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Within Reason
#40 Slavoj Žižek - Sex, Drugs, and Commodity Fetishism
01:48:21
Slavoj Žižek is a Slovenian-born political philosopher and cultural critic. He was described by British literary theorist, Terry Eagleton, as the “most formidably brilliant” recent theorist to have emerged from Continental Europe. (Internet...
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- [00:00]
Alex O'Connor
Welcome to Within Reason. My name is Alex O'Connor. Why, when somebody criticizes Stalin and another person says you can't criticize the leader, does the second man get sent to the gulag first? What has the Barbie film got to do with the Marxist concept of commodity fetishism? Is Donald Trump best thought of as a postmodernist? These are just some of the questions discussed by my guest today. Slavoj Iek is an impossible man to define. But what I do know is that he is one of the most well known, well loved and idiosyncratic European philosophers alive today. I've seen him speak before and even once met him in a canteen of a Welsh literary festival where I found him wandering around and speaking with its attendees. But sitting down with him for a long form conversation was a different pleasure altogether. Talking for the better part of two hours with him today was one of the most unique experiences that I've had during the production of now 40 episodes of this podcast. I hope it will provide an equally unique listening experience for you. And so I give to you in all his Slovenian glory. Slavoj Iek.
- [01:11]
Slavoj Žižek
Can I ask you a stupid thing? What's the point? Why do you have the world map behind you?
- [01:17]
Alex O'Connor
I have the world map behind me because I'm quite uncreative when it comes to designing YouTube backgrounds. I actually usually film with a, with a bookcase behind me of my, of my collection of books, including previous podcast guests. But I'm beginning to feel that there's something a little bit pretentious about filming sat in front of books all the time. I'm not sure you know what I mean, because there are people who actually read the books and there are people who just sort of use books as a background. And I'm trying not to give that impression.
- [01:53]
Slavoj Žižek
I, I met people, friends here in United States and so on. My favorite case is not just you have book, you know that even in Slovenia here you can buy just the, the backs of the book, you know, so it looks that you have books and not only this, you can then choose the color, you know.
- [02:14]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah, you'll have to, you'll have to let me know where I can get some of these.
- [02:20]
Slavoj Žižek
A couple of friends is that they have books. If you have this soft cover books, you break the backs a little bit so that it appears that you read them. And I even had a guy, a disgusting professor, knew him. He was my friend who admitted to me that he asks his assistant students just to arbitrarily underline some sentences in some pages. To, to give the impression that it's a crazy world. Okay, Everything clear. The reason I have the books behind me is not because of that. It's simply because it's the only room where I can be alone. But I, like now I discovered as an ominous thing. Then there is behind, behind my. I don't know which left arm, that ominous door with the window up. It's an element of horror, not just books. Okay, sorry for losing time. Now we really have to begin.
- [03:32]
Alex O'Connor
Not a problem. I wanted to actually begin by asking you something about the arts. I saw recently that you wrote a piece for the New Statesman about the Barbie film. And it was called Barbie Can't Handle the Truth. I saw that film recently. I, I, I thought, I thought as much. I thought as much. It would be, it would be there.
- [03:56]
Slavoj Žižek
Did you guess, since you're not an idiot. Sorry to interrupting you. Did you guess another thing while I wrote that I haven't seen neither. I haven't seen either. Either Oppenheimer or Barbie.
- [04:18]
Alex O'Connor
So what was it that prompted you to write an essay? I know that the essay only, only sort of mentions Barbie in one of the paragraphs and makes comparisons to other films, other films of late. But how do you feel the confidence to, to write about a film that you haven't seen in such a way?
- [04:36]
Slavoj Žižek
I played it very safe, maybe even too safe. The points that I make are so general, but what interested me in Barbie is. And it again, it's way too general point to make. But I think it's important. People, usually traditional Marxists or other leftists, like to point out how all these fantasy words like the sexless Barbie world, not our ordinary world, are just something that are ideological distortion, reflection, ideal, imagined supplement to our actual world. What interests me, and this is one thing that I think it's maybe still alive and as you maybe know, very critical towards much of Marxism. But this notion, which is much more refined in Marx of commodity fetishism, which is what? Which is not just an illusion, which is the effect of real contradictions, it mystifies them, but it's an illusion which is written into the texture of our reality itself. In the sense of you take this illusion away and our real life, not reality, something remains, but our real social life disintegrates. That's what fascinates me. Illusions which are not simply illusions which you can get rid of and then stare heroically into the eyes of actual life, you know, so that that aspect interests me. And you know who was the first one to show me this path you will not believe it. Not some big idealist, but none, none other than Jeremiah Bentham, the great utilitarian. He proposed he should be re read today. I think he was definitely not an idiot, Bentham, because many continental so called philosophers thought he was simply a utilitarian idiot and so on. No, in his theory of fictions he makes this point hundreds of years ago, very clearly that although in principle we should distinguish between fictions and reality, but fictions already structure what we experience as reality. So his whole work is again this simplistic notion that it's truly courageous to confront reality without fictions, and so on and so on and so on. But what really interests me, why I risk that bluff about those two movies, this may be for our viewers more interesting, it's that today I noticed that we have a whole series of movies which deal with some kind of passage from living in an imagined world to so called reality. Yes, and Barbie is an obvious case here. It's even now after seeing the movie, but seeing it after I wrote about it.
- [08:34]
Alex O'Connor
Oh, so you have. You have now seen Bobby, but now.
- [08:38]
Slavoj Žižek
A pirate copy at my home and killed. You know, it's a. It's a pretty complex movie because it's not simply. It's not simply, it's neither reality versus fiction and so on. It's. It's a much more complex relationship between the two poles. What I like is how although our lives are basically sexualized, why we then have this imagined world of Barbie, Barbieland as asexualized, you know, And I think that this is a crucial point which can be even accounted for in Freudian terms. The role of fiction in reality, even sexual reality. Maybe, you know, the story that I repeat so much, I'm already tired of it. I read a couple of years ago now I already think Eve Wiseman, a commentator for Guardian, reports in one of her comments of a special terrifying thing that happened to him. He was watching. And that's not an ironic remark. I like to read this. They are the most depressive. Not hardcore pornography, but hardcore movies shot a step back, if I may put it like this, about how they shoot hardcore pornography, right? It's the most depressive experience you can imagine. And okay, the camera is behind the hardcore camera showing the entire scene. And you have there an actor doing it to the lady on the bed. And in the middle of doing it, he steps back and he says, sorry, I'm losing erection, let's stop. Can somebody pass me my iPhone so that I go quickly on pornhub to get excited Again, now this is an absurd scene from the common sense because my God, we usually dream about doing it and he has there a woman in front of him, naked, everything. No, you need fiction, you know, And I think this is the deep lesson of psychoanalysis. It's not that everything is sexualized in this stupid sense. Whatever you are doing, you are secretly doing about, for or dreaming about sexuality. No, Freud's question is, but what are you dreaming, fantasizing when you are doing it? The sexual act. Freud is here, I think, a great pessimist. His point is that even in sexuality you are never alone without fantasies. It's not that I'm with my lover or lovers alone and we are fully immersed in it, we are just doing it. No, even in direct contact with another's body, fantasy is always at work. And I think this doesn't only hold for children, for so called infantile sexuality where you don't know what happens in sexuality. You dream about it. No, it happens even in, and especially in real sex. Freud's message again is here much more refined. It's not that, but when you become an adult, you no longer need this stupid infantile, empirically wrong fantasies. You are simply able to do it. No, the new versions of infantile sexual dreams remain to the end. Remain to the end. So, okay, I will not, don't want to get lost in it. So here I thought maybe if we engage in a dialogue, because maybe I got a wrong impression from reading and listening to some of your stuff. I wonder, is this too much of you, to what extent you consider yourself Nonetheless, it's vulgar to say, but British empiricist, where do you stand?
