Society/Culture Jordan B Peterson

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Apr 24, 2013
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Can't believe I am falling for this. Such a waste of time.

I appreciate you descending from the mountain.

Here's what it looks like to me, in case you missed the various bits and pieces across this thread.

"Me" being a layperson with no relevant credentials in Peterson's field.

His early claims about his possible arrest were totally unfounded. His own little "**** you" to anyone he didn't consider to be anything other than cisgender was just dumb bigotry, not a crime. He was never going to be arrested for anything. He made it up, or didn't know what he was talking about. Great for marketing though. "I am prepared to go to prison for this! Click my Patreon link! Watch my monetised YouTube channel!"

This is a truly amazing extrapolation.

He seems to claim individualism is primary, despite the known benefits of community and regard for the common good. Limitations on speech and actions can of course be justified. He just doesn't like where the line is drawn. So be it, but at least have a good argument and know the actual limits being imposed before you bleat on YouTube about your impending arrest.

Please table an outline of these "known benefits" and how Peterson's musings are harmful to them.

His 12 Rules are an entertainment device, along the lines of Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, not truly original insights.

Whoever claimed they were?! Peterson freely admits to drawing from a wide range of information related to his field.

Questionable claims are made as if they are objective, proven truth.

Which ones? Are you sure this isn't an ideological construction of your own doing?

His own, disappointed mentor made that comment.

One of his original mentors has been shown to be in ideological opposition to Peterson and as far as I know they have tabled no academically based rebuttal of Peterson's position.

"Order is where the people around you act according to well-understood social norms, and remain predictable and cooperative."

But be suspicious of anyone who tries to change the world by changing others.

Order is masculine? Chaos is feminine? Total fruit loop. See Gray. If he ever actually proves anything let me know. He probably won't, because apparently faith trumps evidence. If you believe it, you will Become.

Where is this?


He puts Christianity up as the only moral guide without any real evidence: religion is supposedly The Path, and without it we are doomed to be nothing, or be controlled by the worst of us. Non-religious ethics apparently don't exist. They just vanish under the incredible weight of his enormous brain, apparently.

Apparently Christ sprung out of human imagination of the perfect being, so he must be the best model. WTF? Like bronze age shepherds and squabbling warlords had reached the pinnacle of human imagination. They didn't even have nugs.

But it gives Peterson an excuse to act like an ignorant dirt farmer.

Where did he make ANY of those claims in that context?


Rather than poetry and the Bible springing out of people's filtered experience of the objective, real world, they become objectivity. He's got an extensive line in god-of-gaps arguments, and they are marked down for the new year! Check out the savings!

I can see where your dissonance arises now. You are looking at him as if he has THE answers, and if he can't provide THE answers then he must be a snake oil salesman..

This biological basis for all dominance and hierarchy is pretty much bullshit he pulled out of his arse. His serotonin stuff is bunkum. Our brains are being shown, more and more, to be plastic. We have much more than just serotonin levels governing our emotions. We can adjust to realities and experiences. We're not slaves to a rigid brain structure.

I just wish he'd chosen a stronger analogy than lobsters, because the lobster thing gives his cultists an out. "He didn't really mean that! Stop focusing on the lobster! It's obviously a metaphor!" Then why put any focus on serotonin and link it back to humans? Why not choose bees instead of lobsters?

I'll tell you why: because he made a weak argument. He spent a weekend copying and pasting from Quora to get his 12 rules book out to catch the cultist wave and screwed up big time.

etc etc etc

Show me where? Provide an academically supported rebuttal.


You can read all of this in any good critique of his work. I don't want to go over all the bits and pieces I read and heard from him, it gets boring. I am not the originator of these ideas - far brighter people have far deeper things to say about his "work".

I'm calling bullshit on this claim.

He's not the messiah - he just plays one on YouTube.

I am not the messiah either. I just read some of the work by people who are more profound and objective than Peterson is, and mash it up with my own dull life experiences. It's all any of us can do.

Refer back to my earlier comments in red.

Now:

Did you take advantage of the bargains he is offering?


I have never purchased a single Peterson related item, nor do I have any tickets for his upcoming tour. Apologies for disappointing your bite sized view of this issue.

All I can add is that this response is predictably vague and woefully inadequate, however this doesn't trouble me.

