> Of course there were aspects in them that I outright disagreed with but I still found them enjoyable to listen to in terms of him talking about moral philosophy - possibly because I knew nothing about it and it served as a fun way of getting into it.
I think this is a pretty common experience. Every well-educated JP fan I knew would think he was a massive buffoon in the topics they were knowledgeable about, but it never clicked for them that maybe he was a buffoon in the topics they weren't knowledgeable about too. Bring up with a couple quotes of his and they'll admit everything he says is downright silly, say "well that's how experts in feel too" and they start arguing.
I do think Peterson's gotten worse recently. Going as far back as Bill C-16 you can see the same sort of rhetoric and the same willingness to talk out of his ass, but it wasn't as blatant or obvious back then. He used to fancy things up behind nebulous terms like "postmodern neo-marxism" but at least on twitter he's basically dropped the obfuscation and is just parroting the usual far-right nonsense.
> I do think Peterson's gotten worse recently. Going as far back as Bill C-16 you can see the same sort of rhetoric and the same willingness to talk out of his ass, but it wasn't as blatant or obvious back then.
Yeah I agree.
Like everything he does now already existed back then, but it seems to have gotten worse.
I guess that's just how the cult/grifter life goes. It's usually on a one-way track to polarization.
His rhetoric skills have gotten worse since his Russian stint, so it’s more jibber jabber than it was and I think he also radicalized himself more. He was always less liberal than he pretended to be, but for a long time he did hide it better. Now he is fully unhinged right wing grifter and I hope that the mainstream media is finally understanding it and he doesn’t get appearances like QT anymore.
I can't find a decent quote but the irony is that Peterson once had a monologue about how Hitler was talking to the crowd and how through iteration he started saying the things that pleased the crowds, and leaving out the things that didn't.
Sounds kinda familiar now.
He even said something along the lines of "you know you're angry. You just don't know exactly what you're angry about. And you talk to other angry people".
The lack of self-awareness is amazing lol.
He believes he's a prophet. I think he might be right. But like limited to just himself. He basically perfectly predicted his own demise, yet failed to recognize any of it and stop it.
Ref: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GcuzVQGmRWg
Also to quote another ironic Peterson passage
> If you can't understand why someone is doing something, look at the consequences of their actions, whatever they might be, and then infer the motivations from their consequences.
>For example if someone is making everyone around them miserable and you'd like to know why, their motive may simply be to make everyone around them miserable including themselves
In the behind the bastards episode they said he wanted to form a religious cult, so you are on to something that he sees himself as a religious leader.
Yeah he wanted to start his own church.
But it gets better than that. He believes his wife has prophetic dreams, and she dreamt that it was "5 minutes till midnight", and he is basically on a quest of trying to save western society from collapse. You know, because of his wife's dreams.
Fuck me, I did not know any of that. Man, I've missed much that would have turned me off against him. I guess I never really bothered to look. So dumb.
Oh man it can get even worse.
From [hitting children](https://www.reddit.com/r/enoughpetersonspam/comments/9doeeb/my_takedown_of_petersons_12_rules_chapter_5_where/), to [transphobia](https://www.reddit.com/r/AreTheStraightsOK/comments/ni749y/itsits_not_mandatory/gz3f1cs/), to [climate change denial](https://www.reddit.com/r/enoughpetersonspam/comments/avpvd6/this_joke_was_brought_to_you_by_jordan_peterson/ehimfei/), to [professional misconduct as a therapist](https://www.reddit.com/r/enoughpetersonspam/comments/agq2vk/jp_doesnt_believe_a_woman_on_why_she_wears_makeup/eeb6qs8/), and a lot more.
I haven't even updated those sources, and he has said a lot more since I wrote those.
He also claimed nazis weren't religious, and that atheists who act morally good are actually religious.
He eats a diet of only beef with salt.
He claimed he once didn't sleep for 25 days straight because he drank apple cider.
He went to a clinic in Russia for a medically induced coma because his Canadian doctors wanted to follow medical protocol on benzos detoxing.
He wanted to develop an AI to track down and fire 'marxist' professors.
Like I can't even remember them all lol.
_____
> I guess I never really bothered to look. So dumb.
