Slavoj Zizek on Trump, Brexit and fake news

Marxist philosopher, Slavoj Zizek, on the surge in populist politics in the US and UK after the election of Donald Trump and vote for Brexit. Subscribe for more Channel 4 News exclusives: bit.ly/LtASif.

[@BlakeSiefken]

When Zizek tugs on his shirt, it's not simply that he's tugging on his shirt. It's that he's not NOT tugging on his shirt. The absence of no shirt tug illustrates the Hegelian disparity between shirts that are tugged and shirts that are not tugged. For a shirt to be truly un-tugged, it has to first be tugged.

[@whoever_81]

Love you man

[@Agostoic]

Yes but what if the opposite is also true, I claim.

[@diaberumonk3580]

Blake Siefken This is the totality of the shirt tug. *sniff*

[@petretepner8027]

He bought his shirt when it still fit him, now it no longer does.

[@JohnSmith-fw1yz]

But Kants categorical imperative tho

[@ssach7]

and so on and so on... Viva Slavoj!

[@TheMdog8]

He said it as I read this comment, but I guess the chances of that are pretty high.

[@rannnoch]

That fucking tie jesus christ What did he mean by this??

[@MattyP62618]

I would prefer not to

[@slukky]

Bartleby

[@slukky]

Methinketh that the foundation of freedom is the ability to say, I refuse.

[@tyd8854]

Everyone's very impressed that you got the reference.

[@slukky]

Oh! Was there a hater? I hadn't noticed. Must've been a child. Hmmm.

[@MattyP62618]

what's going on???

[@jandillingh]

I'm actually really surprised that they let him speak for this long. i've seen some other interviews that zizek did with the British media and that was the exact opposite of this. especially considering how polemic his opinions are, i think it's pretty fucking cool that they actually let him finish and get his points across. I'm not used to this on tv, but i think i like it

[@guillaumeglade1857]

It's funny how the word "Marx" and his way of speaking disoriente viewers only to avoid commenting on what he actually says in the video. Zizek has indeed many reasons to be a pessimist...

[@technodroog]

BUT, he specifically says he's not a pessimist.

[@paradigmarson9586]

Zizek disorientates viewers by repeatedly contradicting himself. Every time he speaks, he searches first not for an answer that's in the conventional sense, but a response that is true in the Marxist sense of practicality in transforming historical circumstances. You have nobody but him to blame for his dishonesty.

[@douwehuysmans5959]

Could you give an example of a contradiction he made here with a timestamp? I'm having trouble finding it.

[@boijorzee]

Zizek has got it right here. We do need a new vision for the left urgently. The pseudo intelectual radical identity politics have crippled left wing ideology for too long. Instead of having an outward looking vision we are reduced to a being sort of self-help group for all who can label themselves as being oppressed in some way. Serious debate can not happen in a climate were everyone is afraid not to step on the toes of someone else. So the first step in the healing process should be a refocus on matters that effect humanity as a whole instead of the individual. The second step should be a formulation of a new vision for the future. Internationalism has to be a key ingredient here to counter the grab of power of nationalistic populists. People are sick and tired of working for a system that only exist to support itself. It has resulted in a lack of pride that the right is quickly filling with nationalistic nonsense.

[@adamdavis5056]

And so on

[@TheJackSparring]

and so forth.

[@Patrick-jj5nh]

Well Zizek says public is not stupid but commenters here are trying hard to prove him right. The man sums up the problems of most of the "right-wing" "anti-left liberal" people here but they are unable to comprehend him.

[@awesomeavenger2810]

☂ ⬅ This might come in handy next time you watch.

[@stephenpavlov8942]

What did he sum up? How did explain that we shouldn't want freedom and we shouldn't want to take care of ourselves?

[@PoetOfNoise]

@Stephen Pavlov: Nothing about not "taking care of yourself", but about how the promise of "taking care of yourself" in private stands in blatant contradiction to everything in the big picture being already settled and long taken care of.

[@stephenpavlov8942]

PoetOfNoise I don't get that? No promise is involved or owed in being an individualist.

[@PoetOfNoise]

I shortly hesitated in using the word "promise" for expecting such an answer but yes, it is the promise of being in control of the conditions of your existence by narrowing the perspective down to the set of options, pseudo-options and substitute-options that you have in designing your private life.

