Best Critique of Jordan Peterson I've heard so far

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And it came from someone who I've wanted to hear intersect or match/compare worldviews with him for a long time.

In a lot of ways Gordon has a lot of the positivity about specific applications that Thaddeus Russel does, as well I suppose he can't help it as a chaos magician, and he does a good job as well of peeling apart the postmodernist schools from the Frankfurt School (which he sees as two very different animals) and talking about what he thinks the dynamics really are behind the strange reactionary politics of the day stem from.

It sounds like he'd give a mixed review of Peterson. Positive: he's helping a lot of people with minimum intervention strategies, which is vetted psychology not personal philosophy, and it sounds like his larger criticisms follow down this path: 1) he doesn't agree with the assessment that intersectionalism is the last dying gasp of Marxism trying to turn the proletariat to rebel and 2) his bigger concern is with Jordan Peterson's classic liberalism (which he speaks of as transferring tyranny from the state to oneself) and a mid 20th century Jungian perspective which he considers to have its on problems but also shares relatively rough/patchy borders with classic liberalism.

I'm a little bittersweet on this because on one hand I'd love to see his views get more public air but at the same time I realize he's a blogger/thinker/author in the chaos magic community and just on those two words 'chaos magic' I think most people would dismiss him long before they took the time to hear what he had to say. IMHO as far as the Peterson/Weinstein/Rubin/Haidt/Harris/Shapiro phenomena I can't help but see him being in a lot of ways on a very close tangent, not only on how he's intellectually picking the world apart along the lines of pejoratized narratives (thinking of Eric Weinstein here) but as a magician he's actually practicing the ways of living and acting in the world that Jordan Peterson's archetypal stories talk about (magic IMHO is best described as applied philosophy or philosophy in action), and so I tend to trust his practiced view of the world from the perspective that - like the scientific pursuit - when you actually do things and see the consequences rather than just sitting around trying to think of what the consequences would be you end up running into the actualities of what the consequences are. I think a great example of the deformity of philosophizing consequences in advance is 'violence in videogames' where some people thought violent video games would cause violence therefore needed to be banned, some people thought they'd be the perfect sump for violent tendencies, both ideas look plausible without testing (and they're both just a slight rotation of consequences away from one another) thus it's a debate that can only be resolved with letting things happen and seeing the results. That's part of where I see the practicality of a very intelligent and well-educated chaos magician chiming in, ie. he's used to sort of living in those crevices that most public thinkers have a way of papering over.

Anyway I'll cut myself off before I talk TOO much more about it. Either way, Gordon in his own words on the matter:

If you inserted a youtube clip it isn't showing up...
Could you provide a link?

Fascinating. It looks like they switched that feature back on maybe a few hours ago, after having it off for several weeks. Go figure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VLEgrla1sg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AtzIWPeun7c