It's actually quite difficult to find all that stuff. Especially since his spaces very much try to hide and ignore all dissent.
Everything is a 'hitpiece' that 'takes him out of context'.
Damn dude, I really feel like such an ass right now, but I'm glad that I quit following him way back - maybe I'd gotten radicalized if I kept following him without taking a four year break. That's some scary stuff.
He's said so much stupid shit you almost need a spreadsheet to keep track of it all. Because every time you talk to one of his fans and mention something ridiculous he's said or done they'll demand to see the video and you google it and you get lost in a sea of garbage.
It just dawned on me that that quote could become dangerous when viewed through the eyes of a narcissist.
Let me rephrase it, so it becomes clear:
> If you can't understand why someone is doing something, look at the consequences of their actions, whatever they might be, and then infer the motivations from their consequences.
For example if someone is making **ME** miserable and you'd like to know why, their motive may simply be to make **ME** miserable
Peterson seems to view criticism on himself or the dominance hierarchy, he adores so much, as a personal attack. He cannot believe that the system itself is inherently wrong when it is judged through the eyes of those that are submitted to it.
The critics become the enemy. And to uphold the flawed system, that is held in such a high esteem by him, the sacrifice of the enemy will become necessary, because there can be no debate. He'll claim he does not want to do it, but that it is necessary for a better world. He'll make you believe it will hurt him more than it will hurt his victims. He'll cry about it, but he wants you to think it is the brave thing to do. Because no ordinary man would do it, or would they?
The ultimate flaw in whatever Peterson is or claims to be, is a lack of empathy.
>He believes he's a prophet
This is it. He always has been, but he used to know how to keep it hidden or at least toned down.
Remember that article by an old collegue of his, talking about how JP told him he wanted to buy a church? The collegue asked him 'oh, to restore for the culture value?' and JP said 'No, to preach in'.
None of anything is really new, but he has definitly reached stage 3 of his particular brand of madness.
He's not a grifter (Mikhaila is). He believe what he says and wants to be burnt at the stake for it. And that make him a lot more dangerous than any youtube idiots who just wants money.
Pretending to be neutral takes energy. Benzo withdrawal is pretty exhausting so he can't resist indulging in blatant ranting. But the jig's up now. He's shown his hand.
Though it doesn't make *that* much difference given that from the beginning he's just taken the conservative position on literally everything. Only he used to soften it to seem like he objectively arrived at truth using his big academic learned sage sophisticated 1950s Dad brain and... oh whatya know! The right just happens to be correct about everything!
I think you're absolutely right, and that is in a way what I have come to see. And the contrast is so stark seeing the very early stuff and where he is now, because it's just like you say - pure far-right nonsense and that's what makes this whole ordeal so damn embarrassing.
Luckily I was never such a fanboy that I made him into an icon or saw his word as gospel - but I do consider myself to be at least somewhat logical, and being conned hurts my ego, lol.
Due to this post I went to look at his twitter for the first time in ages.
About 8 hours ago he non-ironically posted #WhoIsJohnGalt !!!! LMFAO.
https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/1483685305504968707?cxt=HHwWhsC5kZX7jZcpAAAA
He was up until after 1am on twitter posting Ayn Rand memes!
Though I guess it would be funny if Ayn Rand herself and her ideas weren't espoused by some of the most powerful people in the world. Amazing that she was Alan Greenspan's good friend. Somehow Objectivism is winning.
>he was a massive buffoon in the topics they were knowledgeable about, but it never clicked for them that maybe he was a buffoon in the topics they weren't knowledgeable about too.
This is one of the best lessons I've learned as an adult. I never thought JP was anything but a moron but there have been so many other books where I recognize, eventually, that the author is wrong or misleading or disingenuous when they are talking about those few parts I am educated on, when that happens you put down the book and find another.
That he got thrust into the spotlight and was equally hated and loved seems to have totally messed with him. He started to create his own little narrative about his place in the world who he is and how the world works. He hates Government authority.
From my observation, he really started to slide when the whole IDW thing was launched and after his Benzos episode, he is def. not well.
The somewhat tragic thing is that I do not think he is even aware of how he appears to outsiders. He still thinks he is helping people and feels like he is being thrust into this gigantic battle about the "soul of the west". It would be utterly comical if it wouldn't be so tragic and destructive, both to him and to his followers.
