Accelerationism w/ Michael Downs

Alright this week we’re continuing our series on Slavoj Žižek’s Against Progress with another long-awaited conversation with theorist and friend of the show Michael Downs, author of the Dangerous Maybe Blog on Medium and his new book Capital Vs Timenergy: A Žižekian Critique of Nick Land to discuss Žižek’s essay Accelerationism.Is Žižek an Accelerationist?In PART ONE of our conversation we’re talking accelerationism and degrowth, all things Nick Land, cyber-positivity, forced choices, the zero point of modernity, and get into the CCRU, cute accelerationism, AI as metaphysical horror, the barred and unbarred Big Other, Providence, techno-Telos, face tentacles, vinyl records, and the Lacanian subject.⁠⁠Support us on PATREON and get access to our Discord, interviews, extra episodes each month, and our SHORT SESSIONS series for $5/month.⁠⁠See you in Paris,Ž&...

Alright, this week Tim is shopping for two birds that look alike and we’re joined by friend of the podcast Jack Black whose latest book is The Psychosis of Race: A Lacanian Approach to Racism and Racialization and we’re talking through Žižek’s new book Against Progress. What becomes of squashed birds? We’re talking Slavoj Žižek’s work on quantum physics, collapsed wave functions, fetishistic splits, retroactive redemption, disavowal, Jack’s mother’s poetic swearing, and whether the only real option is one that starts again. And again. And again. Support us on PATREON for more episodes, interviews, SHORT SESSIONS and our DISCORD.Big thanks to Jack and as always… See you in Paris,Ž&...

LISTEN TO THE FULL EPISODE HERE!Alright, we’re back with another Patreon SHORT SESSION and this week Tim is at the shops buying a Tickle Me Elmo and we’re taking a look at some aspects of laughter in a few different ways.SHORT SESSIONS, variable length sessions, however you wanna put it, in these episodes we’ll wrap them up because of something that is said, rather than the tyranny of the clock.So what’s so ticklish about the ticklish subject? Can it tickle itself?We’re talking Žižek’s totalitarian laughter, Adam Phillips on the erotic grammar of tickling, Trump as the David Brent of Empire, Romanian orphanages and Rhesus monkeys, and the dialectic of cringe and tickling.Whatever you do, don’t google "competitive tickling".Check out Aaron Schuster's piece on tickling here.Jamil Khader's RELOADING LAUGHTER: ŽIŽEK AND A THEORY OF COMEDYSee you in Paris,Ž&...

Alright, this week Tim is still away and certainly not obsessed with Anomancy a truth procedure which involves reading the folds and wrinkles of someones anus to discover profound insights into health, love, and destiny…he is rather off the wagon only to run someone down and will be back soon.In the meantime we’re talking to Alfie Bown author of Post-Comedy which is Alfie's latest book in the same series as Mladen Dolar, Alenka Zupancic, Helen Rollins and many others.Get a copy of Post-Comedy here!We’re talking anxiety, ideology, the form of comedy today, and the ontology of laughter.We’re getting into the disappearance of the laugh track, cringe comedy, crowd work & platform capitalism, the politics of offence, didactic humour, and how since comedy is surprises, if you're intending to make somebody laugh and they don’t laugh...that’s funny too.See you in Paris,Ž&...LOLAlso, check out the new series on Little Hans by Kate Merritt and Manuel Gabbert which you can find on YouTube and the Everyday Analysis page as well as all everything else going on at @everydayanalysis

To listen to the FULL EPISODE head to our PATREONAlright, we’re back from the LACK Conference at Otterbein University and Tim’s still at the airport screaming that the queue is the destination. Great to see so many friends— Jack Black, Neo Winter Scott, Jon Hegglund, Matthew Flisfeder, Clint Burnham, Katherine Everitt, Todd McGowan, Anna Kornbluh, Russell Sbriglia, Ryan Engley, Derek Hook, Mikey Downs and the crew…too many to name and of course, Žižek himself.In this SHORT SESSION, we’re diving into the extended version of my LACK presentation The Shit of History: No Fickle Matter—a theory of waste in capitalism as structural, not accidental.We’re talking Adrian Johnston’s coprophagic capitalism, Slavoj Žižek’s violence typology, offshore detention, DOGE, plastic recycling, human waste, and James Mcann’s public toilet analysis.Big thanks to our PATREONS for the ongoing support and to James Donald Forbes McCann!You can find his special here! ...or find him on YouTube and everywhere else.⁠Support us on PATREON and get access to our Discord, interviews, extra episodes each month, and our SHORT SESSIONS series for $5/month.⁠See you in Paris,Ž&…

