Highbrow Magazine - god https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/god en Why Is Blasphemy Still A Crime? https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3861-why-blasphemy-still-crime <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Fri, 03/28/2014 - 11:15</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1blasphemy%20%28Carlos%20Latuff%20Wiki%29.jpg?itok=0lLJfnXL"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/1blasphemy%20%28Carlos%20Latuff%20Wiki%29.jpg?itok=0lLJfnXL" width="480" height="377" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p> </p> <p>From <a href="http://punditwire.com/2014/03/25/thats-blasphemy/">PunditWire</a>:</p> <p> </p> <p>The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, an agency charged by Congress with monitoring liberty of conscience around the world, has just issued a report on prosecutions for blasphemy in other countries.</p> <p> </p> <p>Predictably, the leading offenders are Muslim countries, such as Egypt, Iran, Bangladesh, Sudan, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan. Pakistan is cited as “the most egregious example … where blasphemy charges are common and numerous individuals are in prison, with a high number sentenced to death or life terms.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Yet the same report mentions a prosecution for blasphemy in Greece, where a young man created a satirical Facebook page spoofing a Greek Orthodox monk who died in 1994 and is venerated as a saint by his cult following. In addition, the report says that countries as diverse as India, Ireland, Kuwait, Poland and the Philippines have “blasphemy-like” statutes, although they are rarely enforced.</p> <p> </p> <p>Lest Americans feel smug about our own tolerance for religious diversity, we should remember that our country, too, once had prosecutions for blasphemy, and that such prosecutions were still taking place nearly 200 years after the days of the Salem Witch Trials.</p> <p> </p> <p>In 1886, a former Adventist minister turned freethinker named Charles B. Reynolds was arrested for violating a New Jersey blasphemy law. At his trial, he was represented by Robert Ingersoll, another freethinker known as “the Great Agnostic.”</p> <p> </p> <p>Ingersoll was not only a brilliant lawyer, he was by common consent the greatest orator of his day. His closing speech to the jury was typically dazzling: “I deny the right of any man, of any number of men, of any church, of any State, to put a padlock on the lips – to make the tongue a convict. I passionately deny the right of the Herod of authority to kill the children of the brain.”</p> <p><img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2blasphemy%20%28Nheyob%20Wiki%29.jpg" style="height:600px; width:344px" /></p> <p>Despite his eloquence, Ingersoll lost the case, but he had the last laugh on the New Jersey law. First, he paid Reynolds’ fine out his own pocket. Some time later, he arranged—over the vigorous protests of local clergy—to book a lecture in Hoboken. At first, the ministers tried to close down the theatre. But when that failed, they showed up with police detectives in tow, ready to demand Ingersoll’s arrest the minute a single sacrilegious word passed his lips.</p> <p> </p> <p>Undismayed, Ingersoll began his lecture by pointing out how certain passages of the Bible, if taken literally, contradicted each other. Did that mean the Bible was not in fact the word of God? “I don’t know,” he answered with a bland smile. “I don’t know. If it were not for the Jersey blasphemy statute I might know. As it is, I don’t. The Hoboken parsons know. Ask them.”</p> <p> </p> <p>By the time he finished, even the police were reduced to helpless laughter. There would never be another prosecution for blasphemy in the United States. Ingersoll had shamed such laws from the books.</p> <p> </p> <p>It may be that over time international revulsion against blasphemy prosecutions will have the same effect on the countries where they are still carried out. At least we may hope so.</p> <p> </p> <p> </p> <p><strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p><em>Hal Gordon, who wrote speeches for the Reagan White House and Gen. Colin Powell, is currently a freelance speechwriter in Houston. Web site: <a href="http://www.ringingwords.com/">www.ringingwords.com</a>.