Once again people missing the point of Zizek hegelian method of presentation, and conclusion. He is not advocating the soviet failure while saying it was a happy time, he is putting in check the notion of happiness, by comparing it with a failure. The biggest product in capitalism is happiness. Not in the notion that you can buy happiness directly from the product, that would be a pagan way of thinking, but by the notion that while buying it you achieves happiness on itself, the new pentecostal way to see it. Zizek is, of course, touching on ideology and how our happiness is based not in the pursue of it, but by the illusion of having it. That way Zizek also touches in the notion of Utopia. The only way to live "happy" at the utopia, is to never build it. Yes, Zizek can sound confusing at times, but he is very consistent, talking in hegelian terms about politics, while using Lacan for his reasoning and conclusion.
"Here the ways of men divide. If you wish to strive for peace of soul and happiness, then believe; if you wish to be a disciple of truth, then inquire." Friedrich Nietzsche
@@Yet.Another.Rapper.KiG.V2 They are just concepts. And anything I will say after this fact, will just be added or subtracted from the pool of concepts we draw from. Rather, whatever truth and happiness are, refer to something deeper, something unutterable. (Life) -- if that is an appropriate usage of the term here, is a movement towards that thing which is unutterable. And, in this movement we give things names, but they do not define us, nor construct our overall experiences. They are just tools of navigation, from which we draw upon, but they are not the totality of things as such.
Here I claim, that it is PRECISELY this RUclips algorithm, that is supposed to be so radicalizing and mind-numbing and so on and so on, that brings me to worthwhile new content and that, therefore, brings me happiness. * sniff *
Here I claim, that it is PRECISELY this RUclips algorithm, that is supposed to be so radicalizing and mind-numbing and so on and so on, that brings me to worthwhile new content to study and that, therefore, is an excuse for me to procrastinate studying for what I'm actually supposed to study.
Zizek is one of the those guys that I can describe as clickbait in human form. He leads you in with controversial statements and in just a few minutes he makes you feel stupid for ever thinking they were controversial.
Why is Stalin on the Thumbnail? People will think that Zizek sympathizes with Stalin an thats just wrong. He doesnt even talk about the Soviet Union, he talks about Czeckoslovakia and the pressure of the Soviet Union but not directly about the stalinist regime.
That actually triggered me (in a negative way, as a descendant of ČSSR refugees) and made me click the video. So it's not communist propaganda then and it's worth watching?
@@schweizer93 Im sorry my english isnt that good and i cant understand if you are serious or if you are sarcastic. I was just a little bit angry because I saw the thumbnail and the title of the video and it looked like zizek is telling stalinist propaganda even though he doenst.
Stalin was dead then but his picture was still on the billboards. So the thumbnail wasn't as inaccurate as you think. And where do you think Putin's FSB (ex KGB, ex NKVD) comes from?
1. He is not praising the Soviet Union. He is just using it as an example. 2. He does not advocate stagnation or disinterest in reaching one's own personal goals. He is just explaining that the pursuit of happiness will not lead you anywhere. You should instead work for a personal cause while being very careful not to find ways to avoid reaching your object of desire (so that you can continue being happy, or, in other words, constantly ruminating on the idea of how wonderful it would be to get that thing you want). He is definitely for productivity.
When I still see Chomsky being lauded as The World's Greatest Dissident, I think of Slovaj. Not to underestimate the greatness of Manufacturing Consent, but Slovaj is 100 times more in touch with real people and builds his immense theoretical scholarship on what we actually live. He makes Chomsky look like an amateur.
These two are not comparable at all, since only one of them is some kind of dissident at all. Chomsky actually does something to fight the existing capitalist-imperialist status quo. Zizek does nothing of the sort - on the contrary, when push comes to shove, he always defends it and attacks the revolts against it, as he also does here. Verbally backstabbing not only the Prague Spring, but even Corbyn is very much his style.
@@musicloverkathy Corbyn was mostly just a moderate social democratic reformist like Sanders in that he simply proposed a return to a post-WW2-style welfare state, a Keynesian rollback of the post-2009 austerity policies, re-nationalisation of the railways and undoing of the Thatcherite privatisations etc.; there were some very timid hints of actually transcending capitalism by introducing some worker participation in decision-making, but even this wasn't unprecedented - Germany has had such things for many decades. You didn't have to be a revolutionary socialist or Marxist in order to support Corbyn at all; any sort of socialist or social democrat worth the name would have supported him as a matter of course, as did Chomsky. On the other hand, it does take a revolutionary Marxist or some other kind of truly radical socialist - which Zizek supposedly is, too - to espouse the idea that capitalism shouldn't have been restored in 1960s Czechoslovakia and that the society we should be striving for is at least as similar to 1960s Czechoslovakia as it is to modern welfare-state capitalism. Or, with another emphasis - as *different* from modern welfare-state capitalism as 1960s Czechoslovakia was. Chomsky, as a libertarian socialist, aka (left-wing) anarchist, would probably agree at least with the latter formulation. All of these distinctions matter little in Zizek's case, of course. He is only a left-winger by the standard of the Daily Mail, meaning somebody who can pronounce the word 'Marx' without spitting. Although, strictly speaking, he fails even by that criterion, since he does spit whenever he is saying anything.
