Slavoj Zizek: anti-Americanism, Christopher Hitchens, occupation of Iraq (eng subs)

[ahmed337799]

Who is this dickhead? And why isn't he collecting garbage like he should be?

His only talent seems to be talking garbage anyway..

[ididete]

kad ce ovaj smrdljivi slinavac da odapne, zgadio se i bogu i narodu. da ne govorimo o tome koliko je precenjen. lako je biti prorok u eri budala.

[ctownsfools1]

He's clearly coked up. Nose itching, high energy, bad ideas...tell-tale signs.

[1Verlch]

I love Slavoj Zizek...

Sometimes i think he's high on cocaine, though!

[DrMerkwuerdichliebe]

A communist in the US/Iraqi puppet parliament? (Yes, I knew, btw)

Well, Saddam Hussein had friendly connections with the SU and the GDR, many coöperations. (Saddam had those also with the USA and GFR...just like NOURI MALIKI now...)

[loccoptic]

if u generalise the point what he is saying that pointing out one fing is ad doesnt make what you believe or do good. we are against the occupation of iraq but we are also against islamism.. just like right wing facists like the bnp are against the occupation of iraq they should not gain support from the other looking bad

[unitedcoloursofAfg]

so in a nutshell, he's saying that this anti-American sentiment in the East is leading to authoritatian capitalism--> so basing themselves on the capitalism that origniated from the West, but governed in an authoritarian way. The implications of this in international relations: East/West confrontation and underlying this confrontation is ideologies of communism vs. American capitalism.

[Tfrne]

My God, he is brilliant.

[dstpfw]

Subtitles work for me.

Zizek mentions favourably the same in a footnote (p.182) in 'Iraq the Borrowed Kettle' the Hitchens' point about the anti-war position lacking in many ways.

[streetteamnfc]

I'm not sure I agree with this. So there is now a communist party in Iraq and their prime minister is a social democrat - if they cannot win what's the difference? It is just an illusion. If they were real communists they would be fighting to get the occupator out of their land. Do you think that if the communists actually won in Iraq and nationalized everything, USA wouldn't invade again? I think this is a very naive assessment of the situation.

[rotzikotzi99]

haha hes so exhausted that he emptying the whole glass at once

[JagjeetMann]

this man is teh next solbodan lmao

[GoodManBadSerf]

@JagjeetMann How on earth could you possibly come to that conclusion?

[DrCruel]

Leftists are, and for a very long time have been, a tool for the Russian Marxist form of national socialism. Saddam Hussein was an important ally towards the goal of Russian hegemony in the Middle East, as were most other Ba'athist leaders in the region, and so the Marxists supported Saddam's Ba'athist regime - no matter how ruthlessly brutal it was. Like they did with the Vietnamese communists and the Khmer Rouge, they made strenuous efforts to lie about and cover up their excesses.

[GoodManBadSerf]

@DrCruel You say Saddam Hussein was an important ally towards the goal of Russian Hegemony in the middle east, which flies in the face of the fact that Saddam was only concerned with his own theocratic hegemony in his part of the middle east. It was his power or no power. You say he was supported by Marxists, and yet Ronald Reagan and Bush Sr., along with the CIA, were decidedly anti-Marxist. You're confusing the USSR, (a hybrid, imperial state) with the Marxist ideal.

[DrCruel]

@GoodManBadSerf Saddam was interested in his own political hegemony in Iraq. He was a secularist until the First Gulf War, when like Stalin he suddenly "found religion" and began using it in earnest for political purposes.

Saddam Hussein was a Soviet ally. US attempts to mollify his noxious regime in the 1980s were meant to help stop the Iran-Iraq war, which was wreaking havoc in the region. Earlier attempts had involved negotiations with the Iranian ayatollahs, but all had ended in failure.

[GoodManBadSerf]

@DrCruel You must be joking. The Reagan admin did not send Iraq valuable military intel on Iran in order to "stop the Iran-Iraq War". Nor did it remove it from it's list of State Sponsored Terrorism in order to show it's approval with Iraq's supposed allegiance with the USSR. The USSR gave Iraq weapons, and so did we, but Iraq had no special allegiance with the USSR, nor did the Soviets require as much, as their only goal was to destabilize the region. cont.

[GoodManBadSerf]

@GoodManBadSerf We certainly showed no concern for whatever havoc was being wrought, when in 1985 we were issuing the permits for the export of high-tech equipment crucial in the development of Iraq's WMD's, even as reports were confirmed that he was already using chemical weapons on Iranians. He used the WMD's on his own people as it turned out (how socialist of him), instead of Iran (much to our chagrin). Iraq was no one's ally, nor would Saddam have ever allowed as much.