- [13:23]
Alex O'Connor
Well, I did want to ask perhaps before answering that question about this, this concept of this, this concept of fantasizing, never being, always being present during the sexual experience. I think some people would listen to that, particularly people with what, what others might describe as a more puritanical sexual ethic and say that that just demonstrates that sex has gone utterly wrong in our, in our, in our sort of modern secular age. So I can imagine some of my Christian listeners thinking to themselves, well, of course, you know, people are struggling to have sex in, in the kind of situation you describe, like a, like a hardcore pornography set, because this is not the kind of sex that God intended. And of course that when somebody has, you know, countless sexual partners and they treat it casually and they don't want, wait for marriage, then of course when they finally settle down with somebody, they're still going to be thinking about other people. But if we were to sort of re. Inject the missing element for a lot of people in modern sexual experience, which is love, into the experience, then perhaps that fantasy would go away.
- [14:39]
Slavoj Žižek
That's a simple point which. This may surprise you. I partially, from a certain perspective, agree. You mentioned love and I'm now repeating my old stuff. I agree that love changes things, but precisely in the way you say. You said your Christian friends intend me. It's not that without love you have sex which is just real, brutal, raw, bodily presence. No, my paradox would have been. And I'm interesting to hear from you if I'm going too far here, my point would have been that precisely in this raw, brutal, just lust, I don't care about love and so on. The other's body is not really here.
- [15:40]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah.
- [15:40]
Slavoj Žižek
The expression I like to use is. Is that in without love, what are you doing, is you masturbate with a real person. What do I mean by this? You have what is in a. Vulgar. In vulgar terms, masturbation is. You dream about something and you just. Sorry, I will not be too obscene. You do it to yourself. But I think in sex without love, you dream about something and what you do in reality is just. You use the other as a masturbatory prop, as an element there. So that only in love. And this is something very important that I will say now, I think this is why love, true love, does not idealize the other. Love is something much more, sorry for this term, miraculous. In love, you accept fully the other with all his. Her. It's. I will not use theirs. You will not force me to do that. Imperfections. But as such, these imperfections included he, she, it is. It. It's the thing itself in some sense. That's the almost, I would say, theological miracle of love. That ridiculous person. And you don't have to erase that ridiculous aspect is in some sense under quotation marks, of course, the absolute for you. Now, can I add two things here to provoke you? I want to throw you out of your. This cool, cosmic, skeptic complacent view.
- [17:36]
Alex O'Connor
Please.
- [17:37]
Slavoj Žižek
Would you agree with this here? That's so. Okay. I hope we vaguely agree here at all. It wasn't clear. Is this your Christian friends or you. That love is.
- [17:50]
Alex O'Connor
Sometimes they do speak through me. Yes.
- [17:53]
Slavoj Žižek
Yeah, yeah, that. Yeah, that. This basic paradox. To really feel the other in its. Their. His. Her bodily presence, it must be love.
- [18:08]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah, it's something like. It's. It's whatever the. Whatever the opposite. Have you seen. There was a. There was a roast of Donald Trump before he became president, there was a bunch of celebrities on stage and they were all making fun of him. And Seth MacFarlane, comedian, got up and said that Donald Trump has such an ego that when he's banging a supermodel, he closes his eyes and pretends that he's masturbating. Which I thought was one of the more clever quips of the evening. So whatever the opposite of that is is what I'm talking about, I think.
- [18:36]
Slavoj Žižek
Yeah, but another thing, I will not get lost about this. Don't you know what also fascinates me apropos Trump? Just a brief remark. You know, Trump presents himself as, at least superficially, as some kind of neoconservative Christian and so on, blasting against this post modern secular permissivity and so on, referring to classical moral values and so on. But isn't it that the way he acts publicly, his performance, isn't he the worst case that you can imagine, a ridiculous case of postmodern manipulating egotist and so on and so on? I don't think you have to criticize him from outside. Look at what he does.
- [19:32]
Alex O'Connor
I've heard you say before that Donald Trump is a postmodernist, and I'd be interested to hear what it is that you actually mean by that. Like postmodernism. It's. It's a difficult thing to define, but. But perhaps you can give us some ideas here.
- [19:48]
Slavoj Žižek
Somebody who, who first, the term postmodernism, we have to use it carefully because when this term was introduced, it meant something very precise. First, if I remember it correctly, it was introduced in architecture already early 60s, I don't know. Well, it was the end, to simplify to the utmost of this glass and concrete modern architecture. It was the return to what we in modernist times perceived as baroque kit. And we have signs of this everywhere. For example, an unexpected example in Russia for the last 20, 30 years, you know that there is a great return to what even attracts me in a very perverted way, the Stalinist wedding cake. Baroque, you know, all those Lomonosov University of House of Culture, a gift of Stalin to Poland with all this baroque, small statues, complicated structure and so on and so on. But this is getting popular again. But what I meant by post modernism is precisely in general ideology, the era where irony and cynicism became universalized and new. This is the attitude of even if I say this, don't take it seriously, is this ironic self relativization. And it's clear with Trump that only in acting like postmodern cynic can he do what he does, for example, on the one hand, support Israel. On the other hand, his allies in the New Right are. Are often openly anti Semitic and so on. I just mean again, this stance of. Even when you claim something, you include self relativization, but not in your sound skeptical sense. I'm with you here. Our basic attitude should be skeptical. I just want to introduce here a nice distinction proposed by Hegel between what in German is called zweifel, simple doubt, where you remain in your ironic self position, self perception and safe position and just don't take things seriously. And on the other hand, what Hegel calls vertweil flung putting yourself in doubt where you lose this safe position. No, Trump is not able to seriously doubt his own stance. But what I wanted to say is that it's a nice irony. Think about this classical position defended by neoconservatives. You care for basic moral or ethical. It's not the same. I know values. You don't like these postmodern paradoxes. You know what I hate in certain postmodern jargon is this constant relativization. Like if you ask. This is my old ironic example. If you ask a Foucauldian. I mean Michel Foucault, deconstructionist. I know it's more complex, but what is this? By this I mean the glass of water. The guy will never answer. This is a glass of water. But if I make the risk to essentialize things, then under this condition, this may be designated as. And so on and so on, all that stuff. But think the opposite. If anybody fits today in the United States, politics, the most clumsy. Clumsy in the sense of direct, naive position of moral majority. Like I believe in basic values. I speak for them. It's Bernie Sanders. I think that's why sometimes I like to listen for him. He is the true moral majority. But another thing I want to tell you about. Sorry, this may. It's a small obscenity which may interest you and our viewers about against sexuality and so on. You know where, but not in the sense they think this. Even Christian conservatives may be right.
- [24:54]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah. Is this what you promised? To outrage me and disavow me of my cosmic skepticism? I wanted to make sure we went back to that.
