Thread by @GabrielRockhill

My latest: #Zizek rose to fame promoting pomo radlib theory against Marxism, claiming #communism is “the worst catastrophe in the history of humanity." No wonder he’s the (capitalist) world’s most famous “Marxist”! 🧵 1/7
@NatCounterPunch
#Marxism #Marx
counterpunch.org/2023/01/02/cap…

Opposed to #socialism in #Yugoslavia, #Zizek wrote for a ‘dissident’ mag accused of being CIA. He founded the
*LibDem* Party & ran for Pres against the communists, advocating for privatizations: “more capitalism would mean more social security” (sic). 2/7

The Eastern liberal was for pro-West civil society & against the Yugo. state when the latter was socialist, whereas he was against civil society & for the state when the latter turned capitalist (& sought membership in capitalist & imperialist orgs like the EU & NATO). 3/7
#Zizek

Pro-capitalist #Zizek supported NATO’s bombings of #Yugoslavia & he recently accused Kissinger of “pacifism” for not giving his “full support” to the U.S. proxy war in the Ukraine: “we need a stronger NATO” to defend “European unity.” 4/7
#Imperialism
theguardian.com/commentisfree/…

The ‘Borat of philosophy’ opposes actually existing socialism, claiming that Cuba is “a nostalgic inert remainder of the past” & China is authoritarian capitalist. He follows Thatcher’s TINA: “I’m not aware of any convincing radical left alternatives." 5/7
#Zizek #Cuba #China

Like #Badiou, #Zizek claims that “Real communism” is a #communism of the Lacanian Real, which is recalcitrant to “reality.” The transformation of the world through parties & states--making communism a “reality”--is destined to fail. All that’s left is the death drive. 6/7
#Lacan

Žižek is capitalism’s court jester. Aping the figure of the Marxist-qua-antisocial-fanatic, he encourages disdain for real-world socialism, while advancing his career by hawking wares of Western consumer society & the theory industry through his pop cultural mash-up. 7/7
#Zizek