</em></p> <p> </p> <p>From <a href="http://punditwire.com/2014/03/25/thats-blasphemy/">PunditWire</a></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/blasphemy" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">blasphemy</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/blasphemous-statements" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">blasphemous statements</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/god" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">god</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/religion" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">religion</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/aethiest" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">aethiest</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/anti-religious" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">anti-religious</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/nonbeliever" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">nonbeliever</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/religious-freedom" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">religious freedom</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/pakistan" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">pakistan</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/iran" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Iran</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/afghanistan" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Afghanistan</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Hal Gordon</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Carlos Latuff (Wikipedia Commons); Niheyob (Wikipedia Commons)</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Fri, 28 Mar 2014 15:15:07 +0000 tara 4509 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/3861-why-blasphemy-still-crime#comments Modern-Day Philosophers and the Need to Keep Trouble Brewing https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1778-modern-day-philosophers-and-need-keep-trouble-brewing <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/news-features" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">News &amp; Features</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Mon, 11/12/2012 - 08:22</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumzizek%20%28AndyMiah--Wiki%29.jpg?itok=-SeEGw9e"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumzizek%20%28AndyMiah--Wiki%29.jpg?itok=-SeEGw9e" width="480" height="360" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p>  </p> <p> <em>“I despise the kind of book which tells you how to live, how to make yourself happy! Philosophers have no good news for you at this level! I believe the first duty of philosophy is making you understand what deep shit you are in!” </em>-Slavoj Žižek</p> <p>  </p> <p> Netflix is a corporation, right? And corporations are inherently bad, therefore, Netflix is bad. The syllogism appears sound, so let's tack a Q.E.D. on the end and prepare to laud the fine corporation. Netflix earns its <a href="http://domaingang.com/domain-news/netflix-sucks-unfortunately-they-let-their-domain-expire/">bad rep'</a> from the usual corporate chicanery, but (aside from their woeful collection of films and television shows) the company has some not-so-bad attributes. Actually, there's only one not-so-bad, and it's more of a side effect: the rising popularity of documentaries. Documentarians owe Netflix a fruit basket or two for coaxing American viewers into the realm of nonfiction. Lest Netflix users have a cult appreciation for <em>Mega Shark Versus Giant Octupus</em> and other films of that <a href="http://www.pastemagazine.com/blogs/lists/2012/10/the-25-most-awesomely-bad-movies-on-netflix-instant.html">so-bad-it's-good</a> ilk, there isn't a watchable option in the (impressive) collection of thousands of offal-grade film. Netflix notoriously streams some of the most offensive films and innocuous TV shows to date (scrolling through the horrendous film catalogue is actually more enjoyable than watching any of the available dross). As a (probably unintentional) counterbalance, Netflix boasts a documentary library of unexpected breadth and taste. Herzog, Morris, Burns Banksy: they're all available. And so, thanks to Netflix, documentaries are <em>in</em>.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Many of the docs within the Netflix canon address drug use, the drug war and <a href="http://www.allvoices.com/contributed-news/6784250-drug-experiments-with-the-wood-spider">spiders on drugs</a> (we get it, America fetishizes illegal drug use [esp. by arachnids]). These drug-driven films are patently underwhelming, overindulgent paeans to the substance(s) of focus. However, the documentaries that forgo the American drug fetish are true Netflix treasures. Of these non-drug, nonfiction films, one arena has received considerable airtime of late: philosophy. Well-made docs such as <em><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Examined_Life">The Examined Life</a></em> and <em><a href="http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/philosophy-guide-to-happiness/">Philosophy: Guide to Happiness</a></em> have jettisoned philosophers and their field back into the cultural spotlight. And they have an accomplice in New Media, which offers digital salons for philosophers to lecture, opine and squabble. Now that philosophers have re-entered into the global stage of prominence, alongside <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTCRwi71_ns&amp;noredirect=1">Gangam Style and Mitt Romney</a>, what role do these traditionally archaic practitioners play in our modern era?