if there was ever a film about Phallus, this is it

The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology

http://www.versobooks.com/blogs/1159

Why? It’s ideology, stupid. After his 1,200-page Lacanese-Hegelian philosophical treatise, Žižek has returned to his other prism—popular culture. The Pervert’s Guide to Ideology, Director Sophie Fiennes new film with Žižek, premiered at the 56th BFI London Film Festival next week to a packed cinema. As I watched the 90-minute cinematic remix of various twentieth-century films including Zabriski Point, The Sound of Music, They Live, The Titanic, Seconds, Taxi Driver and more, Zizek in his characteristically witty style, explained his concept of ideology.

In its most basic form, ideology is the discursive frame within which our world is produced, but we are not aware of it. As Žižek notes in The Sublime Object of Ideology, this comes from Marx’s Capital: “Sie wissen das nicht, aber sie tun es’”—“they do not know it, but they are doing it”. But there is another step, developed by the Frankfurt school, that points to the deeper problem of ideology—reality cannot reproduce itself without it. Or as Žižek says, “The mask is not simply hiding the real state of things; the ideological distortion is written into its very essence”. After the fall of the Soviet Union and the unipolarity of global capitalism championed by the United States was firmly established, the notion that we are living in a “post-ideological” world permeated the mainstream. This idea of a “post-ideological” world, is precisely what Žižek attacks, both in his academic work, and this film.

The ‘post-ideological’ is a position supposedly without illusions: “they know what they are doing, and they are doing it”. But for Žižek, the illusion lies is the reality of doing itself: “They know that, in their activity, they are following an illusion, but still they are doing it” or “they know that their idea of Freedom is masking a particular form of exploitation, but they still continue to follow this idea of Freedom”. In following a dream we are not absolved of the consequences of that dream in reality. 

the big Other

Stop the Crackdown against Russian Anti-Fascists! (open letter)

http://chtodelat.wordpress.com/2012/10/28/stop-the-crackdown-against-russian-anti-fascists-open-letter/

Original in Russian published here: www.colta.ru/docs/7991

The crackdown against anti-fascists in Russia has recently gained momentum. The country’s repressive law enforcement authorities view involvement in the anti-fascist movement as a crime in itself.

Moscow anti-fascists Alexey Sutuga, Alexey Olesinov, Igor Kharchenko andIrina Lipskaya are currently in jail in connection with dubious and unproven accusations of “disorderly conduct.” Anti-fascists Alexandra Dukhanina, Stepan Zimin, Alexey Polikhovich and Vladimir Akimenkov are among those accused of involvement in “mass riots” on Bolotnaya Square on May 6 in Moscow, when riot police brutally dispersed an authorized opposition rally. Clear evidence of their guilt still has not been presented.

In Nizhny Novgorod, law enforcement authorities are attempting to have anti-fascists declared an “extremist group.” Although on October 18 a court sent the case against the fictional organization “Antifa-RASH” (whose alleged IDs “anti-extremist” police detectives planted on activists during a search) back to the police for further investigation, the Nizhny Novgorod political police are unlikely to leave the activists alone. Igor Kharchenko has also been charged under this same article of the Russian criminal code (“involvement in the the activities of an extremist group”). Alexey Olesinov and Alexey Sutuga’s defense attorneys also expect that authorities will attempt to have their clients declared “extremists.”

The attorneys and comrades of the arrested activists believe this is being done to make it easier for police to prosecute anti-fascists and social activists. If guilty verdicts are returned in the Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod cases, a wave of similar “extremist” cases will follow all over Russia. Anti-fascists are today officially stigmatized as “extremists.” What is next? A court ban on anti-fascist views?

We consider it unacceptable that an individual can be persecuted simply for political views and activities dedicated to the fight against racism. We demand a fair and partial investigation in these criminal cases, and prosecution of all law enforcement officers who abuse their authority and flagrantly fabricate criminal cases against civil society activists.

