They are both Enfants
terribles of their field. And they have been fighting for a long time from
afar: the radical Marxist Slavoj Žižek and the neo-conservative psychology
professor Jordan Peterson. Now they meet in Toronto. Who will win?
René Scheu
13.4.2019, 05:30 clock
[TRANSLATED BY A STUPID
COMPUTER]
INTERVIEWER: Mr. Žižek, all
right?
SLAVOJ: Oh God, yes, we wanted
to talk. I'm just in a bit of a panic, I have to finish some manuscripts
and prepare for this stupid Toronto event.
INTERVIEWER: They meet with
Jordan Peterson, the neo-conservative mastermind of a new masculinity. Why
are you actually going into the lion's den?
SLAVOJ: Quite simply, he
provoked me, and I accepted the provocation. After all, I'm not a
coward. If you want a fight then you should get it.
INTERVIEWER: You criticized
him quite harshly in the Independent?
SLAVOJ: Right. But I did
not throw him the gauntlet. He did that.
INTERVIEWER: Let's leave the
personal. What attracts you in content in the fight?
SLAVOJ: Again, I want to place
a simple message: For people who are dissatisfied with left-liberal dogma, that
is, political correctness, identity politics, and cultural relativism, Jordan
Peterson is not the only answer. We, the good old left, are a valid
alternative here.
INTERVIEWER: The dispute
between the two of them has been ignited by the concept of cultural
Marxism. Peterson accuses Marxists like you of wanting to transform people
with new language and behavioral codes.
SLAVOJ: That I do not
laugh! Peterson's image of the enemy is clear - the politically correct,
egalitarian, superethic, resentful, and envy-driven left. Okay, there are
such people, but they are certainly not the Marxists: Marxists behave
exactly the other way round. These left-liberals are those who sustain the
capitalist order by giving it a human face!
INTERVIEWER: The politically
correct left-liberal are in your eyes - as Lenin would say - useful idiots of
the system?
SLAVOJ: Exactly. They
conceive of man as a fluid, flexible subject who can always reinvent himself -
indeed, in order to liberate himself from patriarchy. The range of
reinventions ranges from sexual orientation to careers. And the left
liberals sell that as a great freedom. Such bullshit! What they did
without realizing it is - in Marxist terms - the very core of bourgeois
subjectivity. And the left-liberals can only do that because they live
well and are privileged. In contrast, ordinary people suffer because they
do not know today if they have a job tomorrow and how they can bring the family
through. Ordinary working people do not want more, but less flexibility.
INTERVIEWER: Now you almost
sound like Peterson!
SLAVOJ: For heaven's sake,
no. I am the alternative to Peterson. What I say is trivial. It
can be read in the "Communist Manifesto". It says: "The
bourgeoisie has destroyed all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic conditions."
Celebrating all the movements against the alleged patriarchy in which we still
live is pure nostalgia and only cemented the prevailing order. And that
consists, as in the past, of good old capitalists, that is, retirees with no
income. People, wake up! To put it bluntly: Political correctness,
identity politics and gender thinking are the bourgeoisie's last defense
against a much more radical, emancipatory change of system.
INTERVIEWER: They preserve
Marxist radicalism. Feminists do not make you popular with your view of
things.
SLAVOJ: At the wise
already. Genuine Marxists, just as serious feminists, never simply opposed
patriarchy, as if everything male was toxic. Max Horkheimer shows in his
study "Authority and Family" from 1936 very nicely how the paternal
role is not to be despised - on the contrary: A strong father figure can offer
young people a role model to defy the social conformism. And conversely,
it is the weak, impotent father who tends to violence and also to
totalitarianism.
INTERVIEWER: They are talking
in rage. Still, again - I'm afraid, Peterson and you are too united in
essential assessments. And for the nuances of differences and different
motivations, only a few are likely to be interested.
SLAVOJ: That's not
true. Take #MeToo. Peterson is absolutely against it, for him this is
merely an expression of a gender struggle that is going on to the detriment of
men. I see it differently. My heroine is Tarana Burke, a black
American activist who used the buzzword "Me Too" back in
2006. It was never about the mood of the affluent and the world stars in
the film business, which are disadvantaged, but the harassment and abuse of
millions of women in everyday life. In a letter she deeply regretted the
turn the #Metoo movement took in 2017. And she is right. The movement
was hijacked by crazy feminists: suddenly it was no longer about equal rights
of men and women, but men's hostility.
INTERVIEWER: Once again, you
agree in the end. Peterson is rude that men are becoming more and more
male and women more and more male. You cannot leave it that way, right?
SLAVOJ: That's way too
easy. Because what, please, should be the male and what the feminine
principle? Peterson takes care of himself by referring to Jungian
archetypes. The male means order, the female stands for the
chaotic. Not correct. There is, of course, a feminine and masculine
form of order and disorder. I think that this kind of metaphysical
psychoanalysis a la Jung is behind us.
INTERVIEWER: The point,
however, is that Peterson also relies on evolutionary biology findings.
SLAVOJ: On the other hand, I
have no objections in principle - no reasonable person can deny that there are
biological differences between men and women that partly shape their
behavior. If Peterson pulls out against those who represent sex and sexual
orientation as an object of free choice, then he is at least half
right. Because it is not that easy - and not so harmless. Man emerges
quite late in evolution and is a strange being. It is characterized by
something completely new that we still do not understand exactly - we call it
freedom. But that does not mean that every human being, so to speak, frees
himself from scratch. Whoever speaks thus is an ideologue. Referring
to your example: Of course, there are biological men who feel like a
woman, and that is a human phenomenon. At the same time, however,
this is not an absolutely free choice of the individual - it is, so to speak, a
forced free choice, which is associated with much suffering. I do not
choose my gender or my orientation as I choose my favorite cake in the
bakery. That's what many gender theorists simply do not want to
understand.
INTERVIEWER: In any case, a
fundamental difference in content between you and Peterson is obvious: you want
to change the global capitalist order, and you do not do that. Peterson is
more modest - he says in one of his rules: Clean up your room first before
calling for a system change.
SLAVOJ: Everyone should first
wipe their own door, that has never hurt. But that's just not enough,
because it winds leaves and dirt of your environment in front of your
door. And do you want to eliminate the dirt of the others day in and day
out? So, your question is a wrong choice. It's not about either-or,
it's about doing both - wiping at your own door and working on the system
change.
INTERVIEWER: Their debate is
reminiscent of the coincidence between Noam Chomsky and Michel Foucault in
1971. Although both were determined leftists, the roles were clearly divided:
Chomsky gave the precise thinker, Foucault spoke more
conspiratorial. Which part do you strive for?
SLAVOJ: Chomsky was a
naturalist, Foucault historian, Chomsky was even farther left than Foucault at
that time. That's a wonderful paradox. Such a combination is hardly
conceivable today, and the left are now all convinced constructivists - except
for the Marxists. The debate will therefore not run along this dividing
line. Peterson and I are both outcasts. We are both cut from all sorts
of groups and have to punch through ourselves. We are both
entertainers. We both do not know what we got involved with. We will
see it on April 19th.
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