Propaganda, Hollywood & Ideology | The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen

The greatest art makes you question. Question who you are, what you believe. Question the assumptions you make about the world around you. Question the fabric of reality, the nature of being. Question free will or fate. Question systemic influences of behavior, or intrinsic human desires.
It does not answer, because in answers we find a more shallow understanding of ourselves and of the world’s complexity.
The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen is one of these great pieces of art. Its questions are not concerned with your preexisting notions of the Vietnam War, nor will it dichotomize the opposing sides into good and bad, right and wrong. The complexities of the War are not simplified, and our American-centric perspective is challenged at every turn. If you read closely and mindfully, you may finish the book having examined the very nature of your way of thinking, our collective desire to neatly place thought into ideological boxes that give us an easy position on any issue.
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0:00 - Intro
1:12 - A Man of Two Faces
7:50 - Asian-American Rage
14:44 - Independence and Freedom
21:31 - Question Everything
32:45 - Conclusion

[@ivantraveler]

Such a lovely and to-the-point review! I'm your fan now, please moore 🙇🏼‍♂️

[@TheStoriesWeTell303]

Appreciate you 🫡

[@TheStoriesWeTell303]

One more Zizek quote I love that I meant to include in this video: "In such times of urgency when we know we have to act, but don’t know how to act, thinking is needed. Maybe we should turn around a little bit. In our new century, we should say that maybe we tried all too fast to change the world. The time has come to step back to interpret it."

[@mezmerism107]

Damn, no comment yet? Here's one. ❤

[@lousarsol9005]

Good shout 👌

[@drabauer]

The true bridge between Nguyen’s The Sympathizer and Zizek is their acknowledgment of ideology as a möbius strip, where the law (the ruling order, social imaginary in power at any one time) is supported and given meaning by its obscene underside (vice, hedonistic excess, etc.). The narrator serves as a vanishing mediator between both sides, both propping up the General’s belief in his mission and the commandant’s hatred of the imagined West. He serves as the archetypal split subject whose subjectivity peaks through in his lapses in judgment (the inexplicable decisions and choices he makes, which seem to serve neither side). His utter abjection at the end may yet indicate that he made it to the other side.

[@lousarsol9005]

One comment? Better get in here too ❤

[@tritran5095]

Can you make video about the sequel “The Commited”?

[@TheStoriesWeTell303]

Definitely planning on it! Have to read it first lol

[@phatle2737]

westernized vietnamese, and westerners wouldnt understand the mentality of the north and the vietcong at that time. when your country has to resist being assimilate by the Han Chinese for thousands of years and your country is the only last Yue country in the modern world, the rest of the Baiyue are already assimilated and called themselves Han, then you understand what are we willing to sacrifice. The southerners were the people expanding south ward back in the Nguyen dynasty, they had to mingle with the native in the south and become cosmopolitan and less nationalistic, lots of criminals and misfits also a big part of the population migrated south because of their past they want to start again and forget the past and stop recording family tree, and these people lost their roots became more individualistic and easier to side with a stronger foreign invaders, the French also started from the South . we worship ancestors(Hung Kings) as people and government and we call our fallen soldiers "liệt sĩ" matyr. it wasnt a civil war, it was a war against foreign occupation, the north calls the South government "ngụy quyền" puppet authority. it was a holy war for the ancestors.