Zizek within the limits of mere reason

Yoshie Furuhashi furuhashi.1 at osu.edu
Fri Dec 17 16:22:58 PST 1999


Ken:
>> CB: Didn't Zizek support the NATO war on Yugoslavia ?
>
>Not in the way NATO would have liked him to.

Right -- and by virtue of that 'ironic distance,' Zizek helped to secure the support for ideology of humanitarian bombings even more effectively than otherwise. He gets hoisted by his own petard.


>how
>many theorists do you know have run for the presidency of their respective
>country - *against* the very real possibility of an ultra-right nationalist
>victory (Zizek was instrumental in the success of the Reform Party in
>Slovenia).

Considering this fact, I think Zizek should thank paranoid conspiracy theorists. There's nothing like the menace of an ultra-right nationalist victory -- its real power is created by right-wing paranoia, and its mythical power is projected by liberal paranoia -- that helps to shore up Zizek's politics. In other words, Zizek is a beneficiary of the vicious dialectical twins of right-wing and liberal conspiracy theories. BTW, the Reform Party is an apt name, given Zizek's politics and pop culture gluttony. What's next? A performative intervention in pro-wrestling?

Yoshie



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