[GoodManBadSerf]

@Packerd01 There's no such thing as a "Marxist in disguise". The moment you hide your allegiance, you are no longer a Marxist by definition.

[DrCruel]

@GoodManBadSerf Since most people, including most workers, know of and despise the Marxists, it becomes necessary for them to disguise their true nature and true intentions. They cannot otherwise gain sufficient power to force their will upon an unsuspecting public.

I think the real problem is that, since Marxist factions are piratical and seek to exploit the societies they gain power in, once one faction comes into power the others fight with them over the loot.

[GoodManBadSerf]

@DrCruel It's true that most workers know of a thing called "Marxism", but it's patently false to assert that they know what Marxism actually is, as they are not really taught as much. The literature is practically alien to most individuals. Marx himself taught that those who sought a progression through ideas, had to wear those ideas on their sleeves. The real problem is that most individuals these days have no clue what Marxism actually entails, yet speak with undeserved authority.

[DrCruel]

@GoodManBadSerf Most people are vaguely familiar with Marxism, it's true. If they were more intimately familiar with it, they would more easily realize how dumb it is. A simple reading of the illogical underpinnings behind Marx's version of the "labour theory of value" alone should be enough to demonstrate how absurd the theories of Marx are.

But the utility of Marx is not in the veracity of his ideas, or lack thereof. It is in its ideological justifications for mass piracy.

[GoodManBadSerf]

@DrCruel First you posit that people require duping in order to support secretly Marxist regimes, because they know full well how "terrible" they are. Now you posit that individuals aren't really all that familiar, but that if they were, they'd know how "dumb it is". And I happen to know you've never read Marx's labour theory of value, because there is no such thing as a "simple" reading of it. Marxism is about the extension of democracy into the industrial sphere, not "piracy".

[GoodManBadSerf]

@GoodManBadSerf I also get the distinct impression that you didn't watch the video, or that if you did, you weren't paying very close attention. If you were, you wouldn't have attempted to paint Saddam's regime as Marxist in the first place.

[DrCruel]

@GoodManBadSerf Apparently you aren't that familiar with Marx's labor theory of value, which presumes that labor inputs, and not intangibles like desire, set the "true" value of products and services. That sort of idiocy is typical of Marx's theories.

But again, the value of Marxism is not in the actual theoretical system (with is absurd), but rather how it can be used to enable and justify kleptocratic tyrannies. Thus why (of course) practical Marxism has nothing to do with democracy.

[DrCruel]

@GoodManBadSerf As for what I posit, let me clarify:

Most people do not know what Marx actually had to say, and in reality few Marxists do either, or care. Marxists are murderous seditionists and pirates that use Marxism as a moral justification for their obnoxious vocation. They often pretend to be something else to gain power, and indeed if they did not most well meaning people would simply kill them before they succeeded. Once in power, they revert to type.

Hope that's helpful.

[nakedmambo]

@DrCruel No, it wasn't helpful. It was nonsense. Pol Pot called himself a Marxist, but of course he wasn't. But it does give people like you an excuse to say this is what Marxists do.

[DrCruel]

@nakedmambo Yes, I've heard this all before. It's never "real" Marxism after the thieves and murderers have been found out. Pardon, but it's a bit like having a neo-Nazi tell me that Germany was never "really" under National Socialism, that my misconceptions about "real" Nazism are based on my ignorance of the true facts, that Nazis are actually very partial to Jews, and so on.

I expect what comes next is the same tired old Marxist bullshit, so let's cut it short shall we?

[nakedmambo]

@DrCruel In the post below this you posit 'Marxists' as opposed to 'what Marx had to say', so you acknowledge the difference. Then you simply proceed to behave as though the one is the other interchangeably. It's a common con trick to pretend that about 3 sentences of Marx is all that remains of value today, but you're wrong and you know it; which is why you have to go about pseudo-intellectualising about it on You Tube.

Tired bullshit is clearly your forte, not mine, you cheap hack.

[DrCruel]

@nakedmambo Let me clear up any misconception here. I don't think Marxists do "what Marx said" implicitly. I think Marx was an idiot who didn't know what he was talking about. I think Marxists know this already, but find his nonsensical ideas useful because they help justify mass thievery, mass murder and tyranny in the name of "proletarian revolution".