So according to the description of video: Stalin, who died in 1953, exerted strong pressure on Czechoslovakia since 1968? I'm just glad you got your facts right. Keep up the good work.
Stalin died in 1953. But that didn't mean everything changed. It was still the Communist Party of the Soviet Union making the decisions, for instance who they needed to invade that year. Like Xi in China: he's not exactly a Maoist, but it was Mao who put the Chinese Communist Party in a position of absolute power.
7:04 This kind of demonstrates how disconnected communists are from reality. It's all theories, theories, theories. Never have I been happier for *almost* getting something over having the thing. To the contrary, the fact that I was close to acquiring it but missed in the end elevates the ache even more.
Ok he missed the mark on that one , but how could you make a generalized statement about communism calling an opinion a " theory " communists came up with ?
The ideology is based on "People are miserable when they have too much (freedoms, money, material goods) - so why bother giving it to them?" There's some truth to that, but the Bolsheviks were a very hateful and cynical bunch of intellectuals who forced their hate and cynicism on tens of millions of people - very often (understatement of the 20th century) bringing them to a very early grave. Let people make their own mistakes!!!!!
@@fuckamericanidiot it is very clear to anyone reading that you’re pulling this out of your ass. you completely miss the point about what Zizek is saying but nonetheless generalize it as like “the official communist position” keep reading boy, stop embarrassing yourself in public
Happiness comes from comparison, you feel good when you are in a better situation than in the past, or you live better than other people nearby or above your level, or other people of other countries at the same or higher level. People feel unhappy when they are suffering, but if the government and media fool you that all people in other countries are more suffering, people feel much less pain (e.g. North Korea).
Just to correct the description: Stalin died in 1953, and the Prague Spring happened 15 years later, in 1968. Also, the official name of the country at this time was People's Republic of Chekolosvakia, if I am not remebering wrong.
@J S Yeah, you present some points I agree with. The 90s were definitely wild, but I believe that with such a radical change of the system, some naivity and instability can not only be expected, but is almost inevitable. However, I disagree with the sentiment that commies operated in some sort of a neutral hypothetical grey area. It was an oppressive regime! You can't just write all the atrocities off because people had jobs (also because unemployment was illegal and we can talk about the efficiency of some workers too) and had stuff to eat (kinda sucked if you wanted meat or some other basic groceries tho). While I'm not excusing what happened in the 90s - and the effect of that can still be seen today, in the form of oligarchs and general corruption (which I belive flourished under communism just as much) - I think it's very important not to understand the 90s as an indicative of the current system, which is objectively better. People are free, they're richer and they live better lives, which they were not allowed to live under communism.
@@dafyduck79 I mean, ANY totalitarianism is better than the party democracy we live in. I prefer to have one corrupt person over 300 corrupt people that pretend to be enemies of each other and involve the population into their stupid government. If you want to involve a family with the rest of the families in the nation it better just be through their jobs, as this is the natural way.
@@gabrielalbeldaochoa8234 i like your last sentence i mean free society means, that people voluntarily exchange goods and services without valuating property rights, with big accent on voluntarily
@@dafyduck79 Society is mainly the union of families to carry out tasks that one family on its own can't. Capitalism makes of that exchange of goods a divine entity that is independent from society when it actually was born through society.
Wow. Everyone should watch “Dear Comrades” by by Andrei Konchalovsky a 2020 film because it illustrates perfectly how this notion Zizek refers to works in real time.
So good that we have the genius Zizek to tell us what should make us happy and how we should feel under the yoke of an authoritarian regime! Oh great Zizek, lead us to the mediocre great future of a reasonably and gloriously average life and so on and so on!
I disagree. It feels like he has never lived under communism …. my country was part of USSR And he’s three points of what makes you happy doesn’t really apply in practical sense lots of people cheated and actually sold items which means engaged in capitalist system lots of people bought for him products that were illegal in USSR any nowhere you have a private life, snitches are everywhere. Peace is very relative term under communism
@@mmkw5621 then they dont understand that it was not possible to keep it long term. my grandma also misses it because my country flourished and improved under USSR but slowly cracks started to be seen and system collapsed
Happiness is easy, just give me 3 free days and Vodka. For me, the question is - what is there, that is worth suffering for? For what should I 'give' myself? Then I can ask - will I be appreciated, respected and adequately compensated - is the struggle real.
I disagree with his definition of happiness, what he describes is some superficial happiness but what about true fulfillment? Not that it is perceived at all times but I can say that I have perceived it at times that were quite different from the state that he describes. To me it is in the moment when I make progress, when I go beyond what I thought I could reach, like reaching a new level, getting a new perspective. E.g., I am truly happy while watching this videos and getting a new insight... But at the same time also some kind of inner calmness, not necessarily a constant state but something that shimmers through even in difficult moments because I know I can take a deep breath and it is all not so bad and I know I can manage whatever is going to come. Some sense of security but more from the inside. Any thoughts on this anyone?
His second argument is sort of faulty because in a democracy you are free to not involve yourself in politics. And on the contrary, wanting to get involved in politics in a communist country and being unable to do so creates unhappiness.
