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

Look at all those people all grouped together in one room. People were crazy back then.

Slavoj Zizek "moralism is always the politics of those who don't know what to do". Beautiful

Zizek: "I don't know enough to give a complete answer" *talks for 8 minutes*

Q: what do you think about basic income? Zizek: let me tell you about military service

My take on UBI has always been that it might _finally_ give freedom to the lower classes to actually choose their occupation. The lower classes take what's on offer when it comes to jobs. Even if they go to college, they're likely going to choose a major they feel they can make enough money from in order to justify having gone to college and repay their loans, rather than something they're interested in/passionate about. In places where they've rolled out UBI, they've not seen a significant decrease in employment. Most people don't tend to want to do nothing with themselves. Maybe for a little while, as a break finally, after devoting years (and deferring time off) to some sh¡tty retail job, but eventually most people will become restless and need purpose. Besides, UBI isn't usually more than enough to cover basic living expenses. It's just to keep you housed and fed and not needing to work in order not to die or be on the street. If you want more from life, you'd have to supplement it.

I think basic income would liberate so many people to do work they want to do, or find more rewarding. The concept of work needs to change. So many great discoveries were made by the rich in the past. Not because they were smarter, but because they had the time and resources to work, not just for their daily bread.

Here in the Netherlands you can only get your unemployment check if you're doing volunteer work while looking for a job. That's kinda what Zizek is talking about.

I paused the video for a minute to get something from the fridge and when i unpaused he was talking about Prague Spring i am so lost i love it

I find it disturbing how much I can agree with this man

Don't forget that the US founders choose life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness instead of Locke's life, liberty, and property. Also remember that only those with property were allowed to vote.

If you do want to know enough to have a precise answer, look up Consumer Monetary Theory. Basic income changes the equation. It's not the answer to an oncoming wave of automation; it's what *allows* an economy to finally automate away undesirable labor. The moral assumption Zizek holds onto about "not getting something for free" puts everyone into the position of needing a job to survive, which must be delivered to them either by the private sector or by the state. As a consequence, to try (and fail) to deliver enough wages to everyone, we then use macroeconomic policy to force our economy to produce unnecessary jobs, which waste people's time, and are destroying the environment. With the technology we already have, we need an incredibly small % of the population employed to actually produce enough goods. Everyone else is just being forced into the service industry. Full employment is the problem, and UBI is the solution to it. The default assumption that every person has to be a wage laborer is holding society back from its true potential. Full output with minimum necessary labor is a better goal for the economy, society, and the environment.

The notion of compulsory work in a fully automated society sounds like something from a dystopian film.

I agree that humans need work and it gives them dignity. But with UBI people don't have to do work they despise just to put meals on their plate. They can choose the work they like. Some people would choose not to work, but, first, we don't know to what extent the effect is for them; secondly, they might choose to discipline themselves to work when they find out that working is good for them regardless of the pay.

I think basic income is a great way to evoke a purpose in people.

Seeing that flash of insight at 3:21 was inspiring

Hmmmmm....it's not necessarily about happiness, but fulfilling one's ability to eat.

I appreciate the fact that this guy is smart enough to realize he is being an old idealist and his position is actually a conservative position relative to UBI (AKA ending poverty directly)

He is talking about basic income as some kind of final fulfillment, forgetting that, for most people, it would mean less uncertainty and more agency before everything else. We cannot expect sanity from people who cannot raise their head from the grind wheel, cradle to grave. Žižek forgot that silent majority.

Reminds me of what unamuno says about dreams in tragic sense of life, but he applies that only on a personal level, on the level of government it is a dystopian idea

Actually Zizek is wrong about UBI. They tested it here in Canada in the 70s. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mincome What they found was that UBI didn’t cause people to stop working-it just reduced stress for anyone who, for whatever reason, couldn’t work. During this pandemic, we have the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) fulfilling much the same function. I hope it sticks.

Work should be optional. But there should be many options, so there is work that aligns with your strengths and passions that could be used to build a career path or a business. And you should be paid more to perform work. With the opportunity to do work you love and get paid more money, who would not want to work? (except people trying to work under the table - then that would be a problem).

While agreeing that work is a genuine human virtue, i tend to disagree with Zizek's scepticism towards both people's will of fulfilling their dreams and achieving their goals. I think that it is symbolic power of Capitalism who misleads you and makes you impossible to think realistically of what you really want to achieve, not the person himself. Basic income is a nice way to feel that pressure not that tough and start focusing on more important things

I want an app that will "honk" every time he grabs his nose.

