Jordan Peterson clearly refutes the misrepresentations of his views in this response piece.
https://jordanbpeterson.com/uncategorized/on-the-new-york-times-and-enfo...
It just goes to show that the left will never pass up an opportunity to slander those that they disagree with.
27
I really love all the quotes with no context what so ever. The only difference between this article and the “Kathy Newman” interview is that Dr. Peterson can’t respond in real time.
In no way has he ever stated or implied that men are more competent at anything. All he’s ever said, is that the people who tend to rise to the top of competence based hierarchies tend to rate high is personality trait conscientiousness, and low in agreeableness, and that combination of traits is found more often in men, that’s it. Anyone that’s listened to the Dr. for any amount of time knows this, and the fact the author actually spent time with him and purposefully misrepresented this makes her complicit in perpetrating the venom spit at Dr. Peterson. He knows people will try to take him out of context, so he’s very careful with his choice of words, yet authors like the one who wrote this “article” jack it up time after time.
You don’t have to agree with Dr. Peterson’s take on things, but don’t try to paint this distorted picture by presenting your obviously prejudice opinion as fact, especially when you are implying intentions of another party, or at least be better hiding it.
39
Actually explaining Peterson's appeal isn't all that hard. He is a classic demagogue IE: a person, especially an orator or political leader, who gains power and popularity by arousing the emotions, passions, and prejudices of the people. Bill O'Reilly, Donald Trump, Rush Limbaugh, Tony Perkins etc etc. He's just a little more clever than most.
30
Peterson is Trump if he were semi-literate. All the racism, sexism, and selfishness is now cloaked in a flimsy academic sophistry. It's the archetype of a widespread kind of Internet troll.
28
The very misinformation in this article underlines Peterson's political points. The level of slant and propaganda is remarkable.
It's really 1984 at the NYT.
49
Yes, and Peterson and his followers would rather it be 1954. So sad.
40
What questions did Nellie Bowles ask that led to the comments she uses against Jordan Peterson? When his words are replies to her in a personal conversation, as opposed to his lectures or books, knowing her side of the conversation is critical. She mentions in passing his book but fails to summarize its primary emphasis on individual responsibility. If anything, that emphasis should be welcomed by anyone, whether female or male. Her writing is unfortunately proof of the tribal thinking that causes so much of the our current anger and distrust: in this case she frames it as women vs men but he talks of far more than the sexes.
She writes:
Most of his ideas stem from a gnawing anxiety around gender. “The masculine spirit is under assault,” he told me. “It’s obvious.”
She has a conclusion, in her words not his, without actually presenting most of his ideas. In fact the quote she uses is 8 words, in response to some comment or question of hers that she does not respect us enough to include.
26
Sadly this article is fully in the area of Journalistic malpractice.
37
The backlash is very real, and very dangerous. I knew it was coming, but I did not think it would be this ridiculous. "Enforced monogamy" is a euphemism for rape. The fact that that alone does not send people/men running from this guy is horrifying. And no, it's not so absurd that it doesn't exist -- some men out there DO hate women this much.
For me, I can never figure out what I did to these men to draw such ire, and make them want to enslave me. It simply seems to me that some men out there think that sex with a woman is their right. Tell me, would these men be forced have sex with the "unattractive" women out there? How about gay men who don't get laid -- do these guys get "enforced boyfriends"? No?? Funny, it seems to be that only women are candidates for sexual slavery.
Yes, I am taking this personally -- how else could I take it?
691
JP does not believe in enforced monogamy.
26
I don't think Peterson is arguing for arranged or non-consensual marriages. I think he's arguing for monogamous social institutions like marriage, because then high-status men only have a single partner. Otherwise a small number of men would take large numbers of women out of the dating pool, and more men would be left without partners.
38
Yes, he and his ilk would love to bring about a Republic of Gilead.
53
Really obvious from the repeated citations of a link to Peterson’s webpage and his counter argument that his fans are flooding this comment section. Ignore the claims of irresponsible reporting, I’ve fact checked professionally and this profile of a deranged bigot checks out
38
This is the first I've ever heard of this fellow and his theories, but from what I gather from the article, men are the purveyors of stability and women, chaos. However if said men are deprived of female attention, these very stable men turn to violent rampaging in the streets. Until a (chaos-prone) woman can be provided for them.
Right. Makes perfect sense.
145
Mr. Peterson comes across as a frightened little man.
Perhaps he should "grow the hell up, accept some responsibility, [and] live an honorable life."
Just sayin'.
62
I just want to make it clear to anyonr in favor of forced sexual redistribution; you try rape me, I will kill you. His rhetoric makes me think of Handmaidens tale. I really don't understand how he thinks pairing up violent men with women will help, other than give them one victim to torment. Force that woman to be his punching bag. I have listened and read the works of this man, and if you support him, you and I are gonna have a problem. I will most likely arm myself upon realizing you support him, because people with these views can't be trusted.
45
This is a deeply unfair, unresearched, and biased piece—poor journalism. The term “enforced monogamy” is just one case in point.
It is worth it to read Peterson’s response:
https://jordanbpeterson.com/uncategorized/on-the-new-york-times-and-enfo...
35
This female writer is living with a worldview from 40 years ago. She hates men. I will never support the NYT again.
22
Somehow I don’t think the editor will lose sleep over you.
62
Peterson doesn't advocate a return to traditional sex roles. What he advocates is rape.
20
Please explain
1
Huh? Where did he advocate for rape? Unless you think monogamy and rape are the same thing, in which case, I don't know what to say to you.
I don't even like the guy but some of these comments are getting ridiculous.
3
That's exactly what I thought after I sat next to one of his supporters on a plane from Sidney to New York. The guy spent the whole flight talking up the "divine" virtues of "forced" copulation. He also said that women ought to be forced into marriage, because that's the way it has always been.
13
The subtitle couldn't be more misleading.
"Why won’t women — all these wives and witches — just behave?"
What does this have to do with Peterson's lectures and ideas?
24
It has nothing to do with who Peterson is or what he represents. This is a low point for the NY Times.
17
I do not share all the opinions of Peterson too, I do not like his style and the fact that he never smiles too, but to give such an unbalanced and bias portrait of him is real bad journalism. I am glad I do not read often the NYT or I would be brainwashed as most of your readers. Shame on you!
31
The author of this article doesn't like that Jordan Peterson is her political opponent, and so proceeds to write an article to create a caricature of him and convince others of his both pathetic and evil nature.
Many 'consumers' will just read this digests and take them at face value. Mission accomplished. That's what propaganda is for, and it's effective of course, that's why it exists.
However, they are just being pawns in a political game. You do realize that for each slandering article like this, you'll find an equally praising one? Where does the truth lie?
Watching what Peterson ACTUALLY says, is a time consuming, and brain demanding venture (his lectures on youtube are probably hundreds of hours). If you watch them, and think them through (because they DO require plenty of thinking), you may come out with a different perspective.
Pathetic he may be, he's just human anyway, flaws and all. Evil and oppressor? Quite the contrary.
23
Why do Peterson followers keep insisting their guru is misunderstood, and all people have to do is watch his videos?
I did this, expecting to like him, and came away repulsed. His views on women come straight out of the manosphere. The author of this piece is exactly right -- they're dressed up in civilized language, but they're the exact same sentiments that you can find expressed in pathetic, loathsome detail on sites like Return of Kings or the incel forums. The exact same checklist of grievances, including the bizarre obsession with women who wear makeup (liars!) and rigid rules about women's roles.
8
Don't judge the professor until you've spent some time watching his lectures on YouTube. Despite the author's editorial comments, he is quite sane, logical, and insightful. A lot of his comments, including many in this article, are aimed at trying to explain how cultures and western civilization have developed. He is not necessarily advocating for a particular outcome. He has a deep distrust of government power, and he has very interesting things to say about tribalism and the importance of looking at people as individuals rather than just as members of some socially-constructed group.
This article is part of a larger effort to discredit those with whom one disagrees by mocking them and dismissing them without engaging in honest discussions about their ideas. Making it career-suicide to debate the most contentious topics openly and without fear (gender, race, etc.) is killing this country.
317
Asking me not to judge a man who thinks there should be enforced monogamy so insecure inept men won't be left out is absurd, in fact laugh out loud funny. Why are those who assign themselves superiority so often the very worst examples of superiority possible? The author has not misrepresented him, these are his words, he just does not stand up to sunlight.
223
He has a deep distrust of government, except when he wants to use it to compel women into relationships with who he admits are undesirable men.
141
He believes that women and men are both limited. He is a champion of liberal values and openness, tolerance, and especially possibility. This is what I have heard again and again in his 'unvarnished' interviews and lectures, hours upon hours of them.
1
This is a deliberate misrepresentation and perversion of the ideals for which Dr. Peterson actually stands. It is a HIT JOB and the Times ought to be ashamed.
I encourage everyone to actually *listen* to some of his lectures on YouTube. Decide for yourself. If all he says is pseudo-scientific, regressive psychobabble, then your ideals or viewpoints won't be at risk by merely listening.
19
"Marxism is resurgent" says Mr Peterson. But so is fascism and populism and (neo) Nazism and Christian fundamentalism, but Mr Peterson does not seem to be bothered by these last ones. His vilification of the left which many times encompasses common progressive movements has made him the darling of the alt-right which he visibly fails to condemn as vociferously as he does the left.
Mr. Peterson is an extraordinary speaker. Obviously an intelligent man who's discourse is extremely captivating even just from shere mastery of language and logic.
But once you listen to him long enough to get pass the mesmerizing flood of well formulated arguments and abundance of common sense statements on freedom of speech and biological inevitability you start asking yourself one simple question: Why is this beautiful mind so obsessed with the left while in the same time turning a blatantly blind eye to the evils of the right?
History is filled with great thinkers, philosophers, poets, artists which have left us troves of priceless works but whom in the same time signed up to abhorrent political views.
Mr Peterson is no stranger to this family. He has undoubtly put out fascinating pages and hours of incredible lectures and debates. But at their core his views are deeply rooted in racist philosophy, male and white supremacy. so far he has managed to skilfully deflect accusations but unless he decides to come out strongly and unequivocally against the extreme right he will remain a fascist.
30
If only the young men who need to be lifted out of alt-right resentment were taught to appreciate the value of each and every woman instead of bemoaning their rejection by "supermodel" types (who of course are going to go for the alpha men). But alas, that message won't bring in the $$ for Dr. P.
16
Are you saying that all right wing thinkers are "deeply rooted in racist philosophy, male and white supremacy" ? Is this based on the political spectrum placing fascism as the extreme right wing position? If so then fine but you would have to look at the extreme left wing position - communism. Communism may not be racist, it seeks to eliminate class and equalize race - but it does almost always result in murder. See the Red Guard for just one of many examples. All semblance of folk tradition and religion in China were looted/destroyed and people trying to stop it were murdered in the name of Mao. It wouldn't be fair to say all left wing thinkers are rooted in a murderous philosophy just because they are left wring thinkers.. I think always equating people w/ the extreme versions of their thought process is cutting off conversation and causing people to misunderstand each other.
5
One reason that Peterson is more concerned with the left's repression than the right's is that he has lived most of us his life in universities, where left thinking rules the day--not only rules but dominates. Look up how many Republicans there are in American university faculties and you will get the idea. Further, the anti-liberal, anti-free speech, anti-individual rights activity is coming more powerfully from the left than the right. This focus might be off target in many parts of the U.S. and in many of its sub-groups, but it is appropriate in Peterson's world.
Rather than simply claim what you do, can you offer evidence that "at core his views are deeply rooted in racist philosophy, male and white supremacy"? I have listened to lots of his lectures and videos, and I have not seen that. His political thought is rooted in classic liberalism. He has denounced the far right on many occasions. Part of his project is to lift young man out of alt-right resentment and get them to take responsibility for themselves. Search for "Jordan Peterson Hitler," and see what he has to say for yourself about that kind of fascism.
23
This article doesn’t really get at who Jordan Peterson is. I enjoyed his book but I love watching him in interviews on YouTube even more. He can put into words so much of what I believe! He debates with angry biased women like so many I have encountered but whereas I have given up so many times he is to cool and makes everything clear, revelling that the emperor has no clothes, so to speak.
I grew up with the most strident feminism, which I think is pretty common in upper-middle class Toronto. I was always told to ‘lose the girlish voice,’ be more assertive, and plan my career more. I felt rejected intrinsically for who I was, and ultimately I did none of those things — and it’s worked out pretty well.
Feminists don’t understand that a lot of women want to be housewives. Many people refuse to admit the possibility that without patriarchy there is only anarchy and that is far worse, for women and everyone.
Equality of opportunity is choice. Equality of outcome is trying to force feminine women like me into masculine careers; it’s trying to force women to have to put their children n daycare rather than staying home with them. I understand very well the frustration of being in this environment.
Rather than denigrate Peterson maybe journalists could try to understand what is suing and why that appeals to people today.
15
To C in Toronto
and exactly 'what is suing' ...?
1
I don’t think you understand feminism. No true feminist would say that a mother has to put her children in daycare. No feminist forces women to enter masculine careers. Feminism supports the women who want to as well as the women who choose to stay home and be a housewife. Rather than denigrate feminism, maybe you should try fully understand what it stands for and why women might want to have their own personal autonomy.
11
Disappointing your email link is dead. I wanted to share some anecdotes and research that might explain why Peterson is affecting so many young men. Your article hardly gives an unfamiliar reader any clue of what he believes, the staggering amount of content he publishes, and how broad the topics he covers are. For what you cover, i suppose you're more fair than others. I'm not a regular listener of Peterson's, but i do love when he's interviewed in long form discussions and plan to make my way to his book after I cover a short list. I was drawn to the man after he was assaulted by the twittards i find myself voting with year after year. I would encourage the curious to view the confrontations he's had on campuses. The screeching left (i don't mean to be dramatic, simply accurate. I'm a life long democrat.) provide a perfect example of the fanatic idiocy he speaks out against in much of his work. The fact that rags such as this don't seem to be concerned with those dangerous children is another. Anyway, that's all i'm willing to share of my opinion. I do hope the NY Times figures out how to create an email link in the future. I can show you if you'd like.
16
“we aim to rededicate ourselves to the fundamental mission of Times journalism. That is to report America and the world honestly, without fear or favor, striving always to understand and reflect all political perspectives and life experiences in the stories that we bring to you.”
From your post 2016 election letter from the publisher.
This Jordan Peterson “profile” is slanderous and indefensible. In a credible news organization there would be an investigation into how this piece made it into print and a retraction or correction published.
While I hate to attribute truth to Trump’s words, if you take no action it will only confirm Trump’s accusation that you are failing, if indeed your fundamental mission is journalism and not something more nebulous.
16
In fact it is perfectly true that when women have free choice and a variety of reasonable options, undesirable men cannot find mates.
This is why enforced monogamy for women was established in the first place...
And yes. When you refuse to conform to someone else's most cherished desires, you are certainly creating chaos.
Thing is, what's good for the goose is often very bad for the gander...
572
That's good. :) It takes a lot of mental gymnastics to place the blame for guys not getting laid entirely at the feet of women. Here's an idea: Be better and maybe you'll catch someone's eye. It ain't rocket science.
158
I like to tell these men exactly what they've been telling women for centuries: "You don't know what's good for you."
And then I'll go about my merry way, just as I please, without a care in the world for the "needs" they think women are supposed to fulfill for them.
109
Kallisti: All humor aside, there are always people who through no fault within their own control are not seen as desirable. Minimal physical attractiveness; enough ability to get a reasonable job; chronic ill health for which no permanent cure is available--these aren't failures of will or character. In many highly-rigid hierarchal cultures, one can always buy or otherwise obtain a bride for one's son, regardless of his appeal. But not necessarily a bridegroom for one's daughter...
6
In all honesty, I didnt expect anything less from the NYT than this hit piece. That said, I have to recognize that the comment section is even worse. Which just shows that we have reached a point in the United States, where is has become truly impossible for these two big groups to talk to each other.
Somehow I hope that intelligent people, who use reason and logic to get their point through, will dominate our public discourse, so that this country will relax a bit. But seeing how the NYT treats Peterson, Im not expecting that to happen very soon. Because to have an honest and intelligent discussion, the "other side" has to at least acknowledge your good intentions.
23
This is very disturbing:
“He was angry at God because women were rejecting him,” Mr. Peterson says of the Toronto killer. “The cure for that is enforced monogamy. That’s actually why monogamy emerges.”
So, if a woman had been forced to be in a sexual 'monogamous relationship' with the man, it would solve male violence? And who are these women who will be assigned these 'tasks'?
393
...and how would they live with this man's anger?
It doesn't go away by itself.
80
That's not how that works. He's talking about a cultural shift to encourage monogamous relationships, not laws or actual force
45
My thoughts exactly. An angry man will be angry whether or not he is having sex. There are plenty of battered wives out there who know precisely what it means to have a perpetually angry, dissatisfied husband. As I recall, the last group of men who decided to try this "enforced monogamy" business was called ISIS. Read the stories of how young women were literally stolen from their homes and given as property to ISIS fighters, as a "reward" for fighting. Marriage solved nothing for these men. None of them quit fighting for ISIS and settled down happily with a contented wife. The women were repeatedly brutalized and terrorized. Some were raped by their husbands' comrades. Some were mutilated, others were killed.
You cannot have a world in which one-half is subjugated to the other merely due to gender. The Catholic church murdered millions of women during its campaign to drive women out of positions of power in society throughout Europe in the Middle Ages through the end of the witch-hunting period in the seventeenth-century. But the Enlightenment sowed the seeds of women's liberation from legal bondage to men, and there has been no looking back since then.
Modern women are not putting up with the old misogyny any more, and as more women break thr chains, they come to realize that they would rather be single and free than be with an abusive, angry man.
If men want partners, they need to learn how to love like healthy human beings do.
172
Here's how I see Jordan Peterson vs. feminists:
1. Man writes a book that helps men rediscover their identities as men. In short, Peterson helps to empower men, and not at the expense of women.
2. Feminists say he is a misogynistic ogre and try to discredit him.
End of story. Today's feminists do not want to see men become stronger, happier, more productive humans. I wish more men would realize this fact.
8
I have been following the Peterson trajectory for some time now, and I have to say, I am completely unimpressed.
He reminds me of me when I was 20 years old and just discovered Nietzsche -- my angst and insecurity had been given a voice! As a matured, I realized that Nietzsche's thoughts were the product of a powerful intellect being operated by an emotionally underdeveloped person. In other words, a wickedly smart pre-teen. Not exactly the perfect match.
Peterson is exactly this with a dash of religious nonsense included.
There is no doubt, however, that he has tapped into a deep need among a significant segment of the population.
He is also correct that the radical left needs to cut out the nonsense and preaching. If life has shown me anything, it is that morality is only lastingly taught by example. Live better lives, be better people. Stop screaming about privileges and live a life worth admiring.
954
I understand your points, but I always feel the need to push back on the claim of 'religious nonsense' when it appears in Peterson's comments. I consider myself an atheist, but I have watched several of Peterson's biblical lectures and am hard pressed to find any sort 'nonsense' in what he is saying. In my view he isn't presenting the stories as literal truth, he's presenting them as myth, and how they seem to perfectly match up with not only Jungian archetypes, but what seems to be deep truths about mankind and society in general. Some of the religious myths, and the underlying motifs, characters, and plot lines just 'make sense' to a large proportion of people, which, in my opinion, is why they became elevated to the level of spiritual in the first place.
70
So ... you're unimpressed because (in your words):
1) He reminds you of you
2) He talks about religion.
3) He has tapped into a deep need.
4) He correctly admonishes the radical left.
5) He has you evangelizing to live a better life.
Are you sure 'unimpressed' is the right word here?
73
If you want the goods on myths and archetypes, go back to Joseph Campbell, not this emotional cripple who uses them to demonize women and to soak angry, complacent white men who think the world owes them a living. Hey, at least his preaching might get them to make their beds and clean their rooms. What progress!
196
Guys, you should definitely check Jordan Peterson out instead of taking this article at face value. If I hadn't already listened to him speak I would've thought he was horrible, based on this. But it's really a smear campaign and it's so unfortunate that he's getting smeared when he is giving so many people helpful guidance that they really need. Jordan Peterson is not who the NYT should be attacking. There are actual threats out there.
Oh, and also, re: some sneering points in the article, I'm a woman who appreciates the acknowledgement that women might actually like being mothers. There's surprisingly little of that in current liberal discourse about motherhood.
20
Argh. Feminism does not say being a mother is bad. It does say that limiting women to being only mothers and dismissing what their other talents/goals are is bad.
11
There is a HUGE amount of talk about the joys of motherhood in "liberal discourse" as you put it. There's surprisingly little talk about how hard it can be, and how many women are made to feel guilty because they might also want to continue working at the careers they were trained for.
If you've missed all that, you must be awfully defensive about your choices.
4
@Another: Where on earth did you get the idea that liberal women don't like motherhood? I certainly enjoy being a mother. I also happen to love working. And in that, I'm lucky, because I don't have a choice about whether to work or not. There's no rich hubby on the scene to take care of us!
I was raised by a mother who taught full-time, then went back to school in her mid 40s to study medicine. She was a great role model and taught me the value of hard work. She also read me bedtime stories and sang to me, just as I've done with my own child. And I get up every day and work at a job I enjoy, too. My son's in college now, and he's a great kid.
Why don't people think that it's possible to work and raise kids well at the same time? I did it! My mother did it! Most other women these days are doing it, too. It is not always easy, but who said that life was easy?
And don't forget that millions of women do not have a choice about whether they are going to work or stay home. Be grateful if you do have the choice!
In my grandmother's time it was much harder for a woman who needed to support herself to even find a good job. And these days, poor women may even have to work several jobs to feed and house their families. More power to them. We should be supporting their efforts by making daycare more affordable, providing affordable housing, and investing in public schools and higher education.
1
White Privilege = Promoting, employing, educating or otherwise providing benefit to, White Peoples, especially men but also women, simply because they are white, even if they are not as qualified as other people for a similar position. This is American history, more overtly in Southern states, mo re covertly in the North, ironically, equally overt and covert in midwestern states such as Oklahoma where the sometimes just make entire villages of American's of African descent disappear. Then you have speakers such as Jordan P give intellectually sounding justifications that are intellectually specious at best. And he knows it...all the way to the bank. His goal is to be to Trudeau as Trump is to Obama.
3
I've been reading about Peterson for a little while now, and with all the attention he gets I keep thinking I must be missing something interesting about him. But perhaps I'm not. So, a once respected academic upset by the mere possibility of transgender people begins a campaign of anti-modern-world fulminating of all sorts. Soon he's a new age misogynist superstar for angry under-socialized white men (making much money in the process), and then somehow he's suddenly someone we're now supposed to take seriously as a profound thinker and social critic?
The main thrust of his arguments though seem to be something like: transgender people, the acceptance of homosexuality, and the diminution of unexamined masculine power are leading us towards communism. Except that this whole formulation seems deeply ignorant of the history of how actual communism functioned, and what happened to non-hetero gender role conforming people under those regimes. In fact, his forced marriage notion sounds much more like communism than anything involved in the feminist and LGBTQ movements.
In fact, under the deep veneer of pop psych gibberish, goofy mythic allusions, and bizarrely interpreted history he throws up, pretty much all of what he says seems to come down to just a particularly thuggish version of tired ol' white male supremacism.
438
What? When has he said anything even close to what you described?
25
I am an educated Canadian.
I am unaware of any Canadian legislation that requires me to use a multitude of pronouns when addressing non-binary persons.
When was this law passed?
What is its name?
8
"The main thrust of his arguments though seem to be something like: transgender people, the acceptance of homosexuality, and the diminution of unexamined masculine power are leading us towards communism."
False. It seems to me, you have ingested third hand accounts, at best.
20
Please stop covering these sad little excuses for a man. I refuse to dislike half of the world's population simply because they are men. I also refuse to be relegated to a position of submission simply because I was born a woman. Hit the road, Jack, and don't you come back no more.
851
Do people like this really have a platform, or are they simply constructs of a vacuous Internet given occasional daylight by articles like this?
27
Sing it, sister !
49
This article is a terrible misrepresentation, not just of men in general, but of this particular person. Peterson has implied that women's choice might be what caused humanity to advance to the level it has in the first place, because unlike chimpanzee females, we human women are picky about who we mate with, but you won't hear that from these people, because it doesn't fit their agenda.
His idea of monogamy is in contrast to POLYGAMY, which the western world finds sexist and abhorrent. This writer took his words out of context and used his minor speech impediment to try to make him look like a creep. This is dishonest on so many levels.
69
As I read this fantastic story and comments, it is a battle of mythologies. Myths are stories (explanatory constructs among other things) we use to explain events, actions, facts, that we do not have enough scientific information to explain. Its amazing how many people embrace mythologies as evidence-based facts.
When these mythologies are used to deny principles of equality of opportunity, civil rights, and when one's gender is asserted to be the basis on which a society should deny or allow fundamental human rights, I know there is no evidence that such a practice is " the natural order of things", and that human history teaches us that such practices have done enormous damage to our efforts to increase equality of opportunity, and protection of fundamental rights. By what logic, by the way, should the spirit of "chaos" be mandated to make an orderly home? Behavioral predilections probably are hard-wired into the human brain, and some of those are probably statistically (but not individually) gender-specific. If we mandate those, then we should mandate every young man become a "dragon", a killer of other men, a predator. After he cleans up his room of course.
269
Contrary to what this reporter chooses to share, much of what I've heard Peterson say is backed up by peer-reviewed science. What his fans believe is another thing entirely, but Peterson reports a lot of facts and findings along with his opinions.
19
"deny principles of equality of opportunity, civil rights, and when one's gender is asserted to be the basis on which a society should deny or allow fundamental human rights, I know there is no evidence that such a practice is "'the natural order of things'"
I know there is no evidence that Peterson has ever in his life advocated for denying principles of equality of opportunity, civil rights, or human rights based upon gender or anything else. You've been misled by this hit-job article.
19
Mythology is eternal - it existed before science. It will never not exist. Archetypes are universal meta-patterns.
13
This article is a hatchet job plain and simple. It epitomizes the other side of editorializing. Biasing the writing in such a way as to demonize and ridicule the person. I'd like to see Nellie Bowles sit down and have a good, frank discussion with the man where she can't get her agenda to monopolize and sanitize the truth.
20
This is without doubt one of the worst articles I have ever read. Since the author is so clearly unable to address Mr Peterson intellectually, she resorts to personal attacks, calling his home "a house of horrors".
Jordan Peterson is, like Robert Bly, a mentor to young fatherless men who have lost their way and have difficulty growing up.
He is not a supporter of people who live in victimhood, and want to find some reason they cannot be successful. He is a fresh and engaging voice against micro-aggressions, and people who are sure they are being discriminated against. I couldn't agree more. Those who believe this should volunteer in a refugee camp in Syria or Myranmar to gain first hand experience of how hard life is.
Peterson is brilliant, somewhat intense and obsessive but he is not anti feminist. This article is slanted and is not up to NY Times standards.
In fact I am giving the NY Times 2 more strikes and goodbye subscription.
29
Yeah, I know lots of young men through my profession and the vast majority have never heard of either Bly--who was a pretentious academic serving warmed-over myths in an attempt to cash in on male insecurity an era in which masculinity was being challenged--or Peterson, who is doing essentially the same thing.
23
I suppose we shouldn't automatically dismiss everything he has to say. After all, even a stopped clock is right twice per day. Yet, similar to Karl Marx, he may be on point about some of the ills of society, but his proposed solutions leave much to be desired. And I find it ironic that he's essentially doing one of the things that he finds most annoying about left wing academia: taking a basic idea that may have some merit to it's most absurd extreme. Take his example of "flip charts." Most reasonable people would agree that we shouldn't use racial and ethnic slurs. At best it's not polite, and it can be oppressive in some situations, and a form of violent threat in others. But to then extrapolate that premise to the point of banning perfectly innocent words and phrases that, by the context of their usage are obviously not intended to be slurs, is ridiculous. And then Peterson essentially does the same thing. He observes that the sexual revolution of the 60' and 70's largely removed the stigma of sex outside of marriage. This led to a fair number of young men, considered undesirable for one reason or another, no longer being able to count on the societal norm of monogamy to take the more desirable men out of circulation. And,freed from pressure to get married early, women are now able to hold out for better options. Okay, there's probably something to that. But to then extrapolate that we need society to dictate the distribution of spouses is absurd.
226
Men's solution to women holding out for "better options" is: be one of the better options! A man doesn't have to be an alpha male making a gazillion bucks to be a better option; he can be just an ordinary guy as long as he is willing to accept and appreciate an ordinary (and perhaps ordinary-looking) woman. Too many of these men are fixated on and bitter about not attracting the Melania Trumps of the world.
104
Precisely! Well put.
27
That's all they really have, these so-called "Men's Right's Activists", isn't it? The notion that some things are just supposed to be a certain way, that's just the way it is, and everyone should fall in line.
Total lack of imagination. That's always what the real problem is when someone tries to invoke the "natural order of things".
It would be terrifying to be such a man in these times. So glad I don't know any of these men.
607
Actually, Peterson argues *why* a certain kind of order/hierarchy is more stable, productive and fair. While the conclusion does support a return to traditional gender roles to a great extent, he is never content to say "that's just the way it is," or simply rely on the circular logic of "tradition" as you say. It's obviously controversial, but if you say you want honest dialogue rather than blind appeals to tradition (often embodied by "the 50's" in these discussions), you should at least acknowledge it when it is right in front of you, and engage it honestly.
23
No one argues for a hierarchy -- in which the speaker would be at the bottom.
34
Peterson is not a Men's Rights Activist. He has called the "Men Going Their Own Way" movement "pathetic weasels." He preaches personal responsibility before trying to change society.
18
Something that is striking to me is the extreme lack of empathy from women and their “allies” toward men who are trying to express themselves and create a meaningful life. Their is certainly a crisis occurring in the West with men and they need women to be understanding and supportive more than ever right now. Instead all I see I disdain and ridicule towards any man that voices an opinion that falls outside the liberal orthodoxy. Please try and be kind and employ some empathy towards the men in your life. They are more sensitive and in need than you know.
462
Are the women in your life lacking empathy? Do they disdain and ridicule you? If so, you need to find those empathic, supportive females you so desperately need in your life. How about trying to understand where women are coming from? How we are STILL fighting to be treated as equals by white men who are freaking out about losing their vaunted privileged status for the past few thousand years?
345
I happen to agree that not enough attention is paid to men's wellbeing and happiness, and especially in our techy era, men are more lonely and isolated than ever. I think a lot of women would love for this to be addressed -- don't forget we are wives, mothers, sisters and daughters, and we love the men in our lives. But Peterson has become a genuine misogynist. He wants to limit women's opportunities and he belittles our intellect with statements like "men test ideas; women test men."
He does not inspire empathy or understanding. He's a provacateur who is making things worse.
477
Once again you want women that be the be to fix a problem that was largely constructed by men.
335
This article has damaged the trust I have placed for years in the New York Times and its reporting.
"ENFORCED MONOGAMY" does not refer some policy idea for the government of Canada to take up, it refers to how societies evolved cultural mechanisms to enforce monogamy despite the natural polygamistic tendencies of our hunter/gatherer ancestors. Monogamy was culturally enforced as society evolved because mate distribution across polygamous societies tended towards socially unstable inequalities among men.
Peterson has a tendency to get drawn into tangents, and the author here has used that to its full advantage by taking the juiciest bits, completely decontextualizing them, and then framing them to imply a completely different meaning than was intended!
I often disagree with Petersons views, but I have done my due diligence to try to understand what he thinks. This article intenionally misrepresents his views to assassinate his character.
679
Dan's comment expresses my reaction to this article, exactly. I gasped when it became clear how Ms. Bowles was interpreting "enforced monogamy".
The New York Times has always had a left-leaning editorial bent, but it's reporting always seemed to broker the facts honestly... I am scandalized by this piece.
121
I agree, a badly written article.
And it's beyond me as to why it is in the Style section of the Times and authored by the tech and internet culture writer.
71
No, John Chastain. It's because he was not using "enforced monogamy" in the way as a social policy and as you would describe as, "the guise of patriarchy and white nationalistic ideals of a social hierarchy dominated by men like him." When he said "enforced monogamy" he was referring to its anthropological definition and how we as a society evolved to create a culturally "enforced monogamy".
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3260845/
There's a study. Enjoy.
24
This is what I call fake news. I have watched hundreds of hours of Peterson's videos and this article potray contrary to everything he stand for. He is not advocating patriarchy but he observe men have more natrual traits that help them dominate many aspect of social life. Many of these traits are not desireable and that is why prisons are full of men (93.2% male in Federal Prison). There are way more dumber men than women and that is why 60% of University students are female. But tiny male population are extreemly smart and driven who given up everything to persuit of their goal. Should we punish those men? We all desire equality and a hints of unfairness infuriate us. There is a monkey video where two sets of monkey were given diffrent amont of food. Monkeys with smaller portion food given protested and refused to take anymore food eventhough all food was free. We mock people who doesn't believe in evaluation. But we can not accept evaluationary difffrence between men and women. Gender arised millions of years before even dinosaurs or trees existed. What Dr.Peterson saying instead of making women infuriate about unfairness, why not we teach them how to succeed in men's field. like being unagreeable. He is all for equality of oppertunity but not for forced equal result. This article is so disapponinting. Just watch the video it will reveal many things in 1minute.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yb796sRnkm0
117
I find myself returning to the same conclusion that it is not the "messiahs' that should scare us, but the people who follow them. What is it about Western culture that there is this constant need for manufacturers of moral pablum to save us from ourselves? I want to introduce these men to the countless fathers, husbands, brothers, sons, and best buds, who live happy, fulfilling lives, with humility and integrity. Men who who do not need to be reminded that they are men, because they just are. They might be imperfect but they perform their jobs, support their families, worship their God, or not, bringing joy and delight to others without needing their sex recognized. Perhaps those who need to go hear these pep talks are failing at being what should come naturally to them, being human males who coexist in a world with females who, like them are imperfect, but are first, human beings. I look around at my group of male friends who, every Thanksgiving, tolerate our game of Scrabble then peel off one by one to plant themselves before the television watching the game. We hurl loving invective at them and love them for being who they are, contented lovable, men. To the others, love and serve someone other than yourselves. You will be happier, and so will the rest of the world.