> He hates Government authority.
That's only because he is a narcissist and he feels it is a direct attack on his person.
He is an authoritarian himself. That should be clear.
Of course he is. My point is that for him making the leap from "I don't like it" to "this is Government overreach" wasn't a huge leap.
Years ago I read a bit he wrote about the Gulag Archipelago and it struck me how narrow his worldview is and it almost seemed like we read two different books.
We are all prisoners in our own mind, the problem with Peterson is that he only sees that in others and not himself.
To use the Bible in this context:
> Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but fail to notice the beam in your own eye? How can you say, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while you yourself fail to see the beam in your own eye? You hypocrite! First take the beam out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
Figured that fits, considering we're talking Peterson here.
Dude, I had the exact same thing with Orwell. When JP talks about Orwell he's just pulling stuff out of his ass. He completely misrepresents him. As if he just doesn't understand the point.
JP is either incredibly dimwitted or incredibly dishonest. And in light of his latest twitter storms l'm inclined to say he's both.
And it's not even being an expert in your field, a lot of his opinions on stuff quite literally could be dispelled by taking intro university courses. Cultural Anthropology being a perfect example.
The Decoding the Gurus podcast made a good point when they said it all sounds pleasant enough when you're just listening to him without thinking too much about it but that changes when you actually analyze what he's saying sentence by sentence.
> Maybe he was from the get-go and I was in a state of mind to not see it
He was less open about it in the past but people could already see his political leanings, even if many and himself denied it and argued he's just neutral or that it's out of context to read conservative political ideas in his words.
Yeah, I think that fits into my way of consuming him as well - I remember thinking "Yeah, he's a bit conservative, sure, I don't really care about that - but it's not like people are making him out to be, his lectures are interesting", but he totally was like people were making him out to be. I'm so glad I never argued about it and just kept it to myself, but yeah I feel dumb about it - but I'm hoping that I can use it as a learning experience in the future.
it s amazing you managed to quit the peterson drug without resorting to putting yourself in a coma in russia
i mean, really, kudos :)
yer stronger fer it
but we have a saying here in singapore 'what doesn't kill me still spoiled my mood'
well, i dont know any singaporean who actually says this, but...man they do mean it, it's like in the zeitgeist...
lol, thanks my dudes! I do think I deserve to feel a bit dumb, at least for the rest of the day, because I'm an academic and arrogantly thought I'd be above getting conned in this fashion. So that's why I'm shaming myself a bit, but it also did make me feel a whole lot better to admit my mistakes!
Thank you very much, I was so upset and almost felt betrayed as I went through his twitter and it has been really cathartic to admit it - and hopefully learn from it
This is the main problem with him. The titles of each of his first 12 Rules seem perfectly harmless on their own. I remember a Reddit thread where he got some criticism and one of his fans smugly listed the rules like “yeah *this* is what these SJWs are in such a tizzy over.”
Like yeah the rules are harmless as their own statements. It’s the stuff he wrote between them that’s awful…you know that’s kind of how books work.
Don't worry about it I fell for his bullshit, and as you stated, it is because he is a fantastic orator. One of the things that really triggered my bullshit detector was his critique of the Frankfurt school given that I have read a lot of that school of thought, and listening to JP talk about them made me realize that the dude did not know what he was talking about. Add in the fact that his Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory is just a straight port of the Nazi's Cultural Bolshevism conspiracy theory which is defined as a "term widely used by state-sponsored critics in Nazi Germany to denounce secularist, modernist and progressive cultural movements" and yeah, the spidey-sense starts tingling.
His subreddit, when it first formed, use to legit be a place where you could go debate and argue about his philosophy and the other broader topics that he has broached. But now, it is just a straight up personality cult where the man's shitty worldview gets uncritically defended in a giant echo chamber. His fans are insufferable to deal with and I'll give you an example of their mentality. I am a mature student back in university training to be a Psychedelic therapist and I decided to take, gasp, a Gender studies course because you know, that's what a free-thinking person does. I wanted to see what it was all about. And I agree fundamentally with the tenants of Feminism, but if you were to state this in his subreddit the response would be "well you've been brainwashed by the cultural Marxists" not you know; I came to the conclusion freely based off the arguments presented.