You have provided virtually no proper contextual examples, or any academically relevant rebuttals, however this doesn't trouble me.

The truly troubling issue for me is how you are prepared to generically criticise Peterson, yet remain completely and utterly mute on the obscene idiocy flowing from the well from which provides this so called "charlatan" with the ready made market for his "product". You claim to see blind ideological subjugation in his "followers", yet you appear to be completely blind about that same idea as it applies to the actual target of work.
 
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Apr 24, 2013
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Peterson is the Zuckerberg of this turf he has staked out, he can mine his current demographic which indeed may be temporal in their age dem, and in the current zeitgeist which has looked to cleave the traditional sex roles and leave some to bleed when those traditions are severed.

He is a product of the zietgiest.

There was a volcano ready to erupt in regards to "contemporary liberalism" and he serendipitously appeared in the spotlight.
 

CheapCharlie

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It did not read like that to me, at all.

It read like an explanation of the outcome of a very significant effort to understand why men suffer, and to then implement continued professional development/training within an industry that can actually make a difference to men’s mental health.

Besides the one line quoted previously by the other user, which parts did you interpret as ‘quite negative towards men and masculinity’?

It actually went out of its way to highlight explicitly a lot of positive outcomes associated with traditionally masculine traits.
Here are 3 aspects that i deemed negative towards men.
There are probably more in the article

Is traditional masculinity harmful?
Some thought says this, plenty of thought indicates that masculinity is helpful and a necessary trait.
they draw on more than 40 years of research showing that traditional masculinity is psychologically harmful and that socializing boys to suppress their emotions causes damage that echoes both inwardly and outwardly.


Assumes there is a patriarchy or patriarchal structure. Its becomes fact there is in this article
“Though men benefit from patriarchy, they are also impinged upon by patriarchy,”

The final paragraph - assumes that men have to be changed to change the world. Assumes they need to break free of current masculinity rules.
Getting that message out to men—that they’re adaptable, emotional and capable of engaging fully outside of rigid norms—is what the new guidelines are designed to do. And if psychologists can focus on supporting men in breaking free of masculinity rules that don’t help them, the effects could spread beyond just mental health for men, McDermott says. “If we can change men,” he says, “we can change the world.”
 

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Here are 3 aspects that i deemed negative towards men.
There are probably more in the article

Is traditional masculinity harmful?
Some thought says this, plenty of thought indicates that masculinity is helpful and a necessary trait.



Assumes there is a patriarchy or patriarchal structure. Its becomes fact there is in this article


The final paragraph - assumes that men have to be changed to change the world. Assumes they need to break free of current masculinity rules.
Even JBP at his most manic doesn’t believe he can change the world. Crazy language.
 

blackcat

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He is a product of the zietgiest.

There was a volcano ready to erupt in regards to "contemporary liberalism" and he serendipitously appeared in the spotlight.
indeed, but the demography and constituency are still marginal, but even so, the constituency is still _H_U_G_E_ and he has virtual monopoly on that, and in the anglophone countries Canada/US/UK/Aus/NZ/(SA) his numbers would still poll in high 7 figures (20mill potential international clients? just some arbitrary number my intuition compels me to sum... his book publishers and their boffins would be able to articulate it better, and estimate it more accurately)
 
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indeed, but the demography and constituency are still marginal, but even so, the constituency is still _H_U_G_E_ and he has virtual monopoly on that, and in the anglophone countries Canada/US/UK/Aus/NZ/(SA) his numbers would still poll in high 7 figures (20mill potential international clients? just some arbitrary number my intuition compels me to sum... his book publishers and their boffins would be able to articulate it better, and estimate it more accurately)
He doesn't have a monopoly as far as attention on academics goes. Even as far as book sales go - he just leads the way in his type of writing, which is predominantly self-help as opposed to purely academic or argumentative like what Pinker or Harris et al put out. Those and others who regularly talk to Peterson or are a part of the same social / intellectual network are just as smart and interesting, but it's hard to scale a "product" like theirs. Dawkins did it, and in many ways he is a polar opposite to Peterson. But not too many others are working from a foundation that can do that, with tours and lectures and interviews to go with it. Psychology lends itself to that realm more than economics or sociology etc. It might be because it's more directly relatable to more people.
 