</p> <p>  </p> <p> Cartoonist Gary Larson loved to juxtapose two clashing factions next to each other with the caption: "Trouble Brewing," a comical description of the human tendency to  unknowingly create <a href="http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5001/5214376913_f0102ca308_z.jpg">powder kegs</a> (although sometimes, especially at gatherings for the drama-hungry, these powder kegs are willfully incurred). Since philosophy and its spokespersons have found themselves thrown under the same lens that controls (or, conversely, is controlled by) pop culture, two extremely powerful forces are now contained within the lens of New Media. Assuredly, this is "trouble brewing."</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/mediumphilosopher%28ziddi%20razan%20Wiki%29.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 438px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Suffice to say that criticizing pop culture is considered hipster's play (similar to child's play, but with an aura of pseudo-intellectualism) by contemporary philosophers. Philosophers don't snap-react to ephemeral pop culture phenomena with vicious criticism (i.e. "Nicki Minaj's oeuvre is a revealing glimpse into the Americana machine"). Instead, the philosopher examines how these phenomena have the traction to actually take place. "What systemic fault motivated Americana to spit out Minaj?" asks the philosopher. For the curious: The answer usually oscillates between the <a href="http://bigthink.com/Mind-Matters/is-capitalism-to-blame-for-worldwide-obesity">oppressive forces of capitalism </a>and the <a href="http://economyincrisis.org/content/democracy-no-more">perversions of American democracy</a>.</p> <p>  </p> <p> With the exception of private high schools and Catholic universities (these academic institutions love to teach Aristotle, then ensconce the unsuspecting student into the world of Thomas Aquinas, a Catholic zealot with an Aristotle Lite philosophy, effectively intellectualizing blind faith), the classic Greek philosophers have been abandoned for their secular German successors. And this remains the case today, with some exceptions: namely Socrates. Plato's subject and teacher became the paradigm for successive philosophers (concerning their lifestyle and <a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_SEXCtyOb_ag/TF1_ynpaW-I/AAAAAAAAAEg/S5YniWfr5DA/S220/Socrates+sketch+-+unkown+source.gif">facial hair maintenance</a>), and his unwavering adherence to the philosopher's role solidified the brevity of taking up the mantle. This excerpt is from <em><a href="http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/apology.html">Plato's Apology</a></em>:</p> <p>  </p> <p> “For if you kill me, you will not easily find another such person at all,  even if to say in a ludicrous way, attached on the city by the god, like on a large and well-bred horse, by its size and laziness both needing arousing by some gadfly; in this way the god seems to have fastened me on the city, some such one who arousing and persuading and reproaching each one of you I do not stop the whole day settling down all over.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Socrates' <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_gadfly">gadfly</a> is no longer a novel concept. History's greatest <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo_Galilei">world-shakers</a> act the part, stinging slumbering beasts into action, rousing society to alter its very fibers. To study and practice epistemology and ontology, is to play the gadfly.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/2mediumphilosophers%20%28wiki%29.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 450px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Society</strong></p> <p> It's October 2009 and West Point is beginning to show signs of fall. Plebes have settled in to listen to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Deresiewicz">William Deresiewicz</a>, essayist and past Yale professor, deliver one of many lectures plebes will be exposed to throughout their studies. Deresiewicz, to borrow a phrase, kills it. His speech, "<a href="http://theamericanscholar.org/solitude-and-leadership/">Solitude and Leadership</a>" is subsequently printed in the 2010 spring edition of <em>The American Scholar</em> and disseminated like academic wildfire.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Snapshot summary of the speech's intro: Yale students, much like West Point cadets, are ambitious, intelligent, and good at climbing greased poles to the very top. But, they aren't necessarily true leaders. Here's Deresiewicz's foolproof guide to bureaucratic leadership:</p> <p>  </p> <p> “Kissing up to the people above you, kicking down to the people below you. Pleasing your teachers, pleasing your superiors, picking a powerful mentor and riding his coattails until it’s time to stab him in the back. Jumping through hoops. Getting along by going along. Being whatever other people want you to be, so that it finally comes to seem that . . . you have nothing inside you at all. Not taking stupid risks like trying to change how things are done or question why they’re done. Just keeping the routine going."