- [25:01]
Slavoj Žižek
You ruined my performance. When? In a good way. When you admitted in advance you brought in this. Your Christian friends. I hope that at the end. Because basically, like you, if I got it correctly, I am an atheist. You know, no doubt here, but I want to. Something else. Another touchy subject. Okay. Even Two of them. Maybe you heard this story. But it obsessed me lately because I used it in some. In some podcasts and so on. This is for me the crisis in some sense, or the psychic imbalance of our time. You know, I was some months ago, I read somewhere that the Nazis, when they tortured prisoners, mostly Jews, in their concentration camps, they had it made. And what struck me is that it was industrially made for this purpose. It's like to crack a nut machine. Testicle crashers. They were industrially made. Okay? So I wanted to check this. Not to be cold again with claiming something wrong, whatever, no. So I checked it up, I put. And you can repeat the experience into Google, testicle crashers. And I was bummed by offers today. You know, that you get immediately 10, 15 offers. It's okay, not too big, but nonetheless a branch of industry of sexual instruments, objects you get testicle crashers, even very exclusive ones. Two balls connected and you can get. I found one for $15,000 sprinkled with diamonds. So you can regulate how far you squeeze your balls and then you get special holes and you get needles to and so on and so on. So this gave me to think in a very naive way, where are we? Where something that 70, 80 years ago was the ultimate horror is now an object that you can buy for pleasure. That is to say, what happened with our permissiveness, that its result, it's not we all spontaneously enjoy, but it's on the contrary that ultimately the result of this permissiveness is that you need pain to enjoy. That only in stronger and stronger pain you can enjoy. Now, my basic position here is more crazy that it might appear. It's not, oh, this is just simply, this is modern decadence and so on. It is that this dimension is. And that's the lesson of Freud, I think it's immanent to sexuality itself. Okay, it comes out only in certain epochs and so on, you know. But that's my first point. I will not lose too much time. Elaborate it. The second point is that, my God, I will again sound as a kind of a neo conservative, which I'm definitely not. But that's my problem with cancer culture. I support much of its goals. Yeah, race, oppression, oppression of women, blah, blah, blah, all that. But my problem is this one that I have to refer here again, what I implicitly mentioned apropotrant, the gap between what you are saying in Lacanian terminology, the enunciated content of what you are claiming and how you act in your practice itself of doing it, of saying it, and this is for me the problem with cancel culture. I mean, even in the big media you already find this insight. Officially they are for. They are for diversity and inclusivity. But then more and more, the result of diversity and inclusivity are de facto exclusion. People who act on behalf of diversity and inclusivity exclude in their practice again and again, practices, statements and so on, which according to them are not open enough towards diversity and inclusivity. So to use an old joke proverb, whatever you put it, you know that famous joke, explorers arrive into a tribe and ask, are you still cannibals? The answer is no, we've just eaten the last one a couple of days ago. There are no longer cannibals here. This is for me the paradox of cancel culture. On behalf of defending diversity and inclusivity, what you are de facto doing is you practice exclusion all the time. It's truly difficult to be for diversity and inclusivity, not just in how you justify what you are doing, but in the practice itself. That's why I think, because this is standard Hegel's procedure. Hegel is. That's why I remain in some sense Hegelian. Don't get seduced by this crazy image of Hegel, fanatical idealist throughout. For example, in Phenomenology of Spirit, what does Hegel effectively do? He takes what he calls a figure of consciousness of a certain stance, for example ascetism. And he proves that this stance is wrong not by measuring with an abstract standard, but by just analyzing what does in practice mean to be a sketch. And his answer is, it means the exact opposite. You want to deny yourself, but all the time what you are doing is critically analyze yourself. You are totally fixed on yourself because you try to get rid of the last element of. Of. Of egotism and so on and so on. So to come back to this, for me, this is linked to what you said, a serious problem today. And that's the first way to approach our mess. How it is that in an era of. In sexuality, but also general social life, diversity, inclusivity, we are more and more engaged in a practice of. In a practice of excluding the other. And to avoid the misunderstanding here, what fascinates me is that this is not just something that the left is doing. You know, the. This woke left, I think is gradually approaching what I cannot but designate a self destruction of the Western tradition, this crazy self critical spirit. Emancipation, equality. Yes, but then they will. When you say emancipation, they will say, yes, but who is secretly privileged here? Do you really mean Emancipation. Aren't other races excluded? Aren't women excluded? Don't you secretly impose your own standards? Okay, nothing against this, but I think today this is brought to a self destructive circle where the focus is precisely of so to the end. How the main source of oppression is the Western emancipatory tradition itself. And it made me so glad to see. Did you notice this? I had some kind of intellectual orgasm reading this that now it's already a couple of weeks ago in Salt Lake City a group of not even only Mormons, Christians also demanded from a school board and then it was confirmed that in elementary and mid schools the Bible should be prohibited. That it's full of obscenities, dirty sects, politically unacceptable violence and so on and so on. So here is that we are, we are caught in a. And especially the left in this cycle of permanent self doubt and self destruction. And this frankly worries me. I Talk. Talk too much. Please. My God.
- [35:05]
Alex O'Connor
No, I think, I mean, I mean.
- [35:09]
Slavoj Žižek
I want to say, I want to point, go into it. Where do you stand here?
- [35:14]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah, well, I'm, I'm. There's a lot to unpack. So. So sort of rewinding a little bit. You were, you were talking, you were talking about the, the seeming modern propensity towards like destructive sexual fetishes. You know, you're talking about the testicle crushes. And I'm wondering if this is something that doesn't, doesn't have an explanation in the sort of some, something to do with what modern society has done to our thinking, whether it's just always been the case that people have been sexually excited by what's subversive. And in fact pulling together what you said afterwards, it would make sense to me that if people have always liked to do things that are a bit naughty and a bit subversive and that's what's excited them. And in a sort of puritanical society of the past, it wouldn't be too difficult to subvert the general sexual ethic. You basically do anything outside of heterosexual missionary sex and the excitement is, is going to be thrilling. But in modern society, with a slight relaxation of our sexual ethic, you might have to go to further extremes to find that thrill. But I think that the sort of essence of the motivation is still the same. And not only this, but if, if the modern, if the, if the principle, if the main principle of modern Western society has become about self worth and empowerment and you are good enough and you are strong and no matter what your limitations are socially you can excel and you have intrinsic worth. And perhaps the way today to subvert the sort of the dogma of our time and do something a bit, you know, subversive and exciting is to, is to reject that and essentially put yourself in a, in a submissive or, or, or self harming position in the sexual experience. It would kind of make sense to.
- [37:16]
Slavoj Žižek
Me that that's happening. Sorry, maybe I basically agree with you, but I find some problems because if you do and engage in a debate, I did it. Which means I encountered some people who advocate this self hurting practices and so on. If I ask them, what why are you doing it? Is it simply pleasure or whatever? It's interesting that the main thing that they evoked is precisely self, my self feeling the way I experience myself, my desire, my desires, which is the absolute and ultimate limit, the ultimate criterion. You can prove whatever you want, but this is how I feel and this is untouchable. So what? Again, I will again go back to this distinction between what you are saying, sorry, what you are claiming, not you, you, but anybody, and the position from which he speaks. Okay, I may crush my testicles, torture myself, want to be mistreated, but still in this, the defense is that that's how I feel. This is what brings me, this is what brings me satisfaction. And here I think what is prohibited today. There is another problem with vogue and trans ideology. Again, as for the trans rights and so on, I'm all for it. Not hypocritically, but did you notice how most of the trans people who attack cisgender and so on, and whoever doubts them, I read, I'm not bluffing here. I read many texts on it by them by extreme trans advocates. Their ultimate argument is not some positive argument, but it's always, I may be biologically, measure me a man or whatever a woman, but I don't feel to be that it's reference to some sense of identity. And the crucial point is that as far as I know, you are prohibited to analyze this sense too of identity to explain it. And here I think psychoanalysis helps, because in this debate, psychoanalysis is absolutely not on the side of biology. The paradox of psychoanalysis, I already hinted it, is that yes, we, we have, of course our sexuality has certain biological roots and so on. But even with so called normal CIS persons, the passage is not smooth. It's not that I am a man, and then I'm lazy, too lazy to deconstruct myself through trans procedures and so on. So I simply accept that I'm a man, no, from being biologically A man in the brutal sense of my biological identity, penis, testicles and so on, to becoming a man in the symbolic sense. It's, and that's the point of psychoanalysis. It's a long and painful process with many cuts, brutal changes, shifts, and so on and so on. In this sense, all our sexual identity is trans. And this, I think, at least from what I've read, disappears in most of trans self justification. Because if you try this analysis there, when you are, you want to, you want to crush my trans identity, reducing it to a phenomenon of such unconscious mechanisms and so on. I don't want to lose too much time here, but you know what shocks me here, did you notice it is how many trans ideologists basically have no place for the Freudian unconscious. It's simply how I feel my felt self identity.
- [42:11]
Alex O'Connor
By which you mean the, the, the consciously felt. The, the, the, the, the feeling that you have, that you recognize within yourself.
