot be adequately recaptured by traditional politics. And that’s to what they are the answer, this wide, wide, wide in the sense that of course they don’t know what they want. My God, nobody knows, but basically they don’t know the way, but it’s clear what is happening. All these demonstrations are, for the first time, a true, implicit in them is a delegitimization of capitalism and of traditional political democracy. Here I agree with the crazy thought of Alain Badiou, but it’s not as ominous as it may sound. He is a little bit crazy that he was able to say this. I love him when answering a question in Brazil. You should look if you have time, I don’t have, to Alain Badiou, you should look at his interviews around the world. There he says things that he would be afraid to say here. He was asked by a Brazilian journalist, what is the true threat today? He said the name of the enemy today is not capitalism, is not imperialism, the name of the enemy today is democracy. Okay, it sounds crazy. But what he meant was precisely this, that our sticking to democracy in this narrow sense of party-state representative democracy is what prevents us not only to act appropriately but even to see where the problem is. And this brings us back to the old insight by Marx where he was right I think, and today these protesters justify Marx, that the true level where freedom or unfreedom of a society is decided is not, do you have multi-party system, freedom of the press, this is important, but nonetheless, the key to freedom lies in the sphere which is directly perceived as apolitical, economic relations, family relations and so on and so forth. And the problem is how to mobilize people, how to redefine democracy to, to introduce it here. Nobody has the answers now, but we are approaching a deadlock. So again, I am not saying we should provide answers. What I say is we should redefine problems, locate problems correctly and simply open up the space of possibility. This is our first reaction, for example to Wall Street. Of course they are, let’s be brutal, but I include myself in, idiots who don’t know what they want. But nonetheless, it’s the first formal gesture of a "no." Which is why, in a crazy way, and I was already attacked, for it maybe you know my text, I already... my idea was no dialogue with those in power now. Because dialogue with those in power now means we have to accept their language. We do not yet have our own language, like when Bill Clinton said, okay, where are your proposals? No, but precisely to formulate proposals now would have meant to speak their language. We have to... this is the symbolic violence we need now. We should maintain our, as I put it, our silence, because as I put it, everything we say can be appropriated, our silence will remain a threat, cannot be appropriated. So again here, you know, people thought that we live in an affluent society where only we crazy intellectuals dream about a different world and how alienated we are and so on, you know, this typical left thought thirty years ago, know where they try to prove it to you how alienated you are if you are consumerist, whatever. Now the situation is totally different. And now we will be really tested. You know like all leftists were dreaming about revolution or radical change. But till now, as George Orwell and my friend Mladen Dolar drew my attention to this wonderful text by George Orwell, where he said most radical intelligentsia talks about revolution, but in this superstitious way, if we talk enough about it then maybe nothing will really change, no? You know like, just to talk about it to... now there will be a possibility of change and things will happen. And what worries me, if you allow me just these two real conclusions, for example I got in fight with some of my friends in Greece who told me, okay Greeks who live in London, Costas Douzinas and so on, my friends who attacked me for being unfair towards them because at the same time they are claiming look, the state is practically falling apart and so on. Then I ask them okay, but what do you want? You, the protesters. And they told me no it’s too early now, this is protest, not yet revolution and so on and so on. But isn’t this a tragic situation where all these protesters, this is a problem, you know if you ask them what do they want, what? Do they want nationalization, the old style communism? Do they want some kind of Keynesian welfare state? Do they want, towards which I am most critical, this Porto Alegre bullshit of you know local, local democracy, local self-organization? No, on the contrary, we will need social political acts of an incredible large amount. There is so much work to be done. So don't worry about being useless. You know what should be your motto? I believe in free thought, we live in a wonderful time when, I remember twenty years ago still, the left liked to say oh what about, oh you live in an ivory tower you intellectuals students, ordinary people are suffering. Now Bill Gates is talking like this. Why? Because when people say people are starving and so on, the idea is let’s, you know Bill Gates provided the formula. He said let’s forget about all these ideological struggles, communism, socialism, why don't we all capitalists, state, charity, get together and do something. The implication is clear, do it, don't think