1033
Bravo.
34
Brava. But yes.
4
The problem with your pleasantly imperfect picture is that it is fading away, fast, especially as you look downwards on the economic scale.
These aspects you love do NOT "come naturally" to men, as a whole, otherwise things would not be changing so fast. A larger fraction of men are lost, and Peterson often is stunned by how little encouragement it would take for men to take on responsibility they once did. But that would mean we as a society would value and applaud improvements, progress, success and competence. Competence, especially, is under attack. What a shame.
24
The truth is that Jordan Peterson has a lot of intelligent things to say...mixed with a lot of stupid and dangerous things. I first saw him in dialogue with Russell Brand on YouTube. He seemed much more thoughtful and nuanced in that conversation than I expected. So I watched some more videos. I stopped watching after the one in which he said the jury was still out on whether or not women should have equal rights since "freedom does not equal happiness." He later went on to say that a lot of men aren't happy with corporate culture either. Yet he never questioned the wisdom of letting men be free.
76
Just because much political correctness is laughable doesn't make Mr. Peterson serious. Although he does seem to have found a quite profitable hustle in appearing so.
43
A very unfair article, obviously intended to paint Dr. Peterson an unfavorable light. Unobjective.
82
A pathetic interview by someone who has a different view.
Peterson is the one with the following.
Not the author of this piece.
Clearly, the followers of Peterson must be deplorable.
Or on to something real.
44
A quote from the article: "The left, he says, refuses to admit that men might be in charge because they are better at it. 'The people who hold that our culture is an oppressive patriarchy, they don’t want to admit that the current hierarchy might be predicated on competence,' he said."
"Competence"! In the current moment, exactly which male-dominated hierarchies does Mr. Peterson imagine have demonstrated "competence"? The U.S. Congress, currently -- and for some time now -- a portrait in governmental impotence,incapable of dealing with the true challenges of our time, such as global warming, growing economic inequality, inadequate health care, mass incarceration? How about the executive branch, dominated by a lying fraud? How about the Roman Catholic Church, still embroiled in sexual assault scandals in countries around the world? How about white evangelical Christians, who -- demonstrating a miles-wide moral double standard -- continue to support a lying fraud of a president who paid hush money to a porn star? How about the male-dominated American business sector (the Times reported just the other day that there are now 23 women leading Fortune 500 companies), that continues to seek short-term profit at the expense of social and environmental well-being? How about the male-dominated hierarchies in the Middle East, who continue to subject their own people and their neighbors to violence, poverty, misery? I could go on, at length.
Grow up, Mr. Peterson. Be honest.
89
The lesson most patients need to hear, he says, is “grow the hell up, accept some responsibility, live an honorable life.” This sounds like a really good idea to me.
59
"...The left, he believes, refuses to admit that men might be in charge because they are better at it. “The people who hold that our culture is an oppressive patriarchy, they don’t want to admit that the current hierarchy might be predicated on competence,” he said...."
If only it WERE predicated on competence! I'm not holding my breath.
35
Additional research on JP showed me that many of his ideas seem genuinely helpful, comforting, and inoffensive. All to the good.
He seemed to become a bit unhinged when Canada’s C-16 law was passed. That law added gender expression & identity to the list of groups historically mistreated by society and now specifically protected. His fixation on pronoun use seemed a bizarre overreaction. It is basic courtesy to address people as they want to be addressed, rather than how you think they should be addressed, and it’s easy to ask them if you don’t know their preference. Why would I insist on calling you Miss Sue Black when your name is John White and you want to be called Mr. White? You’d consider me a presumptuous jerk, and rightly so. It does not take a PhD to treat others kindly and the way they prefer to be treated. Most of us learn that in elementary school.
Perhaps Dr. Jordan also needs to look inside and take responsibility for the shadow side of his beliefs. Pushback should be expected when a person’s or group’s happiness and security depends on forcing others into roles they do not want and treatment they would not tolerate for themselves. It is sensible to heed these possible danger signs when we observe them. Holding himself publicly accountable would be humanizing and inspiring. That’s what true leadership looks like.
37
How did our advanced societies turn out so many crazy people?
Are most of them men? I find that hard to believe.
I used to think education and exploration of the world and of ideas was a good thing. But it seems to have left this bunch still out in the cold, bathed in the juices of their ids.
17
Nellie Bowles does a good job giving Mr. Peterson his own voice while not disguising her contempt for what he is saying. In the field of identity politics, he represents the far right, which naturally would like a return to previous eras where the vast majority of women did not question their roles in life, nor the oppressive political systems which enforced them. When people such as Mr. Peterson are seen close-up, their extremism shows their absurd beliefs to be laughable. It is a wonder any women would want to be photographed with him as big fans of his anti-feminist fanaticism.
36
WOW, just WOW... there is something really scary going on with this “movement”.
31
I’m concerned by the magnetic aura of evidence Dr. Peterson uses to support broad lifestyle and social recommendations. For example, in his rebuttal to this article, he refers to “Evolutionary social psychology and family homicide,” (1988) and a variety of other research from the 50’s through the early 2000’s. He uses these to argue that enforced monogamy has been stable across multiple cultures as it reduces male violence. I believe that the sheer number and complexity of variables contributing to human behavior make it difficult to prove such theories and that the previous existence of given social structures are not satisfactory evidence for their correctness. More than that, we must be extremely cautious regarding the predictive value of such “evidence” (ie this was a stable system in the past, therefore we should support it now). This concerns me particularly when race and gender (important because scientific constructs around both have justified millennia of humans owning other humans, not because I am a snowflake). I would urge Peterson’s followers to read Gould’s “The Mismeasure of Man” and to accept one of the positive features of postmodern thought - the emphasis of context over universals.
Those of us who believe in evidence must now more than ever exercise a healthy skepticism toward what constitutes evidence in the social sciences. In particular, we should be wary of ANYONE who fetishizes things you already intuitively “know.” That is the opposite of science.
35
You have to be kidding with this. First, that it's in the Style section--what does misogyny have to do with style? Second, that the statements this "professor" makes as if they were undisputed facts go unchallenged. Where is his empirical evidence that "chaos is represented by the feminine"? Who says?
He apparently cloaks his retro views in the respectability his degree gives him, which counts for nothing since he uses no science to support them. His opinions--for that is all they are--are dangerous in an era of "incel rebellion," giving violent anti-woman men permission to try to force us into roles we do not want.
Why did the writer not challenge statements like "the current hierarchy might be predicated on competence"? According to whom? Where is his evidence that men are somehow more competent than women? Competent at what? Not self-control, apparently, since women are far less likely to take out our anger on others by shooting and killing them.
I came from an abusive marriage. If my ex-husband (who still, after 15 years apart, threatens me from afar when his life is going badly) saw this he would believe he was right to try to control me.
What's especially clueless--and not at all professional, for a psychologist--is his assertion that women will only marry high-status men. If that were true, no working-class men would be married, now would they?
His ideas are dangerous. As a society, we should NOT normalize them by defining them as "style" material.
52
Ms. Bowles has embarrassed herself through her ignorance of the anthropological basis for Dr. Peterson’s promotion of monogamy.
42
How would anyone go about "enforcing" monogamy?
Being married doesn't mean that a man isn't going to cheat, or have multiple partners if he so desires. Just ask our current president if monogamy has stopped him from sleeping with as many women as would have him.
What are you going to do, have morality police, like they do in Iran or under ISIS? Are they going to tail men throughout their lives, checking to make sure they don't cheat, don't sleep with anyone but their wives? How does "enforcement" work?
Will divorce be forbidden? What if a woman is married to an abusive man? Can she still divorce him and find a better man, or will she be stuck forever with a jerk? If you divorce, will you be allowed to marry again, or do you only get one chance to get it right? Would divorced people be forbidden to marry?
Is the government going to be empowered to punish transgressors? What will the punishment be? Public lashings? Losing a hand? That's what they do in other countries where morality and behavior are policed.
Sure, it would be nice if everyone just got married and stayed married. If men and women wouldn't get sick of each other after ten or twenty years of living together, that would be great. If old men would tire of comparing their old wives unfavorably to young women, that would be nice, too. But I do not see how any of this could be "enforced."
This guy needs to be more careful about what he says. People can and do take him literally.
28
Wrong from his initial premise. "Chaos," which Peterson identifies with the feminine originates from Greek and is a neuter, not feminine, noun.
Nothing to see here but naked male insecurity and worship of the 1950s.
69
This article is a nice fiction with falsehood. Even an infant kid understands male and female are biologically different, we should always maintain this difference socially and culturally. Social construction has to happen based on evolutionary biology. Shifting in social dial with masculine and feminine as extremes of a compass reduces human beings fertility. Our axis is not of Newtonian but of Darwinian.
13
This article is so biased. Just watch some of his talks on YouTube and make up your own mind.
57
His mother must be so proud. "Look at my easily triggered, arrogant, misogynistic son!"
36
This is a hit piece, nothing more.
Read his book and decide for yourself what you think about him.
55
Unfortunately in the social sciences being popular does not mean being right. I remember in the late sixties American and other sociologists being astounded by the feminist revolution. What the hell do women want? The pope of sociology, Talcott Parsons, proclaimed that incest did not exist because there was the incest taboo - an he was taken seriously. All these Peterson followers wanting to reinstate the male hierarchy should look at that supreme example of male dominance - the Catholic Church and its abominable abuse of young men and women. So should we take Peterson seriously? Should we take Ayn Rand seriously? Finally we should just ask: how many wars have been started by women?
33
Enforced monogamy? Like what was endured by the kidnapped adolescent females in Nigeria? Sounds like Jordan Peterson is a Boko Haram acolyte.
22
Pretty complete misrepresentation of Jordan Peterson. Wouldn't expect anything different from the NYT.
35
Live by example. Does he? Where is his agreeable wifey? Of course people say and do stupid stuff. We all do, but always and forever, if your life isn’t working, stop blaming women and do whatever work on yourself you need to do to be a better person.
My god doesn’t anyone else see how Gilead Handmaids Fascist he sounds?
27
OMG where do I start?
Whiny feminists? Just listen to Peterson and his followers.
"Enforced monogamy"? By whom?
Feminine = chaos http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2015/05/did-sexual-equality-fuel-evolutio...
If Darwinian survival of the fittest is "true," Peterson's ilk are, and should be, the losers. YOU behave, or go extinct.
20
Every week the NYT gives a platform, through articles like this, to some new regressive misogynist, often with a patronym suggestive of Scandinavia. Whether it’s Ross Douthat writing about a Canadian whose family name is Hanson or this about a Canadian Peterson who also thinks women are chaos, you take marginal characters and insert them into the mainstream. Choosing these stories over others displaces the stories you don’t tell. It’s not censorship per se, but it is consistent enough that there is a palpable absence of profiles on women who have cult followings for passionately advocating for their beliefs, or Chicano activists in California who move their interests forward incrementally. You focus on the people whose ideology is the most obviously evil, over and over, making rather shallow criticisms like “although he tells his followers to clean their rooms his office is a mess,” that undermine the narrative reliability of the writer by making her look catty, and that ultimately offer the subjects of the articles a legitimacy they don’t deserve.
You’ve run enough profiles of white men who think they’re better than everyone else. Let’s hear someone else’s story next time.
27
This nonsense is not even worth the time it would take to think about it seriously. What complete dribble! Consider that an expression of civility. Well, I guess if Americans can elect a moron as head of state, Canadians can express their own brand of national weirdness by the minority patronage of someone like Jordan Peterson. Really? Grow up? Why didn't I think of that? Thanks for the profound advice. All the world's problems have now been addressed.
22
Peterson is infuriating because he is obviously a) intelligent, b) well educated, c) fails to reject human nature, and d) Canadian. Those things can't all go together! Who is this person, where did he come from? It seems that we are most deeply offended by those origins we cannot escape and would rather fight endlessly and bitterly against than to understand them, tame and civilize them, and ultimately live with them.
For example, order is good, and chaos is good (and all men are not orderly, nor are all women chaotic). If we accept that order is 'good' and chaos is 'bad', first we accept a profoundly false notion. And second, we force ourselves into strange emotional and intellectual postures. Finally, we end up angry at ourselves and at those who point out such an obvious problem.
11
I can not fail to think: what woman hurt him so? As he sounds like a hurt person, who tries to regain his self worth. The idea that women are the start of all ills of men is rather one-sided one would think. Besides thinking that letting lose all testosterone that is around to fix the world is totally counter intuitive. The world needs less aggression, not more That society is not just to all men, as it neither is to all women, is true. And we should fix that. Patriarchy is only 3000 years old. Read Homer and you know that. Old fashioned is, historically speaking, there fore not going 'back' to patriarchy.
16
How appropriate that a new "Fahrenheit 451" was just released and is currently playing on HBO. With each passing day, the Left starts to look and sound more and more like the government ministry in the book. The Left wants to destroy everything it does not agree with, and this review is nothing more than an attempt to assassinate Peterson's ideas & character.
20
That's the problem: destroy rather than try to understand. Destroy rather than to host a controversy that examines different perspectives and lines of reasoning. This article is a perfect example. Attack is so much more efficient than inquiry, and so perfectly justified when you know you're superior to everyone else.
18
Exactly. Debate? No. Attack and destroy? Yes.
This is one of the major reasons the Left is losing so tremendously in the arena of ideas.
3
Sorry, I’m just not seeing the need to inquire more about enforced monogamy in Western society for my daughters. Nice try, tho, guys!
13
As a licensed mental health professional, I have to wonder if he has read his code of ethics.
29
Say whatever you want about @jordanbpeterson, but the @nytimes does itself no favor with some of the jabs its reporter included in the long profile of him that ran online on Friday, omitted from today's print edition: commentary on his "weathered" face and "furrowed" eyebrows; a verbal "tic" akin to barking and "suspicious" eye contact.
16
so here we go again. It was the Promise Keepers 20 years ago, and now it's another flavor, another viewpoint of men trying to assert control over women. We spent a lot of time busting out of the "corset" of male beliefs and programming; why should we corset ourselves again.
17
If JP doesn't feel like a manly man it says a lot more about him than it does about society.
15
The old saying "every pot has a lid" is more palatable than "enforced monogamy," but the outcome is the same. We have to learn to accommodate reality about ourselves, but also realize that everyone is undesirable some time in some way, and that's all right. I think Peterson's core message to men is to fix what's wrong to the best of your ability, and you'll do fine. To women, it's "for God's sake, get off your high horse."
7
Write all the articles you want that spin Peterson as you do here, eventually his message gets through and rings true to its listeners. I didn't get beyond the tired spin that clean your room is a trite self help message. His messages are deep and profound. Don't try to change the world until you get yours in order is a message we need to hear today. The truth will get through and those like the author of this article who are tasked with stopping it will fail.
18
I am from Toronto and have been following the Jordan Peterson phenomenon for a little over a year and a half.
Before achieving his current level of fame, Dr. Peterson was known in Canada for his appearances on various TVO (Television Ontario) programs as a public intellectual. I had only seen one of these appearances over the years but it made an impression on me.
I recall being impressed with Dr. Peterson's intellect and oratory talents, as well as his ability to speak on a wide range of topics, but felt as though there was less to much of what he was saying then meets the eye. He was playing with many of the same sets of ideas that he has been playing with publicly over the past year and a half, many of which are attractive and wondrous.
Malcom Gladwell, in the years before Dr. Peterson’s rise, referred to him in a blurb as a “wonderful psychologist.” As far as I have seen this is the most accurate description of Peterson made by anyone in the mainstream media. A judicious choice of words by an admirable writer.
Dr. Peterson is a wonderful psychologist. I believe that this, not his politics, is what primarily accounts for his recent popularity. In his courses “Maps of Meaning” and “Personality and its Transformations” he delivers truly great lectures, I would recommend them to anybody. He has powerfully intuitive intellect. I have heard him say things that approach the realm of genius.
24
I realize this is but a glimpse into this man, and the "men's movement" du juor he is linked with...but wow...so much wrong in this mans thinking its hard to process.
To the "Incels". I'm a VolCel, voluntary celibate in my early 50's Its not so bad, and a good way to regroup and find better ways to use my excess energies, other then chasing down women. I've had my share of relationships over the decades, short and long term. And I can tell you that the reason you ain't "getting any," is You! Its not the ladies rejecting you. Its you. And forcing them to have a relationship is not the way to go. Especially since all you seem to care about is having sex, not a relationship.
Women are linked with chaos, because men defined it that way. There is no feminine-linked chaos element in the Universe. There is nothing in the natural world, on Earth or "out there", that is chaos and/or feminine in its nature. Its a made-up, wholly male constructed concept. Its what fed the fake medical sciences that thru the ages deemed women as near insane, resulting in "cures" that ranged from machinery induced orgasms to institutionalization, or excess medication for natural reactions to giving birth or hormonal imbalances.
This latest men's movement is just another in a long line of, faulty attempts to create an absolute system of life-guidance. Much like any Religion would do. Except guys like Peterson couch it with quasi-science, but undermine it all with far too much mythological paradigms.
35
I normally respect the New York Times but this is very irresponsible reporting. I was at this event at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and this author's characterization is honestly just fake news. Quotes taken out of context ("enforced monogamy"), blatant bias in her adjectives ("hoary"), and some statements which simply aren't true.
When Peterson spoke about Minassian at the event, he never mentioned "enforced monogamy". Instead he spoke about the harm of individuals who choose to blame the universe for their pain and exact revenge against the world, instead of looking inwards at their own flaws and what they can do to improve themselves. This author paints Peterson to be an inspiration for folks like Minassian, when he is anything but.
The danger isn't Peterson. The danger is irresponsible, inaccurate reporting like this which only serves to further alienate and polarize people on all sides of the debate.
34
Sweetie, if he said any of this, in any context, he’s a lunatic and a moron.
11
I've listened to him directly, and not only has he said that atheists are either serial killers or liars, but his misogyny is so flipping obvious... without this journalists use of adjectives. It's been painful to watch this man get popular, because it really challenges my belief that bad ideas cant withstand criticism, but here he is.
20
"In Mr. Peterson’s world, order is masculine. Chaos is feminine."
I hate to break it to the author, but this is exactly Camille Paglia's view as well.
And Camille Paglia's feminist credentials are, um, pretty impeccable.
12
Paglia doesn't align herself with the majority of feminist viewpoints so I think it's remiss to simply label her as 'feminist'.
17
Here is a challenge for people who believe they are liberal thinkers: Watch this Tucker Carlson piece:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QfuOtGLfg04
It makes me cringe. However, what a liberal person should be able to do is examine every assertion he makes and see if there are studies and data to support them. I did that.
What he does, of course, is move beyond the facts to blame "liberals" for them.....somehow.
Jordan Peterson is looking at those same facts, but isn't blaming liberals or women or anything like that. He is pointing out that males in our society are suffering. Far from being the oppressors they are often made out to be, they are killing themselves and failing in ways unimaginable 50 years ago.
What is wrong with doing this? He is trying to understand what is happening by using history and current data. He isn't putting women down or "in their place."
His main solution is to challenge men to get out of their parents' basements and go make something of themselves. He is VERY hard on men, and especially on young men. No woman wants a loser. When have women ever wanted losers?
It is clear that many people commenting here are just looking at sound bites to use to attack him or dismiss him. Why? Have those of you who are criticizing listened to his lectures or read his book? He is trying to address a serious problem by telling men to go make something of themselves instead of whining and instead of playing video games. Men are listening.
24
It’s Dr. Peterson, actually.
9
I find it interesting - and a bit disheartening - that most readers and the NYT itself - simply "skips" over Jordan Peterson's dismissal of the idea of White Privilege. Yes, it's mentioned in an Internet link, but the implications of his perfunctory dismissal of the impact of racism on our (and much of) Western Society is troubling, particularly in the context of who is in the White House today.
Peterson would have his adherents believe that the effects of racism are simply the results of one group being "the majority" numerically. Peterson, in fact, illustrates his ignorance and flawed thinking when he describes "racism" as tantamount to "stereotyping" - when the two are not equivalent. But, it does provide "comfort" to his audience. Unfortunately, most of the recent media attention on Peterson continues to ignore the impact of his opinions on race and ethnicity in favor of his views on gender - allowing his "fans" to self-reinforce their belief in their "natural position" in society - with regard to both ethnic and gender roles. Perhaps the NYT would be well served to obtain thoughts on Peterson from the likes of Toni Morrison, Angela Davis or bell hooks - to better evaluate the intersection of race and gender in Peterson's remarks. Then again, people like Peterson have always existed in academia (think Willam Shockley or J. Philippe Rushton) - so perhaps he is not really "new", but only re-discovered.
14
This article is very similar to the interview Peterson had with Cathy Newman. "So what you really mean is...." then producing a narrative where he said things or promoted ideas that are very inflammatory and not at all what he said. The hysteria around Peterson's popularity is almost comically given his opinions really aren't as controversial and outlandish as the media tries to make it sound. This crying wolf happens everytime anyone steps outside of the bounds of liberal discourse. It reminds me of Chomsky saying how people believe they have intellectual freedom because we are given a very lively debate within a very small spectrum of ideology. It's exactly what the left and media does. When it comes to gender, transgender, race, Islam, and immigration the left has their versions of AIPACs- groups that frame their "people" as always on the right side of history, producing narratives that omit everything that doesn't put a positive spin on "their" side, and using a lot of intimidating tactics to alienate and silence dissent. And the media is an enabler of these lobby groups. Sorry but the left has a lot of planks in their eyes. Peterson and the IDW aren't right 100% of the time but they are right often enough to deserve respect and to be listened to. Dissent is urgently needed both against the Trump Administration and the hard left which helped elect him. It's not just possible to criticize both, it is necessary if our country is to get back on track.
18
Bring back the draft! That will help to separate men from their boyhoods (and teach them how to make their beds, clean their rooms, and stand up straight).
12
Thanks to the writer
of this article. It was thoughtful
and well done, and I could tell how
creeped-out she was by this guy,
because he is creepy. And sad.
She hints at the biggest problem
these guys have when she mentions the musty smell—they
stink. That sour mustiness that
comes from not knowing how to
launder their clothes properly.
Tsk, tsk, Mr. Peterson. You need
a witch in your life who knows how
to make your clothes and your home sparkle.
12
Peterson explains what he meant by enforced monogamy https://jordanbpeterson.com/uncategorized/on-the-new-york-times-and-enfo...
3
Nice pose of Mr. Peterson. Could he be a bit concerned about his own masculinity?
10
So all the angry gullible men in our corner of the world have a skinny serious version of Trump to adore.
17
Real journalism from David Fuller:
"the print media is speeding up polarisation — in even the most reputable organisations such as the New York Times start to produce clickbait such as the Jordan Peterson article...
The most dangerous part of this whole enterprise is that Peterson has now become pretty much the singular focus of the ramping up of the culture wars. Articles like this add hugely to the polarisation he warns about.
On one side you have literally tens of thousands of people who have had their lives changed, and often actually saved, by listening to Jordan Peterson’s words. On the other side you have a mix of hard core ideological opponents to him, and a vast middle ground who don’t know him well — but are almost certainly thinking that there is no smoke without fire.
He has argued frequently that we are in an increasingly polarised world and that individual actions can have serious consequences...
The treatment of Jordan Peterson is speeding up the irrelevance of the mainstream media at an increasing rate. Too many people are aware of his work and who he is and what he believes for the hit pieces to stick.
In the language of the internet subculture — the treatment of Jordan Peterson by the mainstream media is showing up their ideology, and Red Pilling an entire generation."
https://medium.com/rebel-wisdom/jordan-peterson-and-the-new-york-times-a...
16
Facts
1
"white privilege is a farce"
This citation appears in the 5th paragraph of the article.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEESNpAu1EU
The link is to an extract of a lecture, someone has entitled: "White privilege isn't real."
Farce or not real? Not much fact-checking at NYT, right? Petersen Rule 10: Be precise in your speech.
If you have 15 minutes, listen to the lecture. It is a critique of marxist research on white privilege. He deplores the methodology (dubious questionnaire) and the marxist assumptions.
But the writer of the NYT article ignores this fact and leaves the impression Petersen is in favour of white privilege.
2
I cannot find any of his writing supporting the article's subtitle:
"He says there’s a crisis in masculinity. Why won’t women — all these wives and witches — just behave?"
Those are not his views. Crisis in masculinity, pretty obvious. But wives and witches — just behave? That is a fabrication.
Petersen Rule 8: Tell the truth or at least don't lie.
JP is a Christian democrat, an anti-totalitarian. Most of his beliefs stem from the history of the 20th century, from the killing fields of Cambodia to the concentration camps in Eastern Europe. His beliefs would be very similar to those of Angela Merkel, CDU now ruling in a grand coalition with the SD, social democrats. His approach can be encapsulated as: psychology plus archetypes from the Bible and mythology, plus clinical counseling. His 12 rules for life do not develop special rules for women.
9
I read Jordan Peterson's latest book and suggest a more appropriate title: Jordan's Lament.
7
The person writing this article seems oddly unfamiliar with the concepts of Carl Jung that Peterson (a psychologist) is referring to. Perhaps someone at the Times more familiar with psychology, myth and religion could review his best-selling book "12 Rules For Life", to give the readers a fair and balanced understanding of what he is saying about these concepts in the modern world.
9
This notion of Peterson's that the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s removed a societal taboo against sex outside of marriage and that because of that we have some kind of crisis in masculinity is absurd
There has always been sex outside of marriage. Always. What changed with the sexual revolution was an end to the hypocritical notion that there wasn't that much sex outside of marriage. Men and women have been pursuing sex outside of marriage for as long as there has been marriage.
Furthermore, women chasing "high-status" men isn't something new, either. Aside from being a fiction in practice, enforced monogamy would have to be a two-way street. Those "low-status" males would have to be content with equally "low-status" women. High status men have always monopolized the women.
Peterson is just telling these guys what they want to hear. I can't believe anyone would actually give him any money but I guess there really is a sucker born every minute. The pill liberated women from early motherhood and gave them the chance to postpone pregnancy long enough to get educated and have careers. Women are right to want a man who is willing to work hard for a mate. Any male who laments that fact is indeed a loser.
22
Ok so he’s the Pied Piper for angry, lonely men. All sheep need to follow. Seems to me he should focus his energies on solving the epidemic of white, male, single mass murderers in this country. They would make him useful.
15
Its too bad that the NYT chose a writer who was negatively predisposed against the views of Prof. Peterson. At his university he operates in an extraordinairly hostile environment. Those "tolerant" students and fellow academics detest his challenging their crazed babbling and insane regulations invoked by government institutions. I salute his pluck, speaking truth to the intollerant and easily triggered. Good thing for him that he's tenured or they would have dislodged him as a heritick long ago.
12
“Peterson is using well-established anthropological language here: “enforced monogamy” does not mean government-enforced monogamy. “Enforced monogamy” means socially-promoted, culturally-inculcated monogamy, as opposed to genetic monogamy – evolutionarily-dictated monogamy, which does exist in some species (but does not exist in humans). This distinction has been present in anthropological and scientific literature for decades.”
Context is everything and this article seems to ignore the relevant context in multiple cases to better fit Jordan Peterson into some exaggeratedly sinister "dark-web narrative". Irresponsible and biased reporting at minimum that is incredible disappointing. I'm out on the NY Times.
8
This is the blathering of a lunatic who should have no forum other than a street corner where people walk by him, embarrassed and ashamed that such a person can exist in civil society.
And yet he sells a million books and is a celebrity.
This just one indication of how sick our world has become. Monsters like this convince me that our species is not going to survive this century.
11
The NYT is doing with this "man" what it did with Donald Trump: gift him the attention he does not deserve. And look what happened...
8
Facts
"white privilege is a farce"
This citation appears in the 5th paragraph of the article.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JEESNpAu1EU
The link is to an extract of a lecture, someone has entitled: "White privilege isn't real."
"Farce" or "not real"? Not the same? Petersen Rule 10: Be precise in your speech.
If you have 15 minutes, listen to the lecture. It is a critique of marxist research on white privilege.
But the writer of the NYT article ignores this fact and leaves the impression Petersen is in favour of white privilege.
2
I cannot find any of his writing supporting the article's subtitle:
"He says there’s a crisis in masculinity. Why won’t women — all these wives and witches — just behave?"
Those are not his views. Crisis in masculinity, pretty obvious. Almost all school shootings perpetrated by men?
The author has invented the wives and witches.
Petersen Rule 8: Tell the truth or at least don't lie.
JP is a Christian democrat, an anti-totalitarian. Most of his beliefs stem from the history of the 20th century, from the killing fields of Cambodia to the concentration camps in Eastern Europe. His beliefs would be very similar to those of Angela Merkel, CDU now ruling in a grand coalition with the SD, social democrats. His approach can be encapsulated as: psychology plus archetypes from the Bible and mythology, plus clinical counseling. His 12 rules for life do not develop special rules for women.
2
I was somewhat surprised that the reporter did not question Mr. Peterson on how he lives his personal life, given how certain he is about how everyone else in the world should live their lives. Is he living the life he preaches, or is he just another marketing phenomenon, making money from other people's unhappiness?
If he actually has a substantial following, it is a sad commentary on how easy it is for unhappy people to find scapegoats for their problems than it is to analyze and fix themselves. When most of the world you live in thinks differently from you, it is not the world that is wrong.
8
It's extremely rare--if not impossible--for anybody to be all right or all wrong.
Jordan Peterson says a lot of things that make a lot of sense, but obviously he's not right about everything. He's much better when trying to empower and elevate disenfranchised young men than when trying to marginalize strong women.
If there was not something to his points about taking responsibility and creeping influence and creepiness of cultural Marxism, he would not won the attention and acolytes he has.
If nothing else, his ideas and comments deserve consideration and further intellectual debate.
10
Mr. Peterson's argues that men were once all powerful and ruled the world, this is the natural order and must be followed regardless of how society changes.
He is correct when we look back in history that men were dominant. In a world where labour and physical struggle were predominant, larger, stronger, faster men had a natural advantage. They brought home the bacon, physically and literally, and controlled society. This was true in 1900, 1800, 1700 and for millennia before.
It is no longer true in 2000. The world has fundamentally evolved with technology. Thought supplanted labour as the dominant activity necessary for survival as technology advanced society. Women and men are equal when it comes to thinking and both create and contribute in ways not as likely when gender roles were determined more by physical capability. Rules and practices benefitting and perpetuating men's position in society (many violent and discriminatory) are being washed away as women are able to earn decent livings and care for themselves.
Men, whose economic prospects are dimmed by fast declining returns on physical labour, are marginalised and frightened. Peterson's patriarchal arguments flail at it's demise and do nothing to help the marginalised adapt and cope with accelerating automation and redistribution of societal capital. This must be acknowledged to begin productively discussing how to create equitable prospects for all in an environment where brawn no longer trumps thought.
14
"He is correct when we look back in history that men were dominant. In a world where labour and physical struggle were predominant, larger, stronger, faster men had a natural advantage. They brought home the bacon, physically and literally, and controlled society. This was true in 1900, 1800, 1700 and for millennia before."
I disagree. Most of the really taxing labor was performed by draft animals.
"Physical struggle" relied on logistics, strategy and tactics for success; i.e., the fruits of the mind.
For as long as there has been civilization the smartest men have ruled. Brawn has been going out of fashion for 10,000 years.
1
@Purity of: You haven't read much history, if you're claiming that brawn went out of style 10,000 years ago. It's true that brawny men do better when they are smart, but brainy men without brawn have historically been on the losing sides in many important conflicts.
8
My take from a cursory reading of this article and some on-line research is that IMHO, people, are unable to think critically about issues and flock to anything - the Bible, religion, opioids, or an individual to provide them the answer. It is hard work navigating the nightmare we are currently living through, but we need to do the hard work. That picture with the caption about "security at an event says it all." The noble-looking Male cop with the clipped facial hair, the hat covering his eyes and the tattoo? Wow, don't mess with me. I will club you. Shoot you, says it all. What a mess we are living in.
12
We are set up to solve the problems of the paleolithic era. Men are set up to form groups with hierarchies and bring food to women or go to war against groups of other men. Women do want the best "hunters", and if they think they are worth something, they will not settle for second best. One result throughout the millennia has been polygamy.
The evolutionary model is still alive among hunter gatherer societies and in the Arab Gulf. But this is not what Peterson is espousing. Men are lethal to each other.
Dropping testosterone levels should be a good thing. But he wants to justify male anger rather than control it. He says some things in favor of evolution and some against, as it suits him.
One interesting evolutionary development is that people listen to male leaders, just as they listen to Trump. So he gets crowds whereas a female with the same ideas would not even get an article published.
4
As an old white man who is a life long feminist and a devout proponent of non-hierarchical organization, I can say that this talk of male oppression is complete nonsense. I have been nothing but enriched by the equality of all persons. Are there annoying left-wing fundamentalists? Sure, but there are annoying people of all stripes. And with the US government still being over 80% white, male, and Christian, this talk of some non-patriarchal female witch take over is absurd. Peterson is another in a long line of superficial con artists who appeal to those alienated by our industrial, materialistic society. It is this alienation and despair that are worth talking about.
