Who cares what the caricature Slavoj Žižek thinks he is? Seriously.

​@LarsTragel-zh7ei i do its interesting

Cowen is so overrated. I read a 2017 Vox interview with Cowen...he was wrong about literally every prediction. Astoundingly wrong. Meanwhile, Zizek was right about his warnings, as the US teeters on the edge of authoritarianism, income inequality explodes, and climate crises erupt on a weekly basis.

but did you become a catcher in the rye

I am complete.

LOL! I wont give you a like just to keep the counter in its current value

Legend has it that, when you hear the triple and-so-on, the spirit of Hegel himself comes and determinately negates your coffee from a coffee without cream to a coffee without milk.

I’m still waiting for the quadruple sniff

Cheers amigo.

dank you very much, dank you.

They should at least cut off the first 15 and a half minutes of nothing.

Thanks brother. Here's a like for your troubles!

Thanks

it does when you're idea of liberal is Pete *I'm not racist even though I don't like black people* ukposts.info/have/v-deo/g6SQbaRumn6LuWQ.html

@@III-vg4dp woah dude, you're so far up the libertarian collective butthole...that you've forgotten all Trump voters want is traditional marriage and no abortion...your positions on the power of the STATE don't change your positions on anything. *People don't think things through like that.* You either want a new better world (the left) or you want an idealized version of the same thing's you're used to (the right) *these terms have been used since the French Revolution because they DO IN FACT WORK to describe people's views*

@@III-vg4dp after your description of going facts, what is the antidote ????

II I education agreed-but what content from which perspective?

They wish it did. Makes thing easy for them.

To a degree i cant blame tyler, zizek's ideas are too nuanced in specifics that its hard to "put him into a box" of a known definition. Zizek is in a box of his own and really well into it.

@@diegoveloso3rd isn't it the task of an intellectual, like Cowen, to be nuanced and think "outside of the box"? He's perfectly capable to engage with Zizek, he's just not willing to as he has found a narrative that neutralises Zizek in his mind and allows him to sit there relaxed and smiling. I will admit, though, that Zizek is difficult to engage with, but it is because of the way he talks, as I outlined above, he tends to get carried away so you have to rein him in (in fact, I have yet to see an interviewer who has succeeded in that 100%)

Werd Lert “he has found a narrative that neutralizes Zizek in his mind..” Yes, and he doubles down by inviting Z to ‘live free’ with him and his ‘moderate right friends’.. 1:15:19 “Why not free yourself by jettisoning the nostalgia and take the next step-if I were your therapist this is what I’d be asking you to do.”

@@Medytacjusz I think Michael Brooks is pretty good at doing that

@@Medytacjusz Why yes i completely agree with you. Thats why i used, "to a degree". Admittedly, i couldnt think of the apt choice of words to best describe the looseness or malleability of my point as i was writing that comment

Tyler is a bit of a simpleton...

Tyler showed a lot patience, what you call EXpLAnation in Zizek's case is just a shower of contradictory bull

Zizek didn't explain much in detail, in fact he refused to respond to his points (esp. about China). You only see politicians do same kind of tricks. (And yes I don't care if its right or left-wing, Tyler for example on his blog has criticized right-wing politicians especially on these polemic tricks.) 65 people upvoted this comment?

@@jirikivaari But sorry, comparing Taiwan and China (as an economist!) was a pretty weak start. I would have done the same like Zizek in order not to waste too much time on stuff like that.

Yea the dude is pretty irritating to listen to it to be honest. Yea lets go to Singapore where they hang people every Friday and where there are no beggers because as soon as you beg you are thrown in jail and where you can't stop working until you're dead. Idk why zizek never challenges these people i guess it's just not his way.

I immediately got annoyed. Zizek said some positive things about China and talking seriously about serious things and this guy came out like he was from Reddit trying to drum up some kind of moralistic panic... which had nothing to do with the substance of Zizek's talk.

Would you expect more from an conservative

is that what you got from this? these men are flirting with each other!

The organisers surely made a mistake inviting this guy Cowen to interview Zizek; he comes across as even dumber than Peterson

@@stephenharper5761 Cowen is one of the finest thinkers alive. Zizek came across as a joker, basically making rhetorical arguments and jokes, without actually making an argument for anything. Although I wished Cowen had skipped the jokes and focused on substance.

