1
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What is love?

2
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It's a hard term to define

3
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in so far as it has a very wide application.

4
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I can love jogging.

5
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I can love a book, a movie.

6
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I can love escalopes.

7
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I can love my wife.

8
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(Laughter)

9
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But there's a great difference

10
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between an escalope and my wife, for instance.

11
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That is, if I value the escalope,

12
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the escalope, on the other hand, 
it doesn't value me back.

13
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Whereas my wife, she calls me

14
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the star of her life.

15
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(Laughter)

16
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Therefore, only another desiring conscience

17
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can conceive me as a desirable being.

18
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I know this, that's why

19
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love can be defined in a more accurate way

20
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as the desire of being desired.

21
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Hence the eternal problem of love:

22
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how to become and remain desirable?

23
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The individual used to find

24
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an answer to this problem

25
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by submitting his life to community rules.

26
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You had a specific part to play

27
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according to your sex, your age,

28
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your social status,

29
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and you only had to play your part

30
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to be valued and loved by the whole community.

31
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Think about the young woman
who must remain chaste before marriage.

32
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Think about the youngest son 
who must obey the eldest son,

33
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who in turn must obey the patriarch.

34
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But a phenomenon

35
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started in the 13th century,

36
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mainly in the Renaissance, in the West,

37
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that caused the biggest identity crisis

38
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in the history of humankind.

39
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This phenomenon is modernity.

40
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We can basically summarize it
through a triple process.

41
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First, a process of rationalization
of scientific research,

42
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which has accelerated technical progress.

43
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Next, a process of political democratization,

44
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which has fostered individual rights.

45
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And finally, a process of rationalization 
of economic production

46
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and of trade liberalization.

47
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These three intertwined processes

48
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have completely annihilated

49
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all the traditional bearings of Western societies,

50
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with radical consequences for the individual.

51
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Now individuals are free

52
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to value or disvalue

53
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any attitude, any choice, any object.

54
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But as a result, they are themselves confronted

55
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with this same freedom that others have

56
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to value or disvalue them.

57
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In other words, my value was once ensured

58
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by submitting myself 
to the traditional authorities.

59
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Now it is quoted in the stock exchange.

60
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On the free market of individual desires,

61
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I negotiate my value every day.

62
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Hence the anxiety of contemporary man.

63
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He is obsessed: "Am I desirable? How desirable?

64
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How many people are going to love me?"

65
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And how does he respond to this anxiety?

66
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Well, by hysterically collecting
symbols of desirability.

67
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(Laughter)

68
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I call this act of collecting,

69
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along with others, seduction capital.

70
00:04:01,119 --> 00:04:03,162
Indeed, our consumer society

71
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is largely based on seduction capital.

72
00:04:08,631 --> 00:04:12,742
It is said about this consumption
that our age is materialistic.

73
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But it's not true! We only accumulate objects

74
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in order to communicate with other minds.

75
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We do it to make them love us, to seduce them.

76
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Nothing could be less materialistic, 
or more sentimental,

77
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than a teenager buying brand new jeans

78
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and tearing them at the knees,

79
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because he wants to please Jennifer.

80
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(Laughter)

81
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Consumerism is not materialism.

82
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It is rather what is swallowed up

83
00:04:45,276 --> 00:04:48,285
and sacrificed in the name of the god of love,

84
00:04:48,285 --> 00:04:52,731
or rather in the name of seduction capital.

85
00:04:52,731 --> 00:04:58,112
In light of this observation on contemporary love,

86
00:04:58,112 --> 00:05:01,427
how can we think of love in the years to come?

87
00:05:01,427 --> 00:05:03,711
We can envision two hypotheses:

88
00:05:03,711 --> 00:05:06,447
The first one consists of betting

89
00:05:06,447 --> 00:05:12,141
that this process of narcissistic 
capitalization will intensify.

90
00:05:12,141 --> 00:05:16,209
It is hard to say what shape 
this intensification will take,

91
00:05:16,209 --> 00:05:17,940
because it largely depends

92
00:05:17,940 --> 00:05:20,708
on social and technical innovations,

93
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which are by definition difficult to predict.

94
00:05:25,755 --> 00:05:27,657
But we can, for instance,

95
00:05:27,657 --> 00:05:31,381
imagine a dating website

96
00:05:31,381 --> 00:05:35,513
which, a bit like those loyalty points programs,

97
00:05:35,513 --> 00:05:38,705
uses seduction capital points

98
00:05:38,705 --> 00:05:42,500
that vary according to my age, 
my height/weight ratio,

99
00:05:42,500 --> 00:05:45,023
my degree, my salary,

100
00:05:45,023 --> 00:05:49,488
or the number of clicks on my profile.

101
00:05:49,488 --> 00:05:53,374
We can also imagine

102
00:05:53,374 --> 00:05:56,747
a chemical treatment for breakups

103
00:05:56,747 --> 00:06:00,565
that weakens the feelings of attachment.