[signed:]
Svetlana Reiter, journalist
Pavel Chikov, civil rights activist
Andrei Loshak, journalist
Oleg Kashin, journalist
Artyom Loskutov, artist
Pavel Pryanikov, gardener, journalist
Shura Burtin, journalist
Arkady Babchenko, war correspondent
Igor Gulin, poet, literary critic
Maria Kiselyova, artist
Ilya Budraitskis, leftist activist
Alexander Chernykh, journalist
Victoria Lomasko, artist
Anna Sarang, sociologist
Tatyana Sushenkova, photographer, artist
Jenny Kupren, journalist, political exile
Sergei Devyatkin, journalist, political exile
Mikhail Maglov, civic activist
Pavel Nikulin, journalist
Alexei Yorsh, artist,
Maria Klimova, journalist
Nikolay Oleynikov, artist
Alexander Tushkin, journalist
Daniil Dugum, journalist, anarchist
Andrei Krasnyi, artist
Dmitry Grin, artist
Alexander Litinsky, journalist
Isabelle Makgoeva, leftist activist
Yuliana Lizer, journalist, documentary filmmaker
Dmitry Vilensky, artist
Ilya Shepelin, artist
Tasya Krugovykh, photographer, filmmaker
Vyacheslav Danilov, political scientist
Tatyana Volkova, art critic
Yegor Skovoroda, journalist
Georgy Rafailov, leftist activist
Dmitry Tkachov, editor, journalist
Alexander Delfinov (Smirnov), poet, journalist
Nadezhda Prusenkova, journalist
Anton Nikolaev, artist
Yulia Bashinova, journalist
Denis Mustafin, artist
Matvei Krylov, artist
Olesya Gerasimenko, journalist
Grigory Tumanov, journalist

How to fix the USA

Slavoj Žižek talks new book, Occupy Wall Street at SIPA

http://www.columbiaspectator.com/2012/10/24/slavoj-Žižek-talks-new-book-occupy-wall-street-sipa

[…]

Žižek rose to prominence in his native Yugoslavia, where he said he was “a mid-level dissident, enough to be jobless but not enough to be arrested.” His popular anti-capitalist cultural philosophy attracted an overflowing crowd, some who had come from outside the University just to see him speak.
Žižek was at Columbia to talk about his new book, “2011: The Year of Dreaming Dangerously,” but he touched on a wide array of other topics. Moderator Stathis Gourgouris, professor of classics at Columbia, started this panel on “one of the most provocative thinkers of our time” by noting that “moderating Žižek is an impossible event.” Gourgouris, along with Lydia Liu of East Asian Languages and Bruce Robbins of English, admitted that they found it difficult to put up arguments against Žižek or stop him once he got going.

Building on the arguments in his book, which sold out at the door, Žižek cited many philosophers from the Core Curriculum, including Marx, Rousseau and his “big love,” Hegel. Paraphrasing one of Hegel’s central ideas in reference to the crises of 2011, Žižek said, “Before the Fall, paradise was stupid animality. Only retroactively can we generate the specter of what we have fallen from.” “2012: The Year of Dreaming Dangerously” is Žižek’s take on the revolutions and upheavals of 2011, which he said he views as key turning points in the questioning of capitalism.

Before these revolutions, he argued, capitalism was a dogma, de-politicized because it was such an unquestionable part of our society. “Here, there are more people who believe that Armageddon is coming than that capitalism should be adjusted,” Žižek said. But the global economic collapse began to rip a hole in the fabric of these dogmas, Žižek said.

“Bankers were always greedy. Capitalism as it is today cannot be regulated,” he said. “It simply gave them the tools to realize that greed.” This financial crisis, Žižek argued, led to Occupy Wall Street, the Arab Spring, and the upheavals in Europe. In this new multi-centric world, countries like China, which subscribe to ‘communist,’ non-traditional models of capitalism, are swiftly gaining the upper hand, he added. The world should start to question just what it means to go beyond the constraints of capitalism.

During the question and answer period, Žižek was confronted by a Maoist who wanted a debate. Instead of dismissing him, Žižek called out his arguments and set a date for the contest to thunderous applause and laughter.

[…]