Lou Sanus true

Because Zizek is one of the most famous Communists of the day and he is not even a Communist. What does that tell you about Communism?

@@samuelboucher1454 yeah, what does that tell us about communism?

@@Fishoilification That even Communists realize its unsustainable and impossible.

@@samuelboucher1454 did you even listen to the interview? He states he is a communist, but not by definition of those liberals who never read a book apart from harry potter

@Elias Håkansson You say that because you mistake communism for Stalinism. Communism is ideologically liberal. Liberal socialism has been made to work, but the circumstances have so far been tenuous. Maybe that will always be the case. Socialism is not ideological. It is a response to crises that cannot be answered by liberalism alone. Can you explain capitalism to me? I hear utopian tales about a free market without exploitation. I see entrenched power, institutional capture, a miserable lack of vision, the devestation of the commons and a ratchet that pushes social inequality always in the same direction.

I don't agree he favors what is known as social democracy. I understand social democracy to mean that the poor and unemployed and sick get a small cut of the pie and so on but the wider economy and the other social functions are left to be run by a small elite who get to choose in the end how much the poor scrubs get and when they get the austerity and all the rest. And why is it called democracy when it is not? I believe it is Orwellian double speak that happens to work and it keeps the masses content because they think they live in a democracy and that they are taken care of. Yes, to the extent that they can serve as subjects to be exploited by capitalism they are taken care of, and then additionally the rest who can't work are taken care of to the extent that there won't be too much discontent that would overturn the system.

Elias Håkansson Um, no, Zizek said many times that the modern-day social democracy is not the right political structure that can confront problems today. Zizek believes that there needs to be a fundamental change that goes beyond capitalism, and he calls that ”communism.” Tbh today social democracy we have in Europe is not truly free-market capitalism the idea actually goes back to Marxist Revisionism, people like Eduard Bernstein and Karl Kautsky, who were socialists but supported a gradual change to socialism rather than revolution. This is where the idea of social democracy originated from; it was actually part of a socialist tradition.

@@thumper8684 communism is ABSOLUTELY NOT ideologically liberal

In a sense, communism is a continuation of the liberalist project that started with the French revolution. Its goals are essentially to realize the goals of that revolution that are summarized by the slogan liberté, egalité, fraternité that were not achieved by it. What the revolution did was take the power away from the king and give it to the capitalists, and then it was realized that this did not achieve the liberation that was the point of the whole thing. Hence communism and socialism were born.

Yeah I think this is how you have intellectual discussion.

@@jirikivaari not exactly. It's just a good way to deal with bad actors and shills. By all means, have an honest discussion with people who are open minded and intellectually honest, but if someone who has no interest in that just say your piece and move on. Lol

@@Drumz_of_Liberation Yes Tyler is one of the most open-minded and general thinkers. I was actually interested to hear if he has any arguments in favor of communism but didn't hear any. He just kept dodging the question. Imagine this being a serious conference on HEP physics and Zizek acting like that. It would be a joke.

No no no!!

Nah it's just Zizek's short attention span and social awkwardness

it was never a liberal party it was a lefties wreck and later died

Karsten Stalinism was in fact correct. Tito was wrong

@@kobajughashvili3444 Begone with your authoritarianism

NomadGamer Stalin’s Red Army killed 80% of all Nazis that died in WWII and USSR lost 27 million in Hitler’s war of racial extermination. How dare you put out your cheap little western liberal moralizing based on a one sided understanding of history taught you by the capitalist monsters that are responsible for 300 million deaths to capitalism worldwide.

@@kobajughashvili3444 cringe

@@Ardis160 he has a point though. Although I am definitely not a Stalinist and I think he did a lot of bad authoritarian things, I also think he did some good socialist things

I actually thought it wasn't really a challenge. Sounded like two men enjoying the humorous mood

The thing about marxists is they are good clowns

@@proximaism the thing about proximais is that no one cares about his funny-cringy opinion

@@proximaism while neoliberals are evil clowns.

So you admire imbeciles?

Very relevant analysis, anordered.

He talks of a lot of mambo jumbo bullshit.

Someone just took their intro to logic course

Zizek talking a lot of nonsense as usual. Let him talk though so more people can clearly see the idiocy of leftists and communist morons.

Marcin B “Mother nature is a dirty bitch.”