19
Another journalist with an obvious agenda from the get go. This is one man pleading with others to take responsibility and improve their lives and you basically ridicule him throughout and completely miss the message.
14
Angry men might find a temporary reprieve in sexual release, but that won't address the anger they're directing towards women, which lies in their sense of entitlement to women's bodies, time, and attention.
I recently attended a workshop called "Undoing Patriarchy"--the thoughtful, self-reflective men in the room struck me as exactly as the sort of men I would want as friends and partners.
Men who date women who are feeling confused about what is expected of them in this period of shifting paradigms, would do well to start by asking women what we want and value. Trust me, we'll tell you.
I have watched Jordan Peterson's videos and have found points of commonalities and points of disagreement. One thing I cannot accept is the idea that patriarchy is in any way "natural." Many people, myself included, experience expressions of patriarchy as unwanted impositions. I don't care that humanity lived under this system of dominance for how ever many years. For many of us it doesn't meet our human needs and there are better ideas out there now. Why walk willingly back into subjugation? Is freedom really that terrifying?
20
“The people who hold that our culture is an oppressive patriarchy, they don’t want to admit that the current hierarchy might be predicated on competence,” he said.
Ha, what a joke! Climate change, endless war, many millions of people going without healthcare, education, clean water and food, not to mention systematic oppression of entire ethnic groups, climate change and the senseless murders of children in their own schools -- and this is just what men have done in the United States! This is what Jordan Peterson calls competence? More like a stealth, pseudo-intellectual version of Make Men Great Again.
41
"the current hierarchy might be based on competence" ?
One look at the TwitterFool in the White House demolishes THAT argument!
10
First off, he's trying to make the Handmaid's Tale happen. And no matter what anyone says, being forced into sexual monogamy and intercourse is no what a conscious being would want.
He's also mocking everyone's intelligence by drawing parallels to fairy tales. His arguments are so poorly structured that it only shows how uneducated our society is and it's an embarrassment that he's been given a platform by ALL of us.
7
Unfortunately this is a totally biased view. The terminology used is not reporting but pejorative deprecation. it is discouraging to see that approach in the New York Times. Nonetheless truth probably could be found in neither the extremes of the reported nor the reporter. Yet they both maybe bringing something to the discussion that needs to be included but not everything that they bring needs to be included. At some point, one can only hope, this discussion will mature and the benefit of both sides will be heard. if you just said to yourself, there are no both sides, only one side, please be informed that you are not correct.
34
Wait. He’s using ancient stories, myths and fairytales to support his theories of male dominance and superiority? Those tales were written by men!
13
To clarify a small portion of the underhanded villifying innuendo in this piece (and conspiratorial demonization in the comments section), Peterson's response:
"Furthermore anyone motivated by the NY Times to assume that what I meant by 'enforced monogamy' was anything other than social convention favoring stable pair bonds can think whatever they want, as they no doubt will anyway...
Why do you think polygamy is illegal? Why do you think marriage is a human universal as described by Daniel Brown [in Human Universals]?"
9
Can someone explain why Jordan Peterson elicits so much more outrage and condemnation from the media and left
then Louis Farrakhan? Farrakhan has a larger following (those trying to dismiss him as a fringe figure like Pastor Jones or Westboro Baptist Church are in the dark). Like Peterson he packs full houses of devotees and has for many
decades including on college campuses without being shut down by protesters (unlike Peterson). His followers
including people in Congress, City Council, Senators, Mayors, celebrities, civil rights and anti-racist activists (hopefully others see the sick irony there),organizations funded by the Democratic party, Obama's spiritual advisor, etc.
There is nothing Peterson has ever said that comes close to the racist, anti-Semitic, sexist, homophobic, and transphobic vitriol Farrakhan spews openly with little fanfare from anyone but Jewish groups. There is something very disturbing about how the left dictates what is tolerable and what is not based on bizarre and irrational biases. They allow Farrakhan supporters in the Progressive/Democratic/Leftist fold but vilify Peterson and his supporters to high heaven. It doesn't add up. The same media and individuals skewering Peterson soft peddle Farrakhan's hateful rhetoric and ideology and deny he has a large and powerful following despite this being provably true.
7
Maybe you are much younger, but Farrahkan has been raked over the coals for the past twenty years or so. He's been denounced by many for his rigid views. He's not making news any more, because he's been around for so long that he's just old hat. And like any good cult leader with a following - Peterson, say - he gets support because people like what he says and it makes sense to them.
I'm sure the people who like Farrahkan will tell you that he's misunderstood. Just like all of the Peterson defenders here are insisting that the rest of us just don't understand. If only we would all open our eyes, we'd see how great he is. Farrahkan's followers say the same thing. They're both semi-hucksters who have figured out how to exploit the cult of personality and make money off of uttering controversial statements.
11
This article is so biased and not based on facts (other than selected) of what Jordan actually say and its based on irrationell emotions rather than reality. He does not say that women as biological persons represent chaos, but rather using the classical psychological male - female images to try to understand the forces at play within each of us - male and female. Postmodern power theory is of course scared and maddened by Jordan P, but listen carefully to series like Maps of meaning with an open mind, you will realise that this is not about promoting male dominans, but about promoting a theory of how minds work. He clearly explains how these forces are at work both in male and female brains. You can agree or disagree, but it appears that Jordan P is contributing more to understanding of us humans than his critics. It is not Jordan P who is trying to surpress knowledge, but rather his critics. As an engineer within international development work, I am convinced that it is by facing the reality rather than constructing a reality based on feelings that we can improve the human situation in the world.
9
I am not a supporter of Jordan Peterson's. However, the sly, condescending tone of this article provides ample fodder to those who decry the "liberal media elite". Granted that the Style section of the Times is not strictly speaking, the "news", nonetheless, I would have appreciated a less judgmental approach in this piece. Report, and let the reader decide, please.
14
Mass murders, war and random shootings are pretty much all done by men. Clearly men are the problem and women need to learn to control them.
10
I haven't seen this many threatened women since Trump was elected. Clearly, Peterson has hit a major nerve.
6
Readers should know the following:
1) "Enforced monogamy" is a technical term in evolutionary biology. see: "Monogamy: Mating Strategies and Partnerships in Birds, Humans" published by Cambridge University Press.
2) "Conscientious and Agreeable" are personality traits in psychology, two of the big 5. See: "The Oxford Handbook of the Five Factor Model", edited by Thomas A. Widiger.
12
NO! You're dismissing my misunderstanding of the issue and my desire to lash out at a boogie man. How dare you!
5
This article mentions nothing about Peterson's family and/or marital circumstances...
5
I am really happy this came out in the New York Times, because maybe now liberals will finally see that the man everyone thinks is a intellectual and moral voice for the new century is an actual grifter from the last century, complete with an old-timey suit and swagger. People like Jordan Peterson do not warrant special pride of place in the public forum. He is a very expensive joke, for which I'm sure U Toronto is exceedingly embarrassed.
Does it not tell you something that the people complaining the loudest about free speech and voices being "silenced" in places of higher learning are the ones who make the most bank by selling desperate people rhetorical snake oil?
17
Several weeks ago my sister recommended that check out Jordan Peterson so I've listened to a few of his videos and started reading his '12 rules' book.
So while I've so far found Prof. Peterson to be a bit stilted and a tad arrogant, it seems to me Ms. Bowles has aimed at creating a caricature that better aligns with her hostility to his ideas rather than make any attempt to provide a balanced report to her readers. Tellingly she fails to provide a link to "a viral video of the professor getting yelled at by campus activists" (this one perhaps? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-nvNAcvUPE ) and fails to even mention a highly-viewed interview with a popular newscaster https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aMcjxSThD54&t=13s - perhaps because such evidence would contradict the image she wants to convey?
42
Nellie Bowles' subtle skewering of this snake oil salesman is superb.
12
What is with people and cults? This particular psychobabble, religion, doomsday cults, etc. No one is going to solve your problems by validating your self-pity.
Life is hard for most people (even those with white male privilege). It's a grind. Finding a good life partner is also hard, and requires some luck.
Get educated, turn off ESPN, don't drink your way through college, clean yourself up, and treat everyone with equality and respect, and be responsible for your own future.
15
This piece aims ton convince people to dismiss Peterson. The left is obsessed with telling people who they can and cannot listen to. The idea that Peterson and his followers are being vilified because they deserve it is dishonest considering the left doesn't speak in such a derogatory manner about Louis Farrakhan or Linda Sarsour and their supporters. Peterson is imperfect but you can't judge Peterson, Farrakhan, and Sarsour side by side objectively and say Peterson comes close to the dangerous rhetoric, manipulation and hatred the other two espouse. The New York Times promised to be a credible journalism source in the wake of the Trump presidency but has continued the same ideologically and racially biased propaganda that helped get him elected. It's disappointed.
7
How so many are conned will always amaze me. This guy is living large on the money people give him for what? He has taken his education and experience in psychology twisted to fit what he figured he could con people to pay for it. And pay they do.
I wonder what his relationship is with his wife and kids.
I have experienced being gullible to organized religion. His "teachings" are like a religion. At a low point I got swept up in it. After several years and lots of study I came to realize the con it is. Perhaps some of these followers will realize it too.
8
What disturbs me most about this article is here in the comments section. The fans of Jordan Peterson point out that a big part of his appeal is his 'get your life together' message, and I agree that that's a worthwhile message. But they conveniently gloss over the rest of what he says, the verbatim quotes of him saying "enforced monogamy" and "left-wing bullies" and that the current patriarchy is "predicated on competence". His fans say that those things aren't part of the message at all, but you don't get to pick and choose what someone else means. We have to assume that he meant all of it.
I'm reminded of October 2016, when a certain recording surfaced of a prominent public figure saying "...grab her by...", and that person's die-hard supporters were adamant that he was the ultimate champion of women's rights and dignity.
No wonder we are where we are, when people just refuse to hear anything they don't like or agree with (ahem, climate change...)
16
Oh to be a white heterosexual male and have my unfounded and harmful beliefs parroted by the media. This man is a college professor, you can be sure if he was a woman or minority he never would have gotten this far espousing such clearly harmful views. When can we stop feeding these media savvy & manipulative supremacists? Giving this man a platform is just helping build his diesnechanted and entitled fan base.
11
Really? Women are chaos? Take a look around my home and my family and tell me who is responsible for making sure everyone has what they need and gets where they are supposed to be on time? In my career it is the same thing. In my experience it is men who are chaos. The only reason men have historically been better leaders and in charge of the hierarchy is because women were never given the opportunity.
We should be just as worried about this man’s views as we are about racist neo-nazis. The forced monogamy seems to be a politically correct term for sexual slavery, yet this man clearly reviles political correctness. As I read this article and saw the way he was dressed all I could think of was The Handmaid’s Tale. Let’s hope we do not become Gilead.
11
Demonizing and/or disparaging a class of people (in this guy’s case, women) is as uninspired and repugnant as it gets. It screams weakness, defensiveness, and the opposite of growing up and taking responsibility. The phenomenon is rife, becoming increasingly so, and is one of the great delusions to which humans seems particularly susceptible. How do people become so easily duped?
8
I'm no conservative, right-winger, in fact I'm a registered Democrat and Hillary voter, and as anti-Trump as they come. But I'm familiar with Peterson's writings and can tell you in certain terms that this article is simply a grossly-biased and inaccurate attempt to create a cartoon character with views and personality that do not reflect reality. The mocking (and unprofessional) tone of the article and the Peterson opinions in it reflect the author's own biased views and not Peterson's. Exactly these sorts of articles are what will produce more Jordan Petersons and more people agreeing with his point of view.
13
This piece exemplifies the "flawed" news Frank Bruni just wrote about. The distorting innuendo and vilifications are broad, particularly in reaction to the (admittedly worrisome-sounding to the unfamiliar) phrase "enforced monogamy." From Peterson's response:
“'Peterson is using well-established anthropological language here: “enforced monogamy” does not mean government-enforced monogamy. “Enforced monogamy” means socially-promoted, culturally-inculcated monogamy, as opposed to genetic monogamy – evolutionarily-dictated monogamy, which does exist in some species (but does not exist in humans). This distinction has been present in anthropological and scientific literature for decades.'...
The manifold social conventions tilting most societies toward monogamy constitute such regulation.
That’s all.
No recommendation of police-state assignation of woman to man (or, for that matter, man to woman).
No arbitrary dealing out of damsels to incels.
Nothing scandalous (all innuendo and suggestive editing to the contrary)
Just the plain, bare, common-sense facts: socially-enforced monogamous conventions decrease male violence. In addition (and not trivially) they also help provide mothers with comparatively reliable male partners, and increase the probability that stable, father-intact homes will exist for children."
10
What a sad, slanted article this is. The man is neither a sexist nor an advocate of the oppression of women. Having seen tens of Peterson videos and interviews it is clear that the reporter (though she followed the man) had a clear agenda, much like the infamous Channel 4 interviewer though somewhat less extreme. People see patriarchal oppression wherever they want, and the author chose to see it in Peterson, which only furthers his point. The extreme left only hears and sees what it itself projects on to the world.
Even a few years ago, I would have been skeptical of Peterson's writings, and probably have taken the content of this article to heart, but 2 years at Yale Graduate School were enough to convince me that academia and the more supposedly progressive layers of society are deaf and dumb to anything that does not support their world view. While accusing the far right of living in a deaf intellectually stunted bubble, they are just as guilty. The amount of patriarchal control they see in society deprives women of all agency in a society that is constantly stacked against them by Horrible White Men. If one is to examine Peterson's writings and other statistics on gender one would find a story that is a lot more complicated and nuanced (Christina Hoff Sommers among others is another resource for such information).
431
After many unsuccessful attempt to discredit his ideas in person, Cathy Newman interview is one example, this was a much easier approach.
The author goes on to paint a caricature of Dr. Peterson's ideas and does a pretty good job of misrepresenting them.
I get the feeling that if this was a video interview where the subject was given a fair opportunity to respond, the general "take away" would have been drastically difference.
Bravo, well done.
16
I am a retired college professor, a life-long liberal Democrat, starting from my college years when I was a Conscientious Objector in Vietnam.
Ms. Bowles does not accurately portray Jordan Peterson. He is, in fact, a liberal. That he comes up with different conclusions than "tribal liberals" causes many of those "tribal liberals" to just toss him into the "dreaded and awful" conservative camp, and then conveniently not really listen to him.
My wife and I enjoy his book and have enjoyed listening to his lectures. They are thought-provoking, interesting, well-reasoned, and based upon empirical research and scholarship.
My wife was one of the first four women police officers in our entire state. She graduated 3rd in her academy class, out of some 2000 applicants. Yet, as soon as she could, she got into her "passion" which was raising children. She wanted a man who could provide for her and them so she could do this. Isn't that true freedom? Yet, she was shunned at times because she was "just a mother."
Jordan Peterson needs to be listened to and taken seriously. He is too easily dismissed because he is not toeing the liberal "party line."
Many so-called liberal people (such as Bowles) like to play "gotcha" with him--listening for sound bites to do their own riffs to, instead of responding by digging deeper to understand. (the enforced monogamy mentioned here is an example).
Ignore them. Listen to him and read his book yourselves.
28
she interviews like david letterman, not really listening, just waiting for him to slip up so she can make a one-liner out of his missteps. gotcha. great word word for it.
she reduces the work he does around jungian archetypes to mere obsession with fantasy. is she a child or a professional?
10
This comment only shows that classical liberalism is what's now called (neo)conservative. This is something everyone else has already learned, and explains why the actual left is resurging with no signs of slowing down, despite the snake oil people like Peterson attempt to sell to disgruntled, mostly male, rejects who can't hang with equality and distributive justice because they actually don't really care about other people besides themselves.
12
That all men are orderly and all women chaotic is complete bunk. As to forced marriage, who would be the slave women forced to marry the currently shunned weirdo men? Peterson's idea that women would have no rights, no personhood, again, is chilling. Since married men are also sometimes violent, Peterson's belief in a better world through militant patriarchy and forced marriage is false on its face.
27
This is what basic logic classes call a straw man argument. I have watched hours of videos, and Peterson says none of the things you attribute to him. If I am wrong, please help me and point me to where he does.
5
Clearly you've listened to Peterson's lectures and are not just taking the propaganda from this article on faith.
3
No, I read the article. My life is wonderful and full. I won't waste my time listening to a Peterson lecture on how we should return to the values of the 1950's. I don't accept that men are in charge because they are somehow better than woman. I don't accept his vision of second class citizenship for women or that woman are to blame for male violence because "we" as a class unfairly withhold sex from icky, unattractive men who demand or somehow feel they deserve it. Is that not his message?
6
I enjoy reading work by intelligent people who love to discuss ideas.
I enjoy listening to them and watching them on TV.
I don't have to agree with everything that is said in order to find a discussion stimulating.
Mr. Peterson appears to be an intelligent ,educated person.
But he inspires in me a deep feeling of DISTRUST.
There is something distinctly "off" about him.........
18
The distrust you should have is with the author of this article, misleading.
4
It's all just a game. $80,000 a month, in donations, i.e., for nothing? I tip my hat to him, he saw there was an opportunity to peddle a bunch of easy answers and the sheep out there are willing to lap it up.
29
Easy answers lol .. have you bothered to sit through one of his 3-hour lectures and try to understand what is being said?
1
Question: Is this guy married?
15
Yes. And has a daughter and son.
Yes, for thirty years and in a very loving, committed and supportive marriage, with two children. He strongly supports his wife's and daughter's careers and public personas and generally is an advocate of strong, emotionally healthy women (and men). Don't believe all the biased reporting.
8
Yes. To one woman. For almost 30 years (since 1989).
2
No mention of his relationship status? That I found interesting in itself. Peterson has melded his fear of losing his white man privilege and fear/resentment of women, which taps into some people's own fears, and made quite a lot of money doing it. Still, this does not make him anything more than a charlatan.
To honestly suggest we move backward "to the natural order of things" is stupid. Has he not heard of evolution? Perhaps the men who can't pick up their rooms (and girls) aren't suppose to procreate. Perhaps they can get dates because they are downers, with chips on their shoulders. Who wants to be with someone like that?
Bottom line: Women, like men, respond best when treated as equals, because they are equals.
27
That's actually, I think, similar to what Peterson would say. One of his central messages is that you should take responsibility for your own life: if you are involuntarily celibate, what changes should you make? Is your life in order? Is there any reason someone should want to be in a relationship with you?
5
There was no mention of his relationship status because the author of this piece had agenda and an axe to grind. Dr. P has a wife and two children. This fact would not contribute to the dehumanizing goal of this hit piece.
3
Oh my God. I am so stunned by this I don't know what to say. This is horrifying. I had no idea about this guy.
19
Thank God. I really hope other NYT readers feel the same way you do, because he really is a grifting manipulator who is causing some real damage to the public discourse. I wonder if he goes to therapy, and if so whether his therapist has recognized in him the dark triad. Because I see it ALL OVER HIM.
6
Go to source. Your opinion may change. Sadly, this journalist has grossly misrepresented his ideas.
3
Hopefully next the NYT will inform you about Louis Farrakhan and his disturbingly larger and powerful followers in the Democratic party. Don't hold your breathe.
2
I had come here slightly trepidatious yet interested to have my agreement with Peterson's rhetoric challenged. I don't have time to follow all his talks so would be interested in seeing if I had actually missed aspects of his rhetoric that are insidious. However, I was disappointed to see that the beginning of this article already starting using adjectives without sound support, and later how only a small part of his speech was highlighted as offensive... When this guy has made so many statements on these topics, why couldn't the author have built a stronger case?
In addition, some parts of this writing are more sly suggestions rather than concrete and useful arguments - the fact that he has attracted a fan base with highlights of group belonging behavior which can seem tribal and thus suggestive of loss of rationality. Mentioning change in oratory style and dress suggestive of intentional image crafting. Saying he seems more feline... None of these are very sound moves when it concerns building a righteous case.
On the other hand, I feel disappointed that this is yet another article that cannot deal well with nuances. That blatantly only highlights what might be construed in favor of the author's original biases rather than also bringing up why Peterson is attracting a following. Making that case, and then critically evaluating these attractions, would make for a sounder argument. Unfortunately, I come away uninformed as to the moral decrepitude of Peterson's position.
33
Amazing how when folks dislike anything to do with a different movement and/or way of thinking they attack and dont seek to understand. It is exactly what the left was complaining about during the 60's and 70's and now they are so much better at doing it than conservative ever were. The Hypocricy is so great.
19
We understand just fine. We just don't *agree*.
31
Mark's got this right.
4
"Enforced monogamy" is talking about the monogamy that had been favoured by cultural evolution. It is not a social policy to force women to marry...Come on people...
30
Then wouldn't that just be "monogamy"? Cultural evolution, whatever that is, defines norms. Those norms are generally followed without the need for enforcement--that's what makes them norms.
13
I think it's clear to anyone who's actually listened to him that he was talking about monogamous marriage as a stabilizing force. This author would have you believe that he was endorsing forced marriages.
4
The author and the Left are not interested in parsing for the truth and context in this case. At this point, Dr Peterson must be demonized at all costs.
5
The men who pursue these half-baked, quasi-intellectual, tattered ideologies seem so sad to me. While I sympathize with their human loneliness, I object strongly to their attempts to blame women's equality for their unskillful relationships to their own emotions. Any man who respects women knows their inherent equality. Just proceeding from a place of respect shows our basic human equality with one another is as plain as day.
What's sad is that these guys somehow can't think of anything else to do with themselves besides perpetrate sham ideologies and prey on people's insecurities or allow themselves to be taken in, all the while seemingly ignoring or sidelining the millions of pursuits one could take up to bring meaning to his existence: Art, music, hiking, creative writing, dance, cuisine, scholarship, craft beer brewing, volunteering, Buddhist meditation--the list of positive and meaning making things is almost endless. Maybe some of these guys do both--lament their stricken white manhood while learning the art of Thai cooking on the side?
What's also sad is that these guys seem to be unwilling to engage in friendships with women, in which both sides strive for parity. And finally, how sad that they seem not to question the origin of their notions of masculinity, instead relying on fallacious and intellectually and emotionally lazy arguments from "nature," which, when it comes to humans (if not lobsters), are, given our wild diversity, pretty absurd.
30
I’m not sure I can read anything further by or about this fellow, after that bizarre paragraph about witches. Not because it was so offensive or factually wrong (it’s not dealing in facts so it doesn’t need to be accurate), but because it was simply incoherent. Makes no sense at all, like a self-parody almost... “You know witches don’t exist. But you know witches exist. It’s on that same plane, where the need for witches is the same as the need for swamps. Primordial, like the tides and the hills, and the category of hunter and quarry can never coexist, because the prey is in your mind, up on the hill, and the predator can only be in and of this moment, this future moment. But the memory of witches is burned into our consciousness like that of the sabertooths hunting early man. Because there never were any sabertooths—because of course there are.”
I just wrote that as a stream of consciousness with deliberately no thought put into it or any editing. It makes exactly as much sense as Peterson’s witches quote: zero.
23
Read his books
4
"I laugh, because it is absurd."
Exactly.
14
Peterson recommends "enforced monogamy" - "Otherwise women will all only go for the most high-status men." This theory certainly leaves a lot of women high and dry! LOL
10
To all the Peterson fans decrying this as a hit-piece, I offer an alternative:
https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2018/05/jordan-peterson-shepherd-of-t...
A much more substantive critique, but no less castigating. Peterson makes a living selling old, fraudulent ideas as though they were new. He mixes useful self-help advice with a side of post-modern pseudoscience and displaced-masculine angst. He's cashing on insecure men, and he has every right to do so. But that doesn't mean I'm going to call him a luminary
36
Found this to be a pretty weak and narrowly-focussed critique, honestly.
13
Still waiting for an honest report on Jordan Peterson, though not really, because anyone who wants to know his thinking can watch a few videos on youtube, including real audiences (including young women!)
20
Yes. Anyone who really wants to know. I just watched an interview with Russell Brand--quite long--and it was classic Peterson. That would be a good place to start, though it is two men talking to each other. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLFQxVOvan4
Other people prefer starting with the Cathy Newman interview, but that's Peterson in a confrontational environment. It's interesting, but the more serious interviews are more serious introductions. His lectures to general audiences are also good introductions.
9
Yes, if you are intellectually honest and want to see Peterson directly, outside of a hit piece like this, watch his being interviewed by Cathy Newman. There he responds to a dismissive feminist journalist. I am not sure why he agreed to being covered by the reporter in this piece. He should of known he wouldn’t get fair treatment.
1
Years ago I read an article which I believe was by a Tammy Bruce, who pointed out that everyone spins things to their own narrative: I believe the illustrative example she used was something along the lines of the headline “75 % of men did not abuse their partners” could be reported as “25% of men were abusers of their partners”. This author I believe has spun this story to her own narrative and misrepresented many of the things Jorden Peterson speaks about.
Jordan Peterson is not a leader in the men’s right movement, he actually is against identity politics and group identity! This is also why he abhors white supremicists and the alt-right.
I think it is dishonest to link Jordan Peterson to the incel story (there is no relationship between the two, except what the author introduced by writing about them both in the same column).
The same sort of dishonesty exists in the references to his accepting payment for sessions; therapists and psychologists typically charge for services!
When a clinical psychologist talks about women being agreeable, he is using a scientific term (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Five_personality_traits), in fact, he references that his practice Included coaching of women executives, to teach them how to be less “agreeable” when negotiating salary and roles, hardly the work a mysoginist Neanderthal would perform if he expected them to remain at home barefoot and pregnant.
I think the Dr. should only interview with graduates of STEM.
27
Peterson talked about Minassian in the interview--his comments are quoted--and made the link between him and "why monogamy emerges." I wonder if these graduates of STEM lining up to interview the ever-tiresome Peterson will remember that there are differences between quote, paraphrase, commentary, and summary...hmmmm
1
The phrases "enforced monogamy" and "equality of outcomes" or "forced equality of outcomes" are pseudo-intellectual terms being adopted to the lexicon of the alt-right pro patriarchy "mens rights" ilk. They are totally invented, but made up to sound legitimate. Their goal is to normalize them and have them be adopted in mainstream language.
18
Right, and alt-right, pro patriarchy are completely natural part of mainstream language.
1
What kind of man can only feel like a man when the other people in his life are acting in a specific way? The solution to this is not telling women to give them affirmation, either through words, sex or behaving in some contrived way to make him feel like a man. In my experience, if a person has deep insecurities or really doesn’t know who they are, no amount of affirmation that comes from outside them is going to help. It is like trying to fill up a bottomless pit. Insecure men are most likely to be abusive bullies toward women, and then blame women for their abuse. All of us, men and women, must find who we are within ourselves, and be that with civility and consideration and humility, regardless of what other people are saying or doing. I’m not sure that these men’s rights advocates are really doing that. Life is tough for everyone. Wake up and deal with it.
28
This sounds almost exactly like Peterson himself--not the article's Peterson, but his book and many of his lectures.
2
There seems to be a large number of comments on here by women who seem threatened by this man. So logically, that must mean that he is on to something that will help men live better lives.
8
This man and his followers seem to feel threatened by women and women's success in what they were used to seeing as their exclusive social and professional playground. So logically, women must continue to do what will improve their own lives and don't waste their time (and certainly not date) any of these insecure, scared men until they grow up.
19
Ahhh, I don't think your logic holds, Adam. Peterson's not only helping men.
But for sure there are many tremendously misinformed (and therefore angry) women commenting about Peterson after having read this article, which is clearly a hit-piece.
I would wager not 10% of the incensed commenters have actually listened to a lecture of Peterson's. They simply believe the propaganda. It's frightening.
3
Because men can only lead better lives if the threats are carried out? The logic of this corollary is lacking. Does not compute. Try again.
2
Old wine, new bottle.
Looking a lot like vinegar now.
27
Mr. Peterson is getting attention because he is "news worthy". One commenter here says the NYT should not waste its time on this person. i would say that choice is up to the newpaper, and news media in general... What i got out of this piece is an he is an interpreter of society who admits that he is not consistent in his views, at least as others view him. Irrespective of the words involved, I agree that government legislation or academic policy should not be used to tell citizens what words to use. Even if the initial instance is generally seen as 'kind', it is a slippery slope to , well, tyranny. Language evolves through use, not pronouncement... But after that, for me Mr. Peterson is on his own. For example, i suggest that patriarchy has had its historical run and gender balance will become normal. Someday people will not think anything of a dad staying home with the kids, it will be just another choice to make. We aren't there yet, but it will come. ...
6
I doubt that. I’m old enough to remember clearly the 60s and 70s. Men staying home with the kids was also discussed then. I even knew one such a couple but it was very unusual.
It’s gone nowhere since. Forty or so years have passed.
Why would it change now? These leftist ideologues are recycling the same arguments as those of that earlier era.
(Please note that as a Canadian, I had no direct contact with people in the civil rights for blacks groups in the US.)
1
Peterson neglects to acknowledge that the reason that chaos has been represented by "the feminine" (barf emoji) is that the representations were created by a horde of patriarchal writers. I am very grateful that he no longer practices psychotherapy. I can't help but imagine that he made his patients' lives worse.
26
Once upon a time, such arcane philosophical musings about the gendered implications of the collective unconscious were left to those few alpha lobsters who did not have to worry about where their next meal would come from. But modernity means that every righteous fool now feels qualified to state the last word on the universal place of men and women, and some even get to turn that psychobabble into their very own quite generous meal ticket.
19
Most of these gender debates would be more rigorous if the focus were on hormonal levels. These vary greatly from individual to individual within gender and vary, on average, somewhat between gender. Hormonal levels have been pretty clearly linked to various behaviors. It's difficult to know where the hormones stop and the societal feedback loop begins but that's a more sound starting point for discussion than mythology.
4
John, interesting point. Hormones are measurable and they correlate with behavior. Some of course find this too deterministic. At same time there are, as you suggest, social constructs that define gender. Still, myth and literature are also sources of knowledge, especially if they are treated as open ended constructs that can perceived in different ways. I have heard Peterson interpret the same biblical story from various angles. He points out that these stories continue to resonate for a reason. I do want to know more about his jungian approach and its possible limitations.
2
One can tell from the article and the comments that this is overall not really a discussion of what Peterson has actually said--except perhaps in decontextualized snippets. Large numbers of people here feel free to express hostile and defamatory views without ever having viewed his lectures and videos or having read his book.
One of the more interesting facts about Peterson is that he works (indefatigably) in long form. He has complex views that are assembled into an overall balance that sometimes tilts in one direction or another. It adds up to a serious project that deserves serious discussion. Unfortunately this attack article has not promoted that discussion here.
30
I have read his recent book, watched his videos, and am more convinced than ever that he is an angry, whiny man who feels that he’s owed more respect and notice than he’s gotten in this life. Plus the fact that there so many others who revere his every word speaks volumes about the frightened little men who need direction in life. Grow up, do your job, love your family, don’t wish you need what your neighbor has, and if someone wants to called “they” instead of Mr. or Ms., so what? How much of an interference in your life is that, really?
28
Yep, the problem is precisely that he is indefatigable and the internet exists. All these hours and pages of claptrap are there for willing acolytes to immerse themselves in, and then argue that any critique of their hero is either incomplete, a misreading, or both.
5
From what I have read here and elsewhere, Jordan Peterson, the new self-appointed guru of oppressed males, is a fraud but once again the NYT is wasting time and attention on this flash in the pan cultural aberration.
It would seem that Peterson clearly is not student of history. He have must have had female professors and felt no need to listen to them. Had he bothered to pay attention, he would have learned that males have brought or civilization - or what remains of it- to the point of self destruction. And they continue to do so, as our current roster of male leaders, e.g. Trump, Kim, Netanyahu, Putin, et al, work their way to destroying our planet. Maybe, they are among Peterson's followers
What is amazing, besides the fact that the NYT has decided to give Peterson more attention than he deserves, is that he has somehow managed to convince "80,000" You Tube followers and others to follow his simple 12 rules. Interesting enough, at the end, you say he tells people they need to grow up and take responsibility for their lives. Ironically, if his apostles followed this one simple rule, Peterson's run as the latest post modern guru would be over
22
$80,000 a month not followers he has well over a million followers
6
This article is fascinating, but for all the wrong reasons. It doesn’t appear to care as much about exploring and understanding Peterson, or exploring and understanding his ideas, as it does about systematically judging and then debunking him and them.
Which makes the piece a tautological exercise - how can you purport to dispassionately explore someone’s ideas, i.e., practice ‘journalism’, when you’ve already examined them and found them wanting?
On one hand, I can understand the dilemma of the author. If she were to show the slightest openness to Peterson or his ideas, she might well be crucified by the leftist groupthink mobs who roam the twittersphere and more importantly dominate the NYT readership. That said, it’s her putative job as a journalist to explore, report, and let others judge. At other publications, that is. At the NYT she has license to be a polemicist and ideological hanging judge because it is the mission of the NYT to not only shape left liberal orthodoxy, but enforce it.
Peterson is so terrifyingly outside the prevailing left orthodoxy, I’m surprised the NYT even bothered to do this piece. Unless they had an ulterior motive, which was - yes, of course - debunk and discredit. It all makes sense now.
50
Yes, Bancroft, you are getting close to a scary conclusion about the NYT. Instead of reporting the world, it is confirming the prejudices of its left readership. It’s good for business in the short haul but I predict will come close to seriously discrediting the paper in next few years. The other day the paper lent itself as a platform to a transgender Columbia professor’s opinion piece complaining that Caitlin Jenner was debating transgender issues in front of British Parliament. The professor said she was appalled that her life choices were up for debate. Some favored political views get kid glove assistance. Others like Peterson’s are held up to ridicule.
