The linked article falls into this trap. It sees through “ideology” - meaning political theory - on the grounds that it oppresses the individual. The problem is that this itself a political ideology.
The linked article falls into this trap. It sees through “ideology” - meaning political theory - on the grounds that it oppresses the individual. The problem is that this itself a political ideology.
Except Zizek never claims that. Not everyone is claiming "only I see the truth and you are a sheep". Some of us are claiming we are all being manipulated and need to be aware: ourselves included.
I think it is disingenuous for you to make that straw-man, to claim people who say ideology is harmful somehow think they are better than everyone else because only they see the truth.
That only serves to put a spotlight on your own personal axe to grind.
“The key feature here is that to see the true nature of things, we need the glasses: it is not that we should put ideological glasses off to see directly reality as it is”: we are “naturally” in ideology, our natural, immediate, sight is ideological.”
However, I'm still having trouble internalizing your claim that the belief that you have to put on the glasses is in itself an ideology. How? Is it an ideology in the sense that anyone can apply it by saying, "Ah, you don't see the truth," where the truth can be whatever you say it is?
Wouldn't Zizek have noticed that? Or is it intentional since the entire film is about ideology, and that's kind of a perversion of ideology.
Zizek uses the metaphor of parallax to explain ideology. Parallax is the phenomenon where a distant object's position seems to shift depending on the position of the viewer. Two people looking at the same object from different angles will see something different. Zizek's point is that this isn't an epistemic problem where one person is wrong (lying, deluded, etc.) and the other is right. The conflict is ontological—the parallax shift is part of reality itself.
The true ideological move is to claim that you've stepped back from the conflicting perspectives to a neutral, objective standpoint, some kind of middle ground where all differences are reconciled. This move is always epistemic, i.e. "Both sides have good points, but they're blinded by their beliefs and can't see how things really are." The truth is not a middle position halfway between two people who are looking out at a distant object and seeing different things due to parallax.
Zizek says the They Live glasses are like critique-of-ideology glasses, not because they show the that the "true" meaning behind advertising is "Obey", "Consume", etc. It's because they render the conflict visible. Ultimately, one is forced to pick a side-which is a political choice-because there is no neutral objective position.