But the point was more simple than that. People like to blame others and feel like they themselves didn't contribute to failure. People don't like responsibility. But this is impossible in liberalism because you are made to feel like as if you have a voice and you change things by voting or lobbying. But when inevitably something fails then you are made to feel guilty yourself because you decided who is in power. Not voting is a vote in itself, because it affects the result. People try to emulate this in liberalism by always blaming the other party and pretending that your party is perfect, but everyone is self aware enough to understand it is a lie. It can't approach the pure happiness felt in a communist country where you can, without guilt, blame those in power, knowing you can't influence it.
How to be happy by Zizek 1 - don't have food everyday 2 - have an organization so powerful that it controls your life and you can blame them if something goes wrong. Like having a kid atittude but in reality you're 39 years old. 3 - live in a shithole so you can dream of a better place
Clearly according to Zizek, life in a Gulag becomes happy if you manage to organize above starvation level ... Everything is possible with some Hegelian magic.
I’m Sorry, the more I listen to this guy the more he just seems to talk in circles. I’m sure there is a language barrier of some sort so that when he speaks in English it just comes out like word salad without ever coming to anything resembling a point.
No, bro, you just don't get it. It's HEGELIAN. You're too stupid to understand. Here's another meme about how he talks funny. Now just surrender yourself to Chinese autocracy.
I don´t agree with him in almost anything, but still, I am happy, that he is here. And that is the definition of the freedom in society, the definition of free and healthy discussion.
If you have issues with happiness, then it's time to look deep within yourself. Happiness is the ability to appreciate the now, what you have. And being free of the ego. The immature ego will always try to screw things up.
Yes look at Cuba 🇨🇺 today people are very happy to move to US, I used to love there still have nightmares. Bunch of deep bs about living in Czechoslovakia and happiness, people could not wait to get out of that paradise
Yes. My girlfriend's mom left North Korea. She almost died and was shot at trying to leave the worker's paradise with free healthcare, free education and guaranteed employment. They don't pay you, but guaranteed employment harvesting rice.
Yes I had free everything and employment was 100% people that refused to work went to jail and worked there for free, that is wonderful socialist solution. God bless you all
@@karolkupec2044 I am glad you made it out!! People are so ignorant. That type of society is inhumane. People need to own things. People need to trade. The myth of "the people" controlling the means of production is impossible. There is always inequality even in a communist utopia because people have different levels of intelligence and ability based on genetics.
Happier than now yes. That's because the entire Eastern block was isolated and realsocislism was the only alternative. Still, not happy enough to maintain a corrupt political oligarchy. Realsocialism is dead, and time will come when capitalism fades away as well.
@@pedrosilvaferreira2562 Labor existed long before capital was ever thought of (reason why Abraham Lincoln said "labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor"). Class society only existed with the dawn of agriculture 12,000 years ago. Goodness read a history book
@@diegoalvarez3807 "class society only existed with the dawn of agriculture" you can literally look at a variety of animals and observe distinct social classes within groups like people do in societies. Why don't you expand your horizons and read something other than history for a change.
that is pretty much an example of nostalgic romanticizing of the past, in that case: 'communist' times... growing up in small town Poland: 1) my Mother didn't know what to feed us, because the stores were empty, it was existential to the degree, that my sister laying in the hospital with brain inflammation almost dying from it could not have lemons or butter, that the doctor would recommend, because those weren't accessible (we had stamps for food rations (half a butter for one month for a family of five) - not the 'occasional' lack of coffee he speaks of... 2) a handful of people around town killed/hanged themselves, including two classmates of my older brother, because the system was so oppressive (into ones thoughts) 3) you very much could not speak your mind, or were facing incarceration, torture or death - thanks a lot, how 'comfortable' ... and, i am not against communism values... so... but, what he speaks of is not the reality for most people as i remember... !
Not to speak on your behalf, but millions of people who expressed (or didn't) their unhappiness with the way of things in Soviet Russia were "removed" from society.
For me it seems that you and zizek are talking about different things, you're probably talking about the years following the implementation of market reforms(and the oil shock with the following debt crisis) , in the video he is talking about classical socialism.
Abridged version: “communist rationing, deprivation, and authoritarianism are actually good things, because you need to live in abject poverty and misery to realize how good you used to have it before communism”
@@cynthiaclementine4757 either way, the whole argument seems ridiculous and comes off as an exercise in advanced mental gymnastics. People can always find someone else to blame for anything. But being able to blame someone for your suffering is small consolation for the suffering itself. Acting like that’s a positive while completely glossing over the massive suffering itself is laughable.
@@cynthiaclementine4757 so, this political system requires massive suffering, but at least the people suffering under it get to blame someone else for it. Can you explain to me how this means they would be “happier” under this system vs. one that doesn’t require the same level of massive suffering?
@@cynthiaclementine4757 I genuinely don’t know what point Žižek is attempting to make by using this definition of “happiness.” Maybe you can enlighten me. This version of the term just appears to have been created from whole cloth by him. I mean, I understand that many people fantasize about being utterly powerless and barely having their needs met, because it does sound extremely appealing in the abstract, but that’s beside the point. It’s absurd to even attempt to make the argument that Czechoslovak citizens were somehow “happier” under communist rule. They were so “happy” that over a million of them fled the country? And the ever-present threat of the ŠtB throwing them into a gulag for saying the wrong thing, or not carrying water for the party enough, did that add to or detract from their happiness quotient? He’s really created an interesting new metric for happiness here, and by that metric communist Czechoslovakia was a roaring success.
