Slavoj Žižek quotes
1949 – · Slovenia, 20th–21st century · philosopher, cultural theorist, psychoanalytic theorist
About Slavoj Žižek
Born 21 March 1949 in Ljubljana (then Yugoslavia), he studied philosophy and sociology at the University of Ljubljana and pursued psychoanalytic training in Paris. From the late 1980s onward he gained international prominence through books, lectures and media interventions synthesizing Lacan, Hegel and Marx.
Works: The Sublime Object of Ideology; The Ticklish Subject; Less Than Nothing; Living in the End Times
Quotes
“What if the way we perceive a problem is already part of the problem?”
Source: Year of Distraction (lecture, 2011, ~1:07) · Check the source
Disputed attributionWhat we know
- What is documented
- A closely matching sentence appears in Žižek’s 2011 lecture Year of Distraction: he says philosophy should show how the way we perceive a problem can be itself part of a problem.
- What remains uncertain
- The precise short wording circulating online is a condensed paraphrase; no primary source for that exact sentence has been located, and it echoes Stephen R. Covey’s earlier phrasing.
Žižek prompts us to doubt the frame, not only the answers: the way a problem is perceived can carry ideological assumptions that help reproduce it. This idea is traced to his lecture Year of Distraction (2011) and urges reframing before proposing fixes.