- [42:19]
Slavoj Žižek
Yeah, yeah. And then if you have doubts about your identity, they immediately projected onto social pressures as if biology and society, especially society, tries to impose on us certain sexual identity, masculine, feminine, and so on, and, and, and then they rebel against it. The main reason is somehow I know immediately, not immediately, okay, we enter here all this puberty blockers problem. It's a long path, but at the end you have to discover what you really are. And that's my paradox, that trans people, many of them whose point is against biological determinism, tend to replace it with another determinism. The idea is, independently of what your body is, look deep into you, into your psyche, you will discover what you are. On the other hand, biological determinists, I think, make the same mistake. You know what always shocked me? They claim sexual identity is biologically determined or in whatever way, it cannot be an effect of social pressure, pressures, ideological choices. But then they are so afraid of trans education in schools. I would say if they believe in your immediate biological identity, why be so afraid about, about all about all that? But not to lose time, my basic message here is a pretty simple one. I claim it's that, it's that again, the basic paradox is how, and that would be maybe my modest, not even counter argument, another aspect of what you pointed out. Yes, we want to be subversive, but then, you know, in this woke universe of diversity, inclusivity, everything is permissible, and so on and so on. Not okay, they wouldn't call it censorship, but regulation and prohibitions return with a vengeance. You know, what is missing here in traditional authority, if it wasn't too Totalitarian. And mostly they were not. You never have only the existing ethical, political, social value system. Like you mentioned, it's traditional society. Here I would supplement you. Remember you said that there it was easy to be subversive because the rules were so obvious and strict. For example, in extreme. In extreme oppressive religious spirit, just having free sex is already a subversion. But today, but okay, first point. This was my big experience, my epiphany, ideological. When I was, my God, half a century ago, three serving the Yugoslav army, I noticed how, yes, there were official values, discipline and so on, all that bullshit. But then at the same time, there were so many obscene unwritten rules which were absolutely crucial for the reproduction of a military society. And sometimes if you didn't follow these unwritten rules, it was even worse than violating the explicit rules. I claim that most of traditional authoritarian societies included certain very codified forms of their own apparent subversion. I call this stupid term inherent transgression. And again, this was, for example, I'm sorry, an old example of mine, but many people still don't know it. The general idea is that the army is homophobic. No, masculine patriarchy, blah, blah.
- [47:21]
Alex O'Connor
I understand.
- [47:22]
Slavoj Žižek
Sorry, My experience in the army was totally the opposite one. Yes, I agree, it was homophobic in a simple sense. That if a soldier was discovered to be gay, he was sent home. And before the order came from higher authorities, you go home, he was mishandled in a terrifying way there. Every night he was beaten with belt, with others, blah, blah, blah. But at the same time, I never was in a community where the daily life was more penetrated by. Not in any sexual sense, simple, permitted by homosexual innuendos, like in my unit. I remember, maybe you know the story. The way you greeted your friend in the morning was not hello, good morning. It was, smoke my brick, I'll smoke your prick. Glad I will do it after. And it wasn't even with a smile, as an obscenity. And I. Okay, I will not bore you with other stories, but. So the good thing about traditional spaces, or the bad, because they canceled subversive power, much more is of transgressions, is that they included a certain regulatory transgressions. But in this, with this postmodern permissiveness, you get prohibitions, regulations which are meant precisely to control, to control transgressions, subversions, in order to guarantee that they are truly transgressions, you know, and this is where things get more crazy and complex for me.
- [49:21]
Alex O'Connor
Say, say that, say that one more time. That, that, that, that last bit.
- [49:27]
Slavoj Žižek
For example, today Basically the slogan is everything is permitted in sex. You can do it with animals, group sex, torture yourself, and so on and so on. But the worry is, are you truly as open and diverse as that? And then you can always found that you are not. So we have in some sense a terror, a self control on behalf of guaranteeing your sexual freedom or freedom, diversity, inclusivity itself. That's for me the basic paradox. And as a Freundian, I'm tempted to say this doesn't work for a simple reason, that this type of paradox is well known in psychoanalysis, how like if you try to regulate something, this regulation itself gets sexually invested. The example that I even took from one with whom theoretically I don't agree. But personally, if you have good relations, Judith Butler her point is that the repression of desire always reverts into the desire for repression in the sense of when your desire is repressed, you then your enjoyment is transposed on top the very measures by means of which you try to control your desire. It's very simple. That's for me at least one of the simple explanations of masochism. You are gay, you are afraid of. But this is more in traditional society today it no longer works like this. You are gay, you are afraid to let yourself go. So when you hear, experience a temptation, you squeeze yourself, beep yourself and so on, and all of a sudden you start to enjoy that. That's the lesson of psychoanalysis, I think, more actual than ever today. Sexuality is one big mess. And here I'm even tempted to say, don't misunderstood me, that my big partner in a dialogue, Jordan Peterson, somebody told me that he said recently sexuality was never free. Yes, in some sense, some crazy sense, I tend to agree with it that because this is always an element of sexuality, the genuine masochism, in the sense of you are oppressed, beaten, and you may begin to enjoy it. It's a horrible thing to admit. Now the usual liberal vogue strategy is to say, no, no, this just means you internalize social oppression. I think this is a explanation. The point is to explain how. How. How transgression, violation or not so much transgression as I will take the opposite example, sorry for I, for my confusion, how the very measures which appear to demand from you the ultimate oppression or self renunciation can become a means of what Lacan calls a surplus enjoyment. You enjoy the very renunciation to enjoyment, and so on and so on. Sexuality is one big mixture. And that's, I think, also how you can explain how today militarization works. For example, in high school I learned, for one semester, sorry, for one year, Russian, so I can very passively follow it. And I listen a lot to Russian media and it's important how the sacrifices Putin is imposing on Russians are again and again presented as supreme enjoyment. The big enjoyment of doing your duty, even of torturing the enemies, and so on and so on. It's one big mess. So my view here, it may surprise you, is rather a pessimist one. This will be the topic of a book of mine which now should appear days from now by Bloomsbury. Freedom, Disease without cure. That freedom is a very self contradictory notion. And here again to provoke you. Would you agree or not? My God, I'm waiting for your reaction to you. Are we aware that to be free we have to obey many, many, many rules? To be free in a concrete sense, I want to be free. What? To walk around in the street safely there, which means I count on the fact that me and the others will obey certain basic rules which will allow me to be. To feel safe and so on and at all. Even language free. Think freely, yes, but you can think freely only in language, which means you obey certain basic rules automatically. And can you imagine thinking freely but having to be reminded all the time of the rules you have to obey? It's a deadlock. So for me it's not as simple with freedom. Would you agree now with my ultimate provocation? People, they say people want freedom. I claim It's a horrible thing to say for a leftist. This is why for many people I'm already a neo fascist. Do people, my God, really want freedom in the social sense of deciding? Really? No. People, I claim, want the appearance of freedom, the ritual of free votes. But between the lines, they want to be given a hint. If not a hint, then at least a clearly formulated choice of what they will choose. The paradox of you don't want it to be too free. To be too free in the sense of questioning the very frame of your decisions brings great anxiety, panic, and so on and so on. So again, that's, I think, where philosophy can play a role today. Not nihilism, not mess, but just this basic, I will use the term here very carefully, hermeneutic. Hermeneutic in the sense of reflexive questioning of. I claim this, but what do I presuppose imply by saying this? Ask an or. Okay, my final paradox here. Love, if there is something that it's free, is being in love. You cannot be forced to fall in love. But is it as simple as that? My claim is that you never consciously decide to fall in love. If you do this, it's not true love. All of a sudden you love. Falling love never comes in the present moment. All of a sudden you discover that you are already in love. And this can be a very harsh experience. Love can ruin your life and so on, but it's your fate. You cannot, you cannot avoid it. That's the concrete reality of freedom, which is often experienced at its very opposite. But please strike back. I feel an idiot. Please.
- [58:23]
Alex O'Connor
Well, I think you can be accused of many things, but certainly not of being an idiot. I think this depends on your. Well, I think that the, the problem arises due to what I see as a confused conception of freedom amongst many people, which is essentially, okay, but what.
- [58:39]
Slavoj Žižek
Is then the simple truth? I think this. Sorry to interrupt you, crucial point, then I love. I think what you call confusion is part of the very notion of freedom. I don't think you can solve this problem by simply saying, okay, let's clarify things. This is freedom.