@@cynthiaclementine4757 ok, so let me see if I’ve got this straight. Žižek’s idea of the perfect “happy” communist utopia is one where all of its citizens are mindIess, cattle-like automatons with no personal agency, no personal responsibility, and absolutely zero power to affect anything of consequence around them. All of their basic needs are (barely) met, only to ensure that they can continue to scrape by as they serve The Party. They will be treated like incompetent children because it is assumed they will be happiest in this state. Oh, and they get thrown into a gulag if they step out of line, which constantly reinforces everyone’s “happiness,” with literal force. Does that sound about right? …that sounds _awesome,_ where do I sign up!?
An Italian comic artist writing fiction about Czechoslovak people during Stalin's time is a reliable source for whether or not Czechoslovak people were happy during Brezhnev's time? I do not often have the occasion to say this, but even Zizek is a better source than that.
That's the reason why people in the independent countrys of former yugoslavia are so fucked up today: they are not happy, because the got what they wanted, sovereign national states.
If you want to get Zizek's 'I WOULD PREFER NOT TO' t-shirt you can do so here:
i-would-prefer-not-to.com
Mr Zizek is talking such an English that the subtitles are auto-generated in Dutch
spoilers: this was actually a speech in Dutch
it was a speech about robots
Funny cause I thought his accent sounded relatively close to my own in certain ways (from provence of Antwerp)
LOL!
Hahaha classic! Mooi man :)
I realize I am kinda randomly asking but do anybody know a good place to watch newly released series online?
"Happiness is when you almost get what you want" must be why people can watch a 0 - 0 soccer match.
As a long term Liverpool fan, I think I was more happy in 2014 than in 2020.
@@devilsadvocate7389 the paradise of winning the league and CL got too close and real ah
What is soccer?
A 0-0 match can legitimately be very entertaining tho
Me desculpe, eu só conheço futebol
Once again people missing the point of Zizek hegelian method of presentation, and conclusion. He is not advocating the soviet failure while saying it was a happy time, he is putting in check the notion of happiness, by comparing it with a failure. The biggest product in capitalism is happiness. Not in the notion that you can buy happiness directly from the product, that would be a pagan way of thinking, but by the notion that while buying it you achieves happiness on itself, the new pentecostal way to see it.
Zizek is, of course, touching on ideology and how our happiness is based not in the pursue of it, but by the illusion of having it. That way Zizek also touches in the notion of Utopia. The only way to live "happy" at the utopia, is to never build it.
Yes, Zizek can sound confusing at times, but he is very consistent, talking in hegelian terms about politics, while using Lacan for his reasoning and conclusion.
the zizek understander has logged on
@@TytoAlpha my got
Z is an intellectual fraud, destroying minds with contradictions. He does not want to focus his mind.
@@TytoAlpha Sorry I should have posted some meme about nose or his speech pattern. Silly me trying to make a point on a philosophy video.
@@TeaParty1776 k Chomsky
"Truth and happiness does not go together" - isn't that just great.
"Here the ways of men divide. If you wish to strive for peace of soul and happiness, then believe; if you wish to be a disciple of truth, then inquire."
Friedrich Nietzsche
Happiness is only outside of history. Hegel
Depends, what do you mean by truth and happiness?
@@Marzaries How do you interpret the two?
@@Yet.Another.Rapper.KiG.V2 They are just concepts. And anything I will say after this fact, will just be added or subtracted from the pool of concepts we draw from. Rather, whatever truth and happiness are, refer to something deeper, something unutterable. (Life) -- if that is an appropriate usage of the term here, is a movement towards that thing which is unutterable. And, in this movement we give things names, but they do not define us, nor construct our overall experiences. They are just tools of navigation, from which we draw upon, but they are not the totality of things as such.
He is back
Hell yeah
When we needed him the most
Yes, BACKWARDS TO THE GULAGS AND THE FORBIDDEN THOUGHT.
Thank God
is this really from now? He acutally looks younger than before!
Here I claim, that it is PRECISELY this RUclips algorithm, that is supposed to be so radicalizing and mind-numbing and so on and so on, that brings me to worthwhile new content and that, therefore, brings me happiness. * sniff *
Don't forget the UH! UH--UH--UH--UHHH..UH! interjections
Here I claim, that it is PRECISELY this RUclips algorithm, that is supposed to be so radicalizing and mind-numbing and so on and so on, that brings me to worthwhile new content to study and that, therefore, is an excuse for me to procrastinate studying for what I'm actually supposed to study.
Zizek is one of the those guys that I can describe as clickbait in human form. He leads you in with controversial statements and in just a few minutes he makes you feel stupid for ever thinking they were controversial.
I guess you and 76 other people didn't correctly interprete the quotation marks in which "happier" stands
"there is a greek woman here. i would like to ask her a question." (doesn't ask her a question)
That was pretty funny
Why is Stalin on the Thumbnail? People will think that Zizek sympathizes with Stalin an thats just wrong. He doesnt even talk about the Soviet Union, he talks about Czeckoslovakia and the pressure of the Soviet Union but not directly about the stalinist regime.