about it. No, we should have the freedom to think. You should be Marxists, you know in what sense? There is a wonderful line in Marx from when there was an illusion, it looked as if there will be a revolution, no? And Marx wrote a letter to Engels, very worried letter, he said my God, you already want a revolution, but I haven’t yet finished my Capital. Can’t they wait a little bit? We should... this was the good Marx. Don’t be afraid, don’t be blackmailed by this petit-bourgeois logic of making you feel guilty that you study there. No, use the opportunity study, start to think. It’s necessary more than ever because society is more and more falling apart around us and we don’t have answers, we don’t even have the questions. I’m really sorry if I was too long but haha what can you do, you had to suffer. Thank you very much.
Rehabilitate with all these things, they are doing great things, all these analysis of micro-physics of power, forms of domination, Homo Sacer, blah blah blah, but a reference to production process and exploitation is needed. Now to conclude, I mean, I claim that if we really want to rethink our situation today, we should also kill many sacred cows. The left should really be radical even against its own prejudices. The first one, you know this problem, hierarchy. Let me now give you just three provocative ideas. One, I claim that the most dangerous idea, and here I radically disagree with John Rawls, is this idea that, you know, inequality is... try to imagine a society which would have worked the way John Rawls wanted it to work. That is to say, that inequality is allowed on two conditions, if I simplify it. First, that if I gain much more than you, you should gain at least a little bit more, that is to say, that it profits also those on the bottom. And second point, it shouldn't be simply inherited or what, but as much as possible based on my labor, labor achievements, whatever. I claim this is madness. I claim that if we have differences, they should be experienced as contingent. Why? Because this is the only way that differences are made tolerable because of the logic, all-pervasive capitalist logic of envy and resentment. Let’s say I am poor, you are rich. Let’s say... no, I’ll be poor, you be rich. No, but I’m a good liberal, condescending liberal. Why don’t you... okay, let’s pretend that you are rich from today, so you know, I totally agree with you. You know why? Because what I really hate about political correct liberals is, did you notice how when they describe in a book like a bad guy and a good guy, like Rorty, Ironist and Fundamentalist, Ironist is the "she," Fundamentalist is the "he." You know, like, the good are the women? No, I think this is secret patronizing. My God, I think it’s great if you can be really evil. No, okay, another... okay. No, what I want to say is this. Let’s say that we live in a society where the fact that you are rich and I am poor depends on chance, tradition, or whatever. Then I can still save my dignity, because I can say to myself, oh you see that total idiot, he is much more stupid than me but he was lucky, he is rich. So you know, really my, my narcissism survives. Now imagine that I live in a Rawlsian just society. Then I would have to admit that you are really more intelligent, better, if you are rich. It is here that violence explodes. So we should be here much more brutally open. Second thing, we should stop with this Catholic total bullshit against utilitarianism in the sense of today’s capitalism is egotist, greed, and so on. You know, no. Capitalism, as Walter Benjamin knew, it’s a form of religion. And I mean it in a literal sense, a form of metaphysics, in the sense that a true capitalist doesn’t work for his or her egotistic good. A proper capitalist’s idea is even if the whole world falls apart, capital has to circulate and so on and so on. It has nothing to do with his private gains, consumption, and so on. So no, I claim that to be a good ecologist, it’s precisely... we need more egotism in a way. Third point, now this will be a little bit maybe more problematic for you. Leitkultur. I am for Leitkultur absolutely. Don’t misunderstand me, no, no, no. I was... I didn’t get any special honorarium for a certain popular Dutch politician, Geert Wilders. Yeah, yeah, but you know what I’m saying, that what I don’t like in the idea of multiculturalism is this liberal... if you have this radical multiculturalism, it’s the idea that different cultures coexist, intermingle, all we need is some neutral legal frame to allow their coexistence. No, the fact is that if you look at all examples of more or less successful multiculturalism, you will always find a Leitkultur, but not in the sense of one is the top. In the sense of, for us to coexist, we all have to accept a certain set of basic cultural norms of tolerance, blah blah blah, and so on. This is absolutely crucial. What I... and I am even for dogmatism here. In what sense? Let’s take rape. I would like to live in a society where you don’t have to argue why women shouldn’t be raped. You know what I mean? I would like to live in a society where when someone advocates rape, he simply appears in the best case a bad joke, in the worst case a complete idiot or whatever. In other words, what I’m saying is let’s not underestimate the necessity for, let’s call it, a