Zizek’s Idea of a True Ethics

We most commonly think of ethics as a sort of personal-individual analysis of right versus wrong. The individual is pressed with a dilemma and then decides to act upon their own subjective idea of what it right and wrong – but this is the most vulgar idea of ethics. I personally adhere to Zizek’s brutal idea about what a true approach to ethics is. In Zizek’s thought, a true ethics is not based on either a question of right versus wrong, but what needs to be done for the good of the other – based on the objective need and not a subjective battle of wills.

Zizek uses a similar example to this one to demonstrate his point on ethics:

There is a beautiful young German girl who tends after local children and is known to be very friendly and cordial with those children. One day a train taking Jews to a concentration camp passes by her town. She happens to live near the train station and is taking a walk, along with the children she regularly looks after. The Jewish children on the train are all starving and are in desperate need of water. The beautiful young girl has both at her immediate disposal. She takes some bread in one hand and water in the other and proceeds toward the train. She stops abrubtly. All the Jewish children are crying out for her attention. Before she gets to the train she eats the bread and drinks the water in full view of all the Jewish prisoners, as well as in front of the children she is caring for. She then gives a Nazi salute to the train and walks back to the children she is attending. She then goes back to her home thinking she has acted in the appropriate manner. Two of the children she is watching over slip away from her and proceed to the tool shed. They grab a full bottle of acid. The two children proceed back to the young girl and they throw the entire bottle of acid directly into the face of the beautiful girl.  She is horribly injured and disfigured, but she lives. The two children admit their behaviour to the local authorities and explain why they acted in this way.

The two children who avenged the Jewish prisoners acted in the right way, i.e. ethically speaking, as brutal as it may sound. They acted in the right way because they performed a necessary act for the good of the community. The punishment the young German girl received for her atrocious behaviour was not equal to the deaths of the Jewish prisoners but the disfigured face of the young girl stands as a powerful symbol to those around her; those who normalized her ideas. No, this is not an ethics for everyone but it is an ethics that deals with the necessary, and this is the important thought.

Here is a similar example to follow:

You hate one of your co-workers for very sound reasons; i.e. a true hatred in all senses of the word with no delusions about the character of the other person, or yourself. It is a cold winters night and you are driving on a dark empty street. You see an individual person in the distance and their car is stuck in a massive snowbank. This person is desperately trying to get the car out of the snowbank. You get closer and notice that it is the co-worker whom you despise. You stop, get out of your car, and lend a helping hand. The car is freed. You immediately walk away and offer no words and accept none in return. The next day at work you make no mention of the act and forget about the kindness. You still despise your co-worker with great intensity.

This is a true ethics and it is one that I can support. You do what is absolutely necessary for the good of the community and/or the other rather than what is perceived to be right. You act and do not need to think about the action before hand. You do what is necessary for the good of the other.