7
T. Bancroft - Imagine if all you knew about Peterson is what you read in this article? The resulting anger and confusion is exactly what's reflected in many comments.
This is a propaganda piece worth of Pravda.
7
"... But witches don’t exist, and they don’t live in swamps, I say. ..."
The paragraph following this is complete and utter gibberish.
I never heard of this guy until I read an article by Douthat a few months back. Strike one.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/31/opinion/god-jordan-peterson.html
Jordan himself appears to be suffering a crisis in masculinity. Why won't women ... fill in the blank. But he is making a lot of dough.
18
There’s a male dominated hierarchical structure in Saudi Arabia.
How’s that working for you?
26
But Johnnie, Peterson’s point is that many of us, but especially men in the US and presumably Canada, are dropping out of the social structure. Women too though they have a better tailwind. It takes a good proportion of any population to make things work.
1
I think Jordan is a con man, who speaks psychobabble. That there are so many fawning males who worship this guy is a mystery to me.
431
Jonan,
Jordan Peterson speaks as a scientist. Jordan Peterson is a scientist. He speaks a language my wife and my friends speak and he speaks it clearly. We do not see what others say he says.
39
I am an engineer with a PhD and a master's in one of the social sciences: I understand him perfectly too, but I conclude thatwhile he may begin with some basic harmless self-help advice, his prescription for a healthy functioning society comes at the expense of anyone who has not bought into hetero-normative patriarchy. No thanks.
49
Perhaps you should read his books or listen to what he says without pre-judging the man. When you read this article you see the bigotry of the "journalist" who seems unable to separate her political and ideologic views from the facts of the case.
42
This guy is so full of himself.
7
Can this man go away now? Shoo shoo, off you go!
10
Where did Professor Peterson ever say that women should "just behave"?
I'll save the author some Googling - he's never said or written that.
Disgraceful.
34
Peterson claims that the spiritual crisis that infects the male of the West has been the product of the Marxist theory of diabolical materialism.
2
To omit that Mr. Peterson's views and his academic work are couched very squarely within the framework of Jungian Psychology, is extraordinarily dishonest to your readers, The New York Times, and your profession as a whole.
The omission of Carl Jung which surely must have been brought up at least a dozen over two days (and you can likely refresh yourself in recordings and notes), makes this article truly slanderous.
It captures the "sensation" without any context. It's as if you profiled Medieval Times and wrote: "... all the blood and carnage splayed out before you while having to eat ungarnished chickens with your bare hands like tribes savages," meanwhile omitting the context that the whole thing resembles a Disney World style experience.
There are a few other glaring commissions of context, but, even journalism in Tech and Internet Culture, there is an ethical mandate not to mislead and to get the facts of the situation down - not just personal, subjective observations.
Shame on you @nelliebowles - whether the intent here was purposeful or incidental.
40
Yes, I also wonder Nellie Bowles doesn’t mention or describe the Cathy Newman interview which is central to Peterson’s growth in prominence. It might have cautioned her against writing a feminist caricature of him.
10
Beam me up Scottie. There’s no more intelligent life here.
9
Well, what a jerk. As a nasty woman and a witch-y one also (so I've been told), I'm happy to say that many of us would happily ignore this pompous, self-aggrandizing, extremely vain and silly guy if he wasn't preaching for a movement to crush me and other genuinely satisfied women.
The incel thing is bad enough. I'm 66, and I can't say I ever imagined staying home to take care of the hearth was what I wanted. I don't know where he got the idea that women wanted this, except for those women who work two jobs and keep house.
22
It would be interesting to hear your views if you'd listened to a Peterson lecture instead of getting all your information from this article.
4
Betsy, very incisive analysis. “Jerk” hits the nail on the head, as does “silly.” At the opposite end, Pompous and self aggrandizing are just pretentious.
1
Another charlatan who has found the gravy train. And unlike most people of that ilk, he's not a religious charlatan.
16
He actually is deeply religious, he believes the degradation of Western culture is in part caused by the rejection of religious values.
6
Please read his books.
2
Talk about filthy lucre. Despicable.
Schadenfreude: Petersen, shunned and exposed, bankrupt as befits his bankrupt philosophy.
10
Lobsters, eh? Okay.
10
You don’t have to look far to find people who see through Peterson’s game. Good article, and these too if you want to know more:
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2018/03/the-intellectual-we-deserve
https://thewalrus.ca/the-professor-of-piffle/
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jan/28/12-rules-for-life-an-antid...
https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/is-jordan-peterson-the-stupid-mans-smart...
12
@Andrew: The Current Affairs article is brilliant and hilarious! The seventeen-minute transcript of Peterson "lecturing" is comedic gold. Thanks for sharing!
3
David Brooks (NYT opinion writer and huge Peterson fan - "greatest living public intellectual") should read this
5
Can the Times please cover more individuals actually worthy of being covered?
7
Like only those people you agree with?
14
This is a gross misrepresentation of Peterson’s thinking. Disgusting, in fact. I hope The New York Times invites Peterson to respond in its editorial pages.
49
Incels seem to be men who are upset because they aren't getting porn-style sex with supermodel women, and they don't realize that's almost everyone.
Also, we are living literally in the least violent time in history, and somehow forced monogamy is going to make this better? QuizzicalDog.jpg
8
He reads like a self important twit catering to the fantasies of angry white mostly males...who would pay money to listen to this fool?
12
Stalin & Mao are not examples of the “extreme left” as he suggests. They were manic nutballs not unlike him.
Power corrupts.
9
Then, if not Stalin and Mao, who are examples of the extreme left?
3
1. Why no mention of his marital status? And if married, what his marriage looks like? Seems a glaring oversight.
2. The photo of his audience is mighty white.
7
This man didn't run into career trouble because he's controversial. He ran into career trouble because he's controversial and stupid. Witches in swamps? Women are chaos? Oy. Full of emotion and anecdotes and oblivious to data. (Why were secretaries and office managers always women? Because they were the organized ones.) Look, man, that swamp of yours is sexual desire because it's chaotic and scary to you, and those witches live there because women are what you want but their autonomy is scary and powerful and ugly to you. Or maybe not. But I'm not going to pretend I know for sure and get dictatorial about it.
Oh, but I do await his defense by New York Times Columnist Bari Weiss.
13
wow, I saw him on bill mahr's show, and he didn't seem this extreme or Looney? but then again, the guests only have five minutes....geez......
2
Well, it would be hard for him to misrepresent his own views in real time. Not so much of a problem for the author of this piece.
9
Ellen, he’s not loonie. This is a slanted piece.
3
Not sure if it has been mentioned, but the simple fact that the writer refuses to refer to Jordan by either of his earned titles (Doctor or Professor) and instead calls him "Mr. Peterson" throughout her piece shows her obvious bias. The man is a licensed clinician and a scholar with a distinguished academic pedigree, and deserves to be addressed as such. A writer who cannot be bothered to address her interviewee properly really shouldn't be taken too seriously.
His work takes time to sink in, and requires more than selective quote hunting.
27
This article does its best to paint Jordan as some sexist white male cult leader. Check out the Joe Rogan podcasts he’s been on to hear what he actually thinks versus what snippets made it in to support the authors agenda.
31
I know Fairview Alberta, I have watched listened and read Jordan Peterson. This op-ed is so fundamentally without understanding I almost want to cancel my subscription to the NYT but then I remember Douthat, Brooks and Stephens and realize teach me more about why I believe what I believe than anyone with whom I am likely to agree.
27
How this dope can wail about "Marxist social engineering" and preen about the Nobility of the Rugged Individual at one moment and then call for enforced monogamy so losers don't have their fee-fees hurt at the very next--and keep a straight face throughout--is beyond me.
Somehow, people are actually pouring out their wallets for this pap and--what's worse--believing it.
11
This piece of journalism fails as I come away with no real insight into the ideas Peterson is advancing. Surely it would be appropriate to outline the purported logic of his popular arguments.
Otherwise it's off to other parts of the internet to get a real understanding.
20
it's funny/ sad that he thinks Betty Friedan was being "whiny" about the lack of meaningful opportunities for women. why don't all of these unemployed buckos and lobsters just "get a hobby" (as peterson would advise housewives)
16
It’s amazing to me how easy it is to get rich taking money from willing dupes.
Doesn’t anyone notice that they’re taking advice on the art of manliness from former professor of feelings and emotions dressed like an itinerant preacher from Little House on the Prairie? This guy is playing to his sad sack audience, taking whatever he can get from the $15/hour crowd, earning in a month more than these dudes earn in 2 years. Sure he’s lobbying for “enforced monogamy” (whatever that is) for his drippy acolytes but he’ll be alone in his hilltop home bringing masculine order to his linen closet and fantasizing about being a Canadian Stalin.
We have a word for pasty-faced, out-of-shape guys with odd hobbies, too many online “friends” and no life: Loser.
Real people haven’t deliberately been ignoring “incels,” we’ve just been busy creating our happy, sexy lives. You all continue on scrabbling out your bitter screeds and enjoying your misfits conventions. Us “vonses” (that’s voluntarily sexual) aren’t paying attention.
15
Very obviously a hit piece. I was interested in this "enforced monagomy" thing and really want to hear more about it, preferably from Jordan himself because I like to give people the opportunity to articulate and defend themselves before making judgements (I know, crazy, right?). But there's nothing. No where easily accessible does he talk about "enforcing monagomy" other than a comment he made something like "Well, I don't know if it was such a good idea to make a divorce more accessible" which he defends rather well. But what I did find were several links to this article, and dozens of YouTube clips of talking heads citing it and holding it up as some sort of smoking gun. The rest the article deliberately misrepresents Jordan Peterson for some reason (probably ideological), and would only sway someone who wasn't already familiar with his points of view. I don't know how anyone can take it seriously. The author looses all credibility, and the entire publication should be suspect for allowing such an obviously bias piece of journalism to be published.
24
I'm fairly certain Mr Peterson does not deserve all these words. Just a couple/few words would do: He's nuts. (It's likely that's why he studied the so-called discipline Psychology.)
4
How many hit pieces do you need to run before what you wish was true magically becomes true? A hundred? A thousand? A million? Better keep pecking those keyboards and churning those presses then. You New York City liberals and your precious bubble are embarrassing the rest of us who support the Democratic Party and liberalism because it supported science (used to), reasoned debate (oh well), and prudent policy not based on frothing emotional hate (oh dear). Now we have to spend that much more time beating you during the primary season (Bernie never had much chance, your next guy won't either), and then turning around to face the conservative ideologues who should be our actual opponents. This article is pathetic, but take security in the knowledge that it will also be quickly forgotten.
17
When you are accustomed to privilege, equality seems like oppression.
20
"Violent attacks are what happens when men don't have partners" This simple phrase explains a lot. Think back to the movie City of God - the gangster Lil Ze's reign of terror is explained by the narrator very simply - Lil Ze was ugly. Yes, the movie was fiction but it rang true.
2
This absolutely intellectually dishonest smear piece was the perfect way to round out a particularly egregious week of shoddy journalism. The author completely misrepresents Mr. Peterson's work and his ideas. The only redeeming feature of the entire article is that the author at least had the decency to make her bias, lack of understanding, and purpose abundantly clear.
27
I've been on the hunt for a substantive critique of Peterson ever since I read his books.
Unfortunately, this article is not that critique.
A lot of what Peterson says resonates with me but, as a rule, I trust neither that feeling nor one person's perspective on anything. However, having read his material and listened to his classroom lectures, I'm very aware of the context missing from the quotes in this article (the ideas of masculine order and feminine chaos are never presented as 'masculine is good and feminine is bad' in Peterson's lectures. They are framed in their archetypal forms as equal in necessity and power). Also, there are lazy misrepresentations (particularly regarding his views on patriarchy and competence) not to mention the blatant display of bias in the title of the article itself.
Nellie Bowles isn't the only one who has taken Peterson's words and filtered them to fit previously held beliefs about him. The men's rights groups she attempts to tie to Peterson as well as extreme conservative groups have co-opted and reshaped choice bits of his topics to suit their own interests. The guilt by association tactic Bowles employed falls flat as soon as one reads or hears what Peterson has actually said.
I would urge those who find the media's (Liberal and Conservative) curated image of Peterson horrifying to read a little of his work. You still may dislike what he's selling but at the very least, you'll have an more honest foundation for your judgment.
27
I wouldn't look to the media for the critique of Peterson. I would read about the critique of Jungian archetypes.
This kind of archetypical analysis and it's tendency to universalize gender categories or to universalize mythic forces is widely rejected by historians, anthropologists, and many psychologists because it doesn't square with empirical research. It doesn't square with the cross-cultural or historical study of gender difference and the social organization of gender.
There's a flaky edge of psychology that hasn't given up on cultural myths dressed up as human universals. And Peterson is part of that. But serious historical and anthropological work based on field research or archival research, in contrast to armchair psychology, have been disabused of these ideas for close to half a century.
So if you want to know about the critique of Peterson, you'd have to know about the history of the social sciences. And specifically how gender is understood in those disciplines.
8
Thank you, Neis. I agree with Peterson that myth and literature are important sources of knowledge, but wasn’t as sure about his Jungian approach. I know Joseph Campbell still has creditable support but will follow your suggestion and look up anti jungians.
1
Another miserable, misogynistic reactionary trying to protect the toxic capitalist Imperialist status quo.
Full of pseudo science, lies, superstition and attacks upon truth itself. Another reflection of the toxicity of Trump fascism - a huckster who is lent legitimacy by media.
Refuse and resist fascism....
M
6
Whenever an author describes someone's house without even showing one picture, this is disingenuous.
If you truly visited this 'houses of horrors', wouldn't a couple of snapshots help us unwitting fools (who have pledged our allegiance one of the founders of the 'Dark Web')?
Praise her be Nellie!
4
What a whiny wimp of a man.
The long and short if it is, in order to feel some kind of superiority - you actually have to do the work to become superior. He's getting wealthy telling incompetent, lazy, likely unwashed, malcontent incompetents that they are AWESOME just the way the are. It's like bragging you're a baker - but eating store-bought cake frosting by the spoonful when you never bothered to make a cake, even from a cheap box mix.
Get off the sofa, put down the video game controllers, read a book, do some pushups, clean your room, learn a foreign language, volunteer to teach old people to knit or play bingo. Grow up.
There are no cheap shortcuts to greatness in this guy's rallies, you're just paying for his second home.
8
From reading your response it becomes more obvious how bad this “hit piece” really is. Go online and watch one video. Peterson’s whole point is men aren’t being taught responsibility. He doesn’t tell people they are “awesome” he tells them they are imperfect on so many levels. Only with taking on responsibility and carrying a “load”will their lives improve. It is a sad world that someone who is so easily accessible online, can be so easily smeared because people are to lazy to form their own opinions. He posted his lectures online to protect himself. You don’t need to read who he is through a biased filter. Go look for yourself. You will find that he is doing exactly what you are saying he should do. Telling people to stop worrying about rights and start taking on responsibilities. The two go hand in hand and our society is only worried about half the equation anymore. The lazy are those who take this article as gospel without going to YouTube and discovering for themselves who this man really is! Maybe it is just fear that you might discover he is not the devil that his enemies make him out to be.
3
The ‘mens’ rights’ creeps, pick-up artists, and involuntary celibates’ like to claim that their movements are just an inevitable reaction to feminist overreach when, in fact, feminism is womens’ reaction to centuries of the very same misogynistic, violent ideology this guy is espousing.
11
“order is masculine. Chaos is feminine.”
He obviously hasn’t seen my side of the bedroom.
8
In my book, he's just an old-fashioned creep. And how.
10
In the near future, when we go back to having more than half of the population (women) subjugated by law we can look back at the media giving these men a platform and understand how it all began. All humans deserve to be treated with respect and have equal access to education, economic development, clean water, court system. Men are not better than women, skin color or ethnicity don't make you better or worse at anything. We are tribal and we learn behavior and customs from the society or group we are raised in. This is not political ideology, this is backed by science. It is repulsive that the NYT is giving this misogynist a platform.
This absolutely proves that we still need to be active feminists because our equality with men under the law is very recent and may be lost in the very near future.
Welcome back to the Gilded Age people, only rich men (preferably white) deserve a good life!
11
Peterson’s entire philosophy is based on equality of opportunity. It’s his position that we shouldn’t enforce equality of outcome, for the simple reason that not everyone is equally adept (you wouldn’t want your state’s medical board to hand out licenses to practice based on anything other than demonstrated competence, for example), but everyone should be given equal access to the playing field.
Ironically, you and Peterson see eye to eye on every substantive point you mention.
8
We have never lived in a world or a society where men and women, blacks and whites, rich and poor, have equal opportunity. That's what I advocate for, equal laws, treatment and opportunity. Forced monogamy and women not being able to work is not equal opportunity. Jordan Peterson is peddling misogyny and determinism based on sex and social class, that's not equal opportunity.
8
I particularly abhor his misuse of Jungian psychology. Never thought that could happen so egregiously. Live long enough and you see everything.
11
I'm pretty sure he'll be "on sabbatical" indefinitely or he'll resign. No university would want a snake in the grass like this guy who gets to preach his nonsensical hate with academic freedom.
5
This headline is such a blatant lie about an incredible well-thought, reasonable man.The Left attacks him and deliberately mis-characterizes him because they don't want people actually listening to his talks and actually learn for themselves what he is trying to say.
21
What I learned from this editorial is that Nellie Bowles doesn’t like Jordan Peterson so she wrote a hit piece.
35
When did Americans (especially men) become so susceptible to con men?
12
Is there anything Peterson preaches that is actually new? Is this guy actually bringing anything to light that isn’t supposedly ‘the natural order’? This is an angsty guy who is upset that life is harder now that he has more competition than just fellow white men. I can tell you, I happen to be a man, and I certainly have more competition in my life than my grandfather did. Am I complaining that my opportunities are limited by the fact that people of color and women can now challenge me? No! Peterson, the natural order of things is not for men to be orderly and women to be roiling whorls of chaos, it is for people to be people. All you’re witches and religious tales are ancient, how can you extract wisdom from a story when it was written when women were prizes to be won in battle? How about create something new instead of regurgitating what was said 2000 years ago? It’s out of fashion...
12
This descriptive close up and its ridicule of a modern men's movement reminds me of similar ridicule of the women's movement from back in the days.
11
The author of this article is trying to misrepresent Mr. Peterson. He does not promote 90% of what the author says he does. I suggest people to actually listen to him speak before making a judgement.
21
Very good discussion of Peterson's ideas about hierarchy--convo with Russell Brand. It's a good one. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MLFQxVOvan4
8
Yes. This is much more representative of Jordan Peterson. The interviewer does a good job of asking clarifying and meaningful questions.
6
This is how it begins. It’s “The Handmaid’s Tale” for real. This charlatan has tapped into real fear. It would be wise not to ignore what he’s recognized as a very important issue for so many disenfranchized men. Why do white, Christian men commit mass murder? Why did so many who stand no chance to benefit, vote for this president? Why are white people panicking and reporting black people waiting for friends at a coffee shop?
DEI (diversity, equity, inclusion) initiatives are what’s needed to make the USA a better place, but if half the country doesn’t see the point, we need to help them get there. Digging our heels in and protesting are important ways to be heard, but we need to TALK to each other about these issues. But how?
I fear we have gotten too far away from each other; we are too entrenched in our beliefs to bridge the gap.
If we don’t figure it out soon, we could slip into a world that resembles the Republic of Gilead.
6
Peterson is regressive on gender, and the writer hangs him by his own words. But on freedom of speech she won't give him a shot. Not a single mention of the growing list of professors and graduate students driven, or almost driven, out of the academy by cult-like, hysterical campaigns of political correctitude. The Christakis's? Bret Weinstein? Laura Kipnis? Lindsay Shepherd?
It's here that Peterson has been quite prescient (the left-wing star chamber that Shepherd faced tried to intimidate her by suggesting she broke social justice laws at the provincial and federal levels) and brave. Too bad the writer crafted such an unbalanced portrait.
219
"Regressive on gender" ? Nope ! He is just holding feminists accountable for their distorted ideas !
"the writer hangs him by his own words. " Nellie does nothing of the sort. Distorting Person's words, shows a high level of journalistic dishonesty.
19
"Yeah, they do. They do exist. They just don’t exist the way you think they exist. They certainly exist. You may say well dragons don’t exist. It’s, like, yes they do — the category predator and the category dragon are the same category. It absolutely exists. It’s a superordinate category. It exists absolutely more than anything else. In fact, it really exists. What exists is not obvious. You say, ‘Well, there’s no such thing as witches.’ Yeah, I know what you mean, but that isn’t what you think when you go see a movie about them. You can’t help but fall into these categories. There’s no escape from them.”
Read this carefully and tell me if this sounds like the well-reasoned argument of a person who is orderly in his thinking. Because it sounds to me like a man raving about things he doesn't understand, who has no concept of how culture is shaped by the dominant forces, and who is literally insisting that witches and dragons exist because ... why? Because he says they do. What evidence is he putting forth? He is merely insisting that he is correct. He is ignoring the fact that all of western civilization's "ancient stories" are narratives that have been written, curated, and selected for their ability to hold up the narrative of patriarchy. Who categorizes women as representing chaos and men representing order? Men do. Women do not. This guy is a fake and a know-nothing.
15
"He wants to feel their imprisonment, though he lives here on a quiet residential street in Toronto and is quite free." how dare he.
3
Enforced monogamy means socially enforced monogamy, ie “going steady” or getting married, and breaking down the acceptability of the hookup culture. This paper itself has done stories on how this culture actually isn’t what many women want, but feel forced into, and how this culture leads indirectly to the #metoo transgressions. It’s also linked non-monogamy, and as a result fatherlessness, to poorer outcomes for kids.
Peterson is a proponent of liberty, that’s where all the anti-Marxist content and paranoia come from. Linking him to incels and their bizarre ideas, or legally enforced monogamy, is a deliberate misrepresentation.
331
No, he specifically said that enforced monogamy would have stopped the Incel guy from driving into and murdering people. He didn't say marriage or 'going steady' would have prevented this.
78
You do not know exactly what he said, only what the NYT said that he said. I understand that you have cemented yourself into an adverse opinion. But I would encourage you to examine all that Dr. JP says on the general topic. Then you might find that his analysis is far more comprehensive than 15 words. You still might not like it, but at least you would have a better reason for doing so.
11
"Good people...on both sides," said PT, of those who gathered in Charlottesville last August. And keep in mind, members of "The Flat Earth Society;" also, Galileo and Urban VIII. Balance can be illusive.
12
Can somebody tell me how his books get to the bestseller list? Is there something I’m missing?
4
Yes — actual knowledge of his positions.
11
Peterson may very well be on his way towards more misogynistic points of view since he came on the scene a few years ago—I've watched some of his youtube videos and read his online writing, and all I've seen until this moment seems pretty logical. Asking "why won't women just behave," labeling him the "custodian of the patriarchy" when his positions are actually far more nuanced than portrayed here, and editorializing his every action is a deliberately distorted attempt to profile him. Maybe his rhetoric *has* changed—it would be a lot more effective for the author of the article to let his words speak for themselves if they're really so vile,.
10
Jordan Peterson, Ph.D. of Clinical Psychology, Professor at the University of Toronto
He is Dr. Peterson, not Mr. Peterson, and he is a scientist. If the author has problems with his ideas, show evidence that they are wrong. The strawman arguments in this article reveals ignorance, not moral clarity.
14
Are you okay with this statement:
“He was angry at God because women were rejecting him,” Mr. Peterson says of the Toronto killer. “The cure for that is enforced monogamy. That’s actually why monogamy emerges.”
Should women be forced to be in a monogamous relationships ("enforced monogamy") with certain men to help prevent violence?
This is not science. It's sexist nonsense that devalues women's sexual autonomy.
13
Well observed, but the lies Mr. Peterson tells deserve more and better push back than the assertion that witches don't exist. Our current political leadership demonstrates every day that letting people prove their inanity with their own words is not enough. Every ridiculous assertion mentioned in the article, such as that enforced monogamy in some cultures exists to equalize men's access to women for sex, can and should be refuted with facts from evolutionary anthropology, world history, and the like.
Lies should be exposed and explicitly labeled as lies, not left to speak for themselves, depending on the knowledge of the hearer.
6
Jordan Peterson is a remarkably intelligent guy who is also quite articulate and passionate. He is addressing current societal issues while staying anchored in facts, research, and common sense logic. As a professor and public intellectual, he’s challenging us to think through our positions and opinions. This is invigorating to bright people. Any blanket criticism of the man or his appearance can safely be ignored. It’s his intellectual arguments that matter and these cannot be simplified or caricatured.
Our society is grappling with with the evolving relationship between men and women in the face of evidence that, on average, men and women are truly different in their brains and behaviors. The complicated effects of advancing technology, civilization, and liberal values on male-female relations means that dogmatic positions, like “women deserve better” or “men deserve better” are just lazy and ignorant complaining. And we men hear a lot of women complaining.
11
Peterson trots out the same hoary justifications for male dominance like order and the “naturalness” of hierarchy and wraps it all in a gossamer blanket of poison. Just because animals have hierarchies, and that would include the human animals, it doesn’t necessarily mean that all hierarchies are the same. Many animal soceities are matriarchal (elephants, whales), so his narrative of orderliness pf patriarchy flies right of the window. He’s another sad little man in a long line of sad little men who can’t stand the fact that that women have a voice. He seems to forget one thing: stasis, with respect to the human condition, is never a good thing.
10
If he is such a misunderstood genius, like his followers claim, why are those hateful, misogynist websites filled with guys who say their journey started with Jordan Peterson?
And if he truly doesn't support incel/redpill/return of kings ideology, why does he never denounce it, knowing that many of his followers are part of these utterly vile ideologies? Could it have anything to do with the amount of money he's making off those followers?
16
The problem with a somewhat childish hit piece such as this is that we live in the 21st century. There are hundreds of videos of Peterson available for anyone to watch. As the article mentions, he is a well documented man. Therefore the childish and sneering observational lines written to shape the perceptions of the reader are both useless and ineffective. This isn't a 1970s issue of Playboy or GQ. We don't need the writer to interpret and describe. We have already seen. We already know. We know so much, in fact, that this missive becomes embarrassing to the author. You don't like Peterson. We get it. That doesn't make him wrong.
10
"Nellie Bowles...she used to be a correspondent for "VICE News Tonight".
That explains everything you need to know about the blase derision laced throughout this piece.
The cultural progressive Vice mindset Bowles bring to this piece is the same that was used by Vice earlier this year to dishonestly edit Peterson's remarks. The video of Vice's edits and the uncut version can be found on YouTube with a simple search.
I don't subscribe to much of Peterson's topical approaches particularly his attribution of chaos and order to the sexes, but I listen and am increasing frustrated with general attacks like these on heterodox figures.
But I get it, writers with Bowles' mindset at Vice, Vox and Mic tried to cast him as an alt-right white supremacist sympathizer. Since that isn't working, now they're trying to cast Peterson as a misogynist, the same way Forward cast him as an anti-Semite.
It won't work.
This belongs in opinion. Bowles has every right to contest Peterson's approaches. I empower her to do so. But this, like most profiles of Peterson, is disinformation.
Intellectuals of any sort can rarely be captured in any profile no matter how glowing or critical. I'm skeptical of anyone being able to boil a person - particularly one who engages in deeply contextually-based philosophical questions - into a single piece of editorial. Some at least make an effort.
Bowles doesn't try to capture Peterson because she can't. She gets in the way of herself.
16
Yes, I agree, but why did he consent to a piece by a writer from Vice? He had to know it would be hit job.
I find that men who are bitter about rejection often have an unrealistic ideal of the woman they should be with. Women should want them no matter how they look, but women should look a certain way. There is so much in traditional society that reinforces this idea. (*Revenge of the Nerds* is one stark example.)
Meanwhile, the world is becoming more tolerant of a variety sexualities and sexual identities. If some men only want casual sex, there are plenty of willing women to hook up with. If they want marriage, there are plenty of women to date (though they will have to prove they can be good partners and not whiny children). The field narrows considerably if every woman has to look like a lingerie model.
Progressivism would help these men if they could get over their hangups. But as long as they're advocating for sexual slavery, they'll never get my empathy.
14
Jordan Peterson is a highly articulate and intelligent Professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, and one of my favorite people to watch on youtube. He's not the devil "patriarch" that the author paints him out to be, he just disagrees with radical feminists that propagate lies. Most of the comments and description about him on this article are largely inaccurate. I encourage people to watch his interview with Cathy Newman if you want to learn the truth about him.
11
Deep breath people - old saying - you cannot change where you’ve come from, but you can change where you’re going. Confirmation bias is obvious by most of these posts. My take away is the stories of the past are the story of our human condition. Chaos/order, good/evil, yin/yang, he states quite clearly that each person is capable of both and the individual should be responsible to society in order to enjoy the rights of society. That each individual should have a foot firmly planted in both sides of the line of chaos and order in order to progress ... yin needs yang as much as yang needs yin - I believe Peterson is promoting the middle and warns about the extremes. If you do not want to read the book, at least read the foreword by Norman Doidge
10
Maybe these men would have more success in their professional and romantic lives if they spent less time whining.
6
Many criticisms of this article by Peterson fans.
Perhaps a fair view of his political philosophy is that in a hierarchy, there are only alpha males at the top. (They, BTW, will never have any problems.) He is ministering to the hurting Beta, Gamma and Delta males who have fallen down the pyramid from their traditional perch just under alpha males, due to all the social changes of the last 50 years (brought on by technological innovations, not by feminist harridans, BTW). He’s telling them that in demanding the return of the old regime they can ascend the pyramid again, but they must remember the deal is to submit to alpha males (i.e., clean up your room). Is this an fair assessment of his...mythology?
8
White men, of which I am one, are flocking to Peterson because their place in the world is no longer as certain as it was in the past. Sharing power with minorities and women is scary to his followers. This is really hard for me to understand, but I believe it's because I have empathy toward others, which means I want to treat women and minorities as equals. For men that believe they should be at the top of the hierarchy, the future looks many times worse than the past, and they are doing everything in their power to return to that past. This is the promise that Peterson and Trump provide to their followers: come with me and I'll give you your power back.
8
"...the current hierarchy may be predicated on competence..."Thank you for my laugh of the day.
10
These men remind me of two fellow students I endured as grad student in Chemical Engineering in the early 90’s. Every single day they told me that my brain wasn’t sufficient to understand the science because my body was built to have babies. I would fail, fail, fail. I was taking up valuable space in the lab that a man should have.
I had never faced such potent misogyny in my life. What kept me sane was that these were two of the most insecure and socially awkward men I had ever been around. It was so clearly not about me but a projection of their angst. They were such sad, angry people that in retrospect, I think they were suffering more than I was.
I dropped out and went on to have a successful career. I’m the breadwinner in my family and we laugh about how our modern lives look so different from our parents’. But it’s been freeing for both of us - we both have more options to pursue career, intellectual interests, and nurture our child.
Change can be threatening. It strikes me that these people are like those insecure grad students, struggling to understand their role in a new order that allows women to be engineers. How can we help them understand that it’s not a zero-sum game?
12
This author's dislike of Peterson is clearly visible: she quotes him in a transcript-like manner, making his words seem like some manic trance (compare a direct transcript of your own speech to the same thought that you took time to write down - the former seems moronic), she mentions all the details to convince the audience that he's just some spirited preacher (talks withous notes, cries often, has people tell him how he's changed their lives), and even puts his words terribly out of context to later clash them with a rationally-presented women's rights activist. Forced monogamy and redistribution of women? He just said that monogamy emerges, in the course of evolution (not "is imposed" by anyone's decision!) as a social phenomenon, for a reason: without it only the few men of highest status would have a chance to mate and have children, rendering all remaining males useless and unable to participate in preservation of the species. Monogamy solves that problem. Obviously he refers here to the evolutionary perspective, and not literally to modern society - which the author of this piece probably deliberately chose not to notice to make Peterson look even worse. I strongly encourage anyone who wants to have a genuine opinion on Jordan Peterson to watch his university lectures he recorded in the classroom. All the "outrageous" ideas mentiones here are thoroughly explained and supported with quoted scientific sources. This article is really just a slur, but a truly dirty one.
12
Jordan Peterson inspires us to be unapologetically competent.
6
I’m midway through Russell Brand’s second interview on his Under The Skin podcast with Jordan Peterson and am struck by how Peterson sounds nothing like the man in this NY Times interview. I will read his book to better understand this dissonance. Right now, I’m mystified.
12
It would be nice if some one had the ability or the will to report honestly or contend with Peterson's ideas.
Every hit piece since he came out against compelled speech has missed the mark, and this screed is no exception.
Here, Ms. Bowles seems to strive to be the Cathy Newman of print.
13
This article really does a disservice to Times readers, following a divisive script I think we are all getting tired of whether it's on Fox, MSNBC or here. Society does not work with all of us at each others throats all the time over every perceived slight and offense. This is a big part of Mr. Peterson's message. He also rails against enforced equality of outcome while fervently supporting equality of opportunity - for everyone. This used to be called common sense.
I'm not making the case that Peterson has been perfect in a career that spans hundreds of public speaking appearances. But what I have seen is not misogynistic. It encourages women and men to pursue whatever type of success they hope to achieve.
Saying hierarchies are natural is not a controversial statement. The NYT is one...a hereditary male hierarchy, in fact. Universities are hierarchies as are almost all businesses and other organizations. As mentioned, JP forcefully advocates enforced equality of opportunity. But he deplores equality of outcome. We live in a free labor market. Some major choices are made along gender lines. We cannot force more women to be bricklayers anymore than we can force more men to be nurses in a free society,
The title tells us the writer has an ax to grind...then goes downhill from there. Barely any of the quotes of the subject are more than a sentence long. That alone should tell you how serious this piece is about portraying Mr. Peterson fairly.