set of... and this cannot be politically correct commandments. It must be a set of, let’s call them, unwritten rules which regulate the very coexistence of different cultures, blah blah blah. This is where the battle is won. So again, my problem with all those from Angela Merkel to David Cameron, Leitkultur, is no, they... that it’s the wrong Leitkultur they are proposing. I’m not against Leitkultur as such. Leitkultur can be a very progressive one. This is the tragedy of Hitler. The tragedy for... not for Hitler. Namely, look at Weimar Germany. Whatever we say about it critically, it obviously had a different Leitkultur, basically it was secular Jewish Leitkultur with tolerance, acceptance, and Hitler radically changed the German Leitkultur. What do I mean by this? Ah, let me even add another provocation here. Eurocentrism. Well, we have this far... this right-wing anti-immigrant freaks who claim we defend the European legacy. I totally disagree with this ridiculous, ridiculous masochist liberal attitude. No, we are guilty, Europe, colonization, we killed millions, blah blah blah. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it’s true, but nonetheless, I think it’s much more effective and shocking. Once they almost beat me when I advocated this, the right-wingers. It clearly hurts them to tell them, no, you got it wrong. There are good things in European tradition. Feminism, equality, democracy, and so on. And our point should be you, anti-immigrant populist, you are the true threat to Europe. We are. And so I mean this, now I am slowly returning to Jan van Eyck Academie here. There is, maybe it’s not, I’m not sure, but okay, but nonetheless, I claim there are some things in European tradition which are the very core of European tradition and which are worth fighting for. The idea which you find in Descartes, wonderful idea, this is the beginning of true multiculturalism for me. Remember when Descartes at the beginning of his meditations says, this is how I began really to think, that first other cultures appeared to me ridiculous, but then I asked myself, but what if in the eyes of other cultures my own culture is ridiculous, and so on? This, this is why incidentally Cartesian Cogito was so popular with women. Don’t you... it’s not only Queen Christina of Sweden. It’s many others. They said Cogito has no sex, at least in principle. So what I’m saying is that our... we should be much more aggressive here. Don’t even concede to the enemy what he claims. What we should say is that no, yes, we should say yes, European heritage, Judeo-Christian civilization is under threat today by you, exactly by you, all that is great you are threatening, not by poor Muslims or whoever here. They are not a threat. They are, in the worst of cases, some narrow group who tries to impose, but they are not a threat. And here I am a Hegelian. A true threat comes from within. They are... imagine Europe where, how do you call this guy, Geert Wilders would be the prime minister here, where, I don’t know, he died, okay, but Haider in Germany, Le Pen in France. My God, pathetically I claim this would no longer have been Europe in any sense. So we should be here much more aggressive. So again, now really to conclude with the texts, namely sorry, not with... what does this mean in all these battles? What is our duty and yours here? You know, situation has changed. That is to say, a, we no longer can play the game of traditional vanguard intellectuals who, you know, ordinary people are now protesting and we will provide the answer. I doubt it. I doubt it. Also on the other hand we should not in a pseudo-Maoist way celebrate the ordinary people. Oh, there is so much wisdom in them, we intellectuals should just learn. No, you will say Mao. Ah, but Mao as you must know was much more wise. You know when he did that swimming? You know what Mao said? He said a leader should swim with the people, but he shouldn’t drown with the people. No, seriously, what I am saying is that let’s be frank. We should not... every false elevation of ordinary people is a fake. Recently I reread that horrible text by Heidegger, you know, Warum in der Provinz bleiben, why should we stay in province. You know when Heidegger was called to Berlin in '34 and here is the scene. Sorry, I quote Heidegger. Recently I got an invitation to teach at the University of Berlin. On that occasion I left Freiburg and withdrew to the cabin, Todtnauberg, his famous hut there. I listened to what the mountains and the forest and the farm lands were saying. And I went to see an old friend of mine, a 75-year-old farmer. He had read about the call to Berlin in the newspapers. What would he say? Slowly he fixed the sure gaze of his clear eyes on mine and keeping his mouth tightly shut, he thoughtfully put his faithful hand on my shoulder. Ever so slightly he shook his head. That meant absolutely no. No, the ordinary wisdom told... Now first I claim one can only imagine what the old farmer was really thinking. I claim something like he knew, he tried desperately to guess what Heidegger wanted to hear from him. Probably he guessed it correctly, that Heidegger wanted to have confirmed his... the no. So again, today we will not learn from ordinary people. If I may put it in German but referring to ongoing demonstrations, warum sollen wir in Wall Street