104
00:06:00,565 --> 00:06:04,622
By the way, there's a program on MTV already

105
00:06:04,622 --> 00:06:08,606
in which seduction teachers

106
00:06:08,606 --> 00:06:12,524
treat heartache as a disease.

107
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These teachers call themselves "pick-up artists."

108
00:06:16,226 --> 00:06:19,470
"Artist" in French is easy, it means "artiste."

109
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"Pick-up" is to pick someone up,

110
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but not just any picking up -- it's picking up chicks.

111
00:06:24,298 --> 00:06:28,767
So they are artists of picking up chicks.

112
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(Laughter)

113
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And they call heartache "one-itis."

114
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In English, "itis" is a suffix that signifies infection.

115
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One-itis can be translated as "an infection from one."

116
00:06:43,353 --> 00:06:47,122
It's a bit disgusting. Indeed, for the pick-up artists,

117
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falling in love with someone

118
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is a waste of time,

119
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it's squandering your seduction capital,

120
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so it must be eliminated

121
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like a disease, like an infection.

122
00:06:59,831 --> 00:07:03,532
We can also envision

123
00:07:03,532 --> 00:07:06,549
a romantic use of the genome.

124
00:07:06,549 --> 00:07:10,199
Everyone would carry it around

125
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and present it like a business card

126
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to verify if seduction can progress to reproduction.

127
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(Laughter)

128
00:07:22,021 --> 00:07:27,184
Of course, this race for seduction,

129
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like every fierce competition,

130
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will create huge disparities 
in narcissistic satisfaction,

131
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and therefore a lot of loneliness and frustration too.

132
00:07:38,270 --> 00:07:41,014
So we can expect that modernity itself,

133
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which is the origin of seduction capital,
would be called into question.

134
00:07:45,550 --> 00:07:48,181
I'm thinking particularly of the reaction

135
00:07:48,181 --> 00:07:53,110
of neo-fascist or religious communes.

136
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But such a future doesn't have to be.

137
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Another path to thinking about love may be possible.

138
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But how?

139
00:08:06,258 --> 00:08:10,572
How to renounce the hysterical need to be valued?

140
00:08:10,572 --> 00:08:14,780
Well, by becoming aware
of my uselessness.

141
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(Laughter)

142
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Yes,

143
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I'm useless.

144
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But rest assured:

145
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so are you.

146
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(Laughter)

147
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(Applause)

148
00:08:29,629 --> 00:08:33,999
We are all useless.

149
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This uselessness is easily demonstrated,

150
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because in order to be valued

151
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I need another to desire me,

152
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which shows that I do not have any value of my own.

153
00:08:45,316 --> 00:08:48,689
I don't have any inherent value.

154
00:08:48,689 --> 00:08:53,489
We all pretend to have an idol;

155
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we all pretend to be an idol for
someone else, but actually

156
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we are all impostors, a bit like a man on the street

157
00:08:59,830 --> 00:09:02,689
who appears totally cool and indifferent,

158
00:09:02,689 --> 00:09:05,838
while he has actually anticipated and calculated

159
00:09:05,838 --> 00:09:09,443
so that all eyes are on him.

160
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I think that becoming aware

161
00:09:11,012 --> 00:09:13,219
of this general imposture

162
00:09:13,219 --> 00:09:14,627
that concerns all of us

163
00:09:14,627 --> 00:09:16,447
would ease our love relationships.

164
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It is because I want to be loved

165
00:09:18,837 --> 00:09:20,334
from head to toe,

166
00:09:20,334 --> 00:09:22,309
justified in my every choice,

167
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that the seduction hysteria exists.

168
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And therefore I want to seem perfect

169
00:09:27,374 --> 00:09:28,994
so that another can love me.

170
00:09:28,994 --> 00:09:30,521
I want them to be perfect

171
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so that I can be reassured of my value.

172
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It leads to couples

173
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obsessed with performance

174
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who will break up, just like that,

175
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at the slightest underachievement.

176
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In contrast to this attitude,

177
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I call upon tenderness -- love as tenderness.

178
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What is tenderness?

179
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To be tender is to accept 
the loved one's weaknesses.

180
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It's not about becoming a sad couple of orderlies.

181
00:09:57,826 --> 00:09:59,021
(Laughter)

182
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It's not so bad.

183
00:10:01,091 --> 00:10:02,423
On the contrary,

184
00:10:02,423 --> 00:10:05,189
there's plenty of charm and happiness in tenderness.

185
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I refer specifically to a kind of humor
that is unfortunately underused.

186
00:10:09,238 --> 00:10:12,115
It is a sort of poetry of deliberate awkwardness.

187
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I refer to self-mockery.

188
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For a couple who is no longer sustained, supported

189
00:10:17,717 --> 00:10:19,794
by the constraints of tradition,

190
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I believe that self-mockery

191
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is one of the best means for 
the relationship to endure.