In today’s day and age it’s difficult not to in some way or another run into the many statements of the polarizing Toronto psychology professor Jordan Peterson. Making his way from the niche of academia to the spotlight of pop-culture self help philosophy, he has managed made a name for himself in what can only seem as overnight. One question I find interesting regarding Peterson is this one : why now ? why not 10 or 20 years ago ? A lot of the ideas, concepts and theories that he spurs are certainly not new, so what’s all the fuss about it now ?
One thing which is quite relevant in my opinion, is that right wing politics does not hold a place in modern academia. In the world of cultural and social studies, the prominent ideology has always been quite leftist. It has always been more difficult for conservatives to be part of the academic debate in identity and social politics as such, given that most of their talking points have been scientifically debunked for decades and hold very little value in this domain. This far right wingers have made do with talking heads such as Shapiro, Kirk, Yiannopoulos and the like - people with very good debating skills, but no scientific credibility - to make a point for their political orientation in debates, discussions, panels and so forth. Jordan Peterson is the first real right wing pundit to make use of his academic background to defend his conservative ideology with incredible convincibility and (arguable) credibility.
Yet essentially all which Peterson does is use his academic jargon, serious face, and weak studies in evolutionary psychology to convince the unacquainted of his ideas. Right wingers have always loved the whole “facts do not care about your feelings”, and Peterson is seemingly bringing the facts on the otherwise empty table of right wing academia. And young conservatives are falling for it. Bad.
There is so far no argument Peterson has come forth ith which isn’t very easily debunkable, except for the ones that are simply borderline racist and/or misogynistic, in which sense we are simply talking about shitty opinions. Jordan Peterson doesn’t understand most of what he is talking about, such as his absurd claims about Postmodernism being a continuation / “rebranding” of Marxism that happened during the 60s and 70s, because Marxism had seemingly lost its popularity because of the Soviet Union (completely disregarding the fact that the communist parties of France and Italy were at their biggest in the 1960s during the peak of postermodernist philosophy) . From a philosophical point of view this is pure nonsense (see the table below).
Marxists were generally the biggest critics of Postmodernism already from the beginning. Both Marx and Hegel were Modernist philosophers so why should they embrace Postmodernism which essentially goes against everything modernists believed in ? Various marxists critics have spoken out against postmodernism, and were in fact some of the earliest critics of it. Fredric Jameson called postmodernism "the cultural logic of late capitalism", John Molyneux called it "singing an old song long intoned by bourgeois historians of various persuasions", and Alex Callinicos said it is "a symptom of political frustration and social mobility rather than as a significant intellectual or cultural phenomenon in its own right.". Just because marxists criticized the oppressor/oppressed relation of labour against capital, and postmodernists with identity politics, doesn’t mean that they are one and the same. On top of that, postmodernist philosophers such as Foucault, Baudrillard and Derrida hold very different views on many subjects, so simply classifying them under one umbrella is quite ridiculous to begin with. Jordan Peterson also often talks about what he calls “Cultural Marxism”, which doesn’t fall short of Cultural Bolshevism - a term commonly associated to german Nazis and the red scarce, all to try and theorize a grand conspiracy of leftists being out there trying to crush western values and western cultures. Needless to say this, is completely absurd.
Jordan Peterson sees the world and our society not through the lense of centuries of research in the social sciences, but through concepts deeply rooted in evolutionary psychology : a controversial scientific field which tries to explain all human behavioral aspects with the hard science of biology and psychology. This parallels humans to all sorts of other animals in their ability to act and comprehend the world, and normalises some of the worst aspects of our society : violence, rape, oppression, hierarchical structures and others. Jordan Peterson for example explains that social hierarchies in our societies are completely normal and even natural, given that lobsters who have a very similar nervous system as humans, live in social hierarchies, and hence biologically humans are rooted to have social hierarchies as well. With this point of views, humans are no more capable of organizing a functioning societies than a mere crustacean. Peterson also pointed out that women’s use of makeup and high heels triggers very primal sexual behaviors in men and hence women are responsible should they experience any forms of sexual abuse. Again, men are apparently nothing more than horny chimps who in no way understand social norms and can’t control their natural urges. Should it be noted that Peterson actually has throughout his life received 3 accusations for sexual harassment, so he probably simply bases it on his own uncontrable urges. When attempting to explain the case of Alex Minassian who killed 10 people in Toronto by driving a van into a crowd, Peterson blames his actions on his celibacy. Alex Minassian being a bitter incel (involuntary celibate) supposedly fueled his anger that led to his deadly actions. Peterson’s solution : let’s introduce “enforced monogamy” so that every man is entitled to a woman, as if women were some sort of utility furniture. He also argued that feminists who argue for the protection and rights of muslim immigrants are not doing it out of empathical reasons, but because on an unconsious desire to be brutally dominated by muslim men.