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He doesn't have a monopoly as far as attention on academics goes. Even as far as book sales go - he just leads the way in his type of writing, which is predominantly self-help as opposed to purely academic or argumentative like what Pinker or Harris et al put out. Those and others who regularly talk to Peterson or are a part of the same social / intellectual network are just as smart and interesting, but it's hard to scale a "product" like theirs. Dawkins did it, and in many ways he is a polar opposite to Peterson. But not too many others are working from a foundation that can do that, with tours and lectures and interviews to go with it. Psychology lends itself to that realm more than economics or sociology etc. It might be because it's more directly relatable to more people.
Loved your detailed retort to Chief yesterday
As you know I have a more effusive view of JP

The connections JP has elegantly elaborated are a game changer
And I expect his work to trigger a global cultural shift - ever new and clearer lines of elucidation will follow as the horrible limitations of post modern nihilism recede and evaporate.
 

CheapCharlie

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He doesn't have a monopoly as far as attention on academics goes. Even as far as book sales go - he just leads the way in his type of writing, which is predominantly self-help as opposed to purely academic or argumentative like what Pinker or Harris et al put out. Those and others who regularly talk to Peterson or are a part of the same social / intellectual network are just as smart and interesting, but it's hard to scale a "product" like theirs. Dawkins did it, and in many ways he is a polar opposite to Peterson. But not too many others are working from a foundation that can do that, with tours and lectures and interviews to go with it. Psychology lends itself to that realm more than economics or sociology etc. It might be because it's more directly relatable to more people.

He is incredibly hard working also
The amount of interviews and talks and tours he does is staggering - cashing in while he has public relevance.
Unlike some other interviewees he isn't openly antagonistic towards his interviewers, even under a constant barrage or misrepresentation. That makes him more appealing to be interviewed.
 
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Loved your detailed retort to Chief yesterday
As you know I have a more effusive view of JP

The connections JP has elegantly elaborated are a game changer
And I expect his work to trigger a global cultural shift - ever new and clearer lines of elucidation will follow as the horrible limitations of post modern nihilism recede and evaporate.
I find it hard to see such a drastic change happening but I hope you're right.
 
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He is incredibly hard working also
The amount of interviews and talks and tours he does is staggering - cashing in while he has public relevance.
Unlike some other interviewees he isn't openly antagonistic towards his interviewers, even under a constant barrage or misrepresentation. That makes him more appealing to be interviewed.
There's been a few where he has cracked the shits, but it's a tiny proportion.
 

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He is a product of the zietgiest.

There was a volcano ready to erupt in regards to "contemporary liberalism" and he serendipitously appeared in the spotlight.
By chance his obsession happened to become a popular field.

Like telco analysts just as the dot com boom hit. All of a sudden they were hired for millions to analyze markets for ISPs and wireless spectrum buyers, where before they were analyzing a boring and steady landline industry.
 

nicky

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Does anyone think he'll have the courage to debate the indefatigable Richard Wolff after stating no socialists will debate him?

Although, I got around listening to him debate Sam Harris. What a s**t show. Peterson is barely coherent in an attempt to confuse Harris. I've heard strung out coke heads who make more sense. Peterson's absurd methods of trying to justify Christianity have almost made me atheist. Harris really sounded so much more impressive.
And Harris is dishonest in his his debating.
 
Same, but here we go.


His claims were that should he refuse to abide by any human rights court ruling against him in Canada that he would be jailed. This is true, as it would move from a civil to a criminal matter.

Your implied accusation of bigotry against non 'cisgendered' people is a crock of s**t. He has repeatedly stated he would call anyone by the gender they asked if he thought it was genuine. Something I think we would all agree with.


Considering the individual as primary over all other things does not mean you ignore the known benefits of community and regard for common good. His whole point has been that through improving the individual you then produce even better outcomes for the community and common good. You've missed his point entirely.


Limitations on free speech can be argued; justified is another far more concrete thing. He does have a good argument. Several, in face. Here's one of my favourite videos on it:



The only things worth paying attention to must be original? Right. The insights are in his arguments about why these quite well-known axioms are applicable. Never has Peterson claimed they were his own invention, and in fact has stated numerous times that he is just bringing new life to old ideas.


I agree - there are times when I am not fully sold on something he argues but he comes across as if it's the God-spoken truth. I don't like that. But then again, we all do it (case in point with your responses) so it's a bit hard to be too critical about that.