Sadly, Jordan Peterson, recently proved with a Trump and Biden-like
Twitter remark that even though he has massive intellectual achievements and
indeed has helped many people through some basic psychological assistance; he is still
suffering from 'little man syndrome'; as although he talks a good talk about competence of virtue,
he spoiled that whole photo in his 'little man skin' of threatening to slap someone in his room, if they
were there, for criticizing his work. His Non-Verbal Language and General pissed off at the World Attitude
And Conspiracy theories about a Neo-Marxist take over of the world over being butt hurt over his deep seated
black and white pictures of the world as far as Pornography being bad; Marriage and Having Children Being Paramount
to Happiness from Traditional Influence; and failing to understand that Humans with environmental influence can/will be almost anything away from what otherwise is influenced by Nature in terms of as many Genders as one cares to relate too likely comes from being Raised in the Catholic Church as his view of the World is still somewhat Victorian in Canada style of doing Victoria still. Little Dogs Bark. Big Dogs don't have to Bark; and that's just a metaphor. Obviously, the part of Jordan that appeals to so many young men is the fact that he is as angry as they are; and still hasn't grown up and
Self-Actualized beyond the first few floors of Maslow's Pyramid of Peace as
Angry Young Men do often become Angry old men too. That's rather a
Scathing Criticism; but Toxic Masculinity breeds what's at the Top of the
Country that is helping to continue to ruin any Global respect the United
States still has. But Still, now, regardless of how Peterson walks the talk
and talks the talk in his book; empirically speaking, except for the part
of discarding 'the Helmet' in Chapter 11, like he did foolishly still on Twitter the
other day; the Book is Good and presents clinically sound practices to help folks
in the wild for free on YouTube, too; Now, he just he just needs to grow up and be
a good role model too; if he
plans on fulfilling
just another
Messiah Complex among the masses
now to the good; instead of evil of harm.
It's not much Different than Aleister Crowley as
that Man brought to light much out of the dark like the
Science Evidenced Fact now that Lust is a basic source of all Human
Cooperation; Human Creativity; and Productivity; as well as expanding on Archetypes
through his own style of Thoth Tarot Cards too; that are still healthy to investigate
the Inner Universe of Human Being that Science Currently has no tool to replicate
and measure reliably. Sadly, Crowley as noted, through Nurture or through Nature,
had Psychopathic Tendencies of torturing small animals when he was young; and leaving
people to die on a Mountain Climbing expedition that went awry as he couldn't defeat the Nature/
Nurture of what he came to be even with a Golden rule that would have otherwise overcome that with Love;
And additionally, without any need for external Drugs to fill the wHole of a soul that would other wise not torture
small animals and leave people to die
with zero-point compassion for
other living things.
Still though; he helped
take the World in what is
not so small a way out of the
dark ages of 'clothed up' Humans
imprisoned from the Nature of God
that is Nature at hand; There's A LOT OF DIRTY
Water in the World; one just has to HAVE THE WILL TO; And education/experience/discernment to Mine the
Water for the Gold that does exist in the Dirty places of Darkest Water AS FAR AS REAL LOVE LiVinG iN LiGHT..
And to be clear;
i've been
there and
done 'that'
too; took me a long
time to Grow up to be a "real man" too.
The source of a 'real man' is A Balance of Grace as BaLaNCinG FoRCE;
After that Strength and Will comes with the Potential of Free Love too;
As those are just general phrases of what happens when Duality becomes
one of force of life; Yin and Yang; Masculine and Feminine; and to be clear
Jordan Peterson recognizes this Philosophy but he's likely never going to achieve
it in Self Actualization and True Transcendence of Agape Love until he escapes his Ivory
Tower and Massive Stress that comes from conspiracy theory type thinking and the 'like of that';
Sure, And Having a Job too that's Super Stressful. The Dude lives somewhere Between Purgatory
and Hell; 'same' as the folks who see him as their Father; 'same', generally speaking too as the folks
who see Trump as Big Daddy; and the same generally; yes as a gross generalization too, for the 'same' folks
Who see a
Trump Angry
Old White Man
Older Testament
Tribal Fixated God too
in Older Human Malignant
Patriarchal ways of doing Life.
Someone, like Jonathan Haidt will never
get a following like this from "Jordan's Crowd" for
Obviously, Jonathan Haidt as a 'real man' has already
arrived and of course all
of this is in
my
humble
opinion too;
it always is; in
case i fail to mention that too.
Generally Speaking, Women Love Confident
men; and men who are not Confident don't
like Confident men too much; Birds of a Feather
flock together; But not so much when they are the opposite sex;
Fifty Shades of Grey and all of that WereWolf And Vampire Jazz too..

While I have tremendous respect for the man, he is bound much too much to his biological/evolutionary hardware, for my liking...

Peterson has dealt with the stress of taking Care of a Chronically ill
Daughter from Childhood; and my understanding is that he has dealt with
Auto Immune Issues himself which often can be associated with stress. From
my experience, it's not worth it. None of it is; particularly if it is a Volunteer effort
and not required to actually take care of family members or beyond the Job at hand
that makes subsistence work. It appears that he is potentially close to a Break Down
as it really is out of Character from what I've seen of him so far to melt down like that in a
rather childish Personal Attack where I read the assessment of Him in question; and while it was
tough, there were no actual direct words of personal attack as Jordan Peterson suggested that he
was called a Fascist and his Honesty was attacked, just because the guy said Jordan claimed to have been
inducted into a Tribe; and questioned the Logic of his beliefs, not much different than the Fellow did in the
Video here. Yes, it appears that he came up against someone smarter than him on topic; and he just could't handle
that challenge at hand. Seriously, he owns more vocabulary than Trump Twitter Talk that even goes further than
what Trump would say on his worst Trump day. It's disappointing to me; and perhaps a general Trump Trickle
down effect on the World in general; as otherwise Hillary wouldn't have been as likely to make a fatal
political mistake to call a Subset of Americans, 'Deplorables', even if they do, generally speaking fit
the Minion Movie theme of supporting a Truly Despicable Character with little to no Integrity as
their
favorite
Leader. Anyway;
it's Spring Here and
Beautiful in my Neighborhood
as Fred Rogers Might say too; let's
rewind a little bit and be a little more
kind to each other as a World in General.
Meanwhile, unlike that 'other Fred'; I'm still
Gonna dance the dance too with my own style
too out of the current Tradition of Walking in Straight Lines..

