“But capitalism gets something absolutely right, and there is no way around that. What it gets right is the interplay between value and self-value. It ‘understands’ (uses, relies on) that the individual is constantly in the process of attributing value in order to persist.”
It would be hard for me to exploit the technology like I do (I am A+ certified) and not appreciate what it is that Capitalism can do. And let’s put in mind here that Marx did study Adam Smith and had a full appreciation of what Capitalism could do: build the means of production and technology. His take on it was that we had to go through a successful Capitalist phase in order to have a successful (via socialism (Communist phase. And this is the take on it that I tend to follow. In fact, it has been reasonably argued that the reason Russia and China failed like they did (a failure that even Zizek recognizes) is because they tried to go straight from an agrarian society to a Communist one. In fact, this was a matter of contention among many of theorists at the genesis of the Russian Revolution.
And it has been a point of contention between me and Zizek’s thought. I’m more of a revisionist in that I have to make a concession to Edmund Burke that society is an organic thing that works better with slow change. At the same time, I tend to disagree with Burke’s take on the French Revolution in that there comes a point at which the resistance of the status quo is such that violent revolution becomes necessary. I would prefer to take it step by step –and even still maintain a role for market forces. At the same time, I have to agree with Zizek that the manipulation of Capitalism has been so deep that the only solution is a complete transformation.
As an alcoholic, I know what is at stake in the difference between taking the Methods of Moderation route and the AA one of dealing with the problem at the root: the way your whole life has structured itself around the addiction. In this sense, Zizek has been a kind of intervention in that he has pointed out the folly of my leftist concessions to Capitalism.
Still, I would argue that we can take a softer route through Zizek in getting people to face the illusions they have been working under. I would argue (as a kind of synthesis with Zizek’s mindset) that we need to take the revisionist approach with the understanding that a Communist system may well be the endgame if that’s what it comes down to in the back and forth between Marxist reformers and Capitalists. I say we make it clear to them that they can either act like they are only part of the general social system, and not its owner, and in ways that are more sincere than philanthropy, or we can eliminate their role, step by step, from the general social system.
“To be or not to be: to stand in the right place in the text.
Text as in “there is no outside-of-text” -
Within text, our presence causes a context.
Our presence can cause many contexts. The art of life is to learn how to create the type of context that sustains a vital and/or agreeable experience of translating.
Youth runs through the text, is not yet encapsulated by it, has not learned enough. Instinct carries one through youth to a specific type of place to stand within the great logos, the text of the world, the web of perspectives, intersecting contexts, rhizomes of identity.
Happiness is to have identified ones proper paragraph, sentence, term or even inflection. But the more texts inhabit ones mind, the more puzzling the given of a proper locus becomes. To stand in the right place in the text: the holy grail. It is not the object of our utmost desire, it is knowing what we desire most.”
Now you’re waxing poetic….
Way to jam, brother!