Rothenberg quoting Žižek from Revolution at the Gates: “universal truth and partisanship, the gesture of taking sides, are not only not mutually exclusive, but condition each other: the universal truth of a concrete situation can be articulated only from a thoroughly partisan position; truth is, by definition, one-sided” (177). Rothenberg then continues “[M]eanings are not at the disposal of the speaker but change with the auditor. If there were such a thing as a universal unaffected by the particular positions from which it is engaged then meanings would be stablized once and for all, and the fulfillment of political promises would be an easy task” (Rothenberg Excessive 161).