On the Difficulty of the Ethico-Political Act

From Žižek’s and Daly’s book Conversations with Žižek (Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2004), pp. 71-72:

“The result of all this is that, for Lacan, the Real is not impossible in the sense that it can never happen—a traumatic kernel which forever eludes our grasp. No, the problem with the Real is that it happens and that’s the trauma. The point is not that the Real is impossible but rather that the impossible is Real. A trauma, or an act, is simply the point when the Real happens, and this is difficult to accept. Lacan is not a poet telling us how we always fail the Real—it’s always the opposite with the late Lacan. The point is that you can encounter the Real, and that is what is so difficult to accept.”