- [58:58]
Alex O'Connor
Well, you probably can't solve the problem, but you can get some clarity in that when you say, well, look, any kind of freedom requires some kind of restriction. That is, you think you freely fall in love. No, no, you're not in control. It just sort of happens. You think that you sort of freely think, but no, you're constrained by your language and you have to agree to certain linguistic rules. If the kind of freedom you're looking for is freedom from any of those kinds of constraints, then you've just conflated freedom with chaos, with randomness, with, with cognitive anarchy, with neurons just firing and, and, and just sort of absolutely no constraint. And so, of course, I mean, one thing you can say here is, is, oh, therefore, you know, freedom is impossible, or freedom is not what we really want. Or you can say, this should give us an indication that that thing that we intuitively think we're getting at when we talk about freedom is not. That is not this, this complete and utter, you know, absolution, absolving ourselves of any kind, of any kind of restraint. And so freedom, I mean, famously, I think one of the best descriptions of the. The sort of two concepts of liberty, of Isaiah Berlin, is the picture of the man driving down the road and he can either turn left, he's got a flight to catch, or he can turn right. And he, he freely chooses, ostensibly to choose to turn right, even though it's going to make him late for his flight because he wants to go and buy some cigarettes. And that's because of an addiction to nicotine that he has. And the question is asked, did he turn right freely? Well, in the crude sense of did he do what he wanted to do? In other words, in the sort of political sense of freedom that pervades the modern Western ethic, yes, he acted freely. But the criticism is that, well, the problem with that is that there's an internal constraint as much as there is an external one. And the truly free thing to do in that circumstance would actually have been to turn left. And so in an ironic sense, you know, had you blocked off the path to the, to the tobacconist, had you forced him to turn left, you would have forced him to be more free. Now, the great paradox of that is that by inflicting sort of more restriction, you're getting more freedom. And there are two problems with that. The first is that this is always the justification for authoritarianism and totalitarianism. I know you think you want this, but we know what you want better than you do, and we're going to force you to have it, and it's for your own sake. That's what makes totalitarianism often so attractive as well. It's a bit of a mystery why today in a conversation like this, we can sort of unanimously say totalitarianism is bad. But we must not forget that this isn't an obvious truth, it's just a common one. And if you need a reminder of that, just look at the popularity of the totalitarian, the fascist, the authoritarian movements of the past, and even today elsewhere in the world. There has to be some reason for that. And I think it's because it's always sold on this notion of I know what you want better than you do. So that's the first problem. But I mean, the interesting implication is that, and I do think that problem can be solved in principle, that in other words, that's a problem in practice. The problem is that, and I think it's basically the only criticism of this conception of liberty, that you can be made more free by imposing more restrictions, that works, is that this can be exploited. But that's like a practical problem in principle. We could still say that in that case the free thing to do would have been to overcome your internal constraint somehow and do what your sort of real self would have done. And so when you're talking about, well, freedom always requires some form of constraint. And the way that you paint that is as if the constraints you're describing limit our freedom. If we have this conception of freedom, of liberty, then when you say that, well, we need to, you know, restrain ourselves to a certain linguistic paradigm in order to think freely. That constraint on our thinking that, that, that. That allegiance to a linguistic form is not, Is not a restriction that restricts freedom. It's a restriction that enables further freedom. If you have that conception of freedom and liberty, I think that the problem almost, almost goes away. People talk about this like when they become religious, for example, and they say, gosh, I found God and I just freed myself. I freed myself from my sin, I freed myself from my. From my vices. Isn't it strange that such a common experience of what people intuitively think freedom means, and we all know what they mean by that, has been achieved by sort of introducing this swath of new regulation and restriction on the way that you behave? And yet the overwhelming feeling that people have when they do that is freedom in the modern, sort of, I think among modern youth, especially online, there's a lot of advice. Free yourself from the constraints of modern society. Stop watching pornography, start going to the gym, start eating healthily, this kind of thing. In other words, achieve freedom by introducing restriction. So I'm not sure if there is a paradox here at all unless you have a conception of freedom that just means freedom from any kind of constraint. But as I say, I don't think that's a freedom worth wanting because it would just look like uncontrollable chaos.
- [64:28]
Slavoj Žižek
I see your point, and maybe I was unclear, but I, at some level, I think, profoundly agree with you. Just a couple of tricky supplements of mine. First, when you said totalitarianism, they know it better, and so on. But you know what? For me here, I'm maybe a tiny shade more pessimist than you. Yes, I know this. The difference. One of the very simple differences between totalitarianism and mere authoritarianism is that authoritarians simply want to assert their authority. Sorry guys, we are blah, blah. True totalitarians always add this, but we are doing it for you. We know better than you what you really want. And this is my old story that I like to repeat. That's why, for example, you find in Stalinism, which is. Was at its high point, totalitarian reasoning, which you would never have found in fascism, which is more authoritarian. For example, do you know that on Stalin's birthday in all Gulags, even all prisoners were gathered and had to sign a telegram wishing Stalin all the best, and so on and so on, which was a madness, but they wanted to sustain this. Stalin is working for our own good, blah, blah, blah. Which is why a Stalinist leader never characterizes himself as a leader. It's the servant of the people. Okay, but let's drop that.
- [66:24]
Alex O'Connor
Well, it's interesting. It's interesting what you say there, that. That this is something you wouldn't find anywhere else, because surely, I mean, Stalin himself must know, receiving all of these telegrams from people in the gulags, he must know that these aren't legitimate, that these aren't proper. It seems such a strange obsession to have to get people to do this kind of thing when you know that it's false. I mean, it's kind of like being like an obsessive boyfriend, forcing your wife or your girlfriend to write you love letters. The moment that you start forcing them to do it, you know that they're illegitimate. But I guess in the case of totalitarianism, I can't remember who said it, but I saw a tweet or something where somebody said that propaganda is controlling not what you think, but. But controlling what you think other people think. And maybe it's got something to do with that, that it's not so much that by getting everybody to sign a birthday card, you think that they're actually going to start to love you, but by watching everybody else sign that birthday card and be publicly affirming their love for the dictator, that it sort of keeps you in check.
- [67:41]
Slavoj Žižek
A very crucial point here, and sorry, we don't have time to go into it in detail because this agency of about whom this. I call it, in Lacanian terms, big Other, not the others, but how the others. You see, this is one of the meanings of what Lacan calls le grand autre, the big other. And it's interesting how you raised the crucial point, how Stalinism, which is usually perceived as. And it was at a certain level, the regime of utmost brutality, you know, like incredible sacrifice, millions and so on and so on, was also the regime of total panic, effort to maintain the appearances.
- [68:35]
Alex O'Connor
Yes.
- [68:35]
Slavoj Žižek
How, for example, I mentioned this somewhere. You don't. You should ask a totally stupid question. Why in these two big parades, not even 1st of May is the anniversary of October Revolution. I don't know which one. When they had big parades, you know that the authorities were afraid that Bahrain will ruin the spectacle.
- [68:59]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah.
- [69:00]
Slavoj Žižek
So they spread the clouds above Moscow. Sorry, the air, to prevent formation of clouds, and so on, because. But for whom? No, they were afraid that for some, let's call it Bitcoder, it would appear as a sign of impotence. And it's crucial what you say. It's. What matters is the big Other, in the sense of the one for whom Even if it's none of us empirically, the appearances should be maintained. And I did a lot of study on this. And my answer to this, your question, did Stalin really believe. No, he didn't believe it himself. He didn't think that people really think. But, you know, I tried to reconstruct his reasoning first. It's interesting to learn that Stalinists among themselves. Now some archives were open. We see the minutes of their top meetings. They were not simply cynics in the sense of privately they said, screw democracy, it's all a joke, and so on. They knew it, but their reasoning was again, some type of almost Freudian split. Their reasoning was, yes, we are doing horrible things. Of course, we don't take seriously democracy, blah, blah. But at the deeper things, we are doing something terribly progressive.
- [70:34]
Alex O'Connor
Yes.
- [70:35]
Slavoj Žižek
Bring, bring our nation forward.
- [70:38]
Alex O'Connor
And that's always it. That's always, that's always the justification. In fact, I remember, I saw, we were. We were both at a festival in Wales sometime, sometime last year. I was there and I saw you speak. And one of the things that I remember you saying how the Light Gets in festival. Yes. And I remember seeing you as part of some panel. And one of the things you said that sticks in my. It's the only thing I remember from, from that event and it stuck in my mind was when you said that you sort of imagine Stalinist Russia and you say somebody criticizes Stalin. And then another person says, hey man, don't. You're not allowed to criticize Stalin. And it's the second person, the person who says you're not allowed to criticize Stalin. That's the first one to be round up and shot, rather than the one who actually levied the criticism. Because the thing that holds it together is not so much the following of the rules per se, but the perception that everybody is following the rules, then that there's no other option but to do so.