13
This isnt an opinion article? The author is arguing refutable ideas with Jordan Peterson as if they were absolute.
The only thing absolute is science.
3
Peterson leverages demand for his books, lectures, and ideas through YouTube. That's not illegal, but the sheer number of Peterson videos is staggering. Peterson makes fallacious comments about not just the patriarchy, but all things discursive under the sun.
Peterson extemporaneously speaks and passes judgment on myriads of subjects like he is an oracle or ultimate arbiter. I've never seen a serious academic or intellectual do that. He labeled Joseph Campbell as a New Age speaker. In another lecture, he quoted Campbell without attribution about fine art eliciting the radiance of the transcendent.
He also said Canada does not produce good artists, which would be news to noted aesthete Steve Martin who collects the paintings of Lawren Harris.
Peterson also said cartoonist Robert Crumb and his troubled brothers were victims of an Oedipal complex, whereas the documentary made clear their father had brutalized them.
Peterson's ideas go unchallenged because he gives monologues in front of a claque. When speaking in a group, like during a recent Bill Maher program, he is relatively quiet and small. Peterson is retrograde, misguiding, and really does not have anything novel or salutary to say.
Peterson's exhibits nuttiness with Soviet artwork in his home. Why fill your living space with that depraved stuff while Lawren Harris is available in Canada? Trump is king and Marxism is resurgent? Peterson, the deranged with a digital megaphone.
7
J Peterson is like the D Trump of academics. Personally, he's a bundle of half contradictions, and thereby, such a tempting target for snarky remarks. But, his attackers inevitablly overplay their hand, as Nellie Bowles did in the article, and let drop any pretence of objectivity. Nellie Bowles is the new Cathy Newman.
3
I'm not a fan of everything Jordan Peterson says, but the tone of this article is unprofessional to an embarrassing point. First of all, according to Wikipedia he has a PhD, so it would be courteous to refer to him as "Dr. Peterson". Second, even one who is unfamiliar with his ideas can tell how this article misrepresents them. Take the sentence " what he calls 'equality of outcomes', or efforts toward equality". If he wanted to say a general statement about all efforts toward equality, why would he specify it to be about "outcomes"? I doubt that he would claim to be against equality of opportunity.
11
Competence? Sounds like projection, given that women, who gestate, deliver and nurture babies, while running households, holding down jobs and high level careers and helping their mates multi-task, should probably be running the world, which would, by and large, be a far less violent and "chaotic" place for it. Enforced monogamy? How does that work exactly, except through physical and psychological violence. Honestly, what a weirdo.
8
" .... given that women ... should probably be running the world."
Well - there's gender equality position to ponder.
2
I'm familiar with Peterson's book and lectures, and see that Nellie Bowles has created her own version of him, suitable for her vilification and ridicule. This article reveals a lot more about her than him.
13
I am laughing my socks off! (Figuratively, because I'm not actually wearing socks.)
How black does the pot have to be?
Many of these people would be served better by learning the difference between self-consciousness and self-awareness.
1
Shame on you NY Times. This has nothing to do with my opinion on the man, but rather the fact that this article is INACCURATE.
I may not agree with everything he says, but I do know that Peterson at LEAST isn't what this article makes him out to be.
This is a misrepresentation of a person who has firmly established who he is. Actually, most of the commenters who are disgusted by him would probably agree that this article is inaccurate within minutes of looking up some of his youtube videos.
I hope you like the clicks, likes, and comments NY times. Articles like this is what gives true journalism a bad name.
I'll sum up Peterson better and faster for you liars:
1. He believes men are not held accountable enough and that responsibilities turn males into men
2. He knows that men and women have different methods of competing within their gender
3. He believes that the chauvinism/misogyny may be growing or at least not shrinking fast enough because masculinity itself has a problem
4. He believes that all people need to organize and figure themselves out first before projecting themselves on the world
5. And his firmest belief and stance? That freedom of speech should be protected regardless of political affiliation. That excessive political correctness will infringe upon our freedom of speech.
#5 was his rise to prominence, he wasn't focused on genders as much as he was on our freedoms. It seems like the author of this article was too triggered to notice.
16
Peterson occupies the same rhetorical and vaguely analytical space as an astrologer or palm reader. He speaks in generalities and evokes (unquestionable) "ancient wisdom". He performs thoughtfulness, stroking his chin and donning a natty thinker's costume, and then says nothing. His pitch is both sternly critical and complimentary of one's apparently untapped intuition and capabilities. He tells you that other authority figures have misled you. He is an odious fraud.
The most vile and harmful effect of his enterprise is the way it has convinced so many disaffected young men that there are no systemic problems to be addressed, only one's own existential angst and/or residual mommy/daddy issues.
8
I find this piece to be very one sided. Jordan Petersson speaks on other subjects like poltical correctness and the radical lefts anti liberal behavior. At the same time he has nothing over for right wing protagonists. He doesn't wallow in self pitty but encourages self realization, something needed in these times where everybody is a victim.
7
"The Horror of Women?" I am an independent, educated, liberal woman, a scientist, an atheist, and I have listed to Peterson's podcasts and nearly finished his 12 Rules for Life book. Nellie Bowles distorts Peterson's message, portraying him as anti-woman and anti-equality, but nothing I have heard in his lectures or read in his book are either of those things. His message is that hierarchies form because people differ in productivity and other traits that may make them successful (or not). He is pro equality of opportunity but feels equality of outcome is impossible to mandate (without serious negative consequences).
It is disheartening to read reactions to this article where people form very negative opinions about Peterson without having read his book or listened to his lectures. The ideas he discusses are complex and deep and require work to understand - listen to all of the lectures from start to finish, read the whole book, then form an opinion.
16
The crisis that Peterson seems to be responding to - that of social chaos, and that as a trend which will assuredly grow, has little in my mind with gender roles, but of the degradation of the Earth itself, and the current and coming literal and figurative flood - to borrow a Christian metaphor. And yet there is no greater feminine symbol than Earth, ironically very much not the void or chaos, but quite solid and mathematical and logical in its response to humans and our engineering and fossil consumption and technology - masculine realms to be sure. Is the problem in the Earth or how we treated Earth?
The crisis seems to me to be a moral and ethical one - how is it that can we treat each other including Earth, to create harmony, cooperation, and a unified response to the flood - how can we help each other?
Does Peterson wish to contribute to right relationship, or contribute to encampments and divisions? Unfortunately I see the latter, and I see it as unhelpful, as much as I value the raising of questions and to speaking to the existence of a crisis. Essentially, I am not sure he has the primary crisis in sight.
3
Based on this article, this is just another cult bordering on dangerous. The fans would otherwise (and maybe some are) fundamentalist religious right who dream of living in some mythical society they imagined existed in earlier times. Lost souls pining for a saviour and wanting someone (else) to make up some rules they can follow.
This is nothing new. There have always been people who build and join cults. Most humans grow out of the need by their late teens (when they start to mature and realise pop and sports stars are just media build ups of people who have a talent for singing or catching a ball or whatever). Some don't.
8
Funny, I had a very strong, domineering mother who didn’t hesitate to let us know if we weren’t dressed right, our rooms were a mess, or even if our friends were questionable, and have never felt emasculated or doubt who I am because of it. She taught us that chaos was no way to live, and because of her I’ve never felt the need of a book or guru to tell me that shaving, faithfulness, and even making the bed every day helps keep me centered. My father was a good man and worked hard, but he was so emotionally distant that he was a stranger sometimes, whereas Mom was always there, right or wrong. Peterson’s premise seems flawed and geared to the emotionally adolescent, but if he helps you get out of bed every day, more power to you. I’m happy not needing to spend any money on his book, lectures or Skype sessions.
12
The tone of this article seems very acidic about Peterson and his ideas, but it never actually addresses the content of these ideas. And correct me if I'm wrong, but I can't escape the feeling that it attempts to frame him having designed his own bedspread or having hokey presents from relatives as negative things, which is just the world in reverse to me.
21
I can't help but find Jordan Peterson to be a product of Newtonian physics - the opposite and equally absurd whiplash against social justice warriors bemoaning the oppression of inauthentic college cafeteria foods and other people's Halloween costumes.
In short, on the right and left we've ended up with cultural absurdity. We've drifted from reason and science to tribal affiliation and emotion. I hope we return to our enlightenment roots before it's too late.
9
I’ve listed to and watched about a hundred hours of Mr. Peterson’s talks and lectures and this article doesn’t represent him accurately. It picks out parts of what he says and mixes that with the article writer’s paraphrasing of what she thinks he’s saying and paints a negative picture of him that’s not accurate in my opinion. I advise people who want to really get to know who Mr. Peterson really is to go watch his videos in full context instead of consuming this reporters chewed-up-and-mixed-with-her-worldview version of him. You’ll see what I mean within an hour or two once you reach around this reporter and look at the primary sources for yourself. I do appreciate seeing how some people view him though, which is what I got from this article. In my opinion, this article tells me more about its author than it does Mr. Peterson.
42
Thank you. You said everything that needed to be said about this article and about Mr. Peterson. This was not the balanced, curious, exploratory reporting we’re accustomed to from the Times.
10
Thanks. And I misspelled listened as listed. :| Luckily people can go directly to primary sources these days.
I don't know enough about him to say how much I agree, but he seems to be onto something judging by his following.
I think there is a problem in modern society with ill defined roles for people. Not everyone is a fully developed dynamo who knows what they want in life and tenaciously go after it.
Ever since the advent of birth control pills and the sexual revolution, what used to be strict gender roles in society based on biologic inevitability has become much more open and up to the user to decide. That is an undeniable good. But there is a flip side (no offense). It leaves a lot of young men unsure of how to behave. There are biological (and social) imperatives that cannot be ignored for long, or else they express themselves in uncontrolled ways.
I think this may be part of what Dr. Peterson is getting at. He is probably taking extreme positions, because you have to to be heard in the media fray. But I think it is wrong to label him anti-feminist and ignore him. His ideas are worth consideration.
9
I disagree with this "He is the stately looking, pedigreed voice for a group of culture warriors who are working diligently to undermine mainstream and liberal efforts to promote equality." I want to be a person of balance and reason and I do not see Dr. Peterson as trying to undermine equality.
22
Thank you. I agree with you about balance. I am drawn to Peterson but I still have questions. I like that he uses myth and literature as sources of knowledge, but wonder about a jungian approach. I also don’t know what he means by enforced in enforced polygamy. I don’t trust Nellie Bowles who makes it sound coercive, but it still sounds threatening. Peterson has said that he always feared saying the wrong thing as he knows he has many opponents out to get him. Other posters suggest he didn’t mean it as Bowles makes it out. I will look into it more.
2
Equal opportunity between the sexes, or between the races, seems to be morally justified. Affirmative action efforts are sometimes justified, even when they appear to promote the less qualified, in order to make up for unfair advantages some applicants may have had over other applicants to schools or other positions. But in some cases, for example, men are more qualified than women due to nature and evolution. Sports is just an example. Equality may be the goal, but, if so, why are there separate men and women’s tennis tournaments? Clearly, there are differences among the sexes. Strength and speed are attributes that males, in general, have more of than women. So, because men have superior strength and speed, a truly open US Open Tennis Tournament, for example, does not exist. If equality is the goal, shouldn’t something be done to improve women’s speed and strength?
1
Mr. Peterson, a bearded ectomorph, wouldn't have fared so very well in his vaunted 1950s. Having lived through that era with all the stereotypical social judging, he'd have little gravitas among the silent majority & would probably have been a liberal, his intellectual inclinations taking an entirely different course.
The best advice he could offer young men seeking "agreeable & compliant" women would be to wait for the woman to make the first move. Generally speaking, this would save a lot of grief & allow for a more affable introduction to feminism, which would invariably occur over time.
3
If we waited for women to make the move in romantic relationships, we sure better be patient folks with a life expectancy double current figures.
3
The incel fails because he plays over his head in regard to physical appearance, intellect & feminine mystic quotient in our liberated society. There can be a bit of the incel in all of us men. The thing that separates us from the losers & psychos is never biting off more than one can chew.
It seems to always be the two extremes that are reported on, appealing to the good vs. evil, black vs. white, best vs. worse emotion. In this case though, it’s patriarchy vs. humanity, just as it’s often feminism vs. humanity. Is there no middle ground where people can simply be valued, or devalued, for their character in how they treat other people? Conflict is created to force men to believe they must behave in certain ways to prove their manliness and inherent superiority. That dominant behavior diminishes both men and women. With humane & rational discussion, there’s no need for any groups to wrench their hands over what their losing simply by virtue of being a particular gender. It’s understandable that some of those who’ve actually been oppressed because of gender, race, sexual orientation, etc. feel that extreme actions are needed to right the wrongs, which gives rise to “activists” who manipulate emotions for profit. These aren’t conflicts that need to have a victor declared. Common, acceptable, middle ground has to be found, or the conflicts will continue to be unending.
5
Sadly he makes a very good living spewing this divisive rhetoric.
And Trump is very successful taking the short road to hell (on earth, I'm not religious).
What is to become of us all!
9
Listen to a bit of Jordan Peterson. If you listen with an open yet critical mind, you'll start to notice that he makes very little specific points. I personally believe he's intentionally vague: no one can actually argue against anything that he's said as he says specifically very little. He meanders around critiquing vague things that neo-marxists or post-modernists have supposedly done, but he's never stupid enough to actually say "women should listen to men" or "stop affirmative action".
If you're tempted to buy into his judgments of liberal college faculties like Women's Studies or Afro American Studies (to name a few), just remember that he's spending his energies attacking the (mostly powerless) victims, not the powerful movers of our country.
13
No woman is responsible for your behavior. if you don't have boundaries you become what you're trying to fight against.
11
Imagine, if you will, a white man making the argument that "white people test things, black people test white people" or trying to posit that hierarchies of competence naturally exist, and it would be foolhardy to try to impose means of overcoming them, therefore we should consider the fact that "white people have most of the power because they're just more competent." Now imagine that in the same breath this white man tries to claim that he is in no way implying that white men are superior, just, you know, maybe we shouldn't question the fact that white people are in charge.
I mean, come on, would anyone besides white supremacists and crypto-racists defend that person? Why are so many people trying to make these views mainstream? Can men not understand why having a man impose these boxes on them is sickening?
26
Race and gender is hardly comparable since one actually biologically affects how we act and think and the other does not, and he's not saying men are more competent than women he's saying the people in charge are likely there for a good reason no matter who they are
1
Dear Random person,
You made my point for me. While many of us don't consider race to be a valid point by which to discriminate against someone or put them in boxes, it is still perfectly acceptable and - as shown here - justifiable to do so based on gender. There is not proof that being a woman makes you think and act differently from a man. And yet here we are. Thanks.
1
"He is the stately looking, pedigreed voice for a group of culture warriors who are working diligently to undermine mainstream and liberal efforts to promote equality."
If you know anything about Dr. Peterson, this it utterly untrue and irresponsible.
If you can't see that men are under attack, you're blind. Women can strike, accuse, and berate men with no consequences.
3rd wave feminism does not want equality, it wants tyranny.
Men are taught that they are bad and that their ancestors were bad, and no matter how many advances women have made, we keep hearing "We still have a long way to go."
Feminism is like the war on drugs and the war on terrorism. The goal is not to win, or achieve equality. The goal is to continue the the war on men.
But the mask has come off, thanks to men like Dr. Peterson. The internet has allowed men to expose the lies of 3rd wave feminism. We are shining a light on the hypocrisy and it does not stand up to scrutiny.
It's not about equality. It's about tyranny.
15
Ah, another opportunity to reflect on the sufferings of men who need women to clean up after them all day while reflecting on how superior those excellent men are.
Nobody guarantees anyone a lover, Mr. Peterson.
You've got to figure out what turns people on.
25
It occurs to me that most of the great con artists have been men. Can it be because they are just naturally better at it?
16
Jordan Peterson is a classic American mountebank in the Ayn Rand mould. It's not to say he shares her views. It is to say he has pursued roughly the same strategy to comically outsized acclaim: trick out something pedestrian as a philosophy, and lather it up in high-sounding, obscurantist nonsense that could mean anything and nothing. Then, just wait for people who wish to fancy themselves philosophical, but who don't wish to do the work of becoming so, to both embrace your "philosophy" and to become your most strident defenders. Because once they become sure they understand you, their sense of their own (unearned) intellectual distinction now derives vitally and organically from your own.
Peterson dresses up picayune wisdom in Jungian gobbledygook with the same fraudulent derring-do with which Rand hung a high-sounding name (objectivism) on ordinary selfishness and dubbed it a philosophy. And even if we men were willing to embrace his commitment to the patriarchy, do we really want such a slight, bird-chested fellow as the spokesman for it? A question to ponder. Another: do the country's lazy ever tire of being bamboozled by knaves?
34
The most intelligent conversations are been had in the comments section. This hit piece is all wrong but my faith in humanity is restored while reading the comments.
16
The only revolution that is relevant to Peterson’s arguments is the greatest revolution of all: Birth Control. Patriarchy began its inevitable crumble at its inception. And there is no going back. Men want birth control as much as women do. That’s the irony.
It is a dangerous intellect that misappropriates Jungian psychology and uses it to entrench the fluid human story line. Chaos is feminine? This is carved in stone exactly where? With the advent of reliable birth control our story has changed. Should Peterson even be a licensed psychologist?
10
This article just does not reflect the complexity of Jordan Peterson's ideas. It does more: it misrepresents is. I tell my students every year: don't assume that someone you disagree with is a bad person. See if someone is really concerned about the issues he or she is addressing. Then discuss.
A shame, NY Times.
26
He’s up there crying on stage? Reminds me of Jimmy Swaggart.
8
It's bizarre guys like Trump and Jordan Peterson, who are sort of anti-Gary Coopers who would not have been thought of as manly even 10 years ago, are now these champions of supposed traditional masculinity (the championing of which seems to involve a lot of whining.)
14
Jordan Peterson preaches truth in a world which can no longer recognize it. The natural order of things as been reversed. The world is quickly coming to an end with the dramatic drop in birthrates. Our society has become feminist, materialistic and weak. The solution is for men to once again become responsible and reassert their control over society and return to God.
3
What a bizarre assessment, we should be like the president then?
6
My interpretation is that Peterson is not suggesting that marriage be forced upon women but that monogamy be enforced in society. That’s why he says, “This is why monogamy emerges.” In polygamous societies, who is the “winner”? It’s the high-status men. They get a lion’s share of the women. Meantime, the other men are left with a potential dating pool where there isn't a woman for every man.
I don’t think Peterson would ever remotely endorsed state-sponsored redistribution of women for the Incels.
That said, his lack of criticism toward this group (which would certainly benefit from some of Peterson’s hard knocks) is noticeable. I suspect his motivations are hardly more complex than Patreon numbers. These people are his rabid fans. Somehow I doubt the nuances are what they’re hearing and he’s too busy profiting to correct them.
10
I have a favorable view of Peterson, but you may be right that he doesn’t want to decry the incels point blank. The only group he directly attacks is the postmodernists on college campuses, and he has a point there.
Ok, ok... its venom, to be sure, but I'm not sure that I agree with the goal of JP's argument for socially-enforced monogamy... if a lot of women have children by a few extra desirable men, won't that improve the average male population? Isn't this natural selection at work? The next generation will be comprised of a lot more desirable males and the problem will actually fix itself in time. Enforcing weak strains to propagate is bad for the species.
There is no such thing as a right to sex. The idea is preposterous. An individual's rights supersede another's. Nobody owes you sex unless you're in a legal brothel and you paid in advance.
13
Noneya, clever point, but Peterson’s effort is to lift these male losers up so that women would consider them.
I'm a liberal and a Jordan Peterson fan. I want to applaud the writer for making an honest attempt to characertize Mr Peterson's personality and "representative" fans.
There are several other parts of the article where I'm really reading about Nellie's idology and beliefs, not Jordan's.
1. The headline calls him the custodian of the patriarchy. If you put that question to Jordan Peterson, he would not call himself a custodian of the patriarchy. So we're already getting this framed as pro vs anti patriarchy which is Nellie's framing, not Jordan's.
2. "The left, he believes, refuses to admit that men might be in charge because they are better at it." (Nellie's writing) Jordan is quoted immediately after and it's not at all what he said. Again we're reading Nellie's ideology, not Jordan's.
3. “Half the men fail,” he says, meaning that they don’t procreate. “And no one cares about the men who fail.”
I laugh, because it is absurd."
Nellie's laughing because she's not well informed. Here's a NYTimes article that summarizes the science for why we have more female ancestors than male: https://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/09/05/the-missing-men-in-your-...
Even as a Jordan Peterson fan, the comment about enforced monogamy is silly and backward. He correctly pointed out a problem but obviously that's not a remedy.
I really wish there were more good faith efforts to understand the ideads being put forth here before pen was put to paper.
15
Essentially, this hierarchical argument is, if we men don’t feel like we are on top, then we will make you pay. And it’s not our fault because God or nature or DNA made us do it. So rather than taking responsibility for our thoughts and feelings and actions, we are going to hand that over to you. Well, Mr. Peterson, the world is full of men like that—the most successful ones are called dictators, and they love the feeling of having slaughtered the masses of people who don’t respect them. They gain money and power and get crazier and crazier. Hmm. Look within. Sounds, from this article, as though the same thing is happening to you. Male human dominance is destroying the planet. Wake up!
21
Why is it that when a woman comes along and empowers women to be there best and call men the problem the left celebrates it?
But when a man comes along and empowers young men it's an issue?
Peterson has been helpful in guiding many men away from nilihistic tendencies and apathy and somehow that is bad?
Acknowledging that men and women are generally different is bad?
Why does the left want to destroy society to remake it in some social experiment? Western culture has created wonderful, powerful, smart people who have changed the human race for the better.
Why do leftists want to destroy something that is working better than any prior system / organizing of society ever has?
Sure our system isn't perfect but nothing should change fast, and now, just because you feel it should. Feelings don't matter against facts. Feelings are not superior to reality. And your subjective reality doesn't trump true reality.
Why does the left, usually young adults, think they can change reality before they have even figured out who they are? And why are some people encouraging it?
Clean your own room before you go around trying to muck up the rest of our world.
7
Becuase when women empower other women to be their best, they don't say women have to put down men. Whereas this enforced mongamy claptrap and other assorted sexist remarks make it clear that a return to the 1950s means women will experience a return to the kitchen, rapes by husbands and lack of job opportunities. Sorry, but I'll take a hard pass.
6
In our fiercely polarized public culture, it seems necessary to categorize and label any new voice thrown up by our increasingly uncontrolled online media culture as liberal or conservative, feminist or misogynist, good or bad for our side.
Unfortunately, this is difficult with a phenomenon like Jordan Peterson, whose complex thoughts and obviously widespread appeal is hard to assess and appreciate or ignore.
I can understand why the writer of this article and many commenters want to pin the "misogynist" label on Peterson and be done with him. But, whether you agree with him or don't, especially based on this article, I believe that would be a mistake, that it misses the complexity and significance of what he is saying.
Peterson started out as a YouTube personality so an easy way to learn a bit more about his thoughts on men and women is to him talking about them with Camille Paglia.
Here is a link to a hour and 43 minute YouTube video that has been viewed 1.3 million times: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-hIVnmUdXM
For a shorter 14 minute segment between the two specifically on differences between men and women, see this link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=im_tfMXzrAs
Take the luxury in the privacy of your own space, at least the first time, to try watching without trying pigeonhole the speakers or their thoughts as either "for us" or "against us." There's plenty of time for that.
13
Everything old is new again. In the late 1800s, Edward Clarke used 'science' to prove that it was dangerous to educate women, because it would interfere with their gynecological processes. His book sold millions and gave credence to an entire generation of men who were worried about women rising up and becoming equals. There will always be someone to cash in on societal insecurity with specious science; Peterson looks to be gunning for it
15
Jordan Peterson is not the custodian of the Patriarchy. He never claims it, nor does he defend any particular ideology. He has never once said that women should "just behave". Pointing out the hard science of gender differences (and similarities), the data which shows how gender differences maximize the more governments and groups attempt egalitarian solutions, and how the progressive movements of today which the New York Times and many readers support use identity politics dangerously similar to the totalitarian ideologies of the 20th Century is obviously too much for some to countenance. Thus the intentional obfuscation of this article clothed in the veneer of truth. However, data, rational thought, and history will be an ever constant obstacle to the postmodernists and progressives...thankfully so.
12
Fascinating to see the lengths that white men will go to to "prove" that the system that gives them the lion's share of the benefits is the result of some natural phenomenon. It must terrify them that so many are waking up to the con that they will no longer be able to count on being at the top of the hierarchy.
12
Karen, so i am a white man and you say white men go to lengths for the lions share. I’m entitled, you would say. But if I were to say that you as a woman are too emotional to work out a reasoned informed argument about Peterson, you would be offended and call me a misogynist. So let’s read and listen closely, get informed, and not deal in stereotypes. What do you say?
@Richard: Nobody in her right mind will listen to you until you lose that tone of patronizing condescension you employ to put down women who are angry about their civil rights being questioned and attacked.
How would you feel if some female professor said that women should be at the top of the hierarchy, because they are more competent, and therefore it is more natural that women should dominate men? You wouldn't scoff? You'd just meekly accept it?
What if she said that men ought to be more fairly distributed among women? Wouldn't you wonder why your autonomy, your choice, is being overlooked?
What if you didn't want to get married, but this professor was telling women that they have a right to your body, anyway, just because women shouldn't be denied sex?
What if you wanted a job, but everyone around you kept telling you that you'd be much happier staying at home and raising children? Wouldn't you wonder what happened to your ability to determine your own fate?
The problem with this whole debate is that many of the men here still talk about women as if we were some kind of object or commodity that can be shifted from one owner to another (women are "distributed" among alpha males, while other men don't "get" any). It's as if we had no autonomy, no thoughts, and no desires of our own. We are still being debated only as we relate to men, and not as human beings in our own right. I am sick of being discussed as if I were part of a monolith called "women."
1
There is a shift in our society as there are now, for the first time in the history of the world far more men than women. This means women can be more selective and many of my gender, male, are finding that they are not appealing to the opposite sex. Men who are rude obnoxious no longer can look forward to finding women as partners.
5
One thing the Left has consistently failed to acknowledge: the more they protest and criticize a person, the more popular and influential that person will become. Many are starting to recognize that the left is not acting in good faith. In fact, I would go so far as to say that the left wants to to silence all voices that do not worship at the same ideological altar.
In short - this article will help Peterson sell more books. Until progressives learn to embrace the diversity of ideas, their influence in shaping public opinion will be almost non-existent.
7
As an old straight white male I don’t see the kind of oppression of my gender that he describes. But then I’ve always tried to treat people fairly and with respect based on their behavior and character. That probably explains why I’ve had such a different experience.
9
Articles such as this one are an ideal format for taking on Peterson because the writer can express Peterson's views selectively and he has no opportunity to answer for himself. I have seen him take on opponents (because that is indeed what the present author is) in public, and he spends much of his time correcting their misinterpretations of what he is saying. I wonder whether I would share the observation of the author that Petersen was "looking ashen and stricken"; it certainly does not seem characteristic of him. And I would be eager to hear his responses to the positions that she attributes to him. I don't think he would take kindly to the suggestion that he "dragged his university into controversy" by expressing a personal view on proposed Canadian legislation.
Peterson excels at responding in real time to ideologically-driven attacks, as some interviewers have found to their sorrow. I am disappointed that the format of this article does not permit us the opportunity to see him do so. But I am sure that we shall see some response from him, and I look forward to it.
17
In other words, he's a performer who can't communicate clearly outside of performances that he controls. And doesn't have the self insight to clarify his points to reporters.
11
kJ, you really think you can attribute the caricature of a public intellectual here to Peterson’s inability to clarify himself to Bowles? She was a taperecorder simply transcribing his ideas, appearance, etc? And he just told her he was a “hoary” white patriarch? In the aforementioned interview cathy Newman, the interviewer was in charge, she was in control and she tried to absolutely misrepresent him. He corrected her at every turn. Please go to YouTube and see.
Jordan Peterson thinks that Civil Discourse should be more civil. I agree with him. He says that the country is too polarized. I agree with him. Years ago, the wonderful Dr Warren Farrell wrote a book entitled, "Why Men Are The Way They Are" and essentially postulated that men are socialized the way they are because women made them that way. I agree with that too. The idea that there are reasons why find ourselves in our current state socially and politically, that there's a long trajectory that can help us understand the context of the current state of affairs is valid. The idea that identity politics and gender politics while well intentioned may have unfortunate side effects that is also valid.
I can understand a woman recoiling at some of Jordan's positions, but he makes a lot of sense, as did Joseph Campbell before him. If the writer wants to discredit Dr Peterson's message I'm not buying it. I think Peterson holds an important position in the current political and social discourse.
17
I hope it is obvious that JP is performing triage and addressing what he perceives as the most pressing problem first - that of straightening out the male psyche. Of course he has messages as well for other classifications of people and culture. Give it time.
9
His art choices are so unnerving I find myself thinking he is a very intelligent man filled up with a sublime anger.
7
@Elizabeth: Yup, I was thinking the same thing. This guy is consumed by anger and sadness, and has no clue that he is dominated by his own emotional immaturity. That he thinks he represents order, while women are chaos (as someone else pointed out, where is that written in stone?) is laughable.
Too bad people are taken in by these types of charlatans, but then, our society is full of lazy people who don't want to do any hard thinking or hard work on themselves, or make any significant changes in their behavior or attitudes.
They expect others to come up with solutions for them that will allow them to continue just as they are. They want a group that reinforces their immaturity and makes them dependent on authority. And so they wind up safe in the arms of a cult that makes money off of their laziness, whether it's the Republican party or Jordan Peterson's youtube page.
6
Shouldn't art unnerve you?
2
I don’t agree with anything this guy says. In fact I don’t even know what he says, other than what was reported in the article. But I understand the backlash to metoo and the movement he’s a part of. Men used to be able rant about this stuff on (apolitical) talk radio, and the hosts were given free reign. Guys repeated sexist/ homophobic jokes to their buddies and everyone had a laugh and didn’t think twice about it. Now those kinds of shows are off the air and you can’t put down groups of people without thinking twice about it.
These poor men who just want to feel better than someone else have found an outlet for their frustration in the form of Mr. Peterson, Dave Rubin, and all the other people profiting off this niche.
5
It's more likely that he provides an antidote to the distortions of liberalized, dystopian thought processes.
The reason liberals hate him is the fact he can back up what he says with the history of civil behavior and psychological studies. Liberals, on the other hand, like to invent their own history and "memes" to create their own reality. Kind of the "round peg in a square hole" ideology.
5
"I don’t agree with anything this guy says. In fact I don’t even know what he says, other than what was reported in the article."
This is one of JP's points. That people are against things with no factual knowledge of what they are against.
6
I'm an adult male science professor with no need for Jordan Peterson. He makes assertions without evidence or data. His conclusions cannot follow from the data, because there is no data. For those interested in thoughtful reviews of this his work, I highly recommend reading the one star reviews of 12 rules for life at Amazon. These reviewers are not angry, or ignorant. They are more accurately described as disappointed at the lack of scientific rigor. Finally, my biggest disappointment is that so many people seem to be unable to use critical thinking to distinguish Peterson's speculative theories from evidence based conclusions.
35
The NYT should be able to do a lot better than this . A writer who has to turn their subject into a cartoon character before they write critically about them suggests they were not up to the task of dealing with the complexity of the subject . There is lots in what Peterson says that can be criticized and questioned but it takes had work because , unlike the cartoon character presented in the article ,he is knowledgeable ,thoughtful , nuanced and articulate . He raises important questions about currently popular assumptions that are at least worthy of serious consideration .
34
I have heard Jordan Peterson speak on a number of podcasts and I agree with some of his views in that individuals need to be accountable for their behaviour and take control of their lives. There appears to be a contradiction in his rhetoric however, in that by empowering people (men in particular) to regain control of their lives he is also suggesting that they are victims of a liberal, pc society that is out of control. How can one be a victim and a hero simultaneously?
I agree that being forced to use particular pronouns and the sensitives associated in addressing people have become absurd, however I find Peterson's focus on gender to be redundant, as both men and women have their challenges and to single out the genders only serves to increase division.
Not everybody should procreate, thus to encourage everybody to do so is not only irresponsible but stupid. The reason why so many people are miserable is because they had parents who did not think carefully enough before procreating and were unable to provide the necessary resources and knowledge to ensure a prosperous life. Procreation is a private matter between the individuals involved and should be something that is carefully considered. rather than a matter of duty or purpose. Peterson is completely backwards when it comes to this topic and it is difficult to take him seriously when he diverges on this tangent.
12
The beauty of Peterson is not that he's an outstanding humanist, a caring clinical psychologist, a devoted public intellectual, and extremely hard working, though all of these descriptors are true. The beauty of Peterson is that he does not follow, he leads, and in doing so he sticks his neck out and leaves it there. He can, because he never bs's (that defined as "making it up as you go along").
So he does have a clear point of view that can be attacked by those who disagree, as we see here. This is of course a mark of a valuable contributor to public discourse, the sort of person we need more of, and in volume. His shtick is "rabid truth teller who swings from deep study of a wide body of classics." In that regard he reminds me of Christopher Hitchens, who also ran afoul of the virulent liberal mob for standing up for serious values that were deeply placed in his heart.