Truly, the most intelligent people among us can also be the most dangerously wrong. Enlightening video.

Errr, the problem with requiring people to 'do something' in return for their basic income is the same as for people on welfare - sure, it speaks to the good old Protestant work ethic and may build or maintain work discipline in long-term unemployed people. But the problem with having the superfluous labour force work for their state income is that this can easily impede on work that would otherwise be done by people paid an actual salary to do so. That's why in most countries legislation exists to prevent state-subsidised 'free' workers from entering in any kind of market competition with salaried workers. As well as why as a rule the work performed by welfare recipients tends to be anything but useful busywork, like manually removing staples from documents headed for the shredder.

The mentioned Belgian philosopher is Philippe Van Parijs. en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philippe_Van_Parijs

My take on the "why for free" is that objective moral actions will gain you some current

Bill Still explains printing money as BALANCE (red stamp) or RUBBER (green stamp), promissory, still.

A UBI would give workers enough leverage to leave dead end jobs and get training/education for better careers.

@7:00 Slavo gives as good an analysis of the american/western syndrome known as "pursuit of happiness" as I've heard so far.

Happiness is the realization that you can strive for a different moment of success.

i dont follow zizek here, in my opinion universal basic income can be a shift to a better society post-capitalism, saying people they gotta work in exchange for the basic income is no much more different than staying in the same problematics that we face today, have trust people will eventually do something more meaningful if they don't have to be in the mood of survival all the time

Begin with universal income but he finished with the Prague spring, happiness and military service... It's make sense? Yes, it's very coherent.

this is the argument Frederic Jameson puts forward in his essay An American Utopia: Dual Power and the Universal Army

I like the idea of UBI in America. A rising tide lifts all boats. My biggest fear about it is what it will do to existing prices. There is the distinct possibility that we end up with gold rush inflation and we end up paying more for the lifestyle we've always had. All that extra money just ends up in the hands of the people who already rigged the game to benefit themselves. Would you jump into an in-progress game of monopoly where nearly all the properties were already owned? How do we relax or repeal the rules of our society which maintain the lopsided division of wealth?

As a fairly mainline liberal, I don't agree with Zizek on everything, but here he is correct: mandatory public service is superior to UBI. I also think that we should return to general conscription in the military. The reason is so that young people would serve regardless of background, thereby fostering a sense of national identity, and developing in rich kids a sense of civic obligation.

UBI nema smisla ako se ne radi jer samo rad daje proizvode. To je Žižek točno definirao. Tko prima UBI mora raditi poslove za zajednicu, a ne biti besposlen. Ako će strojevi raditi, tada je pitanje tko je vlasnik tih strojeva. To moramo biti svi (društveno vlasništvo) jer će inače opet dolaziti do koncentracije kapitala u rukama malog broja ljudi.

UBI is one area I can't agree with him. I believe progress happens when people are freed from the mundane and can rethink and remake stuff or make new stuff, in other words allowance to get outside the box. I disagree with the idea that a UBI can be a band-aid to prop up capitalism, that is the thing that makes me weary about UBI under a neoliberal dominant framework. Zizek talks about the pursuit of happiness. I too think the pursuit of happiness is folly but more the pursuit of some commodity sold as happiness. Happiness itself is probably way more abstract and subjective, how ever the freedom to be able to pursue the higher values and attainments may not be folly. I wouldn't assume there are higher values or attainments, because that is similar to having a mental hierarchical framework that suggest up word movements, when again, I think things are more abstract and subjective.

It kind of sounds like that whole “ Life is about the journey, not the destination” philosophy.

amazing to me this guy is more popular than David Harvey. People love spectacle

so universal income and force of labour, i think ive heard that somewhere before hahaha only there they suggested to seize the means of production first

My feeling is that here, Zizek is just out of touch with the zeitgeist. Maybe I'm wrong, but I feel there is something strangely authoritarian about this generation. And I don't mean Zizek alone, I mean the whole way of thinking that for me embodies 20th century political thought. It is very planning, very centralised. I dont mean this in a neoliberal way of thinking, it's not a stupid notion for markets as vessels of freedom opposed to control. I'm trying to describe this idea that if there would be communal work, it would have to be state planned and organised. If there would be no more wage labour (or at least not the _need_ for wage labour), the result would be laziness. I dont believe this to be true. I mean, Zizek is right when he is talking about the need for a returning big narrative, but my maybe naive hope is, that it doesn't need a state or an otherwise centralised entity to achieve collective action and organisation.