"Where do you think oil comes from?!" Haha, so true...

Happiness is for whores.

I'M NOT A FUCKING PIIIMP!!! :DD

I did a double take at that one too haha

It's not the chair's fault if people don't know how to sit in them properly. 🙃

An armpit sweat truther. Or a cushion seller.

😭😭😂😂😂

A person who went to college and it wasn't for STEM

XXBloodyElle 😂✊

In today's world, that's actually a decent argument.

@@erniereyes1994 This is a decent argument from those sweatshop owners in China and Vietnam and cobalt mine (which use child labor) owners in Congo and all politicians and police organizations who serve these owners and don't use decent arguments but bloody violence to maintain today's world

It was a joke. The joke is that he must be a madman to read his books. He was basically making fun of himself.

@@michaelherscheid9709 Who are you, what are you, nobody will listen to you because you're poor.

Merry Christmas to you comrade Wright. We will double our efforts here in gulag.

@@xspotbox4400 You know Joe?

@@michaelherscheid9709 Everybody know Joe, he's the most common English name.

Nikola Jovic 1:14:58 indeed

well rightism would never change: it has always been and will awlays be "relentlessly serving the powerful of the day, secretly hoping that one day you'd take their place, although that day normally never comes."

Tyler seems like a straight up simpleton. More libertarians are just really stupid and pitifully naive.

@@johnc.wrigley6147 Are you SURE? Are you sure you just know nothing about libertarianism?

@@samuelboucher1454 nah I think John has it down to a tee

After seeing the failures in Nicaragua and Venezuela I think the question is very much relevant in Latin America.

@@ramonserna8089 Though as Zizek pointed out, China and Vietnam are thriving. It is difficult for a central planner to know the amount of capital to invest if the potential for profit is ignored. The success of China and Vietnam rely in engaging with the markets rather than ignoring them.

Kevin Lopez. In this cases they have not followed the communist ideal at least not in the purest form and that to me is what fails to many politicians in Latin America (besides enormous corruption) thinking that Marx and Hegel ideas can be implemented as is and not realizing the innate problem with said doctrines. Zizek is an interesting character: He considers himself comunist and Helgenist yet his ideas rarely match and you might wonder why he doesn't call his philosophy something else entirely.

​@@ramonserna8089 the "failures" of Nicaragua, Venezuela, Guatemala, Mexico, Bolivia, Chile and many other countries are linked directly to USA's actions, at least 41 CIA's backed coups. In Latin America there are two sovereign countries: Cuba and Venezuela, and they're paying the price for that. The other countries are in many levels submitted by the USA's interests. In the periphery of Capitalism the fight is against imperialism and can only be fought through socialism, because the bourgeoisie is totally colonized and don't have the interest of national development.

Gilberto Borello. Really? Then Panama that recovered from a USA invasion and now is a leading economy is not sovereign, Dominican Republic that deposed Trujillo dictatorship and now thrives in the Caribbean with amazing grow and estability is not sovereign. Cuba and Venezuela are jokes because their leaders believed in a failed economic model and that's the price they are paying, blaming USA for all their woes show how little accountability their governments have.

I disagree. Cowen is chastising Zizek as using abstract conceptual metaphor to skirt the issue of making distinctions. Distinctions that can then be followed to actionable behaviors or choices. I like Zizek but still think it's totally credible to push him into corners where his viewpoints may reside more in ideological underpinnings of past structure (nostalgia) that won't allow for assertions/distinctions of progress. Zizek's discussion with Will Self encountered the same pushback from Will, though he framed his irritation somewhat differently. The negative tactic of SJW culture currently is that the 'warriors' are hell-bent on destruction vs nurturing progress. The gulags performed a quite equivocal nature...by identifying professed traitors as cancers to be destroyed instead of valid voices to be reckoned with. This comment section riddled with hatred, disdain, dismissiveness towards a guest who is there to FKING ARGUE POINTS is incredible to watch and shameful, though also a great gauge to show how polarization has overtaken much of societies capability to wrestle with ideas. Comments that do not actually address concerns, but make quips about 'whose side you on, bro?'. Or, worse, 'you expect me to read all that, Boomer?'.