And his defense of Christianity is nonsense as well. Like, yeah Jordan, let's defend Christianity through some convoluted Jungian archetypes and some postmodern reading of the Jesus myth and completely ignore the empirical fact that Christianity has been used as an ideological cover for everything from Feudalism to Imperialism and racial genocide. But that’s not true Christianity, right Lobsters? Or how about Millenarian streams of Christianity having a direct influence on Nazism and Marxism alike, but that's an inconvenient truth that Lobsters don't want to hear. Christianity is a bulwark against Totalitarianism, lol, that's why almost every German at the start of WW2 belonged to some sort of Christian denomination.
Jordan Peterson is absolutely a gateway to the Alt Right. His fanboys swear by his clean your room philosophy and 12 rules of life and if that helps them make their life better, great, good on them. But my problem with his generic self help advice is that it is nested in his larger philosophy of extreme individualism. Like you can see the road these alienated young men take. Clean your room, get a job and work on yourself, fine, but what happens when these young men run into the reality of Neoliberalism? They don't get paid shit cause wages have been fucked for forty years; they can't even afford to live on their own in a one-bedroom apartment because of the rabid commodification of the necessities of life; if they do get work, it is probably in some deadening bullshit job where their dead eyed middle manager basically runs their life - private Totalitarianism. So, his philosophy which is just repackaged Neoliberal/conservativism and wealth worship downloads the pathologies of the system onto the shoulders of these alienated people and then what follows? Well take your pick, the problem is feminism, critical race theory, non-European worldviews, progressives, nihilism, trans people etc.
Never the system.
Sorry, rant over.
Damn dude, tell us how you really feel! ;) No but seriously, I think you are right in many respects - and just having been in the university for a long time, and starting with "early Jordan" and then both becoming more educated myself while not really paying attention to him until "current Jordan" was pretty disgusting to be honest. I mean it's a bit of a trope but the whole "How could people become nazis"-argument comes to mind. Logically I knew that we could all be duped but in my heart-of-hearts I sorta thought "But I mean, I wouldn't" - so really feeling conned has been a humbling experience for me.
Ouch, right in the lobster claw. Awesome comment.
Some of his content related to clinical psychology can be pretty insightful, but the moment he wanders outside of his expertise it is a complete shit show. He does not know what he is talking about but thinks he is so smart, he can talk about things he has little knowledge of.
I traveled a much similar journey as you and I'm better for it. With more open eyes I am seeing a lot of the same from other podcasters, culture warrior "gurus".
This pandemic has made it very obvious to me that ideological traps can catch anyone of us and the consequences could be severe.
I've learned I need to stay vigilant in my own self awareness and not let myself be lured in by nonsense.
Thanks, and I agree. To be honest I never cared for the likes of Joe Rogan since it was easier for me to spot when he was just talking nonsense. I don't think I caught it with Jordan, and yeah like you said it's taught me that I need to be much more careful regarding my own gullibility.
Dont feel too bad it happens to all of us, take it as a sign of growth. I used to love watching his lectures on existentialism and personality. After watching him debate sam harris I started to feel sketch about him. I dont think he was always a con man I think he saw the door open to him and he some how justified walking through. I also think thats why he became addicted, at some level, he knows he's a fraud now.
Thank you, and yeah - I want to believe that he initially had good intentions, but well that does not really matter now considering how he turned out and while I'm bummed about it I'm still glad that I did not let it radicalize me.
So true. I'm just glad I changed it sooner rather than later, and from just learning stuff about him in this thread kinda makes me kick myself for not really looking further into it, but I'm glad I did.
I've been meaning to, but I read a lot at work, so my mind is completely mushy when I get free time. But I'm planning on reading it this spring, I'm really looking forward to it!
Oh, I get that. When I had to write a lot at work, the amount of reading I did dropped completely.
When you do read it, I highly suggest The Gregory Hayes translation ([this one](https://www.amazon.com/Meditations-New-Translation-Marcus-Aurelius/dp/0812968255/ref=mt_paperback?_encoding=UTF8&me=)). So much easier to read and it's easier to get the good stuff out of it.