I constantly disagree with Peterson on points of interpretation of literature and history and hence very often question his thinking. But he always teaches, because he always thinks before he speaks and backs up what he says with references. Never once have I sensed him trying to bamboozle anyone, ie take a shortcut to a conclusion in order to pander or earn a buck. Nellie Bowles not only does not quite understand Peterson's message she's unwilling to, because she'd have to seriously question her post modern prejudices about gender and identity.
20
ALL he does is bamboozle and take shortcuts. He's the most dishonest scholar out there. Case in point: lobsters. Lobsters have hierarchy, therefore hierarchy is natural, therefore the patriarchy is natural? That is the hugest shortcut ever. Does he think that there is only one kind of social hierarchy? Does he think that humans are just like lobsters (um, humans have culture, lobsters do not). It's patently absurd. Evolutionary psychology is fake science. He's a fake scientist.
7
You jumped from hierarchy to patriarchy not him he says hierarchys based on competency is natural not based on gender orbrace
1
Women symbolize the non-rational ("chaos") because the womb is the origin of the greatest mystery of life: the emergence of new human being, a being that cannot be explained by masculine reason.
6
People of quality aren't threatened by others seeking equality. Mr. Peterson and his acolytes abhor the very notion of social parity between the sexes and that's all we really need to know about them.
19
Well said.
1
What is one thing he's said or done that doesn't support equality?
2
Be careful of those who seek to cultivate their personality - by projecting a particular image ("retro clothes and phrases"), by creating iconography (lobsters), by promoting pithy sayings, slogans, or mottos - because these types of heroes will lead you to the eventuality of a steamy Guyanese jungle or a small-town Texan inferno.
While I understand many of his points (if simplistic), while I think he is clever and educated (if disingenuous), and while I can empathize with his followers' admiration (if misplaced), it is clear from watching many of his talks that he has the shark-eyed stare of someone who sees his audience as merely a mirror to his own self-righteous, self-perceived greatness.
34
"Violent attacks are what happens when men do not have partners, and society needs to work to make sure those men are married." Mr. Peterson fails to address the fact that many men (albeit some women) are violent within the marriage, sometimes to the extreme. So how he can suggest that marriage is somehow a solution for violence perpetrated by men? It is so clearly untrue.
43
Men are accountable for their own actions, not society. As a man I’m insulted by the way JP portrays men as feeble and weak.
15
There seems to be a pattern emerging: Jordan Peterson is an example of someone asking that issues be thought about with respect for their full complexity, only to be misunderstood by those unable or unwilling to think beyond the simplicity that makes them comfortable. Even worse, he is caught in the polarization that reduces mere simplicity to either-or dichotomies. Speaking in favor of masculinity makes him automatically in favor of the existing patriarchy, when in fact he is in favor or a radical redefinition of masculinity.
37
I honestly think that if the commenters on this article decided to look his channel up on youtube, they'd rather quickly see that his ideas aren't THAT off the rails
2
There appear to be parallels to other ignominious ideologies, like the white supremacy movement which justifies its need and right to exist by referencing a combination of highly flawed / ugly history in which white men enslaved people of color and ancient religious texts written written by white men when the world was considered flat. That "truth" that Jordan Peterson chooses to interpret in religious writings and fairy tales written exclusively by men, certainly lends some comforting, non-threatening familiarity to his arguments but he omits a fair amount of despicable behaviors and outcomes favoring men and disparaging women. In truly free societies, gender roles are not permanently constricted by historic norms and should be free to evolve. Gender fluidity and dynamism poses a psychological threat to only the most insecure minds and those who fear change and individual growth. As an academic with a background in psychology, Mr. Peterson's unorthodox views certainly prove that not all academics possess open minds and some seek comfort and familiarity in an imperfect past to validate their own gender insecurities.
21
I can't believe that you gave this outrage of a person all this pen and ink. I wish I'd never read it or heard of him.
35
Do you think by not reading him or hearing of him he will just go away? That’s the ostrich method.
4
It infuriated me too but it’s better to know that people like this exist rather than to pretend that everyone thinks as you do. The more you know, the better prepared you are to address it.
6
I kind of wish you hadn't read it either, because it's fake news. He's... not that outrageous, not in the slightest.
2
A wonderfully scathing review of this silly man's book ("12 Rules") is written by Richard Poplak in The Johannesburg Review of Books: "Imagine a self-help book written by the Darth Maul of tenured campus bad boys, an act of trahison des clercs so severe that it calls into question the entire five-thousand-year academic project—a book that seeks to make accessible to a general audience a mélange of mysticism, philosophy, psychology and dietary recommendations, assembled into a package so intellectually low-cal that it would be hilarious were it not basically a to-do list for a generation of tiki torch-wielding neo-Klansmen." Could not have said it better.
60
I'm grappling with something about Jordan Peterson: I find him extremely intelligent and compelling as a thinker in ways I haven't felt since Christopher Hitchens was around. However, I get troubled when he doesn't clarify as strongly as he should that his ideas are sensible and empowering for men AND women. Too often, those questioning him see this gleefully as confirmation he is for men only.
Also I'm wondering if the writer feels emboldened to marginalize Jordan Peterson because he is a man? I can't imagine someone writing such a smug piece about someone like Camille Paglia, who is completely simpatico with Peterson.
51
I wouldn’t waste anymore time than this comment on Paglia. She is not an intellectual or an academic. She has always been a performance “artiste” way before You Tube. Peterson hit his performance phase with You Tube.
2
Mr. Peterson has stopped helping others (leaving his private psychology practice and his professorship) and has started helping himself to the hard earned money of every insecure rube he can convince. Capitalism requires rubes so that charlatans like Mr. Peterson can become wealthy.
Caveat emptor, bros!
33
that's kind of unfair isn't it? we live in a capitalist society so it's not like it's some kind of sin?
also maybe he believes he can help more people this way.
7
Our society is an admixture of capitalism and socialism, the components of which ebb and flow with the times. Raw capitalism is not a "sin" per se, although some conduct associated with it can be unethical or even illegal. Hence, my caveat emptor warning. Peterson has discovered late in life that strange and provocative thought and language can be very lucrative given the right circumstances. He is the latest in a long line of carnival barkers.
Where to begin? So much stupid. Let us begin with the science. Lots of other animals— wolf packs, primates, etc, with hierarchies have low status non-mating males. Presumably, the exercise of female choice, and male dominance enhances the gene pool. In elephants, matriarchy is the rule. In human societies, structures have varied; polygamy, monogamy, matriarchy, patriarchy, extended and nuclear families. We are probable flexible enough in our behaviors to make all of these work, depending upon circumstances. For example, labor intensive agrarian societies need large, extended families to work the land. Societies ravaged by war will have a lower men/women ratio, and may favor polygamy as a consequence. In any case, the idea that women cannot lead, that their minds, their wills, are lesser, is silly (doesn’t this guy know any women?) and it is potentially tragic to believe so, because this devalues half of our genius and potential, and I can’t believe THAT is adaptive.
30
I can almost guarantee you will never hear him say that. Don’t take this piece as the gospel.
2
He couldn’t know much about women. Most of us wouldn’t tolerate his antiquated ideas or associate with him!
5
Jordan Peterson is not popular because he is upholding patriarchy. He is popular because he is a good philosopher and scientist who also happens to be good at holding his ground against the postmodern left, which is a toxic, pathological worldview. I'll leave it to Jordan to explain why that is. In the middle between the toxicity of radical leftism and stupidity of Trumpism, sits a group of rational intellectuals called the intellectual dark web who are sincerely and with considerable force of anger hammering the truth home. Jordan belongs to this group.
36
Please, please read and watch some of Mr. Peterson’s material before you make up your mind. I’m not going to attempt to summarize his philosophy here,but I urge all readers of this to do just a little of your own research. Don’t base your judgement on this one article, which I assure you is truly a misrepresention of Jordan Peterson.
65
Why would I waste my time reading something by a guy who thinks forced monogamy is a good idea?
Good for a laugh, maybe. But too many people take him seriously.
8
Because it would give you the chance to make your own judgement about a person, instead of blindly accepting the conclusion of another.
1
Everything about this article is disturbing. Jordan Peterson's ideas are warped and frightening. Even if political correctness has gone too far, his misogynist theories hold no insight and aren't the place to start a discussion. Peterson and his followers want women to be conscientious and agreeable. Perhaps these men who can't attract women should look to their own behavior instead of blaming women.
19
Feminists have tried to re-write the book on men and women. Why not open your mind to a male perspective on men and women? If you read him, you will see he is not misogynistic.
4
but... your last line is LITERALLY what he preaches to men... I swear, just look it up... sigh
1
"pushed out of a state of mental health by left wing bullies in their workplace", really? I might not be some high-flying cultural pooh-bah from the upper echelon of academia but I think I know rank hypocrisy when I hear it. I was under the impression that Peterson stood for the stiff upper-lip school of toxic masculinity. A snowflake by any other name would melt as quick.
21
Yet another angry young white man unleashes blood, bullets and misery with an all too easily acquired weapon... yet it is women who cause chaos?? When was the last time you saw an aggrieved woman take out her frustrations on a room full of terrified children? These wretched young men that idolize Peterson should focus on really understanding modern culture, and adapting themselves to suit it, rather than waiting for some "enforced monogamy" to end their loneliness.
35
There's a lot to unpack here. I have to say most of it comes down to proving that being educated doesn't automatically make you sane. Honestly, much of this is so ridiculous I can't even get worked up. I do note the contradiction between telling people to grow up and take responsibility, and then waxing verbose about how it's the woman's fault if men are violent; that it's her "job" to keep the man tamed through sex and by being "agreeable" :
"Violent attacks are what happens when men do not have partners, Mr. Peterson says, and society needs to work to make sure those men are married.
“He was angry at God because women were rejecting him,” Mr. Peterson says of the Toronto killer. “The cure for that is enforced monogamy. That’s actually why monogamy emerges.”
This is of course idiotic. The mindset that men can't control themselves is also an insult to men, as well as contradicts his idea that men should rule because they're "better" at it.
31
Wow! I can't believe someone still believes in the illusionary sexual dimorphism of humans! If physical masculinity confers reason and order, then all men would be reasonable and orderly. Our own personal experience of life should disprove that. To link psychological characteristics to the gender is to ignore your own uniqueness. All men would have the same set of fingerprints and all females would have the other set. The race would have died out millenia ago.
6
For those of you below who are incensed by the "Men test ideas, women test men" quote please see this video. He was quoting someone else! Excuse the group that put this video up, but you can skip to minute 5:00 and get the quote and what he says about it. Context matters.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqLtEBVkZpA
16
Wait, if context matters, how can we excuse the group that put it up?
3
Thank you, Mr. Peterson, for giving new life to the word "mountebank".
13
Many people do need to grow up.
Peterson is one of them.
If the only way men can feel successful is by suppressing women, then they are going to be disappointed.
Did women force him to decorate his home with the depressing and violent posters he seems to need to stoke his anger?
He needs to put his big-boy pants on and stop ranting and blaming women for his miserable life.
33
sigh... he never said any of that...
2
His pose says it all. No reading necessary.
8
Child, please. The masculine spirit is not under assault. I’m as heterosexual as you can get and I love an empowered woman. Peterson is selling snake oil to sad, frustrated betas who think they deserve to be alphas. No real man is victimized by a strong woman, which explains why Peterson’s little alt-right followers are.
54
This is the best comment on here! Well said.
6
He thinks the current (gender) hierarchy is predicated on ....competence??
Thanks for the laugh, Jordan Peterson. What a hilarious take on the historically inept and corrupt clown show we're witnessing.
22
“...order is masculine. Chaos is feminine.”
I thought this hogwash was dead and buried since the ‘60s. But I guess every creepy-crawly is coming out of the woodwork on Trump’s coattails, to mix metaphors.
15
So Petersen believes "men might be in charge because they are better at it."
Yup. Queen Elizabeth I, Queen Victoria, Indira Ghandi, Empress Maria Theresa, Margaret Thatcher, Pharoah Hatshepsut, Golda Meir, Angela Merkel, Catherine the Great. All just really bad at being in charge.
This guy needs to read a history book.
19
Gotta love the typical sexist hypocrisy of Petersen and his supporters. Equality of outcomes is bad, except when it's men who experience any inconvenience such as not getting laid, then it's a masculinity crisis that is for society and women to solve. Wow.
31
"In Mr. Peterson’s world, order is masculine. Chaos is feminine."
Ah. That explains a lot. Gang crime in Chicago and countless other cities? Crossdressing women with guns. Of course. Wars? Ditto, with bigger guns. Ethnic cleansing, a battle to prevent access to birth control? All done by crossdressing women. The global economic collapse? The secretly female-dominated world of banks and finance. Now I understand.
22
It is amazing that people read this article as fact. It has purposely twisted and misrepresented what Peterson has said and means. Much like the Cathy Newman BBC interview with Peterson where she twisted his every statement.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=aMcjxSThD54
21
If "unattractive" men desire gratification, why not look to "unattractive" women? Are there not female incels as well?
Or is it that "unattractive" men deserve "attractive" women?
This is all very Handmaid's Tale.
27
"[H]e makes more than $80,000 a month just on donations."
Right-wing nitwits might not be so 'economically anxious' if they stopped giving away billions to the countless grifting charlatans who prey on them.
19
Why does Mister Peterson not cite societies like India where enforced monogamy is the prevailing custom? How's that working out as far as reducing violent male crime and chaos?
21
I don't think I've ever read a better definition of "snowflake" than the followers of Jordan Peterson. These men have so little self-respect that they insist others must simply fall in for them and comply. One thing the guy is right about: they need to buck up. But the rest of this nonsense is going to lead to more of this encil horridness.
15
Mr. Peterson's victimhood model sounds as dreary as the Rush Limbaugh/Alex Jones overly adolescent model of middle aged men who scream, cry, and gossip like crones in the ye olde stories of ancient times.
Maybe read Joseph Campbell or Jung and learn that each person has male and female sensibilities that should be developed. It will save you a boatload of time whining about your mom, looking for a bullying target, or expecting women to go along with what is basically your own personal journey to just be an adult - ie without blaming everyone else and boring them to death with theatrics and bad art.
14
I am disappointed in this article. Peterson actually has a good message, too bad the author focused on making him look like freak show.
28
She brought out the truth he is hiding with his mumbo-jumbo about witches and dragons, and being neutered because women in your life are strong.
1
Short, tall, thin, fat, boorish, courteous, rich, poor, educated, uneducated, healthy, ill men have wives/sexual partners. Creeps (the minority) don’t. It’s that simple.
But Peterson says he makes about $80,000 a month from fans (creeps?).
Peterson has no evidence for his claims. Myths and fairytales are all he has, but they sell.
11
He does not sound at all well.
8
"He is the stately looking, pedigreed voice for a group of culture warriors who are working diligently to undermine mainstream and liberal efforts to promote equality."
This betrays the agenda of this entire article. What a hit job.
20
Why is a hit if it reveals the motivations behind the talk? That is what good journalism does, right?
1
You mean that the author points out how Peterson has an agenda to subjugate women and equality is a bad thing?
1
This article seems terribly one-sided. Not a thorough fleshing out of Mr. Peterson's thoughts or why people like him. It really seems like the journalist set out to prove her (negative) assumptions about him and people like him. I don't believe this is good journalism.
26
How so? The journalist is almost entirely quoting Peterson.
1
Really? Have you ever heard of ripping something out of context?
Reductionist nonsense that proves once again that the world is filled with lost souls, and there are always gurus willing to take their money.
12
Well, it just goes to show that there's a sucker born every minute. The back to the '50's fantasies of these luckless souls have been commoditized, so that frauds like Jordan Peterson can cash in on their perceived suffering . Mr. Peterson is the newest celebrity member of the roadshow of outrage. Ask Laura Ingraham, Ann Coulter, and the obsequious courtiers of the Fox News network. Outrage, sincere or otherwise, sells.
I wonder, who's the bigger fool. The one that leads or the one that follows.
9
This sounds a bit like Scientology. And, it appears to also be profitable. Men who can't attract a woman flock to this "guru" who tells them the system is wrong and that it couldn't possibly be that they have zero social skills.
10
Boy, I feel sorry for this poor guy. Bitter, frail, hyper-sensitive, -- "unmasculine" to presumably put it in his terms -- evidently his feelings have been hurt very deeply over the years by various pronouns, liberals, and feminists et. al., and he has turned his accumulated grief into a second career of whining about it. These "men" who follow him need to move out of their parents' basements and show some character. Crying on Peterson's shoulder, as he himself cries on theirs', is not going to improve their prospects one bit...
14
Peterson thinks "order is masculine, chaos is feminine" -- but if women are needed to keep men happy and content and, oh I don't know, NOT shooting up schools or driving down crowded sidewalks, wouldn't that make women key to peace and order by soothing men's chaotic impulses?
9
There is something deeply malevolent about the simultaneous rise of Peterson, the Incel movement, 4chan misogyny, our election of a sexist playboy to the White House, and his subsequent attacks on women’s reproductive rights. The New York Times is absolutely right to be covering this. Ladies, connect the dots—and VOTE.
14
They got to get it done.
We should mock and mischaracterize this man or else people might listen to what he's actually saying. The New York Times does a really good job of this. We must maintain control of the narrative.
11
I think Peterson misses his mommy; and if all women would just be like his mommy, and take care of all these boys/men with "issues", all would be right with the world, again. Ah, but were Freud still with us for a take on Peterson.
Selling boys/men the idea that it's their "right", their biological imperative to dominate women is a very dangerous game to play: we're not going back in the broom closet (unless we choose to) nor pretending we "fell down the stairs".
If the message, the answer to "what does it mean and take to be a man" is: conquer a/your woman, then things are going to get a lot worse for men.
8
“I think Peterson misses his mommy; and if all women would just be like his mommy, and take care of all these boys/men with "issues", all would be right with the world, again.”
Or like the perfect mummy he and these guys wish they had. At the root of both “mom as saint”
delusions is a refusal to see women. As. Human.
3
He sounds deranged to a degree. But he is dangerous, very dangerous, Alek Minassian dangerous. The intense worldwide backlash against gender equality and women's rights is worrying by itself, and because it empowers the extreme-right everywhere.
11
Big blowback backslash on the part of an unhappy, frustrated man. Making lots of money, too. Lobster any time he wants it..
5
Gilead, here we come!
5
The only substantive difference between Peterson and his fellow misogynist trump is that the former projects a veneer of intellectualism.
8
It's not shocking that his fans as interviewed seems to consist sold of men who are scared of women, men who can't meet women, men who are mad because they get told off for saying offensive things, and a homophobic woman.
That's pretty much a concise summation of the Jordan Peterson audience.
8
As a secure liberal man, I can confidently say that Peterson and his fans are pathetic.
Boy, it is EASY to get anywhere in the modern West bemoaning the fact that men and boys are "lost." Or play to the pity party that many men have had forever- namely that they can't get laid.
Western society is only about 50 years into a modern age where it is even possible for women to attain something more than a good marriage. It so happens that this has dovetailed with economic stagnation, income inequality, and a loss of the manly industrial jobs that used to allow a guy to be the sole breadwinner.
So Peterson takes various threads and plays to his audience's self pity- "You've been done wrong by all these changes." It's not simply the valid causes and outcomes. He mixes a complicated situation with an easy target: if women were in traditional roles, everything would be easier for dudes. Well, yeah...but how does that work for women?
Oh, all the Peterson apologists quickly refute that he plays to anyone's moping- "His first rule is stand up for yourself!" Okay, fair enough. So what's the problem with women who stand up for THEMSELVES, including choosing not to sleep with guys that they don't want to and taking jobs that might squeeze out other men? Um, if his message is all about self-respect and determination, what's the problem with women doing as they please?
19
I have read Peterson's work and find it quite compelling. It seems like most of the negative comments are by well meaning readers of the New York Times who assume that this article must be a reasonable summary of his views. But it's not. I don't agree with everything Peterson writes or says, but this article is simply a hit piece. The reactions are akin to Trump losing his mind over something Fox and Friends misconstrues to fit his worldview. Just because the writer is appealing to our liberal/progressive/feminist viewpoint(s) doesn't mean she has been fair or accurate.
25
How can it be a hit piece when it describes vertabim what this guy says, thinks, writes, wears, and how he acts? It's a mirror and if it's not flattering (or is ridiculous), that's just reflective of Jordan himself.
13
There is an excellent article in Wired Magazine, “Sam Harris and the Myth of the Perfect Rational Thought.” Harris and Peterson are both placed in the Intellectual Dark Web group, so the excellent points made by the Wired article apply to both.
I wonder how Peterson really feels about that “incel” murderer who just happened to strike in his own sweet unaggressive country. Does he feel even a twinge of responsibility, or is he pleased by what he sees as affirmation? Something tells me he’s pleased, and that makes him worse than deplorable.
No. I don’t have to question how my feminism has created this vile backlash. The future is ours.
This article was excellently written, by the way. Sly and insightful.
14
It takes real work to purposefully misinterpret Jordan Peterson. I think it's very refreshing for someone to expose our current debates over gender and fairness to both Science and Tradition, which is exactly what he's doing, and the consensus that the Times likes to push doesn't hold up well.
How hard is it to listen to a person and begin with the assumption that he's not some dark totalitarian??
16
The author simply followed the subject around and reported what he said, asked and answered questions, and did not say that Peterson is a 'dark totalitarian', however from what he's reported to have said, his views, esp. on women, jive with those of Mussolini.
1
The real story here is a very old one: obscure, mediocre academic with few achievements to his name finds a niche peddling obnoxious, recycled provocations that will bait and rile enough people to make him some money and give him his 15 minutes in the spotlight. We can't do much about his profiting off gullible and frustrated men; if they're seduced by his authoritative, condescending voice, he'll have the last laugh on them. But we can refrain from offering him the respectability of a real thinker, much less a philosopher. He's one in a long line of intellectual con men with a gimmick, and just because he takes -- or pretends to take -- himself seriously doesn't mean anyone else has to.
20
Totally agree with Ace. Peterson's a drop out, depressive who wants someone, anyone, to edit his sentences. How did he respond to a critical review in The New York Review of Books? He twittered the author that if he, Peterson, was in ths same room, he'd slap him. M hmm. The most appealing aspect of a man's character is his sense of humor. A shame Peterson has none.
3
Yeah, he only taught at Harvard and U of Toronto--real back-water places like that.
1
I would hope both women and men would prioritize their children over work. He says people need to grow up but did he say that to his Skype client Mr. Nestor? It seems he just agreed that his problems are due women and teachers who made comments he didn’t like. But those 50’s women – what a bunch of whiners. And that flight attendant? Who knew the reason almost everyone through history has hated their job at some point is all because of the “angry gay queens”? And of course his followers want lobster t-shirts – to remind them that even if they are low on the hierarchy of males – at least they are still above women.
6
As someone who identifies as left leaning, I find it disappointing to see the NY Times portray Mr. Peterson in such a caricatured manner, which does more harm to the NY Times than to Mr. Peterson.
I've only read one of his books (12 rules), which I found inspiring in some parts, a bit dramatic in others, but mostly non political, except for a seething disdain of liberal academia, which I do not share. I've also seen some of the "infamous" youtube videos which are more provocative. That is the context for which I comment.
To be honest, I can't say whether I agree with him on his overarching views. His arguments are actually quite nuanced when you examine them closely and deal with some holy cows that I think should always be matters for debate and discussion. Unfortunately that debate and discussion was not undertaken in this article. It's fairly easy to mock him as a nut based on his mannerisms, and some of his followers, whom I do not share many views with, however, agree or disagree, the one thing he does do is put forth rational arguments. Regardless of whether those arguments are sound, he's one of the only so-called "others" that has done so in genuine way, and it's woefully irresponsible of a media institution such as the NY Times to not respond or engage with those arguments in the same manner, for reasons that should be obvious,
51
Exactly right. This is a deliberate misrepresentation of Jordan Peterson to satisfy a left leaning narrative. I don’t agree with everything he says but responsibility and accountability are good things and it’s not racist, misogynist or xenophobic to expect people to be adults and not perpetual victims.
5
This is not the first NYT hit piece on Peterson. He was either brave or foolish to give the writer this access. Yes, it's very irresponsible journalism, which is not surprising given the way the main stream media behaves in general. The need to get those clicks is the overriding concern, apparently. Oh, well, let them live in the swamp, maybe they like it that way, who knows? Peterson has some flaws in his thinking, as most people talking about such vast subjects would be expected to have, but the main arguments he makes are valuable and interesting and worth a lot more attention than this writer was willing to give.
2
The number of omissions in this essay is stunning. You can disagree with his conclusions while accepting that the biological and psychological research literature in which he bases his premises (omitted here) are basically sound - if still provocative, as is his defense of free speech for which he gained attention (viz. Canada's implementation of hate speech tribunals to enforce forms of address and whether a student could re-broadcast his publicly broadcast lecture without violating them) and rejection of identity politics on the left as well as the right. No one would know that these are the activities that have led to his notice from this article.
16
This article and its comment section seems to be mostly an opportunity for those men who are feeling particularly defensive right now to reassure themselves that everything was fine.
I would point that that dictatorships are orderly. When social anthropologists study societies post-dictatorship, they often find people will talk about orderly society was. Oppression does in fact keep people in line. Many people would be oppressed if Mr. Peterson's vision of how society should be run were but into practice.
It may seem like a good idea to him to enforce monogamy between women and anti-social woman-hating men, but he may have to grow up and accept that no sane person is going to accept an orderliness that comes at the expense of her freedom.
I actually can't believe I've drawn into this debate as if his ideas were reasonable or sane.
21
I don't see how MLK would have supported violent revolution. Who would argue for that, even just for the sake of arguing?
6
As women have been allowed into all aspects of society--voting, college, the work force, the arts, politics--they have excelled and improved the world condition. It has been shown repeatedly that when females lead in societies, the educational level rises, health improves, the economy improves, and there is more peace. Plenty of women still stay home and raise kids, which is wonderful, but now men do it too if that is a good balance between a couple.
Anyone arguing for the patriarchy is not noticing the trend of violence, war, and dysfunction that remains when patriarchy is firmly embedded. Trust me, if there had been no patriarchy, there would have been plenty of female Beethovens and Picassos and, most importantly, the world would be more peaceful and prosperous.
Until we understand the necessity of having females in positions of power to literally turn this planet around, we will continue down the destructive and barbaric path we have been following since the beginning of civilization.
That is the revolution we need, and it will do no harm to men whatsoever. To be afraid of that is to be a weak coward. Get over it, Peterson followers.
28
I'm not "trusting" you on the Beethoven and Picasso bit. I want evidence. Do you have any?
Bjork is possibly the stand-out genius in music, we've had Georgia OKeefe, Frida Kahlo, Lee Krasner who was the genius behind Pollack...many contemporary greats.
Also. politics:
-A study shows that congressional districts served by female legislators do better, get more spending, sponsor more bills.
-A study using data on international crises over four decades found that as the percentage of women in parliament increases by five percent, a state is five times less likely to use violence when faced with an internat'l crisis.
-Statistical analysis of data from most countries in the world during the period 1977–1996 showed that the higher the proportion of women in parliament, the lower the likelihood that the state carried out human rights abuses.
-A study of 40 peace processes in 35 countries over the last three decades showed that when women’s groups were able to effectively influence a peace process, an agreement was almost always reached—only one case presented an exception. When women did not participate, the rate of reaching an agreement was much lower. Once an agreement was reached, the influence of women’s groups was also associated with much higher rates of implementation.
-A study of 58 conflict-affected states between 1980 and 2003 found that when no women are represented in the legislature, the risk of relapse increases over time, but when 35 per cent of the legislature is female, this relationship virtually disappears, and the risk of relapse is near zero.
1
He is not arguing for the patriarchy!! What he is saying is that hierarchy is a fact of existence and the goal of making everyone into the same social status (i.e. no hierarchies) is doomed because status hierarchies are a fact of life. Some hierarchies are based on power (this is a hierarchy that Peterson says inevitably becomes corrupt, as in the many corrupt dictatorships we see worldwide), and some are based on competence (such as a concert pianist has more competence in that area than others). Anyway, the writer has twisted up his views so they can be seen as negative, but these are not his views!!
4
Remarkable little dweebish person. Not my patriarch - perhaps he ought to advertise for the easily led? I understand that there are a fair number of people living in basements, alone and lonely who are in active search for some kind of validation.
14
The expectation that men should exist at the top of a gender-based hierarchy can't coexist with this demand for greater sensitivity towards men as human beings with feelings. Patriarchy gives power to men, but also dehumanizes them for it. As men are expected to be rational, cool-headed leaders of society, or the "Order" as Peterson puts it, they're also expected to keep their feelings in check. Simply put, to be at the top you have to give up some of your own humanity.
Peterson and his followers can make the claim that men are inherently superior to women, and entitled to their sexual services. That is their belief, albeit a violent one. What they cannot do is expect a woman to hold their hand and sympathize as she is being raped ("enforced monogamy", was it?).
19
The journalist clearly set out to frame Peterson in the most unfavourable light possible. The article reeks of bias.
I'm a woman, single, good career, a bachelors and a masters degree from the best universities in Canada. I find Peterson's underlying message refreshing... but that's because I've spent some time listening to him. I actually understand what he's getting at - this journalist obviously doesn't.
The vast majority of what the journalist wrote was completely out of context and severely lacked a depth of understanding of his arguments.
Do I agree with every one of his positions? No. But I do think he's doing a great service to the men and women who's lives he's changed for the better.
Listen to him or read his book - you be the judge.
41
It is becoming truer every day. Yet again, follow the money.
3
Could you please be more specific about the money you speak of here?
He is a thinker, a man who goes into a room and fields complex questions about abortion and economic theory on the fly. What makes this article easy to write in this way is he is honest, conceptual and theoretical. If you want to make him look bad just look for the worst thing he's saying, often in the middle of a 5 minute thought, and print it. The complexity and multi-layered nature of his ideas lend themselves to being taken out of context, since giving the context would take so much space.
A better representation of him can be foundin his conversations with Jonathan haidt, Joe Rogan or john Anderson. Maybe even better are his Q & As at Lafayette or Ryerson, really seeing him working on the fly. I think if you are going to judge someone you should atleast try and understand him. You can disagree with his perspective and opinions. This article represents niether. It represents what people wish he was. Reminds me of what Rush Limbaugh would do to Barack.
29
The best thing I have to say about Jordan Peterson is that he makes me want to read more talented writers. He's a conservative cloaking himself in the usual "this is just the natural order of things" .
He makes many good points, but he's a deep thinker for people (young men apparently) who don't want to think too deeply. It's ironic that this sort of mid level drivel rises to the top of the charts, but I guess that's what his market wants.
8
There's a deeply disturbing connection between Peterson's rising popularity, the incel movement, 4chan misogyny, our election of a sexist playboy to the White House, and the consequent rollback of women's reproductive health services. Connect the dots, ladies--we need to watch our backs. And VOTE!
21
And run for office!
5
Though I will admit I'm not thoroughly familiar with Peterson's work, he appears to be employing the same strategy that spawned Trumpism: taking the rage non-rich white men feel at no longer being the unchallenged power in society, redirecting it at a variety of cultural straw men/women instead of at the rich white men that have taken away their opportunities, and profiting from it.
The number of cult-like "movements" that have spawned on the right in recent years is alarming, and yet somehow not surprising.
14
Having read his work, I strongly disagree. It seems to me that this article does him as much justice as Fox News does for real news--and that the over-the-top reactions to the article are akin to Trump's reactions to Fox and Friends.
14
"Non-rich white men" have never been a "power in society," much less "unchallenged."
Speaking of "cultural straw men"...
2
No, but in America they always held out hope that they would be, or could be someday, or that their sons would. And in the meantime, they got to feel superior to women and non-whites.
The wonderful thing about the rising number of hit pieces on Peterson and the sheer absurdity of the comments greatly misconstruing his viewpoints is that his ideas will reach a wider audience. Objective, truthseeking intellectuals will likely seek out his material on youtube, discover the wisdom of taking responsibility for one's own life, and join the growing number of people who use his lectures to sort themselves out and improve their relationships with others. Unedited Peterson content is deeply enlightening just look for yourself.
19
I do not understand why feminists support the idea of addressing "toxic masculinity" - but then feel threatened by a guy like Peterson. He echos some of their same concerns about the plight and crises facing men today. So basically, I have had to come to the conclusion that many feminists and those on the left just don't like it when men have any kind of positive voice. Anyone or anything that benefits exclusively men is met with criticism and contempt.
14
The hierarchy -- developed so that the most [what word do you guys love the most -- competent, capable, meritocratic, strong, Chad, etc.] individuals establish dominance over others. What's the reward for dominance? A greater share of resources, including women and other types of capital. This makes those males who are not getting those resources spend their lives attempting to obtain top-tier hierarchical status for themselves. When it becomes clear they don't got "the right stuff," they become bitter and angry and live lives of blame and self-hatred and turn their aggression on those BELOW them in the hierarchy, scouring to find someone to dominate. This manifests itself in murder, theft, domestic abuse, jealous rage, fighting, war, etc. -- taking a disproportionate toll on women and children. The problem with the hierarchy is that there's not a lot a room at the top -- and a whole lot of wayward sons roaming the plains looking for his "due." Especially since economics has concentrated wealth at the very top. It is this system that creates toxic masculinity. It is this system that Peterson wants to continue? What?
8
This piece is basically a character assassination.
Jordan Peterson does not in any way shape or form believe in enforced monogamy, or taking women out of the workforce, or in any way limiting women's rights.
I'm not sure that these are real quotes, and if they are, they are heavily taken out of context. The 'men test ideas, women test men' for example is him quoting someone else...
Peterson raises a number of issues in lectures:
-how men are treated different in the criminal justice system (gap in sentencing is larger than gap between white ppl and black ppl).