B Wichart Cowen is a paid stooge of the capitalist class, what more do you expect? His paycheck depends on him not understanding

He clearly did not read his books. If he did, some of points seem silly since zizek articulates them in his books. Rather, his staff read half of his books and gave him notes and he tried to use those notes to come up with some "communism = bad. Haha!" moment.

Signalboosting.

Omfg this guy just gets worse. They had too much gum on the subway go fuck yourself.

Is that why my friends brother is in Singapore with a life sentence for getting caught with pot? Were people smoking too much weed on the subways?

Yeah he started with "If you're not a social justice warrior, you're a conservative. Look, we won!" and it got worse and worse.

Spent so much time telling Zizek to shorten his answers, while posing the same shit like "I know all the best food spots in Singapore" and "You have right-wing humour!". I don't think you could even really call this a debate, more like a class lol.

Rambling nonsense

It's not a debate, it's an interview. Look at the itinerary. It's called a debate because it annually it typically is. Some of the questions have been found wanting by many of us in the comments, and probably beyond, but for the most part Zizek was allowed to express himself. They both wasted time and Zizek admitted as much to having such a tendency in the beginning prior to demonstrating it.@@Jomchen

You should try listening to him

@@taistelusammakko5088 DId you catch why he prefers to call himself communist? If the answer was in there it was very muddled.

@@TheLivirus the answer was that all current ideologies (or whatever you call it) liberalism social democracy fascism Singapore or whatever are not capable of properly tackling let alone solving current problems. the most pressing ones being climate related but others also. so he thinks an entire new system has to be thought up that does not rely on the free market to solve every problem and he calls that communism.

He looks at politics like he looks at economics. He wants to remove every bit of humanity from it and turn it into an academic discipline to avoid personal responsibility.

Zizek's humor isn't right wing, he has more than two jokes

Conservative humor is just finding different ways to call trans people subhuman

@@danilthorstensson8902 It seems reductive, but I cannot recall a single instance when a conservative i know has ever made a joke regarding cultural or political issues that didn't have a disgust for a certain portion of the population be the joke itself.

When he was exasperated he was like "this is the humour of my youth" dude same and im on my 20s I dont know what kind of disaster happened in the industrialized countries but my country's progressives all have the same humour

C Mikhail good side of the algorithm 25:57 “If a state (that’s the idea) spies on people enough and allows machine learning systems to incorporate their behavior and respond to it, it is possible to provide for everyone’s needs better than a democracy could.’_ That’s the idea..”

One could indeed argue that the French Assurance Maladie and that the British NHS were inspired by the Semashko system put in place in the USSR... with the distinction that they were actually somewhat competent and efficient, the only successes of the Semashko system being in widespread immunization, not so much for the rest of healthcare acts (it's one thing to offer care to everyone, it's another for this care to actually be of quality, involve well trained professionals and actually increase the quality of life and life expectancy of its patients). Then again, it can be easily argued that the movements promoting these systems predate the USSR, having their roots in the late 19th century.

@@ethancampbell2422 I was speaking from a grass-roots activism perspective but yes, I'm sure the NHS is better than the old soviet system, if for no other reason than it's modern.

@@jmanakajosh9354 Before its fall, the Soviet Union boasted the highest rates of literacy in Europe, lowest rates of child mortality in Europe, a life expectancy to rival the richest of Western states, and was itself responsible for multiple medical breakthroughs in the field of cardiothoracic surgery, bacteriophage therapy, and so on. The idea that Semashko was inferior to the NHS - which at the time had to bribe doctors through repeated concessions and became highly bureaucratic and alienating ignores the historical achievements of state-borne healthcare. In point of fact, the very contradictions that gave rise to the frictions in the NHS are now being used today, to strangle it. The betrayal of working class demands to have local control over their own NHS trusts and be able to ringfence their own healthcare funding as well as participate in their own delivery of healthcare was the compromise that Aneurin Bevan had to make to the doctors. This centralisation of funding decisions in Westminster allows austerity to be practiced on NHS trusts at will. And today, with hospital waiting times at sky high, and New Labour and Conservative policies driving state-mandated inefficiency through forced private contracting, forced contracting of the NHS bureaucracy, and steady, annual cuts to the NHS, the system is on the brink of collapse. It took a CIA backed coup and billions of dollars from the National Endowment of Democracy flooding into Russia to prop up Boris Yeltsin who proceeded to privatise everything by force. Within 5 years, life expectancy drops some 25 years to be the lowest on the continent. Child mortality soars as does the exploitation of women who can no longer rely on a state-borne childcare and obstetrics system and who are forced to stay in bad relationships in order to raise their families in an atomised way. Deaths from hospital acquired infections soared as even the cleaners at the hospital were forced to turn to begging on the street to support themselves. The stories you hear of the horrors of Semashko come not from the Soviet Union at its height, but at the moment of its CIA backed collapse.