bleiben, or something like this, no? We... we cannot trust the people. We don’t know, intellectuals. So where are we? Is it a blind man leading a blind man? No, I proposed a formula, I wondered if you will find acceptable this formula. I propose a simple formula which turns it around. Recently reading a book, a very good one in English, if you don’t read Russian you should get it. You know who is Andrei Platonov. You had here some meetings on him. The great Russian writer. There is a collection of his short stories which are excellent. I more and more like Platonov from the 30s, his later texts. There is a collection called The Soul, where John Berger wrote a wonderful afterword. Where, okay, unfortunately in Negri-Hardt terms, he refers to multitudes of those who found themselves on the wrong side of the wall. And here is what he writes. The multitudes have answers to questions which have not yet been posed, and they have the capacity to outlive the walls. The questions are not yet asked because to do so requires words and concepts which ring true, and those currently being used to name events have been rendered meaningless: democracy, freedom, productivity and so on. With new concepts, the questions will soon be posed, for history involves precisely such a problem of questioning. Soon, question mark, within a generation. So I think he proposes a wonderful reversal that let’s call them naively people, ordinary people, it’s not that they ask us questions and we will provide the answers. No, they are the answer, but they don’t know to what question they are the answer. And we intellectuals should just help them and ourselves to ask the right question. What do I mean by this? Claude Lévi-Strauss wrote something wonderful, I think already '49 or '53, in his great analysis of the kinship. That the prohibition of incest is not a question, an enigma. It is an answer to a question, but we do not know which question. And I claim it’s something similar with the demands of all protesters today, Wall Street and so on. Intellectuals should not take the protesters as people who ask questions and that we intellectuals should provide answers. People demonstrating have answers, but we should be ready to propose, to formulate questions to which people are answers. As in psychoanalysis where the patient knows the answer, his symptoms are answers, but doesn’t know to what. You know, you have a symptom, it’s an answer to a deadlock, you just don’t know to what. And the analyst is not the one who is supposed to know, no, he just has to formulate a question. I find this a much more productive scheme for what goes on today. Our task is not to provide definitive answers, but I don’t know what, when people ask me ecology, what to do? I don’t know. I only know that the great work of the criticism of ideology to be done, I know that things are happening which frighten me. For example, do you know what is geo-engineering? Do you know that the state, inter-state agencies are already meeting to do geo-engineering, which means they accept that all this bullshit about reducing emissions failed? So the idea is that mega, unimaginably large interventions into nature will be necessary. One idea for example is to spray into the air millions, billions of particles of iron or some other metals to block sunrays from penetrating. These are totally crazy ideas. Maybe it will be necessary. What we should do is simply to ask questions, which are the risks involved and so on and so on and so on. So again, our task I claim is simply this, is to ask the right questions. What do I mean by this? For example, precisely now with all these protests there is now a big battle about who will appropriate these protests. For example, I was attacked, they always attack me, but now again in The New Republic, where they claim that capitalism is good, these are just the minor disruptions of capitalism, and they claim that I am the bad guy because I want to steer Wall Street into anti-capitalist waters. But I claim that this is... now let me reach to conclude really seriously, this is the great thing about all these protests. They answer a very clear... they have a clear insight, which is what? That we have a certain political democratic system. And there is obviously first a certain level of economic processes, epitomized by crisis and so on, which simply are out of control if you limit politics to traditional party-state politics. The result is that we have a certain level of public rage which for structural reasons cannot be adequately recaptured by traditional politics. And that’s to what they are the answer, this wide, wide, wide in the sense that of course they don’t know what they want. My God, nobody knows, but basically they don’t know the way, but it’s clear what is happening. All these demonstrations are, for the first time, a true, implicit in them is a delegitimization of capitalism and of traditional political democracy. Here I agree with the crazy thought of Alain Badiou, but it’s not as ominous as it may sound. He is a little bit crazy that he was able to say this. I love him when answering a question in Brazil. You should look if you have time, I don’t have, to Alain Badiou, you should look at his interviews around the world. There he says things that he would be afraid to say here. He was asked by a Brazilian journalist, what