Alright, while Tim's busy making two minute noodles we're speaking with Helen Rollins! Check out her website here!Helen is a filmmaker, academic, and writer from Northern Ireland who writes and lectures on film and psychoanalysis. Her latest book, Psychocinema, was published in 2024 in the Theory Redux series.We’re talking the le non-duped err and messy bedrooms, the Gaze, the Master’s Discourse, the form of cinema, the politics of film as an industry today, and why film itself is a psychoanalytic experience. And here’s an endorsement from Slavoj Žižek for Helen’s new book…“Helen Rollins’ Psychocinema does something that is very rare: it aims at changing the very frame of how cinema and psychoanalysis are related. Rollins shows that viewing a film is in itself a psychoanalytic experience, the effect of film on the viewer is that of psychoanalysis on the analysand. Watching a film confronts us with the truth of our desire in all its inconsistencies, with the lack that sustains this desire. This ground-breaking thesis is demonstrated by dozens of illustrious examples, and they make the book not only insanely readable but also an important contribution to today’s politics of emancipation.I didn’t dare even to imagine that a book like Psychocinema could exist. But miracles happen, and Rollins’s book is one of them.”Thanks Helen!See you in Paris, Ž&...

LISTEN TO THE FULL EPISODE HERE!Alright, we’re back with a new PATREON EPISODE while Tim's still on an island painting a face on a volleyball & we're taking another look at Todd McGowan's new book Pure Excess.Capitalism promises things beyond their usefulness, the enjoyment of a useless excess, an excess which is presented as pure when it is necessarily impure — there is always a hidden sacrifice.We're talking Jackie Kennedy's fake pearl necklace selling for $200,000, Paper Water and the Resnick's, Trump's Air Rights, and why we can't have McDonalds at home. Big thanks to our ⁠PATREONS⁠ for the ongoing support!⁠⁠Support us on PATREON and get access to our Discord, interviews, extra episodes each month and our new SHORT SESSIONS series for $5 a month!⁠⁠See you in Paris, Ž&…

Alright, welcome back to Žižek and So On this time we’re talking again with old mate Todd McGowan. This was recorded on Valentines Day 2025 and Tim was busy shopping for eggs.We’re diving into Todd’s new book Pure Excess: Capitalism and the Commodity to talk inutility and the promise of pure excess in the commodity form. Why can’t we have McDonalds at home? What is capitalism’s magic trick, and where are the dead birds? Up next we’ve got an episode dedicated solely to Todd’s book staging a series of examples to explore the theoretical underpinnings of the book. SUPPORT THE PODCAST HERE to access our Discord, more interviews, more episodes and our SHORT SESSIONS!See you in Paris,Ž&…

LISTEN TO THE FULL EPISODE HERE! Alright, we’re back for 2025 with a new PATREON episode and while Tim's drinking margaritas on a beach somewhere we’re talking Binocular rivalry, the authorlessness of AI, the Dead Internet Theory, Mr Beast…and what happens when a Rabbi, Businessman, and a poor ordinary Jew talk to God. This is PART TWO in our series on Mladen Dola’rs Rumors through Zizek's recent comments on psychoanalysis, and the strange logic of knowledge in the age of information overload. Can we know too much? Is the production of knowledge necessarily good? What’s the difference between rumour and conspiracy? Is it a conspiracy or platform capitalism functioning smoothly? Thanks to our PATREONS for another year of the show!  ⁠Support us on PATREON and get access to our Discord, interviews, extra episodes each month and our new SHORT SESSIONS series for $5 a month!⁠ See you in Paris, Ž&…

Alright...as you know Slavoj Žižek and Mladen Dolar are the founding members of the Ljubljana School of Psychoanalysis with Alenka Zupančič as part of their Troika, and this week we have our first episode of a new series we're doing on Mladen Dolar's upcoming book Rumors as part of the Theory Redux editions with Polity Press. A little birdie told me that Tim is busy moving house and we're talking the general rumorization of society from Socrates to Trump, Franz Kafka's the Trial, Lacan's ethology, JD Vance and his couch, Castaways, and Cindy Crawford. A lot of people are talking about it! Thanks to everyone for all of the support and apologies for the episode delay...rumors abound! SUPPORT THE PODCAST HERE - for more episodes, interviews, SHORT SESSIONS and our Discord! See You in Paris! Ž&...