Zizek

Philosopher or entertainer? Worth reading?

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howtoacademy.com/courses/slavoj-zizek-will-self-conversation
mediationsjournal.org/articles/back-to-hegel
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Zizek falls into the same trap as a lot of other Zizeks. He has command over a handful of interesting philosophical discourses that are extremely abstruse and difficult to understand. He enjoys the prestige of this, and he's probably frustrated that no one else can keep up. He looks down on public intellectuals who dumb shit down, hewing off all the interesting stuff that requires hard work to understand, so that the plebs can access it in bite-sized form.

What he does instead is swirl it all together into a pastiche-y private language that only he has access to. The untalented dilettantes who can barely understand an Intro to Hegel class, or who delude themselves into thinking they're "Lacanians" because they have unthinkingly internalised a few half-Lacanian methods from Wikipedia, follow him around like groupies because they're too dumb to realise that they aren't understanding even one of the 9 discourses he's fusing together. The public intellectuals who do the dumbing down method don't bother with him. The professors, who are hyper-specialised in one discourse each, have no interest in reading a Lacano-Hegelo-Marxo-etc. guy, when they are only interested in the Hegelo or Marxo part. And the two or three people out there in the world who are accidentally smart enough and learned enough in the same exact areas as Zizek to understand Zizek still aren't interested in reading him, because he's been private language'ing himself for so long that even they can't read his books without insane amounts of effort anymore.

All Zizek is left with is groupies, and worthless college faggots who watch his Youtube videos and post on the DOWN WITH CRAPITALISM MEMESQUAD Facebook page with their repugnant normie college friends.

Zizek could probably be a good philosopher if he were thrown back to 70 years ago and actually had people he could talk to, and who could talk him down into saying intelligible things. As it stands, even the smartest people around have to be forced to read his work, and even then they basically throw their hands up and say "I'm not familiar with Lacan so I can only sorta-understand 30% of this book."

tldr: No one is really in dialogue with Zizek, which is usually a good sign he's not saying much.

Neither. No.

howtoacademy.com/courses/slavoj-zizek-will-self-conversation

*Grabs t-shirt*

>all this shit just to make a basic ad populum fallacy
ha

This was a pretty good post, although it poses the question how, then, can you tell whether he's real or whether he's the Bogdanoff of philosophy?

cocaine-addled clown

I'm sure he has intelligent things to say, but I stop watching any of his stuff 5 seconds in. The constant sniffing and touching his nose makes me uncomfortable.
>inb4 "Just read his works"

Most actual philosophers call him a charlatan

His early books and his tome on Hegel are great, books about popular political topics and his talks can be discarded.

*rubs nose*

The Elvis of cultural theory.

>his tome on Hegel are great

This.
OP what do you think of people who write a 1000page book on Hegel? Are they hacks?

Frequently yes

Literally one of his weakest works. Parallax View and For They Know Not What They Do are his best. Stay away from his more pop-phil shit. It's all regurgitation.

Eh zizek je itak fukjen

He's vegetarian so disregard him

Thanks for the pasta.

>in order to be an active subject, I have to get rid of — and transpose onto the other — the inert passivity which contains the density of my substantial being
What did he mean by this?

Name some

Start with the greeks.

I sometimes call things "pure ideology" but people usually assume it was an odd choice of words and ignore it.

I like him because he's a crypto-fascist that allows me to make the argument I want to make but would be unable to back up by citing his right-wing equivalents like Alain de Benoist

so zizek stole cultural theory from the blacks? bastard

Um he didn't steal it from the blacks, they still have it, he was just influenced by them. It's like digital piracy.

> this is what goes for shitposting these days

Is it too late to say neo/lit/ ?

>extremely abstruse and difficult to understand.

"abstruse, adjective.

difficult to understand; obscure."

>a lot of people just dont get it!

wow, such a valid arguement

*sprays thin mist of saliva with every syllable*

You started by implying there are a lot of other Zizeks; surely they could talk to each other, or is their language so private that even this is impossible?

Also, the only claim you have so regarding OP's question is that he is far too complicated. That doesn't mean at all that he's actually saying something which makes sense regarding Hegel, Lacan or even Marx.

He's unironically Marxist

Not to be taken seriously, therefore

Stupid view.

Both

>he isn't a Marxist

Leave Veeky Forums at once

Definitely philosopher, but whether he is a good one, maybe we have to wait and see to know that.

This might otherwise be true but if no one bothers with him besides groupies, why are shitloads of academics either influenced by him or critiquing him?

>As it stands, even the smartest people around have to be forced to read his work, and even then they basically throw their hands up and say "I'm not familiar with Lacan so I can only sorta-understand 30% of this book."
And he has written several books that are basically introductions to his Lacanianism? Maybe one has to read 5 other Zizek books to 30% understand one, but hey, that ain't too much to ask, really.

This is fucking Veeky Forums, read his works.

I'll agree except for the books that are consciously made to be "introductions". How to read Lacan, looking awry, enjoy your symptom are all good. The other lighter works are ok if one wants a light/fun read.

mediationsjournal.org/articles/back-to-hegel

*sniffs*

If one is not both a philosopher and an entertainer, they have failed.

*Begins to raise hand to nose*
*Stops*
*Begins to lower hand to shirt (to tug it)*
*Stops*
*Crosses arms and legs uncomfortably*

So Locke, Hegel, Nietzsche, etc etc all failed?

Who is an "actual philosopher"?

Nietzsche is an exhilarating writer. Deleuze is entertaining once you get his vibe. It's just neither are clowns.

Also most pop quotes are exactly that - careerist soundbites. Don't trust 'em!

"Don't trust 'em!" - user

marxism is outdated

>muh obscurantism
most of Zizek's work is standard density for actual philosophy, brainlet

it's more accurate than ever now that social democracy is crashing

Marx might be, but Marxism isn't

Not true.
Philosophy major here. We're reading him in my Aesthetics class, The Sublime Object. Obv you have to be familiar with 1 Marx, 2 Freud, 3 Lacan and 4 Hegel. But he's legit and definitely has contributed some interesting ideas.

>he hasn't downloaded the patch updates

Same he was prescribed to us too. Anyone who thinks there's a single group of "serious academics" who have any more commonality in thinkers they like than the average Veeky Forums poster has no idea what he's talking about.
They'd be shitposting as hard as us against each others heralds given the chance

does Veeky Forums even produce original content anymore?

Veeky Forumss idea of the contemporary philosophy world is like a complete 180 from the reality.

According to who? I imagine Zizek will be still talked about in the future more than some loser follower of Kripke.
The very fact the French Post-Structuralists have remained in huge currency gives creedence away from this important philosophy as banal notion.