If ever a term like _cringe_ was appropriate

The nostalgia argument is particularly weird. Zizek criticizes Yugoslavia all the time and has written a ton on his theories and opinions. Yet Cowen hinges his whole argument on like "You said you like communist media. So you must just be silly"

But don’t make it a drinking game! “...and so on and so on.” Gulp... Don’t go there. You won’t make it.

I died

Well he lived in Yugoslavia from 1975-1990 they lived better than anyone else on planet ... Imagine country with free health care free education system and Yugoslavia educational system was wow compared to others ... He lived in system where you finish school and job is already waiting for you and you work in the same company until retirement in company which gives you apartment and send you on holidays in they own company owned resort almost for free In country where drugs and prostitution and criminals you could see only on the TV ... Where people hardly lock the doors ...where almost everyone was middle class where you had tons of days off during year .... where you are not just number in place where you work many other unbelievable things what people in west and all around globe could only wish for and dream to have .... If you lived in Yugoslavia you would be communist like him hahaha but Yugoslavia after 1970 was more like social democracy than like communist state

@Sean Davis I mean.... yeah?

Sean Davis ...how?

Sean Davis toxic ignorant baby, hey.

Communism has been around for almost two hundred years, it is not revolutionary or daring, it has been an abject failure.

@@andrewharris3900 are you that thick?

I hate liberals. I like real Leftists.

@RED PILL PORTAL Well Stalinism wasn't particularly intellectual. :-D Zizek mentions the Frankfurt school in this speech when he talks about former Yoguslavia and his life there. I think its you who need to embrace the wast span of intellectual schools, directions and movements growing from Marxist ideology and socialist and communist theory. Its not all the same, not at all. So before you revert to judging and opting out, try to study some of the stuff you pretend to be interested in. Do you want a serious argument for a week or more? Put a socialist and a communist in the same room. And they will still fiercly disagree at the end of it. (Come to think of it: Maybe that's why Stalin took over back then?)

@@iamnotevenanumber3312 communism is a spirit of openness to otherness, but not in the sense that your brains fall out you know..

@categorille8330 Soooooo very true. I've been trying to find and connect with ant pro-feminist trans groups to counter the massive press given from media to reactionary trans groups in the battles over sport competition and bathroom use. Thanks for ANY leads as www hasn't revealed anything.

It's hard for your side to be critical when you have no solid basis for being critical. Your whole ideology rests on inclusion and laissez-faire groupthink, which is really just a way of saying your side is intellectually incoherent. I've never seen a partisan group so proud of themselves for sounding so illogical and clownish.

​@@BrianbeesandbikesDo you want transwomen in womens sports?

​@@-AxisA-I want you to touch some grass after going outside for the first time in ten years instead of bringing dumb logical fallacies into a conversation that has no basis in the question you're asking

​@@networknomad5600that's a lot of projection there buddy lol

My main problem is that he calls things right wing that are just very basic, down to earth, agreeable. He accepted that SJWs and the whole political correctness movement and so on were leftists. Zizek's point is exactly the opposite, that these people are not leftists and should be (like anyone else) more leftist. I've seen this a lot with people who aren't familiar with the real left. If you accept this progressive mainstream as the left, then you're already lost, but very typical for our public debating culture nowadays. If you're not saying you support trans people you're a fascist, if you don't like Jeff Bezos you're a commie and so on.

These people love police states as long as they're open to foreign investors. They would absolutely be fine with China if they dyed their flag blue.

Thank you.

I think Zizek explains very clear (in this video and other places) why he still calls himself a communist. Zizek believes that modern-day capitalism is not enough to confront issues we have today (ecology and so on) there needs to be some kind of new alternative emerge. Zizek calls his idea of a post-capitalist society ”communist.”

Cowen is a pos

academic discourse needs official sanction does it? what a twat.