That actually triggered me (in a negative way, as a descendant of ČSSR refugees) and made me click the video. So it's not communist propaganda then and it's worth watching?
@@schweizer93 Im sorry my english isnt that good and i cant understand if you are serious or if you are sarcastic. I was just a little bit angry because I saw the thumbnail and the title of the video and it looked like zizek is telling stalinist propaganda even though he doenst.
Who cares. Stalin goes brr.
@@mustaineforpresident delete this
Stalin was dead then but his picture was still on the billboards. So the thumbnail wasn't as inaccurate as you think. And where do you think Putin's FSB (ex KGB, ex NKVD) comes from?
2:18 the second point is an eye-opener for me. Thanks Dr. Zizek. I'll include this in my reviewing of my own decisions.
“Now I will become a Christian”
I didnt think you would come back to RUclips I became a total pessimist and so on
Welcome back. So good to listen to your speech again. Happy April🌺🌱🦋
My gott! You're back!
1. He is not praising the Soviet Union. He is just using it as an example.
2. He does not advocate stagnation or disinterest in reaching one's own personal goals. He is just explaining that the pursuit of happiness will not lead you anywhere. You should instead work for a personal cause while being very careful not to find ways to avoid reaching your object of desire (so that you can continue being happy, or, in other words, constantly ruminating on the idea of how wonderful it would be to get that thing you want).
He is definitely for productivity.
hes back, finally! I missed these quick zizek talks!
When I still see Chomsky being lauded as The World's Greatest Dissident, I think of Slovaj. Not to underestimate the greatness of Manufacturing Consent, but Slovaj is 100 times more in touch with real people and builds his immense theoretical scholarship on what we actually live. He makes Chomsky look like an amateur.
The World's Greatest Gravy-Stained Dissident 😅
These two are not comparable at all, since only one of them is some kind of dissident at all. Chomsky actually does something to fight the existing capitalist-imperialist status quo. Zizek does nothing of the sort - on the contrary, when push comes to shove, he always defends it and attacks the revolts against it, as he also does here. Verbally backstabbing not only the Prague Spring, but even Corbyn is very much his style.
@@dumupad3-da241 And Corbyn is your idea of mainstream? Explain that.
@@musicloverkathy Corbyn was mostly just a moderate social democratic reformist like Sanders in that he simply proposed a return to a post-WW2-style welfare state, a Keynesian rollback of the post-2009 austerity policies, re-nationalisation of the railways and undoing of the Thatcherite privatisations etc.; there were some very timid hints of actually transcending capitalism by introducing some worker participation in decision-making, but even this wasn't unprecedented - Germany has had such things for many decades. You didn't have to be a revolutionary socialist or Marxist in order to support Corbyn at all; any sort of socialist or social democrat worth the name would have supported him as a matter of course, as did Chomsky. On the other hand, it does take a revolutionary Marxist or some other kind of truly radical socialist - which Zizek supposedly is, too - to espouse the idea that capitalism shouldn't have been restored in 1960s Czechoslovakia and that the society we should be striving for is at least as similar to 1960s Czechoslovakia as it is to modern welfare-state capitalism. Or, with another emphasis - as *different* from modern welfare-state capitalism as 1960s Czechoslovakia was. Chomsky, as a libertarian socialist, aka (left-wing) anarchist, would probably agree at least with the latter formulation. All of these distinctions matter little in Zizek's case, of course. He is only a left-winger by the standard of the Daily Mail, meaning somebody who can pronounce the word 'Marx' without spitting. Although, strictly speaking, he fails even by that criterion, since he does spit whenever he is saying anything.
worlds greatest CIA-funded "dissident"
Welcome back! I always loved your works.
Truth and Happiness don't always go together and Desire and happiness don't go together
You have to be heroic enough to stand by your desire.
Heroic? Cute.
@@TheRaveJunkie thanks, I try
In the description you say normalisation occured under Stalin, but it began in 1968, 15 years after Stalin's death. This is a classic Brezhnev policy
So according to the description of video: Stalin, who died in 1953, exerted strong pressure on Czechoslovakia since 1968? I'm just glad you got your facts right. Keep up the good work.
:'D yeah should be Brezhnev
the description of this video erroneously refers to Stalin, but Stalin died 15 years before the normalisation period began.
Stalin died in 1953. But that didn't mean everything changed. It was still the Communist Party of the Soviet Union making the decisions, for instance who they needed to invade that year. Like Xi in China: he's not exactly a Maoist, but it was Mao who put the Chinese Communist Party in a position of absolute power.
"Paradise has to be at an appropriate distance. If its too easily accessible you see its the same shit as where we are."
I love Zizek.
7:04 This kind of demonstrates how disconnected communists are from reality. It's all theories, theories, theories. Never have I been happier for *almost* getting something over having the thing. To the contrary, the fact that I was close to acquiring it but missed in the end elevates the ache even more.
Ok he missed the mark on that one , but how could you make a generalized statement about communism calling an opinion a " theory " communists came up with ?
The ideology is based on "People are miserable when they have too much (freedoms, money, material goods) - so why bother giving it to them?"