Peterson, even as a professional psychology professor, has no understanding of social dynamics and human behavioral science, and uses truncated theories that match his political views to support his claims - which is exactly what evolutionary psychology as a scientific field has been immensely criticised for. As a field it often uses very weak science while excluding most research already done in the social sciences to reinforce old school conservative values while rejecting the findings of the social sciences that often point to ideologically contradictory conclusions regarding how we ought to structure our society or behave as human beings. Social science is a holistic field which also does includes findings in evolutionary psychology and other hard science fields, but then proceeds to weigh it against other factors such as how our society and other environments also influence human behaviour. It’s about understanding how much of an effect a society/group/culture have on the person contra his/hers biological and psychological self. Hence the social sciences include what evolutionary psychology inversely chose to exclude, which frankly diminishes the credibility of the field altogether.
This brings us to the next weird part of Jordan Peterson’s universe : his christianity. For a man constantly trying to argue for logic and facts, his spirituality seems a little bit off. Nonetheless I have nothing against religion and people of faith, so I will not start criticising this fact as it doesn’t bother me at all. What does bother me though is his very biblical vision of the world, which goes back to our previously mentioned “enforced monogamy”. Jordan Peterson is against polygamy or simply having more than one sexual partner, or even one night stands. He sees monogamous relationships as being the core of all peace and the lack of it as that of violence, and so he does with God. Although he often underplays his religiousness, he also seems to believe that faith combines our entire society into one functioning organism and the lack of it thereof a purveyor of violence and discord. He again often tries to use philosophical and scientific reasoning to argue for his opinion, but most of what I’ve heard or read so far makes absolutely no sense. Yet he seems to be one of those christians who believe that morality stems from religion (christianity in particular), and hence humans cannot live without it. This is such a bible belt evangelical gun-nut point of view that really should make you question everything else that he says given that he confidently can spur such nonsense. Even people who admire Peterson such as Harris, Dawkins or Maher can’t follow him on this one.
While we are in the religious domain I wanna get to my last point, which is that of the cult-leader status that Jordan Peterson seems to have reached. I have rarely seen such an insanely protective fanbase such as the one he fosters, who cling to his every word and opinion as if they came from the messiah himself. Jordan Peterson has managed to tap into a crowd which Steve Bannon once called “rootless white males”, young white cis millennial men who can’t seem to find their role and place in today’s society. As social structures and gender roles are changing, it can be difficult for many men (and women) to exactly understand who they should be and how they should behave. Humanities students on college campuses constantly bringing up the oppression of black people, women and other minorities, and the white man as the evil oppressor, has made a lot of priorly privileged white men insecure about their opinions. Like the saying goes, “when you’re used to privilege, equality feels like oppression”, but this is not how many of the Petersonites see it. They see a society who refuses to listen to their opinions and hence find comfort in the cold-eyed straight shooter style which Peterson gives when he “DESTROYS” an interviewer “using FACTS and LOGIC” arguing for the more conservatively political point of view. These young white men don’t see themselves as oppressors but rather as an oppressed minority as conservative values usually aren’t the norm on college campuses, and Peterson plays into these very new feelings socially speaking, of so called “white oppression”. Today Peterson makes around $50.000 a month from his followers on Patreon, and although some people argue that this is simply his market value based on econ 101 concepts of supply on demand, no other academic today can brag about receiving this kind of money for basically doing nothing but lectures and youtube videos. If you look at many evangelical pastors in the US, you will see them receiving crazy amount of money from their fans and followers who passionately believe that this man is their saviour, and this is exactly the same which is happening with Peterson. He daily receives thousands upon thousands of emotionally filled thank you letters from his fans who tell him about how much his book and many lectures have saved their lives and helped them find meaning again in their lives - this again screams of cult-like behaviour. We have all heard of many stories of people joining in cults such as scientology, paying crazy amounts of money to be part of it, and finally finding meaning in their lives. Cults and cult leaders thrive on rootless and aimless people who need guidance and direction, and Jordan Peterson can give you exactly that - shall you decided to pay him a monthly fee for it.
And that’s basically where we’re at. Jordan Peterson has managed to convince thousands of men with his faux-science of his racist, misogynistic right wing views, and has made a fortune in the process. People constantly equate him with other actual respected academics within their respectful fields simply because of his pop culture appeal. He has managed to gather around him a gigantic crowd of scientifically illiterate people who will follow him all the way to hell should they have to. Yet he is nothing more than yet another self-help guru with a revised demographic, who instead of talking about the power of love and positivity like most of these charlatans do, talks about white mens need to reclaim their place at the center of the conversation, at the top of the social hierarchy, who need to spread and protect western values at all cost from the destructive forces of social justice warriors and other leftist political views. Societal change that helps the oppressed is nonsense and the only real oppressed is the conservative white man. Such is the message of this bitter old Canadian pseudo intellectual, and thanks to him we now have an entire new movement of people who have never had an original political thought in their head, parrot all of his incredibly bigoted opinions.
