Peterson Versus Wolff

Now that would make for a great debate; Jordan Peterson discussing or debating Marxist professor Richard Wolff. In fact we almost had it; Boise State University tried to organize exactly that clash of ideas at JPCON in 2018. Sadly, Peterson declined, so we were left with a solo appearance of Wolff, schooling Peterson on Marxism in his absence...

Actually, Peterson did agree to debate Douglas Lain of the Zero Books YouTube channel. Unfortunately Peterson also cancelled that debate, he said that Zero Books isn't popular enough. When asked to instead debate the very popular Marxist professor Richard Wolff, he said he would not debate Wolff for less than $50,000; obviously the student club didn't have that kind of money. Wolff on the other had agreed to speak or debate, whatever would turn out to be the case, at cost, and so we ended up with the Wolff speech which you can watch here: Richard Wolff Schools Jordan Peterson on Marx, at #JPCON. Another reason why Peterson declined to debate at this JPCON event might be that the event was explicitly organized to respond to Peterson's numerous mistaken opinions on political, economical and social issues he likes to comment on that fall outside his field of expertise, which is clinical psychology. But hey, Peterson paints himself a white knight for free speech, repeatedly argued that he welcomes opposing views for the benefit of sharpening and possibly correcting his own, he purports to want to "steel man" (as opposed to "straw man") the opposing arguments, so this weaseling out comes across as weak.

Peterson eventually did agree, on another occasion in another event, to debate Slavoj Zizek on the relationship between Marxism, capitalism and happiness; he got schooled that day as he was exposed a having no knowledge at all about Marx or Marxism while limiting his comments to a couple of sentences from Marx's Communist Manifesto. Yeah, that one went bad for dear old Jordan, not just according to myself, but generally and worldwide:

Sam Miller and Harrison Fluss of Jacobin magazine reported that Peterson made many factual errors about Marx and Marxism, such as misunderstanding the fundamental principle of the labor theory of value, incorrectly associating Marx broadly with identity politics, and denying the existence of a Marxist philosophy of nature. The Guardian claimed that he was uninformed about The Communist Manifesto and generally ill-prepared for the debate, while Jordan Foissy of Vice magazine maintained that he was "completely vacuous", making claims such as that power is never achieved through the exploitation of people. German magazine Der Spiegel concluded that Zizek won the debate clearly, describing Peterson's attempt at arguing as "vain enough to show up to an artillery charge with a pocket knife"
_{source: Wikipedia}

If you want to watch that debate, you can find it here: Slavoj Zizek debates Jordan Peterson.

But What I want to focus your attention on today is the below linked video, which is supposed to be a reaction to professor Wolff's challenge to Peterson for a debate, but turned out to be a defense of capitalism, something Peterson himself would be doing if he were to debate Wolff. The main argument made in the video, and I truly don't know if it would have been Peterson's main argument, is that socialism and Marxism would fail because private property rights, the thing capitalism is based on and would be abolished under Marxism, is somehow part of human nature. No one would strive for progress if they wouldn't be allowed to own the wealth they personally create; why would I work hard if everything I make falls into someone else's hands? How would I know where I stand in the social hierarchy if there's to social ladder to climb, no meritocracy? Well, I hope you can immediately see the fallacy of that argument, but I'll say it anyway: under capitalism the majority of people, the ones who do the actual work (the ones we've labeled "essential workers" during the corona pandemic), do NOT get to keep the fruits of their own labor. Furthermore, the social hierarchy begotten by the capitalist system of accumulating private wealth, is anything but a natural hierarchy. Socialism and Karl Marx never wanted to eliminate the hierarchies that are natural; we are social creatures and like any other social beasts we'll always have leaders and followers. Leaders and followers, separated by age, wisdom, intelligence or whatever, aren't the problem, the rulers and the ruled, the have's and have-nots, the oppressors and oppressed created by the materially defined ranking order created by the capitalist ideology ARE the problem. Equality of opportunity doesn't exist under capitalism, just as equality of outcome doesn't exist under socialism; just think about it for two minutes and you'll see they're both ridiculous arguments to make.

Still, I'd like you to watch this video, and ask yourself why the opinions expressed therein are so popular and sound so damn logical. Why is it that indeed we identify ourselves for a great part by the stuff we possess, when for tens of thousands of years we lived an almost completely egalitarian life in tribes, with the only hierarchy being the one of age and the wisdom that comes with age? The tribes Elders were our leaders and there were no rulers. What has changed? Why can't we measure our self-worth against the good we do for others or society as a whole? Why do we deny ourselves the freedom that comes along with a society without rulers? I, like Marx, reject the traditional conception of an eternal human nature which remains the same in all places and times; our transition from "tribal nature" to our current conception that our worth is equal to how much we own, is proof for that. So listen carefully to what's said in the video and try to answer for yourself why the narrator is wrong. Or you could agree with him and Peterson of course, that's totally alright too ;-)

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