Slavoj Zizek on how to identify ideologies.

Posted on: November 21, 2024 at 19:58:52 CT

“If you listen to podcasts or whatever it is, and you listen to one where two people have long-form conversations on it, pull up an episode, listen to it, and when you listen, don't think about it as though these are just two people who are seeking the truth about the universe like I am. Instead, listen to it like you're a detective or something, and you're looking for evidence of the ideologies they've internalized that they're bringing into that conversation. Pay attention to the language or the metaphors they use to describe reality.

Pay attention to the narratives they bring in about how society should be functioning. Notice how the values they believe in will be something they're all for when it brings about that world, but then their values will change the second it becomes about another type of person or another world that may come about. Again, that selective vision.

Notice how they'll blame all the problems of the world on some opposing ideology, which they'll call an ideology, funny enough. Theirs isn't, but that one is. Zizek has a great line about this.

He says, quote, the minimum necessary structuring ingredient of every ideology is “to distance itself from another ideology, to denounce its other as ideology, end quote. This is one of the tactics. More than that, though, notice how often in these conversations, when people make claims about how the world is, they'll try to make things not a matter of opinion.

You know, this isn't me saying this. This is the nature and truth of the universe. Or in other cases, they'll make things into something that's completely undefinable, just an arbitrary social construction.

Notice how many times, if you're paying attention, somebody who makes their ideology public like this will contradict themselves in the same calendar month. And again, none of this is something that makes these people conscious, evil foot soldiers of an ideology. In fact, if someone had an attitude where they thought, if you can find contradictions in someone else's worldview, that must mean that they're stupid or misinformed.

That's another thing Zizek would think is a little oversimplified. Contradictions and paradoxes. These are not the marks of someone being misinformed necessarily.

To Zizek, these again are the marks of ideology. This is the evidence, if you are looking for it. This is where you can see ideology “reveal itself for what it truly is.

Not the truth, but a collection of symbols trying to simplify things that's incapable of ever fully capturing the real. You will always have contradictions in the way that you make sense of things, because of the way that you're making sense of things. In fact, it can seem like if you're not aware of the contradictions, present in your own way of looking at the world, well, a couple different options, I guess.

One option is that you're really just not trying very hard. You're not truly aware of the extent of your own positions, maybe because you're too busy trying to look for contradictions in other people all the time. The other option is that for some people, who are pretty deeply embedded into an ideology, well, it's not impossible for them to see contradictions.

It can be effectively impossible, because their field of view is so narrow that they'll just never have the thought where they come across the contradiction in their own thinking. To that person, their whole life might just feel to them like, well, there's nothing wrong with my thinking. I just see the truth about things.

“So again, finding a contradiction in your own world view is not something to be embarrassed about to Zizek. In fact, if anything, it's a sign you're actually doing the work of critically thinking. You're starting to understand the limitations of ideology.

Zizek loves to point out these contradictions and paradoxes in people, especially in politics. Take the environmentalist, who wants to solve the problems caused by consumerism by just buying more environmentally conscious products or investing in green companies. Solving a problem caused by consumerism with more consumerism.

This is an example of ideology obscuring the true nature of the problem. Or take the fan of capitalism, who says that capitalism is great because look at all the choices it gives people. They can buy anything they want.

Hyper-focusing on the fact that people can, yes, choose between 15 different kinds of barbecue sauce at the store, but ignoring the lack of choice that people have when it comes to participating in any other economic system. Again, ideology limiting the very definition we have of choice.” - Stephen West