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... an-twitter

here's a criticism of peterson for you:
peterson advocates individualism, moving the tyranny of the state etc. onto the individual. But to cope with the responsibility, het then asks to seek guidance in a book of society-approved stories, i.e. he moves reaponsibility away from the individual onto historically grown narratives with a foundation in something transcendent - and the narrative eventually points back to the individual. It's a circular shifting of responsibilities.

Peterson also says that to make up one's own values, as Nietzsche demands, is too much for an individual, too crushing a burden. Hence the individual needs guidance from tradition. - I get the impression that Peterson uses "Individualism" and "Liberalism" as placeholders tat, in his view, lead back to tradition.
I'm not fully against Peterson, I'd like to add, but I think he uses his knowledge as a psychologist to peddle an ideology.

Which renders him increasingly just another obsessive youtube thought-leader.

My main problem with Peterson is not his appeal to tradition. Even as a non-religious person, I think religion and tradition has some merits for civilization. I think mainstream liberalism has been too quick to throw the baby out with the bathwater with it's obsession with individual liberty at the expense of everything else.

My biggest problem with Peterson is his incessant promotion of the same-old egocentric competitive rugged individualism that is really the most toxic element of western civilization. There's only so much you can pound people over the head with a message of "self betterment". After a while it just rings hollow. I think to find true contentment people really need to feel a sense of duty towards something outside themselves.

I think you're selling JBP a bit short, here. True, he bangs hard on the self-improvement drum, but that seems in part to be because that's the part people seem to get upset about, as though the implication that one: they aren't perfect and two: they have more power over their lives than they think they do is somehow an affront to them. Just as you say, a later step in the process is "find a burden and carry it", which is all about an external purpose and a sense of duty towards others.


I'ma go clean my room now.

The problem is modern right-wing ideology today is all about lying to people as a deflection tactic. Deal with suffering people by telling them they can be rich one day if they just work hard. Nevermind that there are a limited number of jobs with a high income. If you get that high-income job, it means somebody else doesn't get it. Everyone's pitted against the other. There's only so far self-help can bring up people as a whole.

It would be fine if self-help was simply given freely on it's own merit. The problem is when it's only sold in conjunction with an ideology of unconditionally accepting the status quo, it starts to smell like common snake oil. It seems like his brand only appeals to people who already accept popular right-wing ideology, hence the popularity.

^^

My own big wave of nausea is that it seems like everyone's lying. The kind of stuff that Jonathan Haidt says about tribalism, conformity, and how little truth matters to most people over group signalling of shared belief, or what Robin Hansen had to say along these lines, is ringing all too true. I was listening to Sam's podcast with Chrisitian Picciolini about white supremacist groups and the conversation hit me with yet another wave of nausea - ie. per his claim the words 'liberal media' and 'globalism' are now right wing extremist code words. Sam also spent the back half of the public forum with Christian about how the left's use of the far right's tactics has just caused mutual arousal on both flanks and he brought up Steven Pinker being called alt-right after bringing up the significant danger of suppressing hot topics on campuses as weakening student's immunity to the alt-right. I deeply fear that sooner rather than later we won't be able to talk about nearly any problem that's there and consequential because it'll be a dog-whistle for some group or another.

It's like the compound fracturing of reality is also working in tandem with a form of sadistic genius that creates unsolvable problems for every potential solution. Eventually trying to solve problems or hash out details in and of itself will be racist, xenophobic, imperialistic, or some other thing in such a profound way that all people will be able to do is turn the west into Bosnia at this rate. If we're really fleshy automatons with no free will you'd think there's some type of wrench we'd be able to jam in the cogs of such an infernal machine but it seems like it's goal is murder and mayhem and it's covering every flank and closing every door to ways in which such things could be prevented.

Teaching someone who is willing to learn to swim so they don't drown is a bad thing?

Not everyone has a "good" attitude...
Helping those that do, are proactive and are willing to listen to good advice will in all probability get ahead...
Those who have an attitude of entitlement and expect others to service their needs will be left behind...
It may be a harsh statement/fact-of-life, but who said life was fair?



Thanks for that...
I will have to look them up...

Did you even read what I said. Are you that dense? I'll try to explain it again...

The problem occurs when situations arise in the world in which the only way one person can "swim" is if another is allowed to drown. If self-help was simply presented on it's own merit I wouldn't have a problem. The issue is presenting self-help as a panacea for the worlds problems. Self-absorbed Jungian mysticism won't solve issues that humanity will have to work together to solve in order to avoid a global crisis. When global warming was mentioned Peterson just spouted typical right-wing head-in-the-sand idiocy. His answer was along the lines "you have no right to concern yourself if you drive a car". WTF?