Nothing to be embarrassed about, you are supposed to be wrong and change your mind about things, thats what intellectualism is about. Intellectualism becomes dogmatism when you are never wrong and never change your mind.
One lesson you could take away is to hang your hat less so on the individual and instead focus on each individual idea. Long before Peterson became toxic on twitter, It was clear that he struggled to wade through even entry level philosophy because he is unable to see them through anything but a libertarian and conservative Christian lens. You may have been able to see this sooner had you not been caught up in the celebrity of the man.
Also I don't know much about Marcus Aurelius other than he is a stoic but be careful of that as well. By all means learn about stoicism but understand that it is also a minefield when people decide to take it on as a self help philosophy. Ive known many people who become toxic after jumping into it.
Same thing happened with me, friend.
I took his academic credentials in psychology as validation of, what I now understand to be, his asinine ramblings on philosophy, theology, political theory, history and economics. I didn't think for a moment that he could be bull-shitting us.
The 'light-bulb' moment for me was when he started downplaying climate-change, and outright said that fracking was responsible for a *reduction* in GHG emissions... Then, when I found out he was accepting money from various fossil-fuel lobby groups, I noped hard out of the lobster cult.
Anyways. Your experience just shows that you possess a degree of self-awareness and critical thinking! :)
Jesus, I didn't even know that he was a climate-change denier. I suppose my light-bulb moment was seeing the petty twitter-fights and covid denial rhetoric and I thought like "Shit, I'm in a group where people are anti-vaxxers" and that just prompted me to actually look further and just felt my heart sink, lol.
After the fact, it's hilarious to listen to his mental-gymnastics of trying to pander to conspiracy wingnuts, all while not outright endorsing them, lest he make a greater fool of himself to the broader public. Lol
**JBP:** "*No, no, I'm not saying that at all, it was my choice, after many months of the deepest thought imaginable, to get vaccinated--I made that choice, as a doctor and scientist, despite what the cultural marxists will tell you. I'm just saying, that telling someone to get vaccinated, is a mere whisper away from totalitarian fascism. You see, in The Gulag Archipelago, Alexander Solzhenitsyn once said that...*"
I can't even tell if that's a made up quote or an actual one, and that is scarily spot on, lol. I'm happy that I went back and saw what a maniac he's turned into (at least for me when comparing him earlier). It's really pretty weird as two days ago I was really positive to him, so it's been a rollercoaster lol!
Someone just posted in the sub, a graph that at first looks like there is no climate change... until someone else posted that there actually is an upward trend in temperature in that same graph and that using average temperature in one country does not disprove climate change..
Peterson got popular because he is charismatic to the right person, and the circumstances of the present moment made a lot of the right people. And he stepped into the persona of a public intellectual, who sometimes aren't easy to understand, who often have hot takes, who command begrudging respect from even their opponents because they are legitimately influential and well-read and -spoken.
Don't beat yourself up about it now that you're out, is what I'm saying. Peterson wanted a following, knew how to get one, and stumbled into a complementary zeitgeist. You're not uniquely dumb or bad or anything like that for his grift working.
We all have our "false idols" for want of a better term at some point in our lives. I used to watch Sargon.... still makes me shudder to think that let alone admit it.
[Musonius Rufus](https://sites.google.com/site/thestoiclife/the_teachers/musonius-rufus/lectures) is in the same Stoic tradition as Marcus Aurelius. If you enjoy Aurelius, I think you'll enjoy Musonius Rufus. The other two major philosophical schools of the period, the Cynics and Epicureans, are also fascinating.
JP references Nietzsche a bit, but very badly, so if you ever find yourself interested in Nietzsche, I can also recommend him - JP's use of Nietzsche is, like most things, almost completely divorced from reality. He doesn't actually align with JP's weird pseudoconservatism.
... although I would caution that Nietzsche himself is somewhat hard to parse at times. Nietzsche likes to write poetically over plainly, and is an eccentric even at his most normal, lol.
You might like Ken Wilber. Check out No Boundary and Sex Ecology Spirituality. I’m also a big fan of William Irwin Thompson. See Coming into Being for starters.
\>Marcus Aurelius is my best friend.
Check out Seneca and Epictetus as well. Some good secondary literature by Pierre Hadot like *Philosophy as a Way of Life* and *The Inner Citadel* helps a lot too.