is the true threat today? He said the name of the enemy today is not capitalism, is not imperialism, the name of the enemy today is democracy. Okay, it sounds crazy. But what he meant was precisely this, that our sticking to democracy in this narrow sense of party-state representative democracy is what prevents us not only to act appropriately but even to see where the problem is. And this brings us back to the old insight by Marx where he was right I think, and today these protesters justify Marx, that the true level where freedom or unfreedom of a society is decided is not, do you have multi-party system, freedom of the press, this is important, but nonetheless, the key to freedom lies in the sphere which is directly perceived as apolitical, economic relations, family relations and so on and so forth. And the problem is how to mobilize people, how to redefine democracy to, to introduce it here. Nobody has the answers now, but we are approaching a deadlock. So again, I am not saying we should provide answers. What I say is we should redefine problems, locate problems correctly and simply open up the space of possibility. This is our first reaction, for example to Wall Street. Of course they are, let’s be brutal, but I include myself in, idiots who don’t know what they want. But nonetheless, it’s the first formal gesture of a "no." Which is why, in a crazy way, and I was already attacked, for it maybe you know my text, I already... my idea was no dialogue with those in power now. Because dialogue with those in power now means we have to accept their language. We do not yet have our own language, like when Bill Clinton said, okay, where are your proposals? No, but precisely to formulate proposals now would have meant to speak their language. We have to... this is the symbolic violence we need now. We should maintain our, as I put it, our silence, because as I put it, everything we say can be appropriated, our silence will remain a threat, cannot be appropriated. So again here, you know, people thought that we live in an affluent society where only we crazy intellectuals dream about a different world and how alienated we are and so on, you know, this typical left thought thirty years ago, know where they try to prove it to you how alienated you are if you are consumerist, whatever. Now the situation is totally different. And now we will be really tested. You know like all leftists were dreaming about revolution or radical change. But till now, as George Orwell and my friend Mladen Dolar drew my attention to this wonderful text by George Orwell, where he said most radical intelligentsia talks about revolution, but in this superstitious way, if we talk enough about it then maybe nothing will really change, no? You know like, just to talk about it to... now there will be a possibility of change and things will happen. And what worries me, if you allow me just these two real conclusions, for example I got in fight with some of my friends in Greece who told me, okay Greeks who live in London, Costas Douzinas and so on, my friends who attacked me for being unfair towards them because at the same time they are claiming look, the state is practically falling apart and so on. Then I ask them okay, but what do you want? You, the protesters. And they told me no it’s too early now, this is protest, not yet revolution and so on and so on. But isn’t this a tragic situation where all these protesters, this is a problem, you know if you ask them what do they want, what? Do they want nationalization, the old style communism? Do they want some kind of Keynesian welfare state? Do they want, towards which I am most critical, this Porto Alegre bullshit of you know local, local democracy, local self-organization? No, on the contrary, we will need social political acts of an incredible large amount. There is so much work to be done. So don't worry about being useless. You know what should be your motto? I believe in free thought, we live in a wonderful time when, I remember twenty years ago still, the left liked to say oh what about, oh you live in an ivory tower you intellectuals students, ordinary people are suffering. Now Bill Gates is talking like this. Why? Because when people say people are starving and so on, the idea is let’s, you know Bill Gates provided the formula. He said let’s forget about all these ideological struggles, communism, socialism, why don't we all capitalists, state, charity, get together and do something. The implication is clear, do it, don't think about it. No, we should have the freedom to think. You should be Marxists, you know in what sense? There is a wonderful line in Marx from when there was an illusion, it looked as if there will be a revolution, no? And Marx wrote a letter to Engels, very worried letter, he said my God, you already want a revolution, but I haven’t yet finished my Capital. Can’t they wait a little bit? We should... this was the good Marx. Don’t be afraid, don’t be blackmailed by this petit-bourgeois logic of making you feel guilty that you study there. No, use the opportunity study, start to think. It’s necessary more than ever because society is more and more falling apart around us and we don’t have answers, we don’t even have the questions. I’m really sorry if I was too long but haha what can you do, you had to suffer. Thank you very much.