@@axeman2638 "what a twat."at least we have something in common

I think he meant " anesthetized." 1. to administer an anesthetic to (a person or animal), especially so as to induce a loss of consciousness. 2. deprive of feeling or awareness. Edit: I just noticed you said, "dictionary of theory" and not just dictionary.

the video/audience questions were much better.

@Elias Håkansson because Cowen's claim was that progressivism was on the retreat and that "centrist"/"moderate" candidates were in the lead. It is also worth noting that Harris, a largely progressive candidate, was the 4th place competitor with Buttigeig - so it seems to me that in terms of leading candidates - the progressive vs. moderate situation is entirely competitive. Buttigeig being in 4th, behind two/three progresive candidates kind of nullifies Cowen's point. Additionally, it is worth saying that Sanders has set the agenda of the Democratic party. Biden is still talking about "continuing obamacare" or whatever, while every other candidate has a policy that either is either medicare-for-all or is some kind of half measure towards it. Even "moderate" Buttigeig's claim for example (Which imo is disingenuous), is a public option which is meant to build up to medicare for all - "medicare for all who want it".

@@jimbobnazerene3969 Kamala Harris was most certainly not a 'largely progressive' candidate.

Julius C. In an American setting, yeah she is. She supported the Medicare for all bill, has reasonable positions on justice reform, raising mininum wage to 15, fix campaign spending, carbon tax, etc.... To be clear, I'm no fan of Kamela and never have been. Her time in the California justice dept was horrifying in many instances for sure. She also waffled on some issues. Her foreign policy is pretty status quo/hawkish. But on domestic policy at face value, she is largely progressive, especially when comparing it to status quo American politics which has been drifting right for 50+ years.

@@jimbobnazerene3969 Not even by American standards. She dropped in the polls as soon as she walked back on medicare for all, and would flip flop on issues following polling data. She was another centrist candidate, liberals recognized she peaked early and jumped ship to more electable candidates like Biden or Buttigeg.

instead of being the force of pure provocative chaos he usually is i agree. very refreshing. I knew he had it in him.

Zizek so often fails to stand up for the honor of the USSR

@@kobajughashvili3444 **Communism

Koba Jughashvili The USSR wasn’t communist LOL.

@@domoroboto8752 Zizek stands up for communism more than he does the USSR.

Or probably longer than an hour

as an anglophone that struggles sometimes with Zizek's accent, this would be appreciated for future uploads.

Volume button

My favorite part of any debate or otherwise philosophically related video is all the enlightened genius philosophers that type out 15 paragraphs on how they have ascended this mortal plane and can declare with every detail who had won and how the winner of the debate is indecipherable to everybody but them because of the sheer force of their intellect.

lovely missing of the point there, thanks for the contribution

Mats Sypriansen V A P O R W A V E

Mats Sypriansen I feel this take is missing it’s counterpart as it pertains to the rest of the world. American culture is globalist culture as far as I can tell. The same neoliberalism we see forced on say all EU nations even the unwilling Poland is the same neoliberal empire being propagated and amplified from Washington and Hollywood. Capital’s control over our being isn’t relegated to mere physical plastic products but a set of ideas that increase the rapidity of capitals growth and hegemony cover the world and everyone in it. Practically every element of so called progressive solutions to mankind’s issues is manufactured for an end determined by capital.

What? You're trying to discredit an *individual person's* arguments because of where they were born? Also-it's always eye-rolling to come across any version of this argument, especially when the person is using an American media platform to say it. "American culture is so vapid and dumb... let me go gram and tweet that from my iPhone, hit up reddit, upvote a baby yoda meme, watch an episode of my favorite tv show, The Leftovers or Breaking Bad, and listen to Drake."

@@steviewonder417 I certainly agree that neoliberalism's perniciousness extends beyond the mere application of nostalgia, but I wanted to comment on that specifically because of how insistent the interviewer was about Zizek discarding his, which, if you think about it, is actually an extension of the cultural imperialism you refer to.

@@jamiegoodnight863 I'm discrediting an individual person because of his myopic perspective. He is telling Zizek that his nostalgia is problematic, while blind to how his own nostalgia is far more harmful (which you inadvertently point out in your comment). Also, please endeavour to be more interesting than "Yet you live in a society, I am very smart". It's not a compelling conversation to have.