-the hypocracy of focusing on gender imbalance in tech jobs, but not on say workplace deaths or dismemberment which is disproportionately male (95%+)
-how men have essentially no rights to see their children in family law disputes, are presumed to be aggressors in domestic violence situations, and other ways in which family law fails to repeat men equally.
-how healthcare system disproportionately spends on women's health issues over men specific examples - office of women's health and 17 sub offices fully funded, today still no men's office of health exists in US. Female contraception covered, male contraception not covered. Breast cancer receiving disproportionate funding by NIH, colon cancer kills mostly men to similar numbers as breast cancer extremely underfunded by NIH
There are a lot of issues. This article is a joke. It paints him as a villain so the real issues he raise don't get discussed.
21
I think the word polarization has been over used recently to the point where (like many other words) it's become meaningless. In any case, the polarization that exists now between women and men - I'm not sure how we fix this. Do we women really want a world where men are no longer allowed to have ideas that don't exactly mirror our own?
So, here we all are, together - in a position where ideas aren't so much considered as they are opposed from the get go, based on little or no real understanding of what's been said.
I feel like the author of this article has left out every third line of what she might have written in order to sound as if she doesn't necessarily agree or disagree - but we do get the gist. It's a very safe position.
I've (so far) been challenged by Mr. Jordan to think. He has an internal integrity and an uncompromising approach that is off putting to some. I suppose this can lead to misunderstandings. In the end it doesn't matter - it's the debate that counts.
14
Brilliant, last sentence. The IDW has done just that: Given me more opportunity to see issues and myself more deeply.
That said, Peterson challenges the established "Progressive" orthodoxy: That our society is fundamentally bad and that the "old ways" and "its adherents" are the cause. Peterson, instead, draws from an old view, a deep conclusion in western thinking: You face evil in yourself and the world around you. How do I change that? Change yourself, and the by-product will be a better world. This is a hard, old path, one that we in America simply do not want to tread.
11
What concerns me these days (among other things, and the list grows ever longer) is this *established progressive orthodoxy* you mention. I say this as a progressive, or a leftist - it's so tiresome having to constantly stake out our position on that line - establish our street cred - whatever. I read the comments coming from the right sometimes and it makes me cringe - but I cringe even more when I hear the replies from what should be an informed and thoughtful left, especially when I know they are knee jerk responses based on something in a headline that reads: Custodian of the Patriarchy
I honestly can’t tell if Nellie Bowles truly misunderstood Jordan Peterson to this extent, which would make her astonishingly dense, or if she was just barely listening, waiting for gotcha quotes to repeat out of context. For starters, Peterson never said men are in charge because they’re better at it. He said the particular individuals who rise to the top of hierarchies are the ones willing to invest the most time in developing competence, often at the expense of everything else (including time with family), and that women rarely want to make that sacrifice. He also does not say, “Violent attacks are what happens when men do not have partners, and society needs to work to make sure those men are married," what he says is that men need to do the work to make themselves worthy of partners, rather than blame the world for it. As for the concept of Chaos, it is represented in many/most cultures by the feminine because chaos is where *creation* happens. One would think you couldn’t get out of college without knowing this, it's Anthropology 101. I could go on but, by all appearances, Ms. Bowles already had her idée fixe before she ever started the piece, even interpreting his thoughtful pauses before answering questions as somehow "suspicious" when all he's doing is *thinking*. So to quote John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary magazine: "I’ve never read a newspaper profile like this Jordan Peterson thing. It’s an open assassination attempt with no effort to disguise its intent."
24
I agree w/ the Chaos categorization as well - it's a feminine archetype - and both men and women can have some amount of the feminine archetype within them. There is nothing sexist about equating femininity w chaos. Again - we are talking "femaleness" which can belong to a man or a woman - very different from saying "all woman are ruled entirely by chaos". I have seen this mistake over and over lately..
9
I have been following Jordan Peterson's career for a few months and he is polarizing but not wrong about everything. I think that he makes a good point about free speech. However - on men's rights activism ..I think he, like many men, simply has no idea how difficult it is to raise children. The bulk of it goes to women no matter what. Men romanticize the idea of it - and romanticize the ideal woman who would love childrearing naturally .. but that is so far off from reality for many people. It's a very complex subject and women do of course love their children - but raising them in a society that hasn't figured out how to structure raising children yet is very very difficult. Upper class people all over the world are fine because they always have help. People in older wiser cultures have a much clearer understanding of the "it takes a village" concept and they have very happy mothers. Middle class people in western countries are in trouble no matter what .. if they work they feel pulled in many directions. If they do not work and are sahm - they are doing one of the hardest jobs in the world period. Most stay at home mom's know they are now making a huge sacrifice for their family. Men will never have this pressure or make this decision with the same weight attached - certainly not when any progress being made is already eroded w/ this pendulum swing towards the men's rights movement. The crux of equality is child care.
16
For women, the crux of equality is the freedom to control our reproductive destiny.
18
I agree - but assuming people are going to have children - and there will always be people who decide to have children - then do women give up their equality just because they are mothers? I hope not - that's why I say it then becomes about child care.
1
Peterson was very involved in raising his 2 kids and he talks about child-raising, generally speaking, a lot. In a recent YouTube discussion, he and another guy (forgot the name) talk a lot about the important of playing with your kids and especially roughhouse type play and how it helps kids to socialize, learn about their own bodies, etc. When you think about it, all young animals play together in rough-house type of play--like puppies. It's a very important part of child development.
7
The more Jordan Peterson is misrepresented is the more people support him. I'm going to give the opposition the benefit of the doubt that they just don't understand what he is really saying. Eventually someone is going to have to come up with a well thought out response rather than people mischaraterizations and ideological insults because you know people CAN check out his content for themselves.
18
I checked out some of his videos for myself and was horrified. His views were way worse than I thought.
But then, I've spent plenty of time reading sites like redpill and the old reddit inches sub, so I recognized pretty much all of his talking points on men and women as originating from there -- even down to the weird obsession with makeup.
13
Touche'!
what does he say about makeup?
Mr. Peterson asks everyone - especially young people - to live our lives with responsibility and integrity. His professional expertise is in clinical psychology, where he has seen a great deal of human suffering. He advocates clear thinking about ourselves, mutual support, courage, high standards for our kids, and kindness towards ourselves and others. Which part of this is wrong?
13
Nothing wrong w/what is stated, if he'd follow that advice himself. Integrity would mean not taking big $ for repeating cliches for advice to unemployed people, and suggesting that women need to return to the past and not compete with men. There is no scientific evidence that women cannot do the work that men do, and there is no reason that women should still not get equal pay for equal work. The devil's in the details with this guy.
13
"Men test ideas, women test men."
Does that not seem wrong to you?
Interviewer: "Do you think men and women can work together?"
Peterson: "I don't know."
Does that seem wrong?
4
Yes, but this is a straw man argument--he doesn't say women should return to the past and not compete with men! That's so completely NOT what he says, it's unreal.
Sensitivity should be respected, but there are limits to how much a particular sensitivity needs to be part of the public discourse. Most people are humane, if not politically correct. Jordan Peterson seems to hold some very retrograde views though. It's a very self-serving tautology to say that the myths of a patriarchal society support having a patriarchal society.
13
Jordan Peterson is a symptom of an ongoing process that started with an accelerated, hyper-capitalism and Globalization. However, we have seen his kind before, a Man that has all the answers to the disruptive assaults of Modernity. It is a dangerous and combustable mix and should be understood, acknowledged and not discounted.
In a technologically advanced world where we are all potentially disaffiliated from a provisionally, stable environment, shouldn't we be beyond this binary debate? Shouldn't we all be engaged in helping to steer the future toward equanimity and mutual understanding despite the unrelenting quest for profit and speed?
The challenge for us going forward is to bring everyone into the debate, engage in the conversation and... equally important, understand the violence done to the human spirit by forces beyond our immediate control. We all have more in common with each other than we have that separates us.
In this very disruptive era we find ourselves living in, we all need consolation. Consolation is where you find it and in Professor Peterson's worldview it is relatively, narrowly defined in a shrill and retro-active pursuit. This however is not the creative force we must develop to maintain our humanity, regain our sense of orientation in the new world we are creating... and being dragged into.
11
Peterson is saying things which only a few generations ago were considered well-worn wisdom: The human condition is eternal. Society is improvable but not perfectable. Life is unfair and difficult. History is tragic and cyclical, not linear and therapeutic. We can use the age-old wisdom distilled in arts, tradition, myth and religious text to guide us on how to live our best lives.
That Peterson has become such an immense celebrity only shows how starved young people are to hear these eternal truths. His observations are a feast to those force-fed the thin gruel of modern, scientific materialism which says that life is about pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain, demanding rights and avoiding responsibilities, looking outward rather than inward.
We don’t have to be religious reactionaries to recognize that while our techno-capitalist-secular society is giving us more physical comfort than ever before, our souls are going hungry. There is a reason why we are seeing so much addiction, suicide, anger and mass shootings, and it’s not merely politics, the economy, lack of support programs or material things.
People like Peterson may be pointing the way back to the wisdom we need. The danger for him will be that he could be captured by his audience, and partisanship. That would be a terrible shame. His message isn't beyond reproach, but it's important.
15
Here is an educated person who cannot comprehend that what goes on in his head does not represent the whole world, that different people have different world views, social structures, and expectations. Of course there will always be people who feel safest in some kind of June and Ward Cleaver lifestyle, but what I fail to grasp, myself, is why these types so often believe everyone else should be just like them. I live a lifestyle that harms no one, works for me, and I have no intention of signing up for Peterson's World. On the other hand, while I might like it if he became a little more educated as to cultural views from all over the world, I don't expect him to live a lifestyle just like mine. I feel sorry for the young men he is leading into an unrealistic set of beliefs.
And btw, he's not married. That means that he is not providing for one of those women he wishes would stay at home, so he is not fulfilling his own dream of the proper hierarchy. So what is that woman to do? She has to work. And why again should she receive less opportunity? Less pay? When men take their feet off of women's necks, it turns out women do things just as well and intelligently as men, sometimes more so. Is that the real problem? Jealousy?
19
Your statement that Jordan Peterson is not married will come as a shock to his wife Tammy, to whom he has been married to for almost 30 years.
8
He appears to be married with two kids, there are youtube videos of him discussing his relationship with his wife.
2
His being married still doesn’t address why he thinks women should have their talents dismissed and be forced to be nothing but wives or mothers.
Nothing wrong with patriarchy. In my "Women & the Law" course at Vermont, I learned that women in power almost immediately began to imitate the men who came before them. So I'm a proud patriarch and guardian of this institution that made the world safe for all -- even women.
4
What's wrong with any kind of "-archy", especially the one you describe, is that it limits opportunities, accountability, and progress, keeping us stuck in the 1950s. It doesn't matter if you think it has good intentions.
9
I can't tell if you're kidding, Rolf. I'm so happy you feel safe, but I don't at all and I'm guessing neither do a vast majority of women.
3
I've enjoyed Peterson's lectures for years. It's not often you get Jungian psychoanalytic tack on power and politics. His reading of resentment and its causes and his discussion on orienting oneself through attention to meaning is first-rate and accessible (TEDx talks).
As a feminist and a Lefty, I would say his stuff on women is weak and relies on a small amount of peripheral science. Still, he himself often admits his hero's journey reflections don't map that well to the lives of women, especially modern women who have reliable birth control for the first time in human history.
I think Peterson's somewhat messy musings on masculinity are really a very small part of the insights he has to offer on how to lead an orderly, useful life in a secular age. It would be more correct to say he is a Custodian of Modernity. True, sometimes modernity has been patriarchal but modernity has given us some very good things: human rights, relative affluence (historically speaking), and significant reduction in the number of wars.
Peterson is very eloquent about the psychological origin of political fanaticism and offers some good insights for people who are not able to find their way in a strongly relativist society. Structure can be helpful for those who are floundering. His popularity is about that, not about men's rights extremism.
28
Jordan Peterson is an interesting figure. If you want to criticize him, and be persuasive, then you have to engage with him seriously, and not try and reduce him to some sort of old guard cartoon character. Complex ideas require a complex response.
29
Hah! No surprise there are a lot of theatre majors in his audience -- because what he's doing is theatre. He is very, very good at creating a character and working an audience. And making himself rich in the process.
16
Some of Jordan Peterson's ideas can seem appealing in an age of gender non-binary self-identification laws and bewildering arrays of pronouns. I can see why young men trying to find their place in the world and lacking male role models might gravitate towards his ideas.
What I fail to understand is his evident misogyny. It is one thing to say, 'there are only two genders, male and female, and they have the following characteristics'. It is another to then go on and say that the female gender is inferior and chaotic and requires male authority to thrive. That latter strain of misogyny runs deep in our society so its appeal is simple but it can have dangerous consequences.
In one interview that I saw, Mr Peterson recounts how he 'convinced' his wife to take his name after marriage. He said that he had known his wife since they were young kids and when she was young she had said that she would never marry or take a man's name. He recounted with some smug satisfaction how he had strong-armed her into changing her mind. That anecdote gave me the creeps and revealed him to have power issues with women. It's sad that he is using his considerable influence over young men for ill rather than for good.
33
Where does Jordan Peterson say that women are inferior? He does say that evolutionary psychology and biology tell us that males and females have socially important differences. He does believe that evolutionary psychology is a science. He does believe that human females are in general "inferior" in upper body strength to human males.
I have never heard him say that women shouldn't have the same rights or opportunities as men.
9
One wonders what else Mr. Peterson has strong-armed his spouse into doing.
As if the world needed another verbose bully.
8
@MB: Wow. Why should it matter to him what his wife's last name is? They're still married in the eyes of the law. The fact that he felt he had to talk her into changing her name is indeed very creepy, and a big red flag that something is not right with this man. Maybe he'll start calling her Ofjordan soon, tying the linguistic bonds tighter.
5
This article would be more relevant if it attempted to get to the bottom of Petersen's message and provide a counter to it. it appears to be more of a selective extract of provocative extracts from his message.
Petersen's message to me is not anti-women as about a world where bad stuff happens and those who would impose simplistically rational solutions indiscriminately end up perpetuating repressive societal constructs such as the Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, or Venezuela, or any of the other expressions of society that do not tolerate different views. Similar the intolerance of other views features in many of the dystonia narratives that frequently feature in stories in novels or movies (think 1984). As individuals we are all flawed and often struggle to see the other side of the argument. I'd suggest that your columnist has done just that and produced a work of character assassination rather than a clear statement of the ideas of Peterson and a substantive rebuttal of those aspects that she has a different view on. Its a world where "Everybody Knows" is an assumption that generally reflects your own limited view and not necessarily the objective truth.
21
A very long, front page article on a white man expousing extreme chauvinism that limits basic human rights and dignity for others. I am trying to recall when you last ran an article so prominent on a black man, or woman of any color, working to make a positive change in society to help everyone, equally.
25
Where does Peterson espouse "extreme chauvinism that limits basic human rights for others"? He is a defender of rights and dignity. I would honestly like to know. I have read and watched a fair bit of Peterson, and I have not seen it.
9
Another important characteristic of lobsters: they're bottom-feeders.
69
While it is useful and necessary to write about such ways of viewing the world, giving any one such person a soapbox makes strides to legitimize and normalize such thoughts, which is a mistake. It is precisely because the Toronto killer/driver had validation online from similar misfits that he felt empowered to act and kill people randomly. There are plenty of women who are interested in a NICE PERSON rather than 'the hot guy', plenty of women whom the 'hot guy' is not going to bother with, so the reason these 'intcels' aren't getting any is all about their personalities and their lack of interest in anything but 'hot women'. Enforced monogamy - aside from not being the answer, how does one do that in a free society??? The whole notion is absurd and deserves that laugh the author gave it, rather than laughing at the men AND WOMEN who have been 'losing out' as Peterson chose to incorrectly (knowingly) see it.
There are some good points to make, that men have plenty of issues and insecurities too, but listening to these over the top guys in particular "it’s so whiny, it’s just enough to drive a modern person mad to listen to" them.
14
Reading the comments here I hate the way readers are interpreting Peterson’s emphasis on monogamy. I’ve read one of his books and watched several YouTube videos and I have never heard him use the phrase ‘enforced monogamy.’ He is advocating in favour of marriage generally as a good institution for both men and women. He himself is long married and has two grown children and grandchildren.
When he talks about ‘patriarchy’ he is using the word in the old sense of the way the western world is organized not as shorthand for the oppression of women.
Peterson is very supportive of women. He talks about how women can get what they want. He has counselled professional women on how to achieve career success.
Nellie Bowles has misrepresented him.
41
"When he talks about ‘patriarchy’ he is using the word in the old sense of the way the western world is organized not as shorthand for the oppression of women. "
You do realize that 'the way the western world is organized' did lead to the oppression of women, right? They are not two separate things; not two separate meanings for patriarchy.
13
Yes. And the question is why. I've read and watched Peterson, too. Anyone who has given just a few hours of serious attention can see that this is a misrepresentation. Why was it written and published? I don't get it. There is a serious critical discussion to be had about Peterson, but this is not it.
4
"When he talks about ‘patriarchy’ he is using the word in the old sense of the way the western world is organized not as shorthand for the oppression of women."
The western world is organized around the oppression of women, among others. Or did you somehow miss the last century, or millennium, or two?
13
He has some valid points about extreme leftist and Marxist and post-modernist agendas, but he conflates them with conventional liberals who scarcely know of the extremist agendas of those groups. Being in academia, he's exposed to extremist students who have little to do with conventional American Democrat policies. The primary agenda of feminists is equality of opportunity for women, not forced equality of outcomes. But his newfound celebrity status is fueled by virulently opposing the straw man of the equality of outcome, amongst other extreme positions that aren't on the actual real-world agenda.
btw - i've also seen him speak positively about Trump's intelligence (Joe Rogan podcast) and anyone with an ounce of sense can see Trump is not very intelligent. And as a clinical psychiatrist he should be able to easily identify Trump's multiple psychological maladies.
23
Sorry, Fred. Trump is loathsome, but while he's no intellectual, he's no dummy. He has his own kind of diabolical intelligence and that's what makes him so dangerous.
I’m a little astonished by this article, and the comments here. I’ve watched a bunch of Peterson lectures and found them really insightful and nuanced. But the article paints him as a right wing demagogue, and he’s not. And the comments take that bad-faith caricature and run wild with it.
The thing that always attracted me to liberalism was clear-eyed critical thinking. That seems to have evolved into something very different lately.
55
Watch his Vice interview and get back to us.
1
Neither the author nor most of the commentators here have read (or heard of) the 12 Rules of Life.
3
I did watch the Vice interview. Who is the “us” I’m getting back to, “formertemp?”
And where was Jordan's wife during the home interview? Should she have been home, cooking, cleaning or something? Does he even have a wife and if he does why not at least mention that she exists? This guy is truly creepy!
14
Psychology professor Peterson exemplifies the old saw about academics: if you can't do, teach. And now he's taken it to the next level: if you can't do, preach: make a religion out of whole cloth. Yet another self-aggrandizing evangelist/guru/demagogue, monetizing a shtick for his own narcissistic power and influence satisfaction. And of course making a buck along the way, made so easy by the internet.
The tragedy of such populist figures, a la Trump, is that at best they're hucksters hijacking worthy issues, in this case of gender roles, societal responsibility, actualization of our lives, etc. Instead of selflessly serving the hungry community of the human spirit, they exploit vulnerable and gullible minds, rabble-rousingly appeal to fear and anxiety, and in the process only really serve themselves and their wealth. And the social issues they pervert don't get processed and resolved in a healthy, durable and satisfactory way.
And at worst, again a la Trump, these "leaders" incite mobs to unleash primitive tribal and nativist impulses, to intimidate, and to support power grabs for the reactionary forces and repression that often seem to accompany, or transform and ultimately control, these populist "revolts." (See, Tea Party @ 2010, and MAGA, 2016.)
This is on all of us, and each of us. We Americans are generally not wise, not discerning, and not careful. As one fabled huckster said, there's one born every minute.... And Trump himself said, "They'll believe anything."
15
Why are you giving this man more media attention??? He's already raking in $80k/month from donations, it's not like he needs more attention. So disappointed in University of Toronto for continuing keep him on staff.
23
And you wonder why liberalism has the reputation for being illiberal? Just shut the guy down because he doesn't salute every bit of progressive orthodoxy sent up the pole? How sad.
2
Many white men had become extremely comfortable being the center of everyone's concern. As those days pass into history, they are a bit unmoored. They will learn to deal with it, but their days as the self-proclaimed centers of the universe must never be allowed to return.
15
Proclaimed by whom?
Or is expecting evidence of one's claims a eurocentrist conceit that's being upended in these times of "late capitalism" as well?
Almost as if, in quite the opposite of your fantasy, your religion is being questioned as much as the previously hegemonic one.
Hm...
1
Jordan Peterson feigns arch-reason when it makes him look good to his followers, but then wraps himself in emotion and myth when that suits him better. He’s an amateur in both arenas.
18
Shouldn't we look at Islamic Arab states that embody the principles Peterson espouses? They don't do too well, do they?
But, they keep their women in submission, hidden in tents,
some so fully veiled, their eyes are seen through bars diagonally placed in the cut-out area for the eyes. Can you make her more
invisible than that? And, submissive? No mistake about obeying one's master. It hasn't made their countries happier or healthier. To the contrary, I think they're a very unhappy people. This subjugation of women hasn't benefited anyone.
The article doesn't talk about Peterson's marital status or if he has children, how his family life is progressing, what are the opinions of his wife, if he has one. That seems to be an important omission. I would have liked to know his background and his current family situation, if there is one.
13
Who are these frightened men who are so angry with women? They sound like some teen-boys who have not put it all together yet. Fortunately, most boys mature into secure men we love and enjoy.
There are many non-democratic, patriarchal countries where the values of these insecure, enraged men are the norm. They can exclude women from most activities, compete only against other men, and receive the entitlements they crave. Alas, I doubt these men would find success or happiness there either.
17
In 2009 Kevin S. Amidon and Daniel A. Krier anticipated and warned about undisciplined pseudo intellectuals masquerading as disciplined thinkers: "In the twenty-first century, as new media makes available fantasy worlds of gender-marked perpetration-play, as real-time news is manipulated to provide an endless stream of violence-saturated imagery, as debates about the places of men, women, and sexual and gender minorities in military, paramilitary, and quasi-military groups gain visibility, as nonstate organizations dedicated to the perpetration of violence proliferate, and as state actors reciprocally justify the escalation of both violent action and new forms of institutional acculturation to the perpetration of violence, the form and the content of Klaus Theweleit’s analysis of the German Freicorp retain their challenge and their richness. Symbolic order is meaningful, because all social acts generate it. It is possible to make sense of that symbolic order, both theoretically and through the empirical relationships between social action and violence. [Public Thinkers] must recognize that their analyses are part of that symbolic order, and that their work can escape the realm of the reflective and enter the realm in which order and perpetration merge. Only through such recognition might scholarship still hold the prospect of liberation through discipline." Which is to say that Jordan Paterson is a studiously undisciplined pseudo intellectual on considerable menace.
7
I am not an expert on Jordan Peterson, but have listened to several of his lectures and televised interviews. What is clear from my exposure to him is that he is a far more nuanced thinker than Nellie Bowles. This wasn't a profile. It was a premeditated hatchet job.
61
Yes it is a bit of a hatchet job. At least she didn’t drag in the whole bit that he is channeling fascism, which is a favorite progressive “reach.”
2
Interesting that he criticizes and condemns Marxists but not Nazis. Maybe because his views of women dovetail with those of the Nazis, who believed women had only three roles, kinder (children), Kirche (Church) und Kuche (kitchen).
14
He makes clear at length his criticism of Marxism. Your claim of fascism, is based on what?
How in the world you came to the conclusion that he doesn't criticize Nazis is beyond me. He is a critic of Stalin, Hitler, and Mao. He rails about it again and again. He is a classic liberal who believes in rights and liberties. Give some actual attention to his lectures and videos.
This empty-headed so-called psychologist and philosopher seems to be no more than a poseur, wrapping himself in the obscurity of myth and story. So human beings are lobsters? Only a crack-pot can see human nature in invertebrates. What kind of hierarchy does he want? How about Sparta, with its system of annual raids to kill helots? Maybe it would appeal to him, as the cult was of extreme, warlike manliness, women mattered only for procreation. There's nothing new to his attitudes, and no defense for them in the straw-man he sets up, the silliness of debating whether "flip chart" is permissible or not because "flip" could also be an ethnic slur.
15
Guys like this show that slave-owning classes don't give up power voluntarily. American women have had full citizenship for only 98 years, and African-Americans for 155 - clearly the fight for equality takes time and hard work.
39
Come now, what's all the fuss? Peterson is a "youtube intellectual" in an age of Ted Talks, who publishes populist books with academic-sounding themes. He's the mirror image of Timothy Leary, though with half his imagination and twice the moralism. Instead of "turn on, tune in, drop out," Peterson exhorts the boys to "turn off, tune out, and step up".
3
A gaping hole in this otherwise very interesting article is Mr. Peterson's PERSONAL experience with women. Has he ever been married or even in a serious relationship with a woman? And how have those relationships, or lack thereof, colored his judgement of half the world's population? It's unfortunate that the author didn't seem to believe that this was relevant.
9
Who created this system? Whose idea was it to give lip service to motherhood and wifiness while truly only valuing one's contribution to the GNP? The patriarchy is over. People want more, men and women both, and men are not going to get it by blaming women (beginning with Eve). Get over yourselves and grow up. Develop more fully as humans. Time to master your fears and for pity's sake stop insisting you have a right to them.
15
This is entirely predicated upon the fact that certain males have gotten used to be in charge by force. The laws of the land had women and minorities forced into their "places". Since Griswold, the Voting Rights Act and The Cilvil Rights Act (among others) this hegemony has been systematically stripped away from these males.
Now they find themselves having to compete for the first time in history with women and others who have historically been artificially subjugated by law. They are no longer artificially in control. They became lazy when in control. They could just take what they wanted. But they are losing (or have lost) this control.
And now they are all really cranky that they are no longer artificially in control. And they are having tantrums.
21
"The natural order" Peterson talks about was established when humans were hunter gatherers and organized into tribes, based on research. Life then was different, being about surviving wild beasts where the strength of men became a critical factor, according them a dominant role. In the modern era, though, especially when robots can be designed to fight all the wars in the near future, men will no longer be needed to be strong to be useful to the society (or attractive to the opposite gender). Men will need to be groomed and cultured differently where they don't suppress their femininity, and will be able to connect with a modern woman who wants to be an equal. The men you see who are enthralled by Peterson are those who have been groomed as men were in the past: is strong, suppresses his feelings, expects deference from lower status humans (and women are lower status in his view), and are getting rejected by modern women. Unless we end up with a level of conflict in the society where law and order cannot be enforced, in which case "those men" will again be in demand to protect the women; otherwise, these men will be little more than a nuisance value, and will be marginalized and ignored.
4
Interestingly, modern hunter-gatherer societies are extremely egalitarian, socially and economically. One ethnography in 70s called them "the original affluent society." It's only when these societies are forced to be sedentary that they begin to have problems of inequality such as poverty and domestic violence.
1
For a funny version of this serious man watch Ali Wong's "Baby Cobra". I think she's really trying to say the same thing. Women long for the days when they had one definite role and they really had it good back in the day. I confess as a now retired full time working mother of three, there were many days when I fantasized being one of those 50's stay at home moms, not torn in a million different directions. The thing is, you can't verbalize this because it's almost a sacrilege! Ask my 27 year old professional daughter. We watched "Baby Cobra" together. She says she could never vocalize those thoughts and many of her peers feel the same way.
6
"Women long for the days when they had one definite role and they really had it good back in the day."
No, not all women long for one definite role and not all women had it good back in the day. This is romantic thinking.
13
JP is a breath of fresh air. It is obvious there is a huge problem with the culture and lack of inclusive community. Cultural norms evolve and adapt, but remain rooted in solid morals found in every religion. This author clearly has issue with the solid culture that has continuously striven to improve collective and individual well-being. She completely misrepresents JP's stance on gender roles - implying he supports any erosion in individual rights and respect. Until we go transhuman or artificial wombs catch on (the Left would love the State to literally be parent to children), marriage for procreation is the best we've got.
13
". Cultural norms evolve and adapt, but remain rooted in solid morals found in every religion. This author clearly has issue with the solid culture that has continuously striven to improve collective and individual well-being. "
Most religions subjugate women. This improves the collective well-being of men, not the collective or individual well-being of women.
16
This story made me laugh out loud. More than once.
6
Read Tabitha Southy's piece on Peterson: "Is Jordan Peterson the stupid man's smart person?" in Macleans, (avail online)
It's SIDE-SPLITTING and dead on.
8
Thank you for the lead re: Macleans article! "Jordan Buttercup Peterson" :-)
It should. Its a work of pure fiction.
2
For all his chauvinism and dubious philosophy, he's a gifted speaker highlighting uncomfortable biosocial truths; albeit in a roundabout way. Female empowerment and career success doesn't make women more attractive to high status men. And no, men aren't intimidated by your sucess. Likewise, men will need to up their game if they want to attract todays more independent woman. Being 'male' isn't enough. And no, women aren't going back to the 50s.
10
Jordan Peterson is incredibly successful because he tells the truth (even if it's his truth) as news outlets who tout themselves as unbiased continue to lie unabashedly about things we can see with our own eyes.
Jordan Peterson tells the truth about masculinity not because he believes in some insane masculine hierarchical structure, but because the left is fetishizing gender and would rather deny agency to women who want to choose their own paths in life than admit that there are inherent differences in the choices and preferences of mothers and fathers as a matter of averages.
18
"the left is fetishizing gender and would rather deny agency to women who want to choose their own paths in life ..."
Balderdash. Your caricature of "the left" is through-the-looking-glass absurd. The struggle against oppression involves many obstacles and not a few paradoxes, to be sure, but no one is challenging individuals' right to choose their "path," only others' insistence on whatever path they think your sex, gender, color, or other identifier supposedly requires one to take. What nonsense.
4
The origins of the current male-dominated socio-political hierarchy are predicated on violence and ambition. Competence? I wish.
14
Just think of all the Republicans who will immediately stop reading if they see that the author identifies as a feminist or a human rights activist. Wouldn't it be better if they'd drop the snark and try reading outside their comfort zone for once? Well, I'm a liberal and I really enjoyed reading "12 Rules for Life," despite the cheesy title and the National Review blurb on the back cover.
9
It's always amusing to hear someone speak of the need for a "natural" hierarchy and crown one group as the top of the heap, with no stated qualifications or means assessing whether members of that arbitrary group are actually worthy of being on top. How does society benefit, as a whole, when inferior specimens are allowed to rule?
4
We don't need sexual affirmative action for men (or women) who are not desirable partners any more than we need affirmative action for people who are embezzlers or harassers. And when I say "desirable partners" I am not referring to physical attractiveness but to emotional stability, empathy, a work ethic, and the imagination required to improve themselves.
14
Germaine Greer said it best: "Women have very little idea how much men hate them."
I would add also, FEAR them. But it is not my job to make you feel comfortable and sexually satisfied. The world changes. Grow up and make a place for yourself without hurting others.
28
I have watched hours of Dr. Peterson's talks on YouTube. I have never heard him mention enforced monogamy. I'm not saying he never said it. Maybe he did. I don't know. Can someone please point me to a lecture or talk in which he advocates this idea? Is he just saying that monogamy is enforced because bigamy and polygamy are outlawed? If this is what he means, I'd suspect the law was made by men, back when women didn't have the vote.
13
It's in this article as a direct quote:
“He was angry at God because women were rejecting him,” Mr. Peterson says of the Toronto killer. “The cure for that is enforced monogamy. That’s actually why monogamy emerges.”
2
He’s never recommended anything of that kind... he doesn’t believe in “forcing” anything. My goodness, man, listen to the guy.
He became known because of his distaste for government enforcing a terrible law on Canadians. Literally the opposite of the claim.
1
It looks like you've sublimated your own crisis of masculine identity to an intellectualization, with projection onto other people and causes. In other words: blame everyone else, including the victims. Oh, and I'm a heterosexual male, only more in touch than you.
6
Sounds like #metoo and #mefirst locked in a steel-cage death match on PayPerView...
All's fair in lust and war - but laying it all on gender is like laying it all on God…
There are other possibilities...
Ask the mongoose or the cobra, but - please - not while they're fighting...
Etiquette’s death has been greatly exaggerated…
1
I remember the 50’s and they were not a golden age. Frankly I prefer men who are not as so full of themselves. Fortunately I married an equal and we have almost sixty years of shared life behind us.
I am happy that gender roles have become more fluid and that women are assuming a greater share of leadership. We all- both men and women - need to develop our talents, do our very best work, and support one another. I find the most attractive people are those who do a job well, are kind to others and are respectful of the people they encounter - whether they are male or female doesn’t matter a lot.
18
Watch out, Nellie. I think he's going to fit you for a handmaid's gown after this article.
6
Please spare me glossy write ups about misogyny masquerading as philosophy. Mr. Peterson comes across as one of those people he himself likes to pick on.
11
Jordan Peterson is clearly proof of reincarnation. Alas, as sometimes happens with reborn souls, they implode into a past life rather than advancing. There is some help for this condition. Vigorous massage to ground one in one's present body, and an elegant contemporary time-piece attached to one's wrist, have been known to help. (I write this as a man-person.)
2
What does "I write this as a man-person" even mean?
And yes, there is some help for this condition, and it involves understanding your opponent's arguments and then coming up with counter-arguments. It involves civil discourse and exchange of ideas, not derision and mockery.