There's some truth to that, but the Bolsheviks were a very hateful and cynical bunch of intellectuals who forced their hate and cynicism on tens of millions of people - very often (understatement of the 20th century) bringing them to a very early grave.
Let people make their own mistakes!!!!!
@@fuckamericanidiot it is very clear to anyone reading that you’re pulling this out of your ass. you completely miss the point about what Zizek is saying but nonetheless generalize it as like “the official communist position”
keep reading boy, stop embarrassing yourself in public
@@funnyhandle Thanks for adding nothing except to show that you're afraid to demonstrate how ignorant you are. Smart.
@@fuckamericanidiot lol and what did you say? "Bolsheviks were meanies!" I think you missed the point
May I add: the fourth element is freedom of movement. In Yugoslavia one could travel anywhere in the world.
Sitting in quarantine and becoming more aware of how much I touch my face.
Why police yourself like that in your own home? Just wash your hands when you get home and be free, as free as you can be.
Happiness is the feeling before you want more Happiness...
~ D. Draper
MORE OF THIS CLIPSSS. MORE.
Precisely This °
Moar!
Happiness comes from comparison, you feel good when you are in a better situation than in the past, or you live better than other people nearby or above your level, or other people of other countries at the same or higher level. People feel unhappy when they are suffering, but if the government and media fool you that all people in other countries are more suffering, people feel much less pain (e.g. North Korea).
One of Zizek's best
Yay i love ur channel
Just to correct the description: Stalin died in 1953, and the Prague Spring happened 15 years later, in 1968. Also, the official name of the country at this time was People's Republic of Chekolosvakia, if I am not remebering wrong.
@J S Your grandparents didn't get to rebuild anything after the war because everything got stolen.
@J S Yeah, you present some points I agree with. The 90s were definitely wild, but I believe that with such a radical change of the system, some naivity and instability can not only be expected, but is almost inevitable. However, I disagree with the sentiment that commies operated in some sort of a neutral hypothetical grey area. It was an oppressive regime! You can't just write all the atrocities off because people had jobs (also because unemployment was illegal and we can talk about the efficiency of some workers too) and had stuff to eat (kinda sucked if you wanted meat or some other basic groceries tho).
While I'm not excusing what happened in the 90s - and the effect of that can still be seen today, in the form of oligarchs and general corruption (which I belive flourished under communism just as much) - I think it's very important not to understand the 90s as an indicative of the current system, which is objectively better. People are free, they're richer and they live better lives, which they were not allowed to live under communism.
Zizeks lisp has a life of it's own.
I am so happy you are back!
Stalin did not intervene, it was Brezhnev. The invasion happened in 1968, 15 years after Stalin's death. But Brezhnev was still a strong stalinist.
nah he continued the khurschev-esque reforms but wanted to rule and not normalize as much
The funny thing is that those arguments are very similar to the ones monarchists used (and use).
every totalitarian; people are dumb, i know whats the best for them
@@dafyduck79 I mean, ANY totalitarianism is better than the party democracy we live in. I prefer to have one corrupt person over 300 corrupt people that pretend to be enemies of each other and involve the population into their stupid government. If you want to involve a family with the rest of the families in the nation it better just be through their jobs, as this is the natural way.
@@gabrielalbeldaochoa8234 i like your last sentence
i mean free society means, that people voluntarily exchange goods and services without valuating property rights, with big accent on voluntarily
@@dafyduck79 Society is mainly the union of families to carry out tasks that one family on its own can't. Capitalism makes of that exchange of goods a divine entity that is independent from society when it actually was born through society.
what was the german phrase he spoke at 5:16?
"Aber glücklich bin ich nicht"
But happy I am not
Zizek is my friend (in my head) and that makes me happy
People are happy, when they look around and they see that everyone is just like them.
@Elias Håkansson relax, you can be homogenous and still be anti racist and democratic.
This is a new record: he touched his face 7 times in 10 seconds (From 4:14 to 4:24)
Lol
"love is a catastrophic", this is so true.
It was a very similar situation in Poland in most of the communist era, really. Great analysis.
"I want to go a step further"
"What? You Slavoj? Really?"
Wow. Everyone should watch “Dear Comrades” by by Andrei Konchalovsky a 2020 film because it illustrates perfectly how this notion Zizek refers to works in real time.
They were 'happier' because they had a defined purpose, whatever that is...
As long as you didn’t question the powerful, you were…..”happy”
So good that we have the genius Zizek to tell us what should make us happy and how we should feel under the yoke of an authoritarian regime! Oh great Zizek, lead us to the mediocre great future of a reasonably and gloriously average life and so on and so on!
Bitter haha
This is a way better analysis of happiness than any of Arthur C. Brooks stories.
It's just lame Hegelianism in the vein "man is made for history". I can assure you that adult life under a communist regime was horrible !
MY CONTINUAL SUBSCRIPTION WAS NOT IN VEIN!!!
IT WAS IN ARTERY INSTEAD!!!
I disagree. It feels like he has never lived under communism …. my country was part of USSR And he’s three points of what makes you happy doesn’t really apply in practical sense lots of people cheated and actually sold items which means engaged in capitalist system lots of people bought for him products that were illegal in USSR any nowhere you have a private life, snitches are everywhere. Peace is very relative term under communism
Most relatives i know miss communism
@@mmkw5621 then they dont understand that it was not possible to keep it long term. my grandma also misses it because my country flourished and improved under USSR but slowly cracks started to be seen and system collapsed
What does it mean to "be heroic enough to stand by your desire?"