</p> <p>  </p> <p> The leaders of bureaucratic hierarchy rarely exhibit anything aside from the skills they strap onto their bureaucratic climbing belt. The weight of intelligence and persona is cast off during the ascent up the rock wall, and once on top, the new bureaucratic leaders mindlessly keep "the routine going." Why not? The most effective means to maintain the position gained is playing within the preset rules — improvising a new identity leaves the position too exposed to usurpation by someone willing to abide.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/3mediumphilosphers%20%28Gerard%20von%20Honthorst%29.jpg" style="width: 600px; height: 437px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Bureaucracy is America's great anathema. Deresiewicz appeals to his audience to rail against bureaucracy's dehumanizing power and maintain the solitude of a free thinking leader while functioning within the greatest bureaucratic machine of all, the United States Army. The army is a great Leviathan, warns Deresiewicz; refuse to become a cog and fritter away creativity and independence.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>The Gadfly</strong></p> <p> "Solitude and Leadership" surfaces the chaff, but shirks the role of the gadfly. Instead of denouncing bureaucracies as an inefficient and oppressive offshoot of American governance and procedure outright, Deresiewicz urges future leaders to retain independent and creative leadership within the massive bureaucracy of the United States Army. Don't refuse the incoming shackles of militant bureaucracy, advises Deresiewicz, submit but keep your essence intact. How much different is this bureaucratic free-thinker from a slave with a penchant for independence?  </p> <p>  </p> <p> Often on prominent display, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavoj_%C5%BDi%C5%BEek">Slavoj Žižek</a> is radical philosophy incarnate. Hirsute, animated, staggeringly intelligent and expectedly misanthropic (it comes with the cognitive territory), Žižek is the "<a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/2012/08/people%E2%80%99s-republic-gotham">hero Gotham deserves</a>". Or, to draw from the Socratic quote, he and his contemporaries have been attached to our epoch "by the god." Žižek  and co. (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariq_Ali">Tariq Ali</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alain_badiou">Alain Badiou</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noam_Chomsky">Noam Chomsky</a>) practice the art of ripping our society a new one, prompting incisive questions that beget awkward pauses and shuffling of feet from the addressed. They largely function to upset the status quo (or, bureaucratic routine).</p> <p>  </p> <p> Perspective: Deresiewicz compels the future bureaucratic leaders of America to avoid succumbing to individual distillation via bureaucracy. Žižek and co. demand that the intelligent demolish bureaucracy, expunge it from our epoch  (Žižek will synecdochally represent modern philosophy in this piece. Not because he epitomizes the zeitgeist. He's simply the most visible and vocal member [and physically resembles the philosopher stereotype]. Please note that the philosophical vanguard of today disagree on a vast array of topics; Žižek’s theories are as representative of his contemporaries as Mitt Romney represents Joe Sixpack).</p> <p>  </p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/3mediumphilosophers%20%28Raphael%20Sanzio%29.jpg" style="width: 458px; height: 600px;" /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Here's an excerpt from Žižek's <em><a href="http://www.lacan.com/zizek-self.htm">Self-Deceptions: On Being Tolerant and Smug</a>:</em></p> <p>  </p> <p> “Instead, one should “let oneself go,” drift along, while retaining an inner distance and indifference toward the mad dance of the accelerated process. Such distance is based on the insight that all of the upheaval is ultimately just a non-substantial proliferation of semblances that do not really concern the innermost kernel of our being. Here, one is almost tempted to resuscitate the old, infamous Marxist cliché of religion as “the opium of the people,” as the imaginary supplement of real-life misery. The “Western Buddhist” meditative stance is arguably the most efficient way for us to fully participate in the capitalist economy while retaining the appearance of sanity.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> Žižek derides Western Buddhism (practicing <a href="http://buddhadharma.com/"><em>Buddhadharma</em></a> within the rigors of capitalism) as a sanctioned process of coping with the capitalist agenda. It's the means of "retaining . . .  