- [71:41]
Slavoj Žižek
Or even more paradoxically, what I like here is the. Like it's a horrible thing is the idea that prohibitions themselves are prohibited in the sense that you are not allowed to state them publicly. But let's go on.
- [71:59]
Alex O'Connor
Well, I just wanted to ask, if you don't mind, if you see a parallel here. I mean, you were talking earlier about freedom and this idea that people don't actually want freedom. They want something like a perception of freedom, but what they really want is security. What they really want is, is something else.
- [72:14]
Slavoj Žižek
This seems the appearance of freedom nonetheless.
- [72:17]
Alex O'Connor
Yes, this, this appeared, this appears to me to be essentially the, the, the The, The Dostoevsky and criticism of. Of. In. In the. In the Grand Inquisitor passage of the, of the Brothers Karamazov, the possibly the most famous passage that Dostoevsky ever wrote. The. The argument is essentially the sort of Jesus and the inquisitor arguing, and the Inquisitor, well, arguing Jesus doesn't say anything, but the Inquisitor saying, look, you got it wrong when, when the devil was tempting you and you sort of pushed him off and rejected him. You got it wrong because people, People don't want what you're offering. What they want is, is. Is the administration of security. They want to be able to eat, you know, they want to be able to have. Have a sense of. A sense of security. What they don't want is freedom. So what we do is we know full well that we're not living in accordance with your. With your ethic. You know, the Grand. The Inquisition is not in accordance with the ethic of Christ, but we slap a Christian label on it because we recognize that even though that's what people think they want, it's not really. And they. It's like what you say there about the. The executives of Stalinist Russia in that this Grand Inquisitor character says, well, of course I know that this isn't Christian. Of course I know that this is. This is harmful. Of course I know that this is causing, you know, innocent people to be burned at the stake. But more fundamentally, we're doing something important which is making sure that people can eat, which is making sure that people feel a sense of security. And it feels like in that discussion, in the center of the grand, of the Brothers Karamazov, you place yourself on the side that is, I suppose, ultimately supposed to be rebuked by Dostoevsky that, yes, the, The Inquisitor is. Is right there.
- [74:13]
Slavoj Žižek
No, I, It's. I would. Okay. And. Sorry, I would like to condense now my position also on freedom and so on, because, you know, the problem with Dostoevsky is for me first, Dostoevsky is, as we all know, I don't like him especially, but nonetheless more complex. Like as many intelligent reviewers noted, Dostoevsky there doesn't simply condemn the great Inquisitor. Remember that at the end of that passage, Christ kisses him. I think that's right.
- [74:49]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah.
- [74:50]
Slavoj Žižek
So I think. No, no, you should always avoid with Dostoevsky this simple idea. Yeah, gang Inquisitor, the horror and so on. It's simply the other side, you know, who brought me this idea. Did you read Rowan Williams's book on Dostoevsky?
- [75:11]
Alex O'Connor
I haven't.
- [75:11]
Slavoj Žižek
No, it's a new suit, because you know what he's reading of the idiot. It's that she is a terrible, ruinous, despicable character. He is in himself pure, but the way he socially acts is that he brings havoc, destruction to all people around him. Nastasia Philipovna is murdered, the other guy kills himself, blah, blah, blah. There are people who are pure, sincerely in themselves, but the way they interact socially brings out a catastrophe. But let's go. You know, if you look for a position that would have been much more closer to Dostoevsky, it's. I think I may be wrong. It's some 50 pages or 30 after that.
- [76:09]
Alex O'Connor
Oh, yeah. Well, I wouldn't want to be misinterpreted as saying that Dostoevsky's view is represented by the Inquisitor. I think that Dostoevsky's view is. Is certainly represented by. By Christ there, if not just because we know from his private letters that he was a. I think.
- [76:23]
Slavoj Žižek
I think he gives. He concedes a point to Inquisitor. His point is that who is that old Father Zosima or who old priest who pronounces those famous lines later, we are all guilty. Me, I am even more responsible for everything, and so on and so on. That would have been the point. But what I want to say here is that, no, I'm not as confused as I may appear.
- [76:50]
Alex O'Connor
Sorry, that's what you said was the thing 50 pages later that you thought was Dostoevsky's own view is represented by Father Zosima.
- [76:56]
Slavoj Žižek
There it comes. If you look for a view that would have been much closer, I have.
- [77:03]
Alex O'Connor
A feeling that there's a letter that Dostoevsky wrote, and I always forget who he was writing to, but we know from his private correspondence that he once said, writing to a friend, if I were to discover that all of the facts lay outside of Christ, then I would sooner throw myself in with Christ and reject the facts than throw myself in with the facts and reject Christ. And I have a feeling that something like this Grand Inquisitor story is, like you say, he concedes a point to the Inquisitor. That's what he does so well, is that he writes a brilliant case for atheism. He seems to sort of understand the psychology of the atheist in the preceding chapter, where, you know, you've just got this sort of. Alexei is just rattling off this problem of evil. He seems to understand it, and he concedes this point. But I think the response of saying that Jesus says absolutely nothing in response and just gets up and kisses him. Something like an emotional response that somehow seems to still rebuke the point without saying anything. That is the rebuke, this demonstration of love. That I think is why I say it seems to obviously represent Dostoevsky's own position, considering what he wrote in that letter. It seems to me that you have, yes, a very plausible, potentially intellectually impenetrable case against the Christian message. And yet it's overcome by something like a feeling and an intuition that loves is more important than, you know, the intellect. And I think that. I mean, I don't know that I can. I mean, I certainly can't say I agree with that, but I think that that is Dostoevsky's position in that book.
- [78:44]
Slavoj Žižek
Close to that. But do you know this? It's very paradoxical fact that they found also some notes in Dostoevsky to go on. Brothers Karamazov. Karamazov Brothers is not the finished novel. And you know, what would have happened in next part? Alyosha Karamazov becomes a terrorist against the state authority. So you know, Dostoevsky, it's incredible.
- [79:17]
Alex O'Connor
It's interesting. There's a lot of, like the same thing in Notes from the Underground, a very short book of Dostoevsky's. There was an entire chapter that we only know again from his letters, was censored by the Russian state. And it was supposed to argue for the necessity of Christianity in the face of everything that the underground man sort of expresses and goes through. There was supposed to be this section that argued for why Christianity is necessary and presenting Christianity as kind of an answer, a solution, but it had to be taken out because it was censored by the Russian state.