I know that the texts of Marx contain useless junk, that most Marxists pretend otherwise, and I know I'm right because I've read the stuff.

[nakedmambo]

@DrCruel You haven't read it, you're bluffing along helped on by the fact that few read it. If Marx was an idiot you could only be less than a bacterium in comparison. He upsets little right-wingers like you because he collapsed the foundations of your fantasies.

Just admit your real position and stop with the pseudo-intellectual circus. You're just a bog-standard follower of ordinary status quo capitalism and probably some libertarian quackery, playing at being intellectual. Pipe down.

[DrCruel]

@nakedmambo Is that your indirect way of admitting that I'm right? By providing direct evidence for what I've been saying about Marxists?

As for "piping down", that's my perogative. You and your Left fascist friends aren't in a power to silence free discourse in this country. But I'm more than happy to ignore anything further from you.

Feel free to get in the last word. You can otherwise piss off for all I care.

[nakedmambo]

@DrCruel I'm telling you you're a blackguard. Fascism comes from your quarter as much as any. And yes, the left is not in power, good that you recognise that. We know who is in always in power, setting the agenda: the cartels and big-business plutocrats and then idiots like you who cheer them on in the name of "freedom". They laugh at you behind your back. You have no monopoly on free discourse. So keep pretending to nobility by offering the last word, you have nothing to say anyway.

[TheAzov]

Hitchens is a wine-bibbing shill for the very system he denounces, and as usual gets his facts wrong in his "eloquent" attempt to divide the left. Iraqi Communists "were included in government for the first time in the history of Iraq" in 1973, as part of the "Progressive National Front" with the Ba'ath Party. Even Kanan Makiya admiits as much.

[xx1994xxversion2]

@TheAzov Good point, I was just about to mention that. Although I agree that the vulgar anti-imperialism of Westeren communists alienated anti-Baathist movements that included communists in Iraq, they are also being hypocrites since as the Iraqi Communist Party joined a national front with the Baathist regime in the 70's.

[TheAzov]

"We will create our own alternative capitalism." This is a pipe dream. The United States/Eurozone and its neo-liberal model have "really existing capitalism" sewed in their back pockets. To create an alternative market system would in itself require a revolution against the very foundations of global finance. Trotskyist capitalism has as much chance of realization as its old socialist counterpart of the USSR.

[0pteryx]

Does Zizek have some kind of Tourettism?

[TheMrAmfortas]

@0pteryx no,why?

[whatuphomes12]

You should be Hung in the middle of Madison square garden

[IROT1334]

sorry Slavoj, nothing justifies the invasion of Iraq

[smallpotatoes989]

komunizem je mrtev sprijazni se Slavoj!

[Exxxid]

@smallpotatoes989 Človek... Sprijazni se s tem, da ne razumeš kaj je njegov point. In ne skrbi, ne želi si komunizma kot ga poznaš. Dejansko niti ne ve kaj točno je rešitev, vsekakor pa da ljudjem misliti... A ni to lepo?

[smallpotatoes989]

@Exxxid a ti pa veš vse kar govori? nikjer blizu nisi tega, da bi bil v njegovi glavi, kot nihče drug ni. leta po ameriki da jim mal v obraz meče po krizi tko kot se je Reagan bahal v Berlinu ko je padla železna zavesa ko je kao komunizem zmagal. Kljub temu da je filozof ni iskren, tolk mu gre za persono filozofa (ki se na nič ne oprime ampak išle samo resnico) da ni vedno objektiven, tko kot ne pri Jezusu,ljubezni in kvantni mehaniki. ne vem pa kva je filozofija kdaj rešila, nč če mene vprašaš

[smallpotatoes989]

@Exxxid popraven: komunizem zgubil.

[smallpotatoes989]

o my god! Take it easy on the powder or your brain will explode.

[WindyDayification]

@ darkillity Its like watching an addict...keeps touching his face for no reason...really really worked up

[synchronium24]

@WindyDayification glad i'm not the only one who this bothers. If you watch his google talks lecture, he's doing that shit while he talks about subconscious subtleties we don't notice. Talk about irony!

[Ovcakisepase]

To delaj Žižek :D

[darkillity]

man, this guy is really worked up.

[juujuuuujj]

For the sake of 30 year oil contracts with Exxon, America can tolerate a token communist party in Iraq.

[ndzapruder]

Zizek's had a bit of the cocaine, methinks.