Does he slobber in Slovenian too?
wow it's actually mental some people think like this.
Pure ideology *sniffle*
Happiness is easy, just give me 3 free days and Vodka. For me, the question is - what is there, that is worth suffering for? For what should I 'give' myself? Then I can ask - will I be appreciated, respected and adequately compensated - is the struggle real.
Important distinction is the soviet system. Definitely not what marx had in mind.
back❤️
Nice you're uploading again!
Slavoj is a great Coronian reminder: ”Don't touch your face!”
Love it !
Hey Slavoj Žižecki I love you
I disagree with his definition of happiness, what he describes is some superficial happiness but what about true fulfillment? Not that it is perceived at all times but I can say that I have perceived it at times that were quite different from the state that he describes. To me it is in the moment when I make progress, when I go beyond what I thought I could reach, like reaching a new level, getting a new perspective. E.g., I am truly happy while watching this videos and getting a new insight... But at the same time also some kind of inner calmness, not necessarily a constant state but something that shimmers through even in difficult moments because I know I can take a deep breath and it is all not so bad and I know I can manage whatever is going to come. Some sense of security but more from the inside. Any thoughts on this anyone?
His second argument is sort of faulty because in a democracy you are free to not involve yourself in politics. And on the contrary, wanting to get involved in politics in a communist country and being unable to do so creates unhappiness.
But the point was more simple than that. People like to blame others and feel like they themselves didn't contribute to failure. People don't like responsibility. But this is impossible in liberalism because you are made to feel like as if you have a voice and you change things by voting or lobbying. But when inevitably something fails then you are made to feel guilty yourself because you decided who is in power. Not voting is a vote in itself, because it affects the result.
People try to emulate this in liberalism by always blaming the other party and pretending that your party is perfect, but everyone is self aware enough to understand it is a lie. It can't approach the pure happiness felt in a communist country where you can, without guilt, blame those in power, knowing you can't influence it.
How to be happy by Zizek
1 - don't have food everyday
2 - have an organization so powerful that it controls your life and you can blame them if something goes wrong. Like having a kid atittude but in reality you're 39 years old.
3 - live in a shithole so you can dream of a better place
I can't believe there are people who follow this lunatic and his ideas ...
Exactly. Complete lunacy. I can't really believe what I'm hearing.
Zizek such a complete idiot... MY GOD
@@varinia3290 HES smart
@@limitnl he's not stupid at all
Turn captions on and you won't regret it 🤣
Zizek broke the auto generator!
was about to comment the same thing. laughed so hard.
he is almost literally describing Syria in the 90's!!
Clearly according to Zizek, life in a Gulag becomes happy if you manage to organize above starvation level ... Everything is possible with some Hegelian magic.
I’m Sorry, the more I listen to this guy the more he just seems to talk in circles. I’m sure there is a language barrier of some sort so that when he speaks in English it just comes out like word salad without ever coming to anything resembling a point.
No, bro, you just don't get it.
It's HEGELIAN.
You're too stupid to understand.
Here's another meme about how he talks funny.
Now just surrender yourself to Chinese autocracy.
Happiest chasing a goal.
Because all those defectors just wanted blue jeans?
I don´t agree with him in almost anything, but still, I am happy, that he is here. And that is the definition of the freedom in society, the definition of free and healthy discussion.
If you have issues with happiness, then it's time to look deep within yourself. Happiness is the ability to appreciate the now, what you have. And being free of the ego. The immature ego will always try to screw things up.
The idea of Prague Spring being a perfect dream because it was stopped reminds me of the Neil Gaiman comic Ramadan.
Yes look at Cuba 🇨🇺 today people are very happy to move to US, I used to love there still have nightmares. Bunch of deep bs about living in Czechoslovakia and happiness, people could not wait to get out of that paradise
Yes. My girlfriend's mom left North Korea. She almost died and was shot at trying to leave the worker's paradise with free healthcare, free education and guaranteed employment. They don't pay you, but guaranteed employment harvesting rice.
Yes I had free everything and employment was 100% people that refused to work went to jail and worked there for free, that is wonderful socialist solution. God bless you all
@@karolkupec2044 I am glad you made it out!! People are so ignorant. That type of society is inhumane. People need to own things. People need to trade. The myth of "the people" controlling the means of production is impossible. There is always inequality even in a communist utopia because people have different levels of intelligence and ability based on genetics.
As ALWAYS the title is misleading
Holy hell, I've just heard the worst take on happiness.
Welcome back! When did this talk take place?
I am happiest every few years or so when the power goes out here for a day or so during a winter storm. Probably all the conditions he listed apply.
I want to be free to be miserable.
Is it just me or do you also get nervous if you look at him for too long? He touches his nose way too often!
I know can't pay attention to what he is suggesting
He's so wise
Great speech
interesting
but this kind of happiness itself is not sustainable
After hearing Mr. Zizek speak one thing is clear, happiness is not the path to progress. If anything, it's the opposite.