- [79:54]
Slavoj Žižek
Okay, no, but my point here is that I have a, you know, what's my problem with Dostoevsky? But we don't have time, of course, to go into it. Now. My first problem is what to deal here with Christianity and to cut things short, as simple as possible, I propose Hegelian reading here, which is. That sounds short, as Hegel put it, put it directly. What dies on the cross is not a messenger from God. God of beyond himself dies on the cross. What follows the cross is Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit is a community of believers. It's basically an atheist society. The ultimate gift of Christ to us is an atheist society left to itself. It's, to use your terms, if I got them correctly, it's a cosmic skepticism. We can only rely on ourselves. That's the harsh side. So I think all that bullshit of will Christ return, blah blah blah. I think this is already the beginning of decadence, already towards the end of gospels themselves. I think that the key point is you remember when Christ is asked, but how we will know that you returned. And he said, whenever there will be love between the two of us, I will be there. That's it, the key. And very many intelligent theologists know this. It's a total misperception to think, oh, let's wait, Christ will come. No, when we are in a community of believers, the best expression for it is for me this Protestant notion of geminde community. Christ is already there. Nothing more will come. We already have it. And it's in this sense. I also read that gaze of freedom. But back to your crucial point, if I may conclude it so that I will not appear unnecessarily too much of an issue. Idiot. Yes, of course, all those points that, that you make. First one can say I agree with you, that I call in Hegelian terms what you describe as actual freedom, as concrete freedom. And this for me makes also a very good argument for a certain. Not excessive models, but nonetheless social democracy. You know, for me, social democracy is not let limit freedom. It is simply I want to be free, free to develop my potentials, blah blah, blah. But isn't it that to be actually free, for this word to mean something, many conditions have to be met. Basic Social Security, free education, and so on and so on. So I'm not playing here the Stalinist game. I know the dangers of it, of opposing abstract freedom and what they called actual freedom. No, no, no, I'm not talking about actual freedom. I'm talking, sorry, about what Stalin is called. Actually, I'm talking about this simple concrete freedom in the sense of the concrete conditions, of course, personal freedoms also, but also, I don't know, health care, Social Security, blah blah blah, which actualize or provide the space for your freedom. But so I'm not in. But I would like to make here nonetheless a step further. There are moments of social crisis and so on where we don't get absolute freedom. I agree with you in this abstract sense of just I do what I want, pure madness and so on. I even accept the Hegelian point that this abstract freedom is terror or self destructive and so on and so on. But there are moments of social tensions and so on when these basic rules of concrete freedom have to be changed, no longer work. And that's my fear. So that's my fear of where we are today. Can I just Add, before I return to this, another point that I like, you know, I remember from my. Not even youth, it was, my God, a little bit over 30 years ago, the last years under communism. How did the notion of freedom work there against the communist dictatorship? But things were pretty soft in the second half of 80s, at least here in Slovenia. We were all for freedom. But if you looked closely, each group had a very different idea of freedom. For Christian conservatives, it was freedom for the church to turn Slovenes into Christian nation. For Novoris, they were already there. It was freedom for their free capitalist explosion, and so on and so on. But what I'm saying is that nonetheless, it's too cheap to say that this abstract enthusiasm for freedom was just a mask for these differences. No, it's precisely by way of forgetting the differences of acting. The last paradox here. Even the communists themselves joined the movement against themselves at the end and say, yes, we screw it up. We want that now. Freedom to propose you a real socialism, whatever. But nonetheless, this enthusiasm, illusory as it was, was necessary. But nonetheless, again, I will conclude. So, again, no misunderstanding here. I'm not simply for the big inquisitor. I'm absolutely not. What I'm saying is that there are moments of social tension and so on, where the very basic coordinates of freedom have to be reinvented, these unwritten ground rules. And what I am afraid today, and I'm not saying it, ooh, ooh, with some kind of a Marxist pleasure, there will be chaos and so on, is that in view of all the crisis that we are confronting today, you know, ecological, social war and so on, I don't think our present big other, the substantial net of values and political institutions are strong enough to cope with them. I think that there will have to be a more radical choice. But don't misunderstand me here. I'm not an idiot who thinks, ooh, perfect revolutionary situation. The main option here that is most forceful today is simply a new form of return to almost feudal authority. You know, these new societies proposed by, from Putin to some other countries, you know, this general condemnation of the liberal west and so on and so on. It's horrible what's happening. So I think this is the task today, I will put it in very naive terms, how to break out of the details of the formal constraints that we have today, but without sacrificing here, I'm pro Western. I'm sorry, the core values of Western. Why not liberalism, emancipatory movements and so on and so on. You know, what really depresses Me, I mean almost. I would like to kill myself. Did you follow what happened, I think in Uganda a couple of months ago when the homosexual. Yeah, yeah. Up to death penalty if you are caught in homosexual activity. But you know, what was the justification? Anti colonial struggle. The west will not impose on us their values, blah blah blah. Those who defended homosexuality were discarded, dismissed as neo colonialists and so on. So it's a. We will really have to invent new rules of concrete freedom. And this is a moment of what Hegel would have called abstract freedom, more open freedom, Freedom which doesn't. It's not pure chaos, but freedom which doesn't simply rely on existing rules, but knows takes the risk of stepping out into the abyss and, and change these rules. And that's why I quote in my new book, a wonderful quote. Otherwise I'm not a Sartrean. Screw him. But Sartre said something very interesting in 45 for an American journal. He said, yes, it was horrible. We didn't have any freedoms under German occupation, but in some sense we were more free than ever because precisely we didn't have any social order on which to rely. Everything was risky, everything was put in question, and so on and so on. And I think. Would you agree or is this too much for you? I think that today our attitude in front of this all threats, immigrants, ecology, war and so on, we still think in the terms of how to make some small compromises, but still retain our relatively comfortable way of life. We are not yet ready to make a step further. Now I can well understand why, because you know, those who today offer a step further are Russia, China or these new fundamentalist Islamic countries and so on and so on. But you see what I'm saying. The moment has come that we will have to step not in pure chaos, but to make a step outside this established rules on which we automatically rely as conditions of our freedom. So again, my. When you asked me my notion of freedom, I think that, yes, okay, great guy inquisitor, concrete set of freedoms. But you know, there are situations of tension and so on where you have to risk a step further, otherwise the others will do it. For example, it horrifies me what is happening now in the United States. Their image of big other traditional democratic system is literally falling apart, threatened from two sides. On the one hand the woke cancel culture madness. But more importantly, on the other hand, some right wing populists, Desantis, Trump and so on, they are already speaking. And words are never simply words. The language of civil war, to be blunt, you know, that's the crisis I'm talking about. And again, I'm not a gleeful Marxist. Chaos, fine chance of revolution. No, I'm. And that's why to finish, maybe this will amuse you. When people ask me now how would you designate yourself? You know which term I prefer? Moderately conservative. Communist. Communist, meaning radical changes will have to happen. But moderately conservative, let's be very careful. Let's learn to think about unintended long term concepts. That's why we need a Hegel today. You know what I appreciated so much? I've written about it about Hegel. Whenever there was something new, Hegel first worry was he wasn't simply idealist in the stupid sense of whatever happened, all the evils, in the long term it will serve the common good. No, Hegel's concern was exactly the opposite. One you have the best idea of how to change things. The result is even worse state than before. Like Hegel would have. His model is of course French Revolution. Absolute freedom. Ha ha. It ends up with terror. So I think Hegel would have loved the 20th love in a terrible sense. The 20th century, you have the glorious period of second half of 19th century, at least in Europe, gradual progress, you end up with first World War. That would have been a question for Hegel. How could after this long era, or Bolsheviks, you end up with something which was already authoritarian, but nonetheless an authentic energy of explosion, social explosion, dedication to a cause. You end up with Comrade Stalin and so on.
- [94:45]
Alex O'Connor
So, so you see, we need Hegelian.
- [94:48]
Slavoj Žižek
Spirit in the sense of whenever something immediately, whenever something, something new, a bright idea emerges here. I'm my God, I trying to be your cosmic skeptic. Sorry. Ask yourself, ask yourself immediately how things can go wrong. Would you agree with this, that, that.
- [95:16]
Alex O'Connor
One should ask oneself how things can immediately go wrong?
- [95:21]
Slavoj Žižek
Yeah, because they usually do.
- [95:22]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah, yeah, no, I, I, I do. And that's why I'm interested in asking, you know, final question. A moment ago you spoke about this, this emerging conflict between the radical Wokists and the sort of radical right in, in the US and said that they're speaking the language of, of civil war. What's the end point for this? Is there a solution? Do you think that it could potentially actually burst out into, into conflict, into real conflict? Or do you think there will be some kind of political revolution, diplomatic solution?
- [95:56]
Slavoj Žižek
But I am not ready to simply say no, it cannot. Nonetheless, United States are a big state. You know, already things that we thought unimaginable are happening. Meloni in Italy and she's even doing Pretty good. The new rise of more radical right in Europe. You know what's my sad point? I'm not glad to say this. Many of my friends are saying yes, these are the two extreme. We need simply to return to good old social liberalism. That's my pessimism. No, it's time has passed. I don't know what. It's a terrible position. But the answer is not simply insist on old liberal values. I'm here a little bit more of a pessimist. Well, it's a very sad decision. Do you have any better option? Okay, screw you. Friendly. What would be your answer here? Do you have one?
- [96:57]
Alex O'Connor
Well, no. I mean I. I struggle to, to make predictions in this way. I just think that given that you are advocating a moment ago always think about the how things can go catastrophically wrong. I suppose that can be quite a depressing pursuit if you're not also thinking about how you might respond to or resolve that worst case scenario.