That depends on what you define as "get ahead". I think this social darwinism nonsense is what is really driving an angry wedge in society. It's the reason men decide to rage and shoot up random people. People need a sense of collective duty where their place on the f*****g lobster hierarchy doesn't matter. Sure, people who are able need to pull their own weight, but it shouldn't be all about f*****g social status. There is more than one dimension to human endeavor. Not everyone is intrinsically motivated by the notion of being dominant over others. Some just want to have a purpose in life.

I agree with this. The left needs to start addressing common far-right fears in a rational matter instead of shaming even moderate voices in such a knee-jerk manner. The outright denial of reality by Intersecional Feminist ideology is also harming the left gravely.

I do feel that words like "globalism" are being used by the right to avoid being labelled "racist". Oddly, "globalism" was originally a left-wing criticism. It first gained popularity in the 1990s in left wing circles opposing NAFTA and the World Bank. Now the right uses it as an anti-immigration dog whistle.


I agree. The problem is horrible caricatures now exist on both the left and the right. There are crazy people like Jason Unruhe who fit the most absurd stereotype of the average "leftist" dreamed up by Ann Coulter. He really does seem to blame every single thing wrong in the world on western imperialism and the US in particular while giving the most brutal regimes in the world a free pass just because he enjoys seeing them "stick it to the man" (i.e. the big bully US).

So long as everyone just characterizes their opposition by the most extreme caricatures (that unfortunately do happen to exist) and play on visceral psychological outrage, I don't see things really getting much better.

I'd like to quote someone mr. Peterson hates: Theodor Adorno of the Frankfurt school of economics - one of the fathers of "cultural marxism": "there is no right way to live in a wrong world" (translated by me, from the German: "es gibt kein richtiges Leben im Falschen"). Sure, I can study, be innovative and competitive. But can I be that without taking advantage of anyone, without relying on destructive processes and hierarchies etc.
Can I invent a great new product that solves all sorts of problems without it needing resources that come from sources I can't control? - how is my (hypothetical) electric car affecting the fragile ecosystems of northern Chile, where the Lithium for the batteries is being mined?
Can I get ahead in society without buying a suit made in a south asian-asian fire-trap?
I guess, once I am on top of the hierarchy, I can afford sustainably sourced clothing and always look new and groomed. -

for now, I wear old, worn down but expensive clothing, because I can't afford to buy new, ethically sourced clothing every month - but that is what my consciousness demands of me.

I daid Peterson propagates Tradition - I'd like to re-iterate. Peterson propagates the status quo of the society he grew up in, with all its destructive wastefulness and dehumanizing competitiveness. He's telling a story that doesn't fit with our contemporary knowledge of what we need to do. And he dares to push the responsibility of that into me, the individual.
I am not depressed because my room is untidy. I am depressed because I am powerless to change the framework that requires me to live in a way I know is wrong.

I think his message is probably best served for the kids who grew up with a massive sense of entitlement and no orientation. To those who've gone left to the point of schizophrenia (thinking of the walk-outs at the University of Portland lecture that lost it over the idea that sexual dimorphism is real and people of their ilk) it might be exactly what they need a dose of.

I do worry about a lot of the things you and NCM have brought up - ie. the zero sum game effect. I worry sometimes, because I want to live in a safe environment or, with worries about existential nihilism or depression I want to have the funds for free movement or to be able to do the things I need to do to keep myself alive - I realize that yes, I have the talent to have a job that can pay for that but at the same time a guy (or girl) with a family to feed isn't getting that spot. I can't think of a decent way to make moral sense of what to do with that kind of situation when we use class as a means of 'meritocratic' punishment for those who are on the bottom or in lower income brackets.

Also like with what you brought up I do worry that all kinds of things I do just to stay in the game reinforce some of its worst characteristics (like you mentioned funding sweatshops and the like). I then go to work and hear what people do with their money and it sounds like a non-stop flow of conversation about new toys and tech gadgets, swapping out last years model every year to stay up with the most current version, and a sense of dread hits me when i start coming to the impression that as a race we're suicide machines and would walk right over the point of no return together just so long as we got to keep our position on the social and 'look what I have!' hierarchy.

This will clearly be a century of hard lessons, I'm hoping nothing like what we saw in the first half of last century with respect to violence, but our distaste for sanity is really what's raising alarm bells. With Jordan I'm mostly in it for the Jung, close second for the introspection on what our religious history has meant, and I do like his drawing of people back to some semblance of common sense or the awareness that there are natural consequences to things (as Bret Weinstein also brings up), that all of material reality isn't a negotiable social construct. My OP had Gordon White for good reason - ie. his criticisms tend to stay with what I appreciate and tend to hack at some of the particular angles that I thought were getting sacrificed a bit.