The example with the Prague spring doesn't make sense. They wanted genuine changes in their political system, under the commie leadership, so they could've gone the Chinese way or Yugoslavian way, or create their own. But what followed after the Russian military intervention was 20 years of Gloom and persecution similar to the 50s which they wanted to get away from and which can't be separated from the historical memory of that event. And that's also why the Czechs hate the Russians despite having been liberated by them in WW2

👍👏👏👏

Im still really mixed on ubi. I feel like its more of a bandaid then an actual fix to the problem. Im more in favor of a more robust public housing and public food option. I am open to the idea of ubi though.

He defeated his own argument, if people can't help but do work then you don't need to force them, and by providing a baseline they can focus on a meaningful contribution, instead on something that merely keeps them busy. Would you find washing dishes meaningful next to a dishwasher? Should we have elevator operators? There are those who enjoy having their own garden and they grow their own food but it's a hobby compared to agriculture. If we scored jobs based on their value to society, some of them would get a negative score, and the gap between positive ones would be massive.

I think that an application of universal income for people would give an excuse to various industries increasing their prices

UBI isn’t money to do nothing, it’s money to do anything

I often agree with him but this is nonsense. He talked about required military service in a positive way saying it creates discipline, then said that happiness is conformative, but military discipline isn't conformative...

i have a honest question. youtube does advertisments and such. so i dont want to spill my coffee with the volume difference everytime i forget to use the browser without addblock. why do people get slaughtered mentioning this?

A new WPA, would be better than UBI. So much great work and arts came out of that. People create culture together, important to have your hand in contributing.

If automation can do all the work and, thus, said system is sustainable and profit is constant, forcing people to work for the sake of it is a stupid and arbitrary imposition, especially if we consider not all people enjoy having to work and that, with UBI, they could fill their free time with hobbies (which could go from working out and reading books to rotting in their rooms watching Netflix).

Basic income is good idea, gives some apriori value to human life, like that famous human right to live, and this is like practically enabling to sustain dignity of human existence. It will reduce crime at least. This is like next steps after minimal wage. So we all as people participating in demand in economy for production, as demand is bigger productivity is better. If we artificially build up demand on false ideas of happiness, we end up in bubble of false reality, which eventually burst because doesn't satisfy essential needs. And basic income could provide this basic needs which will give real results of technological progress, which has the point in sustaining human life, that is why there is population growth. But basic income should be introduced all over the world as manifestation of human rights in practice. If there is point of talking about human rights at all. You don't have to earn human rights, I guess that how is stated somewhere over there under the stars where history is written.

Z just changed my mind on UBI, and I really need this money!! :(

Thank you, Slavoj

Universal basic income is possible. But administration has to go to a minimum staff.

They’re called shares. The financial revolution answered the question for distributing the profits of society. If your income is dependent on the whims of a politician, then it’s not a right. That’s why property rights exist. If your concerns are sustainability, it’s a simple matter of not living beyond the surplus generated by your labor. Contribute more if you’d like more.

Scotland and Spain are looking at it. Spain is going to implement it permanently. Scotland, for the pandemic. It is going to become popular outside of the USA. Just like M4A. The World post pandemic, is going to look very different.

Considering life without work: There's an excellent book called The Human Condition, by Hannah Arendt that he seems to be echoing in his concern about losing our relationship with work. Her prologue shows the importance of having a stake in nature, culture, politics - in short, the world.

I can see a lot of good come from a UBC and then I think of who will be administering and managing it....this is what makes it a bad idea at least in the long term.

The scroungers hero

The problem with UBI is that it doesn't solve class struggle. Someone thinks It gives workers more leverage with their bosses, but it's the opposite. Why should your boss grant you more rights on the workplace if you already have a basic income waiting for you at home? Meanwhile, nothing impedes inflation to happen, with the powerful lobbies trying to rise the prices for rents or any other basic need. Prices will rise to the point you will be forced to find a job in order for you to provide a good life for your family. But now you have a basic income so they don't have any reason to give a fuck about how fair the pay is. Furthermore, who builds these machines? Who will do maintenance and stuff? Standard underpaid workers. Manual underpaid labor will become the privilege among the lower classes, while the bourgeouisie will think to have abolished poverty with a bullshit income that will be useless.