- [97:24]
Slavoj Žižek
Yeah, but here I. No, no, here I'm simply a progressive optimist. Whenever something happens that I think has a certain potential and even if I'm then proven wrong. For example, I was very much engaged in the Greek Syriza movement, you remember, a couple of years ago. I admire very much to give you concrete examples. Evo Morales government in Bolivia. There was a coup against them. Now they return to power because they were an intelligent left. They didn't follow the path of Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba. They didn't screw the economy. The standard of ordinary people was really became higher and so on and so on. I am all for moderate well thought experiments, but at the same time get ready for new emergency states. I mean, who knows what will happen. Look, with ecology and I don't believe this simply doomsday scenarios, but things are obvious. You know, I read a good ecological point which says when we even talk about global warming, we automatically assume that it will be a little bit warmer than now, but just a new stability. No, most models show that if it not even be a new stability, it would be for decades, if not longer, simply a new chaotic period. It will not even be winter, summer or whatever. You know, things are open now. I also listen to eco skeptics who point out how many catastrophic predictions didn't realize themselves. You know, I remember when I was young, 50 years ago more the big obsession in Germany was Waldsterben, the dying of forests. And the general Wisdom was around 2000 there will be no forests in Europe. Sorry, there are now more forests in Europe than 30 years ago.
- [99:40]
Alex O'Connor
So yes, but then arguably that that's. That's partly a response to those fears and concerns. Now people have made a more proactive effort to preserve the. The. The ecology of Europe and a lot of. Of companies involved in the cutting down of trees, for example, and now also involved in the process of planting them. We can be pessimistic and say that's just for the sake of pr, but it might be the fact that were it not for those warnings that emerged, we would have been in a much more dire situation than we find ourselves in now.
- [100:15]
Slavoj Žižek
No, no, no, I agree with it. I just almost worry not only about this, but look, what about Ukrainian war? It's not just a limited conflict there. It's obviously a moment of a big geopolitical restructuring, where again, I am a pessimist, because I think, yes, of course, Western Europe is still at a certain level, neocolonialist, blah, blah, blah. But on the other hand, what is emerging as an alternative is something even much worse than it. That's the horrible thing. I. I am here, in short term, a modest, pragmatic, let's do whatever we can. Maybe let's begin with small things here, there. You know, maybe it's wrong to, in the old Marxist way, to await for a big solution or whatever. Maybe we should simply try, as you say, small ecological measures here and there and so on. Something can come out of it, but never exclude that things can get even worse. I think that we will have to get used for a possibility of new emergency states. We got a taste of it with COVID with the epidemics. Who knows what will follow? No, no, no, I'm not this type of pessimist. Or we are lost. No, just let's get. Let's be ready for everything. Sorry. Please censor me, Censor me, do whatever.
- [102:08]
Alex O'Connor
The only form of censorship that I'm going to engage in now is that of ending the episode, because I am thankful for your time. We've been talking for quite a while and I suppose it's quite fitting to end on a note of subtle pessimism and looking towards the future. So. Slavo Zizek.
- [102:26]
Slavoj Žižek
Sorry, can I finish then with my version of it? Maybe you heard it, isn't it? I will say something horrible, commonsensical, but I believe in it. Isn't it better to be a moderate pessimist? Because then you know, from time to time, as you pointed out, small, hopefully things happen, so at least you can be a little bit happy optimist from time to time. But if you are a general optimist, you are sad all the time.
- [102:54]
Alex O'Connor
Yeah, constantly. Constantly disappointed. I also think that people. People get annoyed if I'm a bit crude in my pessimism. If people are talking about something and I, I point out a consideration, that might not be the happiest. I point out, you know, not, not the happiest consideration that I could inject into that conversation. And people accuse me of being crude with my pessimism, but people are crude with their optimism all of the time. If somebody's upset, if somebody, if the situation is dire, somebody will say, well, you know, look on the bright side, or a similar platitude, and they do. So, you know, even. Even if it's sometimes inappropriate, I, I find it an injustice that people can be so crude in their optimism. But if he's so. He's so critical of crudeness and pessimism.
- [103:39]
Slavoj Žižek
Of course, you saw, you saw, you saw the Life of Brian, the movie Monty Pike.
- [103:46]
Alex O'Connor
I have seen it.
- [103:47]
Slavoj Žižek
You remember at the end how Christ and all of them. No, it's not Christ, Brian. Okay. Sink on the cross, that. Look at the bright side. Yes, for me, the crude optimism.
- [103:58]
Alex O'Connor
I can, I can imagine that that's. That picture is what the optimists will be doing. As, you know, you know, the forests burn and China invades and the nukes start firing. They'll sort of be, you know, stood looking at the sunset, arm in arm, kicking their feet and singing, Always look on the bright side of life. And, you know, why not, if that's the situation they find themselves in? I think in such a dire situation as that, I might find myself becoming a bit of a, you know, self indulgent and self deceptive, purposefully speaking, optimist, because what else is there to be in the face of the end of the world?
- [104:36]
Slavoj Žižek
Yeah, but I prefer the formula that was proposed. Was it by one of the early Frankfurt School Horkheimer of who? Pessimist in theory, optimist in action. You know, in theory, confront all the set possibilities, but act. Act as if there still is a chance. And as long as you act, that is a chance.
- [105:00]
Alex O'Connor
And maybe that's part of the problem. I think a modern political ethic that is, I guess, optimistic in theory, but pessimistic in practice might be where things are going wrong.
- [105:16]
Slavoj Žižek
Yeah, definitely. So I leave you this as the ha ha, final wisdom.
- [105:23]
Alex O'Connor
It's a good one.
- [105:25]
Slavoj Žižek
Thanks very much.
- [105:26]
Alex O'Connor
Slavoj Zizek. Thank you so much for taking the time. Thanks for coming on the podcast.
- [105:31]
Slavoj Žižek
The gratitude is mine. I'm just afraid that there are so many other things from veganism to. I don't know what. What you mean by cosmic skepticism that we didn't have time to cover.
- [105:44]
Alex O'Connor
So, yeah, I'm not sure I knew what I meant by that when I chose that name at 17 years old. But perhaps that's something you can psychoanalyze in a future episode.
- [105:53]
Slavoj Žižek
That's how we. That's how meaning. Sorry, that again. That's how meaning progresses. You know that Helmut Kleist, one of the great of around the time of Hegel writers, wrote a wonderful article on this. How the deepest thoughts emerge. Like this. You just say something, you are not even aware what you mean. It's never so that you think deeply about it and then something comes, you know, that's the proper way to act. I like especially the term cosmic because I think the lesson of quantum physics and so on, that even cosmologically we should be skeptics, does the world exist in what form? And so on and so on. Thanks very much.
- [106:46]
Alex O'Connor
Well, thank you. Thank you for validating that. That choice that I made. It's nice to have a sort of retrospective justification for such a cringy gamertag sounding name for the first half of my YouTube career. So you know what?
- [107:01]
Slavoj Žižek
I was just afraid. But you are not that. I was afraid that you will be some kind of this new Ager, you know, this, oh, deeper unity. Skepticism about reality. But there is another higher domain. What, Whatever that, you know, you are definitely not that.
- [107:20]
Alex O'Connor
That's one of the reasons I'm in the process of rebranding. I. I dropped the cosmic skeptic name as my display name. Now it's now it's just my.
- [107:26]
Slavoj Žižek
So what is now?
- [107:27]
Alex O'Connor
Now it's just my name, which is Alex O'Connor. Although I still have the handle on, you know, Twitter and the At. On.
- [107:33]
Slavoj Žižek
You know what? I advise you then. Yeah, then you could keep that name for your good friends. You know, like when you meet somebody and become really friendly, you tell him, listen, my Official name is O'Connor, but we are friends. You can just call me. Cosmic becomes the intimate name.
- [107:57]
Alex O'Connor
I'll see if that catches on. Thank you. Thank you, Slavos.
- [108:02]
Slavoj Žižek
Bye bye.
- [108:11]
Alex O'Connor
Sa.