sanity" while still participating "in the capitalist economy." Deresiewicz's speech runs similar to the ideals of Western Buddhism, retaining the individual amid the mitigating forces of bureaucratic routine. The criticism Žižek ladles onto the ideals of Western Buddhism apply to Deresiewicz's characterization of the free-thinking bureaucrat (Deresiewicz could argue that unadulterated and original thinking disassociates an individual from functioning as a bureaucrat, but to participate within bureaucracy is to condone, to become a bureaucrat). Deresiewicz prepares the best and brightest to keep their essence within the oppression of bureaucratic rigamarole, while Žižek denies any possibility of retaining individualism under the guise of bureaucratic oppression.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The core difference between the two demonstrates why the modern era demands philosophers like Žižek.  Deresiewicz advises his listeners and readers on remaining to remain creative and independent within a machine that rewards conformity. As Žižek outlines the illusion of Western Buddhism, he also forces those who examine "Solitude and Leadership" to question whether creativity and independence within bureaucracy are true representations of self, or perversions: bureaucratically condoned individualism.</p> <p style="margin-left:3.5in;">  </p> <p> This is the role of the modern philosopher: to compel us to always question; to force life under the microscope; to play the gadfly and keep the trouble brewing.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p> <em>Tyler Huggins is a contributing writer at </em>Highbrow Magazine.</p> <p>  </p> <p> <em><strong>Photos: Andy Miah, Zidd Razan (Creative Commons); Paintings: Gerard von Honthurst; Raphael </strong></em><em><strong>Sanzio</strong></em><em><strong>.</strong></em></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/philosophy" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">philosophy</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/philosophers" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">philosophers</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/slavoj-zizek" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Slavoj Zizek</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/plato" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">plato</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/aristotle" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">aristotle</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/deresiewicz" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">deresiewicz</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/socrates" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">socrates</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/religion" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">religion</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/god" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">god</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/buddhism" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">buddhism</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Tyler Huggins</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-photographer field-type-text field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Photographer:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Andy Miah, Creative Commons</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Mon, 12 Nov 2012 13:22:50 +0000 tara 1895 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1778-modern-day-philosophers-and-need-keep-trouble-brewing#comments Acclaimed Intellectual Slavoj Žižek Waxes Philosophical About God https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1185-acclaimed-intellectual-slavoj-zizek-waxes-philosophical-about-god <div class="field field-name-field-cat field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even"><a href="/books-fiction" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Books &amp; Fiction</a></div></div></div><span class="submitted-by">Submitted by tara on Thu, 05/24/2012 - 19:57</span><div class="field field-name-field-image field-type-image field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="og:image rdfs:seeAlso" resource="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumzizek.jpg?itok=XH5A5Bpu"><img typeof="foaf:Image" src="https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/sites/default/files/styles/large/public/field/image/mediumzizek.jpg?itok=XH5A5Bpu" width="480" height="282" alt="" /></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-body field-type-text-with-summary field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" property="content:encoded"><p>  </p> <p> <strong>God In Pain: Inversions of Apocalypse</strong></p> <p> <strong>Slavoj Žižek, Boris Gunjevic (authors)</strong></p> <p> <strong>Seven Stories Press</strong></p> <p>  </p> <p> Slavoj Žižek has earned himself a reputation as something of a philosophical wild man, an epithet derived at least as much from the way he inhabits a room as it is from the content of his books. When I heard him speak, a few years back at a lecture he gave during the Sarajevo Film Festival, he was in true oracular form, a kind of mangy apostle of