The problem with Zizek's position on UBI is that it is based on the dignity of work ideology, a result of the reduction in capitalism of every concrete labor into abstract labor. Can we really talk about dignity when so many people are working bullshit jobs (in Mexico, for example, we have men whom you pay in order to have a spot to park on the street and so that they give you a heads up when you park so the vehicle isn't damaged, or in the supermarkets you have people working in helping you bag groceries)? Can we really talk about dignity when so many people are working in the prostitution industry, or as bodyguards, personal security, and shakedowners for the mob or businessmen or politicians, or in criminal organizations? When so many people work as maids for high middle class income homes and above, or in call centers as petty salesmen and service? And this is even ignoring the social division of labor in capitalism between manual and intellectual, complex and simple labor, and the division between the rural jobs and urban jobs, which implies then that most actually work in undervalued, underpaid jobs, which are the essential for the production of surplus value. So, you will not in any way solve this by introducing a UBI with mandatory work, since most works will be this kind of undignified-in-practice jobs. But UBI isn't meant to address this: it is only meant to provide a pretty straightforward mechanism for preventing the worst aspects of rules of income in capitalism. Does it tighten the commodification of society? Sure, since it consists in giving you money for free to purchase goods and services, and then it only reinforces the logic of the market. Will it reduce payment leverage for workers? It may, if we not prevent this with proper legislation. Might it produce inflation? Very probably, and every single capitalist pundit will then call for its cancelation. Should it replace welfare programs and similar? No, since it dismantles a structure helpful and sometimes necessary for the working class, for example in health care, something in the current contingency more evident than ever. Should it be a livable UBI? Yes, since then it can give workers leverage to strike in exploiting industries. Should it be the end-all goal of politics? Not it you are a socialist, since it is a capitalist pacifier, and the aim is to achieve the classless society and decommodification of labor. This is only to show that UBI in abstract is anything but a policy, and that it can be advantageous for workers and the socialist movement, if framed properly, or detrimental if framed in a capitalist vein.

Zizek and Peterson are so alike on many issues. I dont know who I like more.

If UBI is an argument against automation then a better law would to simply force corps to hire a majority of people before they are allowed to use robots for work. This wouldn’t decrease productivity nor give away money for free.

Hayek had a similar idea of a more efficient capitalism though basic income

i think ubi would be pretty dystopian, many people would literally depend on the state for survival, and many more could be fucked over by austerity politics in power

Lockdown is a good practice run for the future. Only a few people work and the government pays you a salary. Some people who are young now may have to do this permanently in the future.

If all the world were made of one race and that race were all considered equal there would be universal care for all because you remove the problems of otherness which is the biggest hurdle to all things human

‘Why should you get it for free?’ Exactly.

6:30

I can't take this guy seriously. Both by how he sounds and his ideas.

Finally, I disagree with the old man. Work doesn’t give a person any dignity. A right not to work does.

I can write poems and read and study in underwear and no shirt. I get a job and I have to wear clothes, have transportation, worry about lunch at work, put up with sadism, and so on and so on. I think everyone should stay home. Don't work, just think. Eventually these assholes will come around. If they don't you have that other option.

Universal basic dope

This might be the only thing I disagree with him partially though, yes UBI is required, but you can’t say one should be forced to do a certain work because there were deprived of education and opportunities, happens straight by birth( poverty and inequalities), everybody should be provided with the same level of opportunity whether be it education and all that and it should be an individual’s choice to do what they want after that, I mean we need more of science and education to solve what the mess of an era we’re presently in, only way out is science and education

My elementary observation: if you pay some people for nothing, the working people will demand much more for their efforts

People conflate what UBI does with UBI itself. Raising people out of poverty is an absolute must, but the UBI is not the only way to do it. Is it the best way? Maybe. But one of the issues is the universal nature, as well as the inherent receipt of the payment. You don't do anything, but there is so much work that can be done. If jobs paid properly, had more reasonable hours, and covered the costs of living, how would UBI be better?

He says he hates politicians moralizing as he advocates for a forced contribution to society. We have passed the threshold of providing for human needs globally. Capitalism is no longer needed for distributing basic necessities, its only useful for deciding who gets the extravagant crap the humans make. The act of stopping freeriders in an ultra-efficient system is based on greed. You know people are just in it for the fight when there's enough resources for everyone but there's still competition for it. Not being a criminal is already contributing to society. UBI wont make people lazy. You act as if people will start buying mansions, yachts, and jets to just lounge in all day.