4
No Stas. When your opponent's arguments are that men are entitled to be "in charge" simply by virtue of being men, and that a man is entitled to have women, or at least some unspecified woman, be sexually available to him, also simply by virtue of being a man, derision and mockery constitute a commensurate "exchange of ideas." Civil discourse is not required in the struggle against oppression.
1
Well, that is not their argument per se. Their argument is that a man is entitled to a woman just as much as a woman is entitled to a man. There is a reason that there is a 50/50 split between the female and male populations in the world. They argue that it is in men's very nature to want to be with a woman (or a man). They argue, and quite persuasively I might add, that a man needs a woman to feel whole and complete and that women need men just as much.
Their thinking goes that there is a woman for every man and a man for every woman and that both men and women feel lonely and alone when they are not linked together in the holy matrimony.
They hold self-evident and true the following statements:
1) that men and women are physically and temperamentally different
2) that men are violent creatures whose violent impulses are often directed at women and other men
3) that women are less violent and more agreeable than men, because in the past when women were contrary and disobedient they were often killed by men
4) that it is perfectly natural and normal for all human beings to desire companionship
5) that something is not right in Western societies when the divorce rates are so high and so many men and women are unmarried
6) that true equality between women and men is impossible
7) that men should be forced to be more considerate of women
8) that Western civilization will collapse if men and women cannot connect with each other in a meaningful way
1
Nobody likes change, especially if the system has been working in your favour for a very long time. So obviously a large number of men - especially straight white men - are not fond of the idea of voices being heard that up till recently had been conveniently silenced. The order is changing. It is true that the more masculine forces - and these reside in both men and women - are being challenged, and in a world ridden by inequality, war, environmental disaster surely that can't be a bad thing. Most of these conditions have been brought about by the masculine need to objectify, control, colonise, dominate. The feminine, with its inclusive, nurturing, holistic vision is beginning to regain its rightful place and transform consciousness. There is a call on men to make a change, to evolve, to grow. That is not about holding on to how things have been for three thousand years Mr. Peterson. It is about having the courage to see change not as a threat but as an invitation towards personal and universal growth. It is about adapting. It's called evolution.
14
Wait, so because of a workplace dispute over whether “Flip chart” should be used (seems like it depends on context, if you have a lot of clients who are of Filipino dissent and are offended) “he was radicalized because the “radical left” wants to eliminate hierarchies” — so it’s not about political correctness even, but blatant white supremacy?
Sounds like Jordan Peterson is the one who needs to grow up.
21
It’s hilarious hearing the mental acrobatics Peterson’s cult followers will go to in order to explain away the reasons he has
1. Appeared with the colorful neo-Nazi Devon Huxtable, waving a Pepe flag and giving the white power sign
2. Appeared with a neo-Nazi who goes by “Winston Smith” and was busted for posting white supremacist hate materials in Toronto
3. Conducted a fawning interview with British neo-Nazi lunatic Tara McCarthy
4. Made a fawning interview about Faith Goldy, booted out of her neo-Nazi organization for being too extreme.
5. Made a fawning video about Lauren Southern, banned from the UK for terrorism, including violent attacks on rescue boats of migrants.
6. Tweeted his outrage that his buddy Lauren Southern is not welcome on British shores due to her membership in the neo-Nazi skinhead organization “Defend Europe.”
7. Retweeted a post from a violent Nazi organization called S.C.R.U.M.P. (their account was deleted from Twitter due to violent anti-Semitic hate speech/neo-Nazi lunacy).
8. Retweeted a post from the Nazi organization Evropa40, then laughably claimed he simply liked the pretty picture of the castle.
and so on and so forth
As to the rest of Peterson’s total nonsense, (his claims that ancient people were aware of the structure of DNA and depicted it in their paintings, his assertion that quantum mechanics proves the existence of God, his lunatic claim that GHOSTS have infested the trunk of his car), the less said the better.
32
Nearly every claim you outlined is either a complete or near fabrication. :-)
10
Feminine is chaos, masculine is order? It is a joke, right?
The structured society is the embodiment of the feminine - but shared by older males, to - necessity to bring under control the environment - to maximize the survival possibility of the offspring, for women, to maximize their own power, the old men in control.
The unstoppable Barbarian Horde raping, burning and pillaging its way as it plows through the land is a nice embodiment of the basic instincts of many a man (youngsters with high testosterone, usually).
And war, for millennia the quintessential male activity - as well as the undeclared but fundamental tool to re-balance more favorably [to older males] the male/female ratio, can hardly be described as an ordered endeavor.
I, too, think that "masculinity" is under assault, but more than because of cultural reasons, because of technical and and economical changes that have made it more a liability than an asset for our current version of capitalism.
I.E. a postindustrial society in which "real" war - the only true need for men and for their propensity to open violent action - has become almost absurd, has really no use for too many manly men, not when in the long run the amount of violence required to maintain the social hierarchy can be doled out by other means, be these female officers or drones...
I rather that it was not so, as I am a white guy after all.
But I could as well be a mammoth, my kind's going extinct anyway.
It's not necessarily bad.
8
For the record, Peterson's nonsense about lobsters is of a piece with his other outlandish and utterly phony statements. He claims lobsters "divulged (sic) from humans 350 million years ago. Common ancestor." He repeats this item of stupidity in his book, though he's off by over 400 million years and everything else he has to say about biology, evolution, nervous system development is sheer nonsense, ripped apart by many in the relevant fields, including evolutionary biologist PZ Myers and neuroscientist Lenore Goncalves. Elsewhere, the noted UK physicist Phillip Moriarty DEMOLISHES Peterson's spectacularly WRONG statements about quantum mechanics, insisting Peterson has no clue what he's talking about and is a clumsy reproduction of Deepac Chopra.
Nothing the guy has to say has any credibility whatsoever.
21
Why couldn't young Lion Arar listen to his mom? Why was it more impactful when Peterson told him to clean his room than all those years she did? Maybe it's the bucks he shelled out for such good advice? Maybe mom should have been charging him, too?
13
This is snake oil. It's pseudo intellectualism gussied up with important-sounding words like "postmodern neo-Marxism." He's selling victimhood while at the same time thundering (in his high-pitched voice) against those he claims are false victims. I've seen many comments here attempting to absolve him of what some of his more, um, strident followers believe. Believe me, he knows. That's who he's selling to.
30
The high-pitched voice sounds remarkably like the Muppet Kermit The Frog. In a rare moment of self-awareness, Mr. Peterson seems to have actually admitted this to be true.
1
I stumbled across the perfect theme song for this lot: Don McLean's "Everybody Loves Me Baby"
4
Is this an Op-Ed or an interview? I agree with the author's opinion on Mr. Peterson, but I would have preferred to read this without so much explicit bias against him. His arguments speak for themselves.
11
I strongly dislike his doctrine of chaos as female and order as male. He seems to fall back on a Judeo-Christian belief of hierarchy, with women in service to or subservient to men, yet Peterson's ideas ignore the supposed order that the woman brings to the household. I don't agree with this at all, I just think that his argument needs to be more sound if we are supposed to take this backlash from mostly straight/white men seriously.
4
I bet hanging out with Jordan Peterson and any of his devotees is a barrel of laughs. Serious guys for serious times, bemoaning the state of their existence surrounding by tacky kitsch. They need to get outside and bang on some drums if they are so worried about masculinity, not wasting time dolled up in suits making podcasts.
11
Ladies, observe Jordan Peterson closely. Not for himself, but for the boys in his audiences. These aren't guys you want to marry.
26
Another whining, narcissistic grifter is born, further extending victimhood to those poor white men, who now should also see women - in addition to all people of color - as the source of all their troubles. Phyllis Schlafly would be so proud.
Our current president is the epitome of chaos and immaturity, blaming everyone but himself for his perceived persecution.
Peterson should take his own advice - grow up. Oh, and he better be glad women are not capable of magic spells such as those in fairy tales - or I'd happily turn him into a toad.
26
Enforced monogamy? For whom? Enforced how? By public stoning?
18
Very easy to espouse these views when you are a white male!!!
11
Unfortunately, many of the "journalists" trying to interview Jordan Peterson just aren't quite smart enough to understand what he's saying. That in itself isn't a crime, but when you then step up your ignorance, and turn it into a lie, that then is reprehensible. The author should maybe get some help to actually understand the subject matter and try again.
12
I value some of what Jordan Peterson has to say and also have criticisms of him; I am an ardent and unequivocal feminist (and I am mature enough to read a perspective that I disagree with and not get upset). But I take issue with this article as it comes off more as a project to fulfill an agenda and a personal attack under the guise of reporting. This article seems at pains to mischaracterize and mock its subject. I also find Bowles avoids directly quoting Peterson whenever she attributes a specific perspective on women to him, like she is filling in blanks between where she does directly quote to create her own version of his positions. Bowles seems to lack the ability to imagine that the world has other categories besides one specific offshoot brand of third wave feminism, and everything else and she demonstrates no awareness of the state of this debate (in contrast to Bari Weiss’ much more nuanced and well informed recent article mentioning Peterson among others).
29
Thanks for this thoughtful and well-informed comment. The way this article not only misrepresents Peterson's ideas but attempts to harm him through its personal attacks has done real damage. Many of the commenters are taking Bowles's misrepresentations as truths rather than as what they are.
I urge everyone to see for yourselves. Peterson's real ideas deserve serious attention--a couple hours of viewing, at least. Then they deserve, like all serious ideas--criticism.
4
I started watching his videos and interviews after the BBC interview, expecting to like him. What I found, instead, was an absolute throwback to the chauvinism of the 50s. Anything he said to do with women was pure garbage. And as someone who has spent a lot of time checking out the mnosphere, I was shocked, because he had all their talking points. It's obvious if you've spent any time on the old reddit incels sub, or the other related ones, that he has spent a lot of time in their midst. His views on men and women were identical, just expressed without the usual vulgarities.
3
I have followed Peterson since he critiqued the use of gender pronouns, listened to his conversations with Sam Harris, and recently watched his appearance on Bill Maher. What I have observed - in all these instances - is a person who likes to be right and win arguments before anything else. He uses argumentative tactics of cornering people into dualities of either/or. His inability to engage with the experience of Others is troublesome and clearly helps him tap into/connect with a disgruntled part of the population. I remain unimpressed by him and especially because his overt arrogance and sense of being the only smart person in the room is easily uncovered as reactive and by taking a rigid stance on pressing issues that defy simple answers.
14
I can see how you would draw that conclusion from those two interviews.Fair enough. Sam Harris himself admitted that the interview was something of a failure for each of them. And Peterson on Maher's show was a like a fish out of water, flopping around. There are other lectures and interviews very different from these. He often, very often, recognizes complexities. He does get aggressive when confronting aggression.
2
The male double mm-hmmm grunt is a Harvard tic. I noticed it decades ago while working at MIT and interacting frequently with colleagues from Harvard. Not sure if it’s still in style with younger generations but it was ubiquitous with this guy’s generation. Doesn’t surprise me that this poser would have one of the most annoying and patronizing vocal habits I’ve ever encountered.
12
The question I always want to ask these men is, when they say things have always been a certain way, where are they thinking of? Do they mean the whole world? For all time? How do they reconcile cultures that didn’t work the way they claim is natural ? The ones where women weren’t associated with chaos (which isn’t, as far as I’m aware, even a Western universal. Women have sometimes been order and civilization, who supposedly tamed the men in their society and their “natural” wildness)? What about matriarchal cultures? The Haudenosaunee, one of the oldest representative democracies in the world, are matriarchal. Why is the correct model the one derived from Western European culture of a very specific area? The confirmation bias is so immense, and the men who advocate for these theories are so unaware of their own gaps in knowledge, that listening to the arguments is intellectually painful. The only problem is that this all resonates so well with the similarly ignorant and willfully forgetful and becomes a full-blown movement based on misinformation and pseudoscience.
19
Excellent question to ask Peterson - he actually goes to great lenghts to explain what he means by natural in his university lectures, which are available on youtube. They're long, but it's worth it if you want to have a genuine opinion on this man. Bowles' piece distorts his views beyond recognition in an unprofessional manner.
11
Jordan Peterson (like Rob Ford before him, and now Rob's brother, Doug) keeps the Canadian feeling of superiority toward American's in check. The U.S. has Trump, but we produced this creepy guy. So no, we are not inherently superior to Americans and we Canucks need to work on our own society's ills, just as the Yanks do.
I sure hope that Peterson and his pathetic ilk just represent a passing fever on the way to a healthier and fairer society.
23
Jordan strikes me as a guy who would really benefit from therapy.
25
The spectacle of the pimpled masses, yearning to be made Real Men and certified biologically superior members of the He-Man Women Haters Club--by pseudo intellectuals like Mr. Peterson!--would seem to more a subject for comedy than anything else--until one looks at the huge, gullible crowds he draws and realizes the potential these people have for violence. Then it becomes truly frightening.
More than a 100 years ago, Sigmund Freud understood the relationship between patriarchal sex suppression and the sick violence of sadism. (Perhaps one reason rightists prefer Jung). Fascist political movements, psychologically understood, are expressions of mass sadism.
The book that is the best antidote to the ideological poison peddled by such rightists is "The Mass Psychology of Fascism" by Wilhelm Reich.
11
Really would be interested to see the full transcripts of this interview. Anybody else?
17
Not in the least. I've heard more than enough from this dangerous lout.
Jordan Peterson on Marxism!
Jordan Peterson on why the CUBS keep losing!
Jordan Peterson on Aztec metallurgy!
Spare me.
9
Peterson is a fundamentalist and a believer in a nonexistent “natural order of things.” He also misrepresents postmodernism and Marxism, claiming that the former is the end of civilization (whatever dudebro, it’s philosophy) and the latter is something real that happened. This academically irresponsible, clinically unethical, and politically despicable. He deliberately preys on fragile men and women to make a profit. Thanks for this piece.
12
Can we put this guy and Margaret Atwood on stage together for a debate? Wouldn't that be fun?
18
I was thinking the same thing -
2
Dave Chappelle goes into this kind of thing in his stand up special on HBO, "Killing Them Softly". He talks about how men and women don't get along anymore, how there are fundamental differences differences between the sexes that have historically been accepted (and this is different from oppression, which also existed), but since the 2nd wave feminism movement or the 70s and 80s it's offensive to say men and women are not identical (having equal rights is not the same as being identical).
"Chivalry is dead..."
(applause from the audience)
"...and women killed it."
We as a society are figuring things out. Men are confused, and women are mad because men are confused. Conversations like the one Jordan Peterson is having are worthy of our attention, because the ideas that are true will be carried forward, and the ones that are not will be thrown in the trash. But without the conversation there is no progress.
10
None of the men in my life are confused. They like and respect women and treat them as equals. Why is this such a hard concept to grasp?
19
You are either very lucky or not having honest conversations with all of the men in your life.
I honestly thought this was a parody and was laughing myself silly until I reached the paragraph about the Toronto van murders and realized Jordan Peterson is a real person, selling his snake oil to real people.
13
Peterson says he spoke up to challenge the attempt by the Neo-Left to prevent free speech through new anti-free speech legislation in Canada. That’s it.
2
And if that was really it, no problem.
"If you disagree with someone, attack their character. If you cannot find something to attack, misconstrue and manipulate facts until you can."
This seems to be the mantra for those directly opposed to Peterson ideologically. I have seen very few straightforward interviews and articles related to this man. There is a lot of effort to discredit the man, since they cannot seem to contest his ideas effectively.
It is a shame, since we need rational discourse in this country more than ever. I wish the other sides in these arguments can put forward someone able to separate their emotions and feelings from the subject so we can make some progress here.
26
I agree, it's disheartening to see.
2
Also: Just look at his expression and stance in the photo! Basically, that’s the summation of his book.
2
After retiring from active duty and working in the civilian sector for 6 years, I can understand the attraction and positive aspects of hierarchies with clearly defined roles and responsibilities. That being said, I chaffed at the negative aspects my entire career, sometimes to my detriment.
Peterson is trying to give a complex problem a simple solution. There isn't one.
10
Bingo! It really is that simple. Unfortunately this is the kind of thinking that put Trump in power.
3
Commenters who violently put-down Dr. Peterson make the same mistake America did with Trump: after the Nov. 2016 election, we didn’t ask why sixty million plus Americans voted for Trump, we just called those who voted for him stupid and racist and thought that answer, though meaningless, would hold. We do the same with Jordon Petersen, we don’t ask why millions of people, mainly men it seems, have reached out to him, rather, we just accuse Petersen and his admirers of all sorts of evil things, from being women haters to bigots. I wash it were so easy.
On this day of another American school shooting, a day when it would be fair to ask, has America gone berserk, I’m afraid putting men like Trump and Petersen into little boxes of meaning does nothing to explain either of them or their followers. There’s something else going on in American society, with the people of America, something beyond Trump or Petersen, something raw and ugly and gruesome. Maybe It’s a mysterious cultural longing for something real and true, a longing this article on Petersen, though well-intentioned, didn’t come close to portraying.
16
"Maybe It’s a mysterious cultural longing for something real and true, a longing this article on Petersen, though well-intentioned, didn’t come close to portraying."
Or maybe we simply DO live in a country swarming with racist idiots?
15
The world has changed and some people haven't changed with it and they are not happy - period.
8
This man has no insight. I just had to stop midway to laugh when he described Betty Friedan's book as being "whiny." Seriously? Peterson's beliefs and his entire professional life seems to rest on the whining of men who feel they've lost their advantages!
20
So, hierarchies are fine...
...except when it relates to a man's desirability to women.
20
Peterson's statement that men are ordered and women are chaotic is hysterical! Take a close look at most heterosexual households and see. Women juggle and work twice as hard as their males counterparts. This guy is making buckets of money off young people who have to be reminded to make their beds. He wants society to understand and alter itself to keep the white male on top. It is shocking to hear from an academic that white privilege is a farce - where has this guy been? What is his personal life like? Perhaps he fosters fear and hatred for the opposite sex? And that is why he is so angry. He isn't offering a quick fix people - he is misleading and greedily pandering to the lowest common denominator.
14
The existence of and necessity for some hierarchies does not mean that they inevitably must be patriarchal. Peterson's trying to justify hegemony for white guys. Sorry, women have stopped buying. We will just have to persist on our own.
7
And with us gay guys!!
2
There is so much crazy in this article it's impossible to unpack it all. His assertion that 50% of the men are undesirable and women only date and marry at the top of the pack is demonstrably false. How is it that most people have been married at least once? He is projecting his own inadequacies on women. Plenty of women marry guys who aren't rich and aren't good looking. MOST people are neither rich nor good looking, they are still getting together, still having kids, etc. And he wants people to take personal responsibility, perhaps he and his followers should take responsibility for their lack of attractiveness to women. Maybe their ridiculous, dated ideas are to blame, not the women. Men have caused most of the wars and agony in world history because they've been the ones in power. Women have waiting for centuries for a shot. I'd say we've earned it, don't like it, we don't care. We are taking responsibility for OUR lives. And that means staying away from guys like Jordon Peterson and his crybaby followers.
18
This fellow seems rather simplistic, but he is responding to a simplistic critique on the other side. There needs to be a genuine conversation about manhood and its positive role. Right now we're not having it.
4
Manhood is a silly social construct. Try being a Human Being.
9
"In Mr. Peterson’s world, order is masculine. Chaos is feminine." But also, "Violent attacks are what happens when men do not have partners, Mr. Peterson says." This article is very well done, and shows Peterson for what he is: a misogynist masquerading as an intellectual.
15
So you think that he is presenting a backlash to female progress but do you support your sisters who want to stay home and raise families the same way you would support your sisters who want to run their own businesses and remain childless? True equality will not exist until women who want to remain caregivers and mothers are afforded the same status in society as those that work. The revolution is coming; and journalists like you are not prepared for what awaits...
3
Revolution? Jobs = childless and Home + children?
What century are you living in "Sue"?!?
1
“You know you can say, ‘Well isn’t it unfortunate that chaos is represented by the feminine’ — well, it might be unfortunate, but it doesn’t matter because that is how it’s represented. It’s been represented like that forever. And there are reasons for it. You can’t change it. It’s not possible. This is underneath everything. If you change those basic categories, people wouldn’t be human anymore."
Better tell it to the Egyptians with their Ma'at (order, truth, law, morality, feminine) and Apep (chaos, darkness, violence, bestialness, masculine), which means this was already false even way back at the dawn of civilization. There's plenty of other examples since then, but the comment space is short and it only takes one counterexample to disprove an "always" so I'll stop at the one.
A problem with founding the whole line of argument on a false "always" statement is that when the always goes, the rest of the argument goes too. Suddenly you're reduced from the rationally passable statement "it never was that way and simply can't be" to the less rational, more whiny argument of "well, it mostly wasn't that way, and trying to make it that way is toooo haaaaard."
10
There is so much about this philosophy that is maddening and hilarious, but I cannot help but scorn the, "Violent attacks are what happens when men are without partners" comment. I know so many women for whom quite the opposite is true: Peace, contentment, and real spiritual nurturing are often achieved when women are without partners. Which does beg the question, Who then is the more chaotic sex?
9
As implied by the last line in this article, it seems that it is good to fire a male professor for saying something as banal as - women would be happier if they were married. Even if he’s wrong, why should he be deprived of his livelihood over this. It strikes me as odd that women are ultra sensitive and hypercritical and then they wonder why they aren’t or shouldn’t be taken seriously. And then, women also wonder why men don’t want them around in the workplace or just about anyplace else for that matter. The disconnect just makes me laugh.
3
As a woman of some experience I have something I have questions about.
History shows that the highest levels of female achievement have been attained by women who kept themselves separate from men. So with these examples, there is good reason to believe that it is not only lack of opportunity but actual biological consequences of women having sexual relations with men, as well as bearing children. that have held women back.
What woman doesn't know that you have been and are being changed by these relations?
We know that immune systems go into action against the foreign DNA in sperm and embryos. And we know that the immune system destroys neurons in the brain. We also know that there are changes in brain chemical balances from pregnancy. If women's' bodies and minds are being transformed/remodeled by these exterior relations why hasn't this been investigated? Maybe because the people who benefit from this have been the ones deciding what health concerns and whose freedom of opportunity are worth investigating and protecting?
The point re Jordan Peterson is that the sexual differences that he claims to see are not biological destiny at all but the likely result of policies that have forced women into this biochemical difference.
3
That is one chem-trails like, paranoid, man-fearing (hating) , pseudo-science rant you got there.
There are myriad women, who achieved myriad things, while being "around men" (married and in love with them) and having kids with them and gasp! - appreciating the support and solidarity they got from men.
Just off the top of my head - Lucille Ball - (Feminist icon).
Elenor Roosevelt (Feminist Icon)
Gilda Ratner (Feminist Icon)
All married and deeply in love with MEN - and in prosperous relationships on both sides.
In the interest of brevity, I will limit myself to a few brief comments rather than the rebuttal that Mr. Petersen's noxious, superficial and culturally limited theory deserves: The lobster, with a brain the size of a grasshopper and its cannibalistic inclination seems a poor model for human social structures; in other cultures, Norse mythology and ancient Egypt for example, the god of chaos is male, and finally, just what, in the words of one of his acolytes, is Mr Peterson "waking the West up to?" In the extreme, the tradition of those retrograde cultures where women are the property of their husband's and father's? Stoned for transgressions against "monogamy"?
I wonder if the man who believes Mr. Peterson is telling him something he already knows--some eternal verity, is really just hearing what he wants to believe . . .
15
I don't get it. Where are these generalizations coming from? Half of the mothers I know work, the other half stay at home. It doesn't seem like anybody is ashamed of their decision. The difference between me and Peterson (a "feminist" working mother) is that I want women to be able to choose - because we are autonomous people, just like his fans. I will never listen to this guy (this article was enough to keep me up at night for the sake of my young daughters), but my assumption is he does not think we deserve a choice at all.
13
When I was 30 I decided that I had no interest in having children. Not surprisingly I ended up never getting married as back in the 80's when women found out you didn't want to have kids it was like the Red Sea parting.
Because I was never burdened with the joys of domestic domesticity I was able to work and live and make lifes big decisions unencumbered. As a result I retired at 60 with a LOT of money and have been, as they say, living the dream.
But at no time did I view my good fortune as a result of going out and "doing what a man should" as Peterson would suggest. Monogamy just happened to work out. Peterson's notion of hierarchy and separation and role-playing is both moronic and dangerous. After witnessing first hand riots over gay rights, women's rights and race (and Vietnam) I have come to mistrust any attempts to separate us and will spend the rest of my days trying to find common ground.
14
Grant - as a woman I too was very independent and knew I did not want children - I'm just not mommy material. right after moving into a suburban development, there was a Labor Day get together. I attended thinking it would be nice to meet neighbors. When the women found out I worked and had no children, you would have thought I had the plague. From that day forward I was overtly shunned. It's not noted in the article as to whether Peterson is/was married or has children. Agree totally - a moronic and dangerous man.
7
lol I bet, as my daughter and I would say, that his wife is the boss of him.
12
Ms. Bowles apparently wants to replicate the Cathy Newman interview on this side of the Atlantic. "So what you're saying is ... " proceeding to reword and twist every word he said into an idea or thought he does not have.
19
This article is not very helpful, or well-intentioned. It's very easy to criticize Jordan, because he's a complex thinker and tackles controversial topics. He is also very easy to cite out of context and thus demonize. I've read 12 Rules, and it's a very good and useful book. There's really no misogyny in it. His views of the feminist, marxist, and postmodern traditions is a caricature, but his main point is to criticize precisely the caricature that these movements have become. His main positions are that: (1) Men and women are different, and tend to gravitate towards different things; (2) Human societies are hierarchical; and, (3) People should take charge of their lives and stop playing the victim (from the left or from the right). Hardly controversial stuff. The fact that these positions are considered "conservative" or "extreme right wing" in countries like the US is the really worrisome thing here.
29
Whatever you think of Peterson's intellectual calibre (and there are certainly good grounds to question that) he's a fascinating cultural phenomenon. He's filled a gap on the centre-right that's been there for at least a generation - a yearning need for a charismatic male figure to confront the ascendancy of identity politics, political correctness and cultural relativism. Trump may appeal to the same constituency but he lacks the potent mix of mythology and literary/academic chutzpah that defines the Peterson brand. When Peterson speaks to his audience they hear what Trump can never convey - meaning. It's that they feel robbed of by the godless centre-left. For the men who make up the majority of his followers he also gives them a reason to believe in themselves again - traditional masculinity is central to the natural order and as such is preordained (Peterson might fight shy of admitting to a belief in God but transcendence runs through his thinking like a biblical narrative). No matter that it amounts to little more than pop psychology, Peterson's ideas are perfectly attuned to his audience. All the more reason for articles like this that deftly deconstruct the mythology.
6
Weird that he is apparently so opposed to totalitarian societies, but seems to regard order and hierarchy as the highest values. Maybe he has a begrudging admiration for all of the order and hierarchy on display in his Maoist and Stalinist posters.
He also thinks happiness is overrated, and thinks smiling is stupid - who wants happiness when they can have order...
A very silly man, as many others have pointed out!
14
Has anyone else noticed that this is in the Style section? Is that where this discussion belongs? Or, is someone really bad at masking their subversion? I can't wait to hear the informed responses to this thing after it's "unpacked", in the parlance of our times.
1
Even as an anti-theist, the Peterson doctrines on equality and gender make a lot of sense, once you filter out the religious mumbo-jumbo and just look at the psychology he argues. This profile really humanized him in a way that made his arguments even more credible and personable to me. I think we need voices like his speaking up, resoundingly, against the increasing tide of identity-based tribalism and rhetoric.
9
Peterson's thought is all about "identity-based tribalism and rhetoric" (his own).
1
Another self agrandizing money grubber who can save your status expectations, from "them". Milk 'em good Jordan.
11
He needs to grow up. He wants to set the clock back to cave man times because it is more natural? Men are not entitled to have partners. Men are not entitled to have cover girls as their partners. Resenting all women because you are incapable of finding a partner that meets your expectations is insanity. Mr. Petersen is only increasing the resentment level rather than helping men adjust their distorted expectations and getting rich doing it. It is obvious that there is a societal problem with men and violence and in many cases it is related to their lack of social and sexual connections (Ted Kaczynski springs to mind as such a case) but assigning them a woman is not a reasonable solution. Sounds like he'd agree with forced prostitution ala Japanese comfort women. A women's aid corps for incels.
23
This is nothing more than a hit piece entirely misrepresenting what the man stands for and why he has such a large following. Why is it that all of his viscious critics are unable to simply reckon with his actual principles instead of painting him as a monsterous caricature? He is not some fringe alt-right white supremecist nazi... couldn't be further. Neither the author of this article, nor the many commentors, have actually taken the time to listen to this man. They enjoy having a boogey-man and a punching bag who they can use to make themselves feel more righteous and who they can use as an excuse to burrow their own heads further into the sand. The modern left lacks any sophistication. The modern left is all rigid dogma, full of anxiety, full of a need to aggressively attack anyone who dares to question their orthodoxy, especially those who are actually articulate and who may actually have... GASP... real valid points
64
It's not a matter of being left or right. People are reacting to the misrepresentations in the article that they believe are accurate representations of Peterson's thinking--for example the parts about "enforced monogamy" that are repeated without any context or the notion of "hierarchy" or many others. They are not reading or listening to or watching Peterson. The article has plenty of triggers that will provoke reaction. It's what hit pieces are supposed to do.
15
Dan, why your comment isn't the top NYT pick is a singular mystery.
5
Read the comments—with compassion and a true wish to understand. Most will answer that question for you, Why so vicious?
3
Well done Ms. Bowles... It was a great piece that revealed the deep insecurity, indeed manufactured insecurity in many cases, that drives these new strains of male victimization.
And you let him do it to himself
13
“You know you can say, ‘Well isn’t it unfortunate that chaos is represented by the feminine’ — well, it might be unfortunate, but it doesn’t matter because that is how it’s represented. It’s been represented like that forever. And there are reasons for it. You can’t change it. It’s not possible. This is underneath everything. If you change those basic categories, people wouldn’t be human anymore. They’d be something else. They’d be transhuman or something. We wouldn’t be able to talk to these new creatures.”
This is where his argument falls down in my opinion. In simply opining for the past order of things he fails to notice the importance of evolving our social constructs and understanding of one another and the roles we play in life and society. It could be argued that the entire meaning of our existence is to evolve - what else is our record of human history proof of if not that simple truth?
6
The masculine spirit is under assault by that outfit. It highlights the parts of his body that don't look all that masculine. What a joke. Does anyone really listen to this guy? How sad. The fifties were the worst decade ever. Not even good for men. That's why they smoked and drank so much. They were unhappy too.
14
This article has to fall into the category of "hit piece." It uses familiar techniques: Create loose associations between Peterson and known anathema groups (incels), take phrases and comments out of context, or from casual speech, and recontextualize them in a way that makes them seem odious, and make snide comments along the way ("fleeting, suspicious eye contact"). (I acknowledge that Peterson seems to take a kind of pleasure in provoking people who will inevitably be triggered by some of the things he says and will end up writing articles like this.)
Peterson, however, needs to be read and heard on his own in order to be understood. Taking snippets and re-mosaicing them with an agenda is not a serious way of understanding. There is a reason his books are long and his lectures are long and his interviews are long. What he has to say does not fit into a clever column. His work on myth is complicated, and so is the relation of myth to modern society.
I urge readers to watch Peterson's videos and lectures and interviews for themselves. Or read a book. I wouldn't start with his first book, Maps of Meaning. Most people find the Cathy Newman interview a good entry point. He is worth hearing in his own voice.
58
This hits a nerve in these days as more men fail at the tasks that have historically defined masculinity. The result is scapegoating of women but much more is involved in the loss of status.
In another era men were the expected breadwinners in a family, there were jobs available regardless of education and there were no excuses- you just went out and did it. Schools were oriented to helping males, even the most academically inept, to get the necessary minimum to reach the point where they could achieve the status of "family man".
As women became empowered something had to give and it was this historic structure - in the detritus are many men who will never achieve what they believe is the definition of being "a man". As a result there is grievance and resentment directed at women- if they would only return to their subordinate role all would be well. All of the economic dislocation for other reasons (reasons beyond anyone's control)that has occurred concurrently with women becoming more economically independent would disappear and the proper order of the past would return.
As a psychologist Peterson recognizes that people respond to a simple message of clearly placed blame for their problems and women, who have benefitted from recent trends, are the obvious choice. The more complex factors are left unaddressed but there is another message aimed obliquely at them: "stop whining, if you want to be a man, act like a man".
5
I thought these people had been "hidden" and "censored" and "no-platformed", yet they seem to be the subject of endless features in the NYT, the WSJ, and the Washington Post. At what point do we stop accepting these people's fanciful stories of their own oppression and start holding the media accountable for spreading their hateful rhetoric?
21
This was not worth publishing nor reading. He thinks we should act like lobsters. when should an editor sit back and say, "no?" I would think the lobster part.
12
Is it just a coincidence that there's a poster with Cyrillic writing on it in the background?
5
Until the last 20 years, women needed men for protection, financial support, and procreation. Now that women can buy guns, get jobs, and buy sperm, they expect to be treated with respect and dignity before they sign up for a life-time partnership. A lot of men don't like it when the shoe is on the other foot.
8
The "go backward" lecture is pathetic, a lecture for small men without ideas, actions, or options. It's technology that is pushing patriarchy aside. If men can't make the switch, they will be the ones oppressed.
14
I agree with all the commenters who say leave these people to bask in obscurity. The internet allows a lot of crazies to make a lot of money, as we well know by now. That doesn't mean they deserve the notice of the Times or any educated person.
19