Sounds like damn good advice. Of course we should be suspicious about people trying to change the way you behave or - even more importantly - societal norms and traditions. You seriously have an issue with this? Why?


Order and chaos have been traditionally represented as the masculine and feminine for thousands of years, and Peterson is someone who loves to draw on mythology and symbology of ancient civilisations to give weight to the arguments he makes as being older that the Western tradition. If you had actually read or engaged with any of what he has said about it, order and chaos are not inherently good and bad respectively. I am assuming your pushback on this is largely rooted in the false belief that he is therefore denigrating women as bad. If that's the case, you have no idea what these concepts actually mean.


No, no he does not. At all. Peterson draws on all manner of religion and myth, from the Mesopotamian creation stories and legends to the ancient Egyptian gods, the Jewish tradition, Taoism and of course Christianity. The point is that these stories contribute to the shared narratives we have that ground our value systems and societies. Not that any one of them is 'the only moral guide'. You've - again - comprehensively missed the point. He's also not the first person to argue that a lack of any religious influence on ethics and morality could be an issue. For one example, there's a guy named Friedrich Nietzsche that you may have heard of?


Christ as a distillation of all the previous stories and myths that we used to guide morality - yes. If you know anything about storytelling you would know about the concept of archetypes and how meta-narratives work.

That's also arguably quite a racist thing you have said there. Or at the very least, quite bigoted. Nice.


Holy crap you have missed the mark on this one so far it's funny.

The use of lobster social behaviour and their reaction to serotonin (which is completely accurate) and comparison to human serotonin effects is to demonstrate that hierarchical social structures have existed for hundreds of millions of years, at least as early as the crustaceans. This is to counter the arguments made that the west has imposed hierarchical structure on us, because it quite obviously hasn't.

It's not that there is a 'biological basis for all dominance and hierarchy' at all. Where the hell did you get this from?

It appears that what you think you can do is just read critiques of him and never actually engage with his work yourself, then think you have a handle on what's actually being said. Either that or you did read/listen to Peterson and it just went straight over your head.

Thanks to people like you who fuel the discussions online, he continues to grow in popularity. So, thanks for that I guess. Because what he actually has done - regardless of how right or wrong he is on certain things - is encourage people to engage with big ideas and take an introspective look at themselves to see what they can improve on. That's not snake oil; it's actually doing some good in the world, and that what shits me most about the way some people go after Peterson and anyone who thinks he his interesting. It's so petty, yet they so often try to come off with a sense of intellectual and moral superiority when they jump in to try and snipe. But they aren't at all.

Alright, rant over. Everyone clean your rooms.

And he can sell you a book on how to do it! 50% off personal coaching!
 
If you hate earning money so much I'll be happy to take over BF.
It’s snake oil.

As for engaging with his work, I’ve seen enough. I read about 2 pages of one of those 50 Shades books - that was enough to know the writing was s**t.

Similar with Jordy. But less penis.
 
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It’s snake oil.
But harsh on BF there Chief. It's low-brow, sure, but not that bad!


As for engaging with his work, I’ve seen enough. I read about 2 pages of one of those 50 Shades books - that was enough to know the writing was s**t.

Similar with Jordy. But less penis.
If anyone else said thus about something you were positive about, you'd call them out for being close-minded idiots. Or in Peterson-speak, ideologically possessed.
 

twotooto

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*posts self edited due to extreme douch baggery. What can I say, sometimes the inner flog just can't be contained and has to get out and about and hey, it's Saturday afternoon, after all.
 
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As JP eviscerates post modern ideology its adherents will increasingly resort to resentment and escalating conniptions as the world moves on and finally dismisses the whole sad farce as a bad trip.

when the rage finally subsides nothing but the self hatred -which is at rock bottom of the PoMo ideology - will remain.
 
But harsh on BF there Chief. It's low-brow, sure, but not that bad!



If anyone else said thus about something you were positive about, you'd call them out for being close-minded idiots. Or in Peterson-speak, ideologically possessed.
And it’s your right to do that. I won’t be offended.
 
*posts self edited due to extreme douch baggery. What can I say, sometimes the inner flog just can't be contained and has to get out and about and hey, it's Saturday afternoon, after all.
Lol don’t worry I can read deleted posts :D
 

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