[@not2tees]

Good to see and hear Zizek again, with his Bartleby T. He's worried, as good intellectuals must always be.

[@QuadrivialArts]

I liked his point about how supposing a universality to facts has been something the Left has been very recently excluding from their topics in the context of identity politics. How this comparison hasn't been drawn out more when there was this "alternative facts" outcry I simply do not understand. Elements of the Left have been gorging themselves on alternative facts and alternative narratives for years now.

[@QuadrivialArts]

So is what you just said about truth being relative an absolute fact, then? Besides the problem of using an example of a hypothetical (travelling at light speed is impossible as we know it, mass becomes a de facto changing variable) to try and prove fact, and one that's so derivative when considering the subject matter, you really ought to recognise that questions of philosophy are not subservient to science. That isn't to say that science can't inform philosophy, but your argument is poor.

[@nelsondisalvatore9812]

black lesbian single mother with aids?! heck that's a rare Pokemon if I ever saw one.

[@benjaminhennessy8050]

Nelson Di Salvatore Notice he never explains what he was arguing about with her.

[@PristianoPenaldoSUIIII]

*sniff* *shirt tug*

[@dustiny.334]

ehh, ehh, how should i put it?

[@mattgilbert7347]

Whatever, whatever

[@mmmhorsesteaks]

Dnt Wry and so on and so on...

[@weltgeist2604]

Eh, but I think I think Tramp will be a blow to the establishment. (Rubs nose and eyes)

[@mmmhorsesteaks]

Angus Rhodes but what if the opposite is true!

[@radu1337]

I think I know what's going on, fake news is not just fake, it's also satisfying and entertaining for the people reading it. That's why they don't care if it's true. I wondered how this came to be a thing, and I'm now surprised it didn't happen earlier, people can chose the content that they spend time to consume online, for a while everyone tried to keep it mainstream, but real life sucks and the real news was sometimes fake too, or had gigantic blindspots. I guess we all got tired of it, and drifted more and more towards the ever flowing river of clickbait, which was always there as it constantly performed better than anything else.

[@theresbob8878]

I remember newspaper days. That said...editors and advertisers made sure the paper was producing facts. However, copy people were also paid by the word...so sometimes you had to dig a little to find the truth nugget.

[@jennykiss2235]

Ioan-Radu Tanasescu people get the reward center of their brain triggered by outrage

[@ilonastarilona80]

i like zizek because sometimes your mind needs a little shake...

[@robertvel4051]

Slavoi is never allowed to have a properly working mic and I love it

[@thomassimmons1950]

Nails it!

[@Danny-vg1jz]

does this count as fake news as he's not sitting in front of a canal but a blue screen ?

[@Deantrey]

When he started talking about personal freedom I was like damn...never thought about it that way.

[@GeneralX0]

This is on-point.

[@ELGRANMEGA]

And so on and so on!!!

[@SeanDDaily]

"I just want to interrupt you, Mr. Zizek..." *_"Bitch you don't interrupt the Zizek."_*

[@atomknight8361]

I want that shirt

[@slukky]

another underemployed english major??

[@4455matthew]

amazing.

[@Tracydot3]

I love this man.

[@windokeluanda]

I like the message of t-shirt as well! ☺

[@Jeekossagee]

And so on and so on

[@douwehuysmans5959]

20:56 What was cut out here?

[@peterkohlmetzmoller]

That slovenian river looks delightful! hahaha :-D

[@vergruizerful]

are those angles with ak's on his tie? why?

[@scottmialltablet]

"Isn't there a difference between news that is based on lies that are intended to deceive, and news based on missing information?" No. No there is not. Both are lying - one is lying by making things up, one is lying by omission or by misrepresenting the truth. Both are lies. Personally I prefer the outright liar rather than someone lying by omission or misrepresentation of the truth.

[@Jkr-ok7om]

What if the missing info he is talking about is just that - missing information, which the media cannot present due to it being missing? Not defending those cocksuckers, but just curious.

[@lukasanderson1341]

I'm impressed he wasn't so long-winded in this one.

[@SummumBonum.]

One thing, is this one...