[MaxKrane]

The subtitles don't come up when I press it! ARRRGGHHH what am I to do? (and so on and so on)

[nobodyreally11]

@MaxKrane

I know that some people have problems with this. I still don't know what it is. Perhaps you can try clearing your recent history: cookies, cache and so on and so forth. And make sure you have the latest flash player. Subtitles are definitely there.

[MaxKrane]

@nobodyreally11 Thank you, I've tried that and it doesn't work :/ I will try again another day.

[AndrewMann552]

Zizek's use of Iraq's Communists is pretty weak. They are a worthless force in current Iraqi politics and became active collaborators with what the majority of the indigenous population rightly view as a foreign occupation. Iraq has basically made Hitchens irrelevant, he should just stick to railing against Jesus, Allah and whatever other religious figure that pisses him off.

[fuchikomarrano]

in tako naprej, in tako naprej...

[euclid901]

The presence of supposed Communists in the government of occupied Iraq bears no logical relation to the point Zizek was seemingly trying to establish (that the problem is not America per se, but Capitalism) ... And if I may indulge a 'prejudice' here, by the by: Zizek is a rather loose-thinking sort of philosopher, like Continental philosophers in general.

[niriop]

Zizek neglects however that the Saddam era anti-trade union laws are still in force and that the communists were for the most part ignored tokens who are still pushed aside; note the recent Labour Day protests in Iraq, and the violence that has led to the assasaination of communist trade union officials.

I do agree with him on Chavez; although the anti-Americanism is justified, Chavez will in retrospect be seen as bad as any possible tempered tyrant that US interests could place in power.

[QwidgyboMan]

@niriop

How is Chavez "as bad as any possible tempered tyrant that US interests could place in power"?

[niriop]

@QwidgyboMan Gerrymandering, ignoring public opinion, changing electoral laws to suit himself, monopolising control of public communications network and broadcasting propaganda, censoring critics...

[QwidgyboMan]

@niriop

So basically, exactly what every other state does? The US administration has been doing all of this, to a far greater degree, and for a far longer period of time.

[niriop]

@QwidgyboMan And there in lies the problem: Chavez is merely the lesser evil, not a revolutionary good. As Zizek himself says elsewhere, we should not lie back and look at Venezuala and say "Don't worry; progress is occuring; let's wait for it to reach the West", but instead, layer Chavez with the harshest criticism, so as to not repeat the mistakes of 1917, 1949 and 1959.

[AndrewMann552]

@niriop But that's also a high misconception about Chavez, the electoral law revision in Venezuela simply upgrades the system to the kind of electoral law you have in Europe's parliaments, criticism is rarely censored in Venezuela and in fact the right-wing controls 95% of the media, they call the guy everything from an "ape" to a "lunatic" and nobody disappears the next day (unlike in Honduras), EVERY party broadcasts propaganda, Lenin championed it.

[PersianSocialist777]

I am glad to see that Zizek is friends with Hitchens, they are two of the most brilliant radical thinkers left and they are two of the last intellectuals with the balls to calls themselves Marxists and to critique liberals. Zizek also makes a good point when he says that anti-Americanism often leads to people supporting even more despostic totalitarian forms of capitalism.

[indursmindur]

@PersianSocialist777

What a gem to find in the late evening: Zizek considers Hitchens a friend. Two people who have giving me so much to think about and struggle with, and I always thought they moved in completely separate spheres.

It is heartening to hear that even if in the end he disagrees with the war, Zizek gets the argument about the left opposition to Saddam.

[AndrewMann552]

@PersianSocialist777 I don't see what's so brave about Hitchens when it comes to championing bombing Pakistan, Iraq, Iran etc. Hitchens is a neocon, which basically means some who used to be a Marxist and then converted to some bizarre form of right-wing politics where he combines Trotsky's theory of Permanent Revolution with right-wing fantasies about "spreading democracy" to "dark, barbaric corners." Trotsky would puke if he ever heard Hitchens in his current form.

[PsychedelicClofty]

@PersianSocialist777 is hitchens a marxist? i wasnt aware

[synchronium24]

@PersianSocialist777 Hitchens is of the left? HA, not anymore by his own admission. The marxist part is still kinda true, but his interventionist leanings ALMOST put him in the neoconservative camp.

[joaquinveyron]

@PersianSocialist777

And why does this ugly man have to touch his ugly nose every time in a second=?? This is DISGUSTING!

[obornt333]

This guys on coke. So much nose rubbing.

[zagrebant66]

@obornt333 he has tourette syindrom. Educate yourself.

[meshzzizk]

eng subs?

[nobodyreally11]

@meshzzizk

Push the CC button.