Žižek: cheat notes

For those who are struggling with the video posted yesterday, it is important to note that Žižek is addressing an audience that he assumes will be familiar with may of the ideas he is discussing and so he doesn't always explain everything. He's quite content to say "And so on" rather than join all the dots. This means that if this is your first introduction to Žižek, it may not be the most accessible piece of communication.

The bottom line of what he's trying to say is that the system is so broken that tinkering around the edges is a distraction from the more radical task at hand. Light green consumerism is still consumerism, ethical consumerism is still consumerism. As such, they are largely a waste of time, since they make us feel like we're doing something while we're still mainly on the problem side of the equation.

Does he have an alternative? Yes, though he doesn't really discuss it in this video. It is hinted at where he says, "It is immoral to use private property in order to alleviate the horrible evils that result from the institution of private property." That is, the problem is much deeper than one or two bad apples in the barrel, a few CEOs being too greedy or some missing government regulation. It is knottier than any given new piece of technology, no matter how shiny, can untie. The problem for Žižek is with our economic system as a whole. Does this make him a dangerous radical, a subversive Marxist with an anti-capitalist agenda for world government? Yes, actually it does. And he has no problem with that (having called himself "a communist in a qualified sense").