[@pixelissue]

I DON'T KNOW WHAT WE'RE YELLING ABOUT!

[@eckbertwickleberry4911]

I would prefer and so on... and so on...

[@hpalpha7323]

I need that shirt

[@AcousticJuice93]

Most of the time it's actually a lot more subtle. Take the ABC here in Australia. It's presented as a neutral news source but 100% has a leftist agenda from the decisions of which stories to run and the way they're portrayed, to the negative or positive tonal inflection by the presenters. To me this is more insidious thing about the news.

[@aurorareedy-solano7788]

Where does he mention TS Elliot

[@Roobarb69]

11:55 to 12:10 is the best part

[@em19jay88eff]

Loving the unnecessary green screen

[@waldroj01]

I think the lack of vision is the biggest plague...

[@alma6537]

interesting opinions ... and os on!

[@Caligula138]

I need that damn shirt

[@trytwicelikemice7516]

The left does need to get back to where is was in '45: potent, visionary, creative... The thing that scares me is what we had to go through to reach that point in '45. Zizek is dead right for me, long term optimism but short term pessimism. The big question, which i suppose nobody knows the answer to, is how bad and how long will the bad spell last for. I think it's down to the sane left to not be defeatist, but to make the next decade as painless as possible. Either way it's going to get pretty grim, but we can try to lessen the damage.

[@SEEVCar]

Did he slip up and say "wikipedia" instead of wikileaks?

[@njits789]

Is 'Brexit' mentioned in the title as some sort of clickbait or what?

[@hole1274]

His wobbly chair kind of bugs me.

[@mateuszlaskowski3123]

love his accent

[@Snafuski]

Why are people angry? Because they are bored out of their minds by the staggering banality of their lives they see reflected in the FB, Insta, SnapChatty pages of their friends and colleagues... Idle minds.

[@slukky]

That's certainly part of it. Add to it the loss of the authority which my generation, early boomers, looked up to-- thank God for the Internet-- & the total irrelevance of govts, it all adds up to a simmering global emesis (upchuck).

[@BaphiaMusic]

beautiful lublyana river

[@victorblackley8372]

Here the reverse is true! I claim.

[@HamidRehman100794]

Michael Johns I am always reminded of Yoda when he says that

[@Wills_Duffy]

...th anger you wonder why about - bank bailouts. Not rocket science.

[@chrisbennett606]

He spoke a lot of sense

[@AlmightyDude420]

Is the channel 4 man really wearing a tie with angels holding an ak-47 or am I tripping?

[@andrewroberts8139]

Zizek rocking his Bartleby T-shirt. Note to self - must get one!

[@bigscarybomb]

lol that tie

[@8DX]

Zizek twerking his belly-shirt: he moved from his nose, lol.

[@xabier1375]

10:27 You are welcome.

[@solatockapreloma-veckotins3544]

Še to: Na posnetku naj bi bilo z izrecno navedbo jasno napisano, da je nastal v Ljubljani, da je v ozadju pogled s tega pa tega mostu Ljubljane, glavnega mesta Slovenije, ki je država, iz katere je Žižek, mislec svetovnega formata. Tako. Da se ve!

[@MrDXRamirez]

You cannot have an independent media if it is owned by a corporation or several corporations have controlling interest in that media organization.

[@livthedream91]

"The only way to know it's true is when the government denies it"... Add the mainstream media and the corporate culture who own both of these and you have it covered.

[@YAMI-co8fq]

I would prefer not to grap my T-shirt, but I can't .

[@ImberFuscinae]

"haha, if you get it".

[@shkeni]

Zizek's face at 5:40 xD

[@destroydate7887]

(I) love the public access television look.It adds to the intensity of "full blown kook".

[@drdanielitoto]

something is bothering him,?what are those movements of his right hand ???

[@potenviking]

omg. Rational reasoning.

[@malenag8335]

Although we are wiser and better informed??? What a joke.

[@jennykiss2235]

Zizek is my dad

[@ruben1956]

Slavoj! Das T-Shirt vrrutscht schn wdr!!!

[@gnomes7385]

No social upward mobility kills democracy

[@ditty88]

in the face of all these "fake news" accusations, I guess we gotta do our own research. which sucks, cuz I'm lazy, but that's the only answer.

