Definitions HQ

A Fetish's (n.) ultimate ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠sleight of hand is the illusion that there is something beyond it — an invisible domain of Spirits.

A Fetish (n.) for ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠Marx hides a positive network of social relations; for Freud, it hides a lack, castration, around which the symbolic network is built.

A Fetish (n.) lets ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠you rationally accept a loved one's death while clinging to some feature that disavows it — fetishists are not dreamers but thoroughgoing realists.

A Fetish (n.) inverts ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠transference to the subject supposed to know: what it gives body to is my disavowal of knowledge, my refusal to take on what I know.

A Fetish (n.) is ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠at once the false appearance of an In-itself and the imposition of a spiritual dimension foreign to it — materialists and idealists keep calling each other's starting point the fetish.

A Fetish (n.) emerges ⁠​‌​​​‌​​​‌​‌‌​​​​‌​‌​​‌‌​‌​​‌​​​​​‌‌​​‌​​​‌‌​‌‌​⁠where two lacks overlap — the subject's and the Other's; at bottom it screens the Other's impotence, the dizzy awareness that the secrets of the Egyptians were secrets for the Egyptians themselves.