I have settled for "peace of mind " instead of "happiness" happiness is a nightmare so is eternal life .
sounds like Zizek's been reading some Schopenhauer
Exactly my thoughts.
Captions: Dutch (automated)
Happier than now yes. That's because the entire Eastern block was isolated and realsocislism was the only alternative. Still, not happy enough to maintain a corrupt political oligarchy. Realsocialism is dead, and time will come when capitalism fades away as well.
No, capitalism always existed and always will in some form or other. Socialism will not in the form that your sniffle friend thinks of, at all.
@@pedrosilvaferreira2562 Labor existed long before capital was ever thought of (reason why Abraham Lincoln said "labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor"). Class society only existed with the dawn of agriculture 12,000 years ago. Goodness read a history book
@@diegoalvarez3807 "class society only existed with the dawn of agriculture" you can literally look at a variety of animals and observe distinct social classes within groups like people do in societies. Why don't you expand your horizons and read something other than history for a change.
@@pedrosilvaferreira2562 progessist
that is pretty much an example of nostalgic romanticizing of the past, in that case: 'communist' times...
growing up in small town Poland:
1) my Mother didn't know what to feed us, because the stores were empty, it was existential to the degree, that my sister laying in the hospital with brain inflammation almost dying from it could not have lemons or butter, that the doctor would recommend, because those weren't accessible (we had stamps for food rations (half a butter for one month for a family of five) - not the 'occasional' lack of coffee he speaks of...
2) a handful of people around town killed/hanged themselves, including two classmates of my older brother, because the system was so oppressive (into ones thoughts)
3) you very much could not speak your mind, or were facing incarceration, torture or death - thanks a lot, how 'comfortable' ...
and, i am not against communism values... so... but, what he speaks of is not the reality for most people as i remember... !
Not to speak on your behalf, but millions of people who expressed (or didn't) their unhappiness with the way of things in Soviet Russia were "removed" from society.
@@fuckamericanidiot what kind of expression you're talking about? and how many millions?
For me it seems that you and zizek are talking about different things, you're probably talking about the years following the implementation of market reforms(and the oil shock with the following debt crisis) , in the video he is talking about classical socialism.
I'm happier with daily coffee
Slavoj "and so on and so on" Zizek.
Abridged version: “communist rationing, deprivation, and authoritarianism are actually good things, because you need to live in abject poverty and misery to realize how good you used to have it before communism”
@@cynthiaclementine4757 either way, the whole argument seems ridiculous and comes off as an exercise in advanced mental gymnastics. People can always find someone else to blame for anything. But being able to blame someone for your suffering is small consolation for the suffering itself. Acting like that’s a positive while completely glossing over the massive suffering itself is laughable.
@@cynthiaclementine4757 so, this political system requires massive suffering, but at least the people suffering under it get to blame someone else for it. Can you explain to me how this means they would be “happier” under this system vs. one that doesn’t require the same level of massive suffering?
@@cynthiaclementine4757 I genuinely don’t know what point Žižek is attempting to make by using this definition of “happiness.” Maybe you can enlighten me. This version of the term just appears to have been created from whole cloth by him. I mean, I understand that many people fantasize about being utterly powerless and barely having their needs met, because it does sound extremely appealing in the abstract, but that’s beside the point. It’s absurd to even attempt to make the argument that Czechoslovak citizens were somehow “happier” under communist rule. They were so “happy” that over a million of them fled the country? And the ever-present threat of the ŠtB throwing them into a gulag for saying the wrong thing, or not carrying water for the party enough, did that add to or detract from their happiness quotient? He’s really created an interesting new metric for happiness here, and by that metric communist Czechoslovakia was a roaring success.
@@cynthiaclementine4757 ok, so let me see if I’ve got this straight. Žižek’s idea of the perfect “happy” communist utopia is one where all of its citizens are mindIess, cattle-like automatons with no personal agency, no personal responsibility, and absolutely zero power to affect anything of consequence around them. All of their basic needs are (barely) met, only to ensure that they can continue to scrape by as they serve The Party. They will be treated like incompetent children because it is assumed they will be happiest in this state. Oh, and they get thrown into a gulag if they step out of line, which constantly reinforces everyone’s “happiness,” with literal force. Does that sound about right?
…that sounds _awesome,_ where do I sign up!?
@@cynthiaclementine4757 what points were made, other than inventing an entirely new definition for the word “happiness”? Please do explain
Missed this man 👨
Spot on Tsipras, he knew the Greeks weren"t paying their taxes.
Eh, this is debatable. I just read Giardino's Jonas Fink and you could argue whether people were truly happy during those times or not.
An Italian comic artist writing fiction about Czechoslovak people during Stalin's time is a reliable source for whether or not Czechoslovak people were happy during Brezhnev's time? I do not often have the occasion to say this, but even Zizek is a better source than that.
Finally, new Zizekposting!
That's the reason why people in the independent countrys of former yugoslavia are so fucked up today: they are not happy, because the got what they wanted, sovereign national states.
Welcome back comrade
The human condition and entropy precludes a stable state of mind.
Imagine being one of the kids that got their brains blown out for trying to escape the Berlin Wall and you see this. 👁👄👁
Source?
@@whythelongface64 is this a serious question?
@@Leon56323 I genuinely hadn't heard of this before