[@drdanielitoto]

look his right hand. Strange tick !!!

[@abside30glu]

LEED… PLEASE READ ! BUT MORE THAN ANYTHING LISTEN AND UNDERSTAND PROF SLAVOJ ZIZEĶ. 2017.12.15. HAVE A WONDERFUL X MAS !

[@DidTheySayCheese]

"Twitting"

[@thomassimmons1950]

That's what I say: What's the difference?

[@manishmishraji]

Is that cupid on his tie?

[@Jixejo]

its kind of very true. despite photographic evidence, which usuaully equals truth, it seems power-hungry people don't want to talk about obvious truths

[@thecasualfront7432]

My gott

[@ironmantis25]

Channel 4, just stop with the green screen. It's painfully obvious

[@osamelyvlk8962]

I think that Mr Žižek makes himself mad. Something of his words are true, but the others are foolies.

[@ashgiri94]

Gforce Majeure lmao

[@Jixejo]

political "anger",aka frustration, is always the little things, adding up to a frustrating existence within the confines of UK culture....you know... we want legal cannabis, but why can't we have it? instead young people are in paranoia about the police... fair gender wages? why can it not be a guarantee? fair treatment for disabled people, but our government doesn't listen, actually they stifle debate and the media usually co-operate in presenting misleading facts to the public, call it fake news or whatever, but its basically a truth that has been covered up, and we are presented with an answer to our own question of legal cannabis for instance, which we already know the facts about, but we are presented with something called the truth by the media and politicians, but in fact is a misleading representation of the actual medical and spiritual facts about psychdelic plants, its not even a spin, its just a cover-up of the facts and a misleading alternative presented to the public in its place, and its not good, because we all know and experience the actual truth.

[@adamproduction6834]

Let's be honest. Some questions Kant be answered. There's only the paradox, that the truth we call truth that we can see with out eyes and sometimes hear it is truth for us because for a dog or a fly there is different perception so perspective existence is a theory without answer.

[@77Night77Shade77]

LET'S BEGIN BY TALKING ABOUT JOURNALISTS. WHY DO YOU THINK WE SUDDENLY LIVE IN AN ERA IN WHICH WE HAVE TO SHOUT ALL OF THE TIME, FOR NO REASON?!

[@esorengaard]

god that bluescreen is terrible.

[@kaic6694]

- you can pick up the job that you want, HAHA, if you get it, and so on

[@jewelsbypodcasterganesh]

12:06 Zizek not speaking

[@humblestman]

monetary economics is the root problem...abundance and freedom from servitude are at odds with artificial scarcity...They reek havoc on profit and earning a living. modern technological advances are being hindered by our archaic philosophy...we're still arguing the same points from 5000 years ago, with different faces. We can have abundance, we just have to put down tokens.

[@jiminy_cricket777]

someone needs to tell Slavoj that Jon Stewart has been off the air for like a year...

[@donaleveck2417]

People might be better informed, but "Wiser"? I don't think so.

[@simulacrum47]

Let's play a drinking game: whenever he tugs his shirt, we drink

[@technodroog]

Zizek being provocative and interesting, as usual. Some great points. But, Slavoj - perhaps, if you wear a shirt that's not, erm, form fitting to your round belly, you wouldn't have to adjust it every 5 seconds ;)

[@daPawlak]

so is żiżek called fascist already on leftbook?

[@incognito509b]

It is interesting... whole intelectual activity of Zizek was to deconstruct "Big other", that is metaphysical ideas [objectivity, reality, truth, absolute, ideals - as something idependent] - now he is saying that erasing of that "big other" in media is a problem. It is fundamentally inconsistent.

[@winstonsmith09]

His English is better than Trump's

[@benjaminhennessy8050]

He's out of his depths.

[@sebastiancespedes5842]

21:00

[@MrEliphasdesni]

Ko boste vi govorili slovensko tako dobro, kot on govori angleško, takrat bomo na istem. Do takrat pa ne LAJAJTE!

[@Danilaschannel]

The host doesn't even know what a lie by omission is

[@matthewsnyder674]

Zizek should have ended this interview by swan diving nude into the "river".