sharp, caustic philosophical insight. The threadbare brown T-shirt he wore—for those of the correct age, think early Seattle grunge—darkened steadily with rings of sweat that moved out in widening crescents from each armpit, eventually meeting in the middle. His hair was fully adrift. Eyes wild. Arms swinging beneath an enormous screen that projected clips of the films he was “reading” — themselves a delightful mix, running through classic Hitchcock, Stalinist propaganda films, <em>They Live</em> (starring Rowdy Roddy Piper), <em>Schindler’s List</em>, and <em>Jurassic</em><em> Park</em><em>. </em>About those final two Žižek memorably, and rightly, quipped: <em> Schindler’s List</em> is a remake of <em>Jurassic</em><em> Park</em>. . And <em>Jurassic</em><em> Park</em> is the better film.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The four of us who saw the lecture went out afterwards for coffee. We were divided over what we’d heard in pretty much the way critics remain divided about Žižek. One of us thought he was brilliant, one of us wasn’t so sure, one thought he was a total huckster, the other just enjoyed the show.  The next day my friend who hadn’t been sure (a journalist in Sarajevo), was assigned to interview Žižek. He arrived at 10 a.m. at Žižek’s hotel, as instructed. Žižek emerged in the courtyard wearing the same brown T-shirt, sat down rapidly, and declared that he had very little time, really just a minute or two. Two-and-a-half hours later, my friend’s recorder long since dead, Žižek was soaked in sweat, swinging his arms, still filling my friend’s ear. </p> <p>  </p> <p> Following this session, my not-sure-about- Žižek friend was now my very-sure-about- Žižek friend.</p> <p>  </p> <p> In reading Zizek’s new book, <em>God in Pain: Inversions of Apocalypse</em>, written with Boris Gunjevic, I feel like I get close to the euphoria my friend witnessed while talking to—well, really, listening to— Žižek up close. The book is written in a very direct manner, and if Žižek can sometimes suffer from being a paradoxicalist, he (usually) means what he says. In <em>God in Pain</em> he is also able to say what he means (usually). </p> <p>  </p> <p> The crux of the book is a good one, and although tempting to see it as a corrective to Hitchens and Dawkins-esque writings on atheism, the latter group is so thoroughly outweighed by the sheer force of Žižek’s brain—I’m reminded of a comment made by another politician when Žižek ran for the presidency of Slovenia: Look, we all know you’re the smartest one in the room—that the comparison is sort of pointless.  Still, Žižek is running in the same milieu, and his response to the wild rush of atheism, especially in the more privileged regions of the West, is to say, Not so fast:</p> <p>  </p> <p> “If, once upon a time, we publicly pretended to believe while privately we were skeptics or even engaged in obscene mocking of our public beliefs, today we publicly tend to profess out skeptical, hedonistic, relaxed attitude while we privately remain haunted by beliefs and severe prohibitions.”</p> <p>  </p> <p> For Žižek, the fundamentalist and the cynic both drink from the same well. It’s a compelling argument, and Žižek is particularly apt in discussing a timely issue without falling into t clichés: He has no interest in any so-called war on religion (from either “side), <em>and</em> he has no interest in the virtues or vices of atheism (again, from either “side”). What he is interested in doing—and this is more or less Žižek’s bread and butter as a thinker—is to think clearlythrough  a topic that is so pervasively thought about and discussed as to be nearly unthought. Said another way, everyone is able to take a position on the God question; Žižek isn’t so much interested in taking a position as he is in pointing out what the positions are — and aren’t.</p> <p>  </p> <p> The entire book might be reduced to Žižek’s reading of the aphorism, (mistakenly) first attributed to Doestoevsky by Sartre, that “If God is dead, everything is permitted.” Žižek works with this phrase, turning it into the opposite assertion Lacan saw in it — If God is dead, everything is prohibited.” This, argues Žižek, is the real dilemma faced by the death of God.</p> <p>  </p> <p> As is the usual case in Žižek and, really, most insightful thinkers, not only are the widely accepted positions wrong — they’re actual veils preventing any possibility of insight. Morality, for instance, has nothing to do with the loss of God. God never made anyone good. (But that’s too easy, and it isn’t really Žižek’s point). At best, under God the good stay good. (Also, too easy). The bad also stay bad. (Too easy, still).</p> <p> <img alt="" src="/sites/default/files/mediumzizekbook.jpg" style="width: 377px; height: 565px; " /></p> <p>  </p> <p> Žižek’s real point, vis a vis God and morality, is that only religion makes it possible for a good person to become bad. Evil can only be conducted on a biblical terrain—i.e., a field larger than the quotidian that makes sacrifice, terror, inquisition, merely in service of that transcendent terrain. In fairness, Žižek adds, it is only the biblical terrain that can adequately answer to and consider these very transgressions.