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🇦🇷 Argentina /Culture & Society

Slavoj Žižek: “Words are no longer taken seriously”

From Clarín · () Spanish

Translated from Spanish and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

Interview Named sources Context piece
  • In an interview tied to his new book, Slavoj Žižek argues for a transnational, universalist form of solidarity that could counter technological and capitalist disorder.
  • He says managing artificial intelligence and halting environmental destruction would require an international system with some degree of authoritarianism.
  • Žižek discusses his controversial political positions, including his support for Palestinians while rejecting antisemitism, Islamism and the idea that Hamas was a revolutionary movement.

Slavoj Žižek’s interview comes with an unusual instruction: do not read the questions, because they do not correspond to the answers. The Slovenian philosopher and psychoanalyst speaks in a torrent of ideas, using vulgarity, dark humor and painful truths as weapons against what he sees as the blindness of the age.

His central argument is stark. The world, he says, can be saved only through an international system based on solidarity, and that system must allow for a certain degree of authoritarianism. It would need to control artificial intelligence and stop the destruction of the natural world. Žižek presents a prior global catastrophe as the event that could make such a project possible.

Words are no longer taken seriously.

· Slavoj ŽižekThe interview headline captures Žižek’s broader argument about contemporary language and political debate.

The argument appears in his book Una izquierda que se atreva a decir su nombre. Intervenciones intempestivas, published by Anagrama. He calls for abandoning identity and authenticity claims that he considers increasingly fluid and temporary, and for embracing a universalist, solidaristic position. He describes the alternative as a “new form of communism,” transnational and outside the limits imposed by markets and states, capable of changing what appears politically possible.

A new form of communism.

· Slavoj ŽižekŽižek’s description of a transnational, solidaristic system beyond the market and the state.

Žižek says criticism from opposing sides can indicate that an argument has reached a sensitive and truthful point. He points to his position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as an example. He says he has always supported the Palestinians, but is neither antisemitic nor pro-Islamist. He notes that some people now call him a liberal Zionist because he rejects the view that Israel is only a colonial project, that Jews should be thrown into the sea, or that Hamas was a genuinely revolutionary movement.

He also says the expression “antisemitic Zionism” applies to Donald Trump and his circle, as well as to the Balfour Declaration, although the supplied interview ends during that answer. Žižek attributes his distinctive speaking style to Lacanian psychoanalysis sessions he underwent at 40, when he spoke for five minutes without stopping to avoid uncomfortable questions from his psychiatrist. His stated antidote to humanity’s depression and pessimism is dirty, black humor, illustrated by a final joke about a man with terminal cancer who is told to stop chemotherapy because Žižek has written a brilliant obituary for him.

I have always been pro-Palestinian, but neither antisemitic nor pro-Islamist.

· Slavoj ŽižekŽižek explains how he distinguishes his support for Palestinians from positions he rejects.
About this summary

Originally published by Clarín in Spanish. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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