Is UBI the Global North outsourcing all the dangerous and hard work to the Global South and living off their labor? That is what concerns me. I sit on my dead ass watching Netflix and producing useless social media trash while some poor person mines the cobalt for my iPhone and Tesla car. This funds my UBI. I agree this notion of "no work" is idiotic. Walk outside and look at all the pollution and rotting infrastructure and tell me then there is no work.

I mean if you just want to argue that some people thrive better when they have a job they have to work at then I’d be all for trying to provide that, but if we live at a point in technology where there’s no need for someone to work and people don’t want to do it, then why not just let people live ?

Currently, during the pandemic, people are choosing to stay on unemployment rather than taking pay from their employers, and perhaps it is justifiable. Universal basic income could potentially lead to a class of people that refuse to work because there is no need. The entire system would need to be torn down and built from scratch and the current people in power on both sides of the aisle won't let this happen any time soon.

The common mistake people make when discussing UBI is assuming that people will not work. Jobs are not the only form of work. People will still work. They will re-invent the new economy. The only difference is that the work will be more flexible, self employed, creative and entrepreneurial. Things that the previous form of capitalism didn't incentivize.

Is he talking about a UBI that people can live off of? because Yang isn't proposing that.

From my surrounding, people love to do things, they love to make creative stuff, like dead crafts and arts. That are really dead solemnly because no one would pay for them. I my self would love to do art or crafts while living on basic income. I would still work, I love to work, but I´d like to renovate my house, make some home-made soap, craft clothes for my self, learn how to cook or bake. But I simply can´t because I have no time to do stuff that does not generate income or allows me to rest to generate more income. I believe that people would still work, but the motivation is going to be experience and skill and not money.

Even zizek refuses to talk about poor people.

Automation has been completely useless so far. It doesn't mean you need to work less, but it means you need to buy more, not because you want to, but because you have to. Nowadays there are way more basic needs required to participate in society, like a basic pc, smartphone or internet connection are just a must.

If I had a basic income that took care of my basic needs like food and housing ect. I'd only want to work 10 hours a week. Just enough to buy video games and books. Maybe some people care about achievements and bettering the world but i don't. I'd just sit on my ass all day. Kinda what i do now.

He had to sniff a line to answer that.

This has been my opinion on UBI as well. People should still be obligated to contribute to public works and service.

A new game for your party: Take a shot 🥃 whenever Slavoj says "and so on".

found the Yang Ganger

Now in lockdown we kinda get it. People dont work they have plenty of free time but what are they actually doing with it? Do you feel like everyone is creating art? From what I have seen majority of people dont make any good use of this time, they watch tv shows, play videogames and smoke weed. They are not magically turning into painters, musicians, sculptors etc.... Just another romanticized view based on sentimental appeal.

What of people who are immensely productive in endeavors that don't "pay" in money? Unpaid endeavors such as creative arts and motherhood/fatherhood, or simply the inability to "capitalize" on one's own productive choices as "capitalism" demands? "Constructive-productivity" and "financial-reward" are not synonymous. A UBI can raise those who's endeavors are not rewarded by capitalism, facilitating participation in the "money-game". You want me to play your "monopoly-game"? Give me some playing pieces. I am a native Earthling. I be-long here.

Isn't that a satre play....

I dont approve with him on this one. Basic income but together with public work would hold people back to orientate to what they would realy like to do work wise. Maybe a orientation curse every year? Who wouldnt like to get a basic income and earn money ontop of that?

Moralism and leaning on ethics is always a backward movement. So called established "values" prevent the search for a realistic solution . . . Sorry , I don't have time now to develop this further ✊😊°°°

Corbyn was a success with the worst defeat for 80 years, lost seats that were Labour for the last century, yep a brilliant success...... For Boris

UBI would allow people to try to live for their passion. I know for sure that if we had UBI my mom would try live off her art and drawings, but as things are currently she cannot give up her stable job to do that. So she keeps working a job that she has no passion for, it's a mindless grind but it pays the bills. It's that uncertainty and meaninglessness that UBI would eliminate. On the other hand we'd have a layer of society rather doing nothing productive and living off UBI than to do the most elementary of tasks - cleaning parks, doing public service, etc. as Zizek mentioned. I do believe that you should produce value in order to qualify for UBI, but then the problem becomes who decides if you should qualify. So on second thought maybe it should be just a form of government subsidy that you can receive if you prove that you are talented and continue to work on that talent.