</p> <p>  </p> <p> Žižek discusses The Grand Inquisitor scene from T<em>he Brother’s Karamazov</em> as the great literary exemplum of the curious truth that in the name of God nearly anything is permissible. When Christ returns, The Grand Inquisitor tells him that the church no longer needs him, and that his presence would merely impede the Church’s ability to bring happiness to the people. The Inquisition must go on, despite God. If God is alive, then everything is permitted.</p> <p>  </p> <p> This takes us to the problem of the modern atheist: If God is dead, then everything is prohibited. Dispatching God hasn’t turned any particular group into a pack of marauding wolves (again, it’s easier to argue the opposite), nor has it made the doing of good, the finding of meaning, or the expressing of love impossible.</p> <p>  </p> <p> What it has done, Žižek says, is create a moral landscape in which, lacking the liberating prohibitions of a faith in God, the modern atheist is turned into a collection of invented, substitute prohibitions — non-belief is asserted with as much uncritical certainty as fundamental belief might be, even less perhaps; and the modern atheist, far from running with open arms into wild and truly free pleasure-seeking and satisfaction, is a bundle of mini-prohibitions. Political correctness. Gym memberships. Cage-free eggs. Locally sourced beef. Seitan. These tiny terrors come up, over and over, and, for the free, everything if prohibited:</p> <p>  </p> <p> “However, even if Lacan’s version [‘If God is dead, everything is prohibited’] appears an empty paradox, a quick look at our moral landscape confirms that it is much more appropriate [than the idea that ‘If God is dead, everything is permitted’] to describe the universe of atheist liberal hedonists: they dedicate their life to the pursuit of pleasures, but since there is no external authority guaranteeing them space for this pursuit, they become entangled in a thick web of self-imposed Politically Correct regulations, as if a superego much more severe than that of traditional morality is controlling them. They become obsessed by the idea that, in pursuing their pleasures, they may humiliate or violate others’ space, so they regulate their behavior … not to mention the no less complex regulation of their own care of the self (bodily fitness, health food, spiritual relaxation…).</p> <p>  </p> <p> “Indeed,” Žižek adds, “there is nothing more oppressive and regulated than being a simple hedonist.”</p> <p>              </p> <p> <strong>Author Bio:</strong></p> <p> <em>Trevor Laurence Jockims, a contributing writer </em>at Highbrow Magazine<em>,  teaches English literature at Hunter College, City University of New York. His writings have appeared in </em>The New York Times<em>, </em>Anderbo, Kino Kultura, Connotations<em>, and elsewhere.</em></p> <p>  </p> <p> <em><strong>Photos: Seven Stories Press; Erste Foundation.</strong></em></p> </div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-tags field-type-taxonomy-term-reference field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Tags:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/slavoj-zizek" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Slavoj Zizek</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/god-pain" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">God in Pain</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/philosopher-slavoj-zizek" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">philosopher Slavoj Zizek</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/seven-stories-press" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Seven Stories Press</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/boris-gunjevic" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">Boris Gunjevic</a></div><div class="field-item odd" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/religion" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">religion</a></div><div class="field-item even" rel="dc:subject"><a href="/god" typeof="skos:Concept" property="rdfs:label skos:prefLabel" datatype="">god</a></div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-author field-type-text field-label-hidden"><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Trevor Laurence Jockims</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-pop field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Popular:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">not popular</div></div></div><div class="field field-name-field-bot field-type-list-boolean field-label-above"><div class="field-label">Bottom Slider:&nbsp;</div><div class="field-items"><div class="field-item even">Out Slider</div></div></div> Thu, 24 May 2012 23:57:58 +0000 tara 1023 at https://www.highbrowmagazine.com https://www.highbrowmagazine.com/1185-acclaimed-intellectual-slavoj-zizek-waxes-philosophical-about-god#comments