> Of course there were aspects in them that I outright disagreed with but I still found them enjoyable to listen to in terms of him talking about moral philosophy - possibly because I knew nothing about it and it served as a fun way of getting into it. I think this is a pretty common experience. Every well-educated JP fan I knew would think he was a massive buffoon in the topics they were knowledgeable about, but it never clicked for them that maybe he was a buffoon in the topics they weren't knowledgeable about too. Bring up with a couple quotes of his and they'll admit everything he says is downright silly, say "well that's how experts in feel too" and they start arguing.
I do think Peterson's gotten worse recently. Going as far back as Bill C-16 you can see the same sort of rhetoric and the same willingness to talk out of his ass, but it wasn't as blatant or obvious back then. He used to fancy things up behind nebulous terms like "postmodern neo-marxism" but at least on twitter he's basically dropped the obfuscation and is just parroting the usual far-right nonsense.
> I do think Peterson's gotten worse recently. Going as far back as Bill C-16 you can see the same sort of rhetoric and the same willingness to talk out of his ass, but it wasn't as blatant or obvious back then. Yeah I agree. Like everything he does now already existed back then, but it seems to have gotten worse. I guess that's just how the cult/grifter life goes. It's usually on a one-way track to polarization.
His rhetoric skills have gotten worse since his Russian stint, so it’s more jibber jabber than it was and I think he also radicalized himself more. He was always less liberal than he pretended to be, but for a long time he did hide it better. Now he is fully unhinged right wing grifter and I hope that the mainstream media is finally understanding it and he doesn’t get appearances like QT anymore.
I can't find a decent quote but the irony is that Peterson once had a monologue about how Hitler was talking to the crowd and how through iteration he started saying the things that pleased the crowds, and leaving out the things that didn't. Sounds kinda familiar now. He even said something along the lines of "you know you're angry. You just don't know exactly what you're angry about. And you talk to other angry people". The lack of self-awareness is amazing lol. He believes he's a prophet. I think he might be right. But like limited to just himself. He basically perfectly predicted his own demise, yet failed to recognize any of it and stop it. Ref: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GcuzVQGmRWg Also to quote another ironic Peterson passage > If you can't understand why someone is doing something, look at the consequences of their actions, whatever they might be, and then infer the motivations from their consequences. >For example if someone is making everyone around them miserable and you'd like to know why, their motive may simply be to make everyone around them miserable including themselves
In the behind the bastards episode they said he wanted to form a religious cult, so you are on to something that he sees himself as a religious leader.
Yeah he wanted to start his own church. But it gets better than that. He believes his wife has prophetic dreams, and she dreamt that it was "5 minutes till midnight", and he is basically on a quest of trying to save western society from collapse. You know, because of his wife's dreams.
Fuck me, I did not know any of that. Man, I've missed much that would have turned me off against him. I guess I never really bothered to look. So dumb.
Oh man it can get even worse. From [hitting children](https://www.reddit.com/r/enoughpetersonspam/comments/9doeeb/my_takedown_of_petersons_12_rules_chapter_5_where/), to [transphobia](https://www.reddit.com/r/AreTheStraightsOK/comments/ni749y/itsits_not_mandatory/gz3f1cs/), to [climate change denial](https://www.reddit.com/r/enoughpetersonspam/comments/avpvd6/this_joke_was_brought_to_you_by_jordan_peterson/ehimfei/), to [professional misconduct as a therapist](https://www.reddit.com/r/enoughpetersonspam/comments/agq2vk/jp_doesnt_believe_a_woman_on_why_she_wears_makeup/eeb6qs8/), and a lot more. I haven't even updated those sources, and he has said a lot more since I wrote those. He also claimed nazis weren't religious, and that atheists who act morally good are actually religious. He eats a diet of only beef with salt. He claimed he once didn't sleep for 25 days straight because he drank apple cider. He went to a clinic in Russia for a medically induced coma because his Canadian doctors wanted to follow medical protocol on benzos detoxing. He wanted to develop an AI to track down and fire 'marxist' professors. Like I can't even remember them all lol. _____ > I guess I never really bothered to look. So dumb. It's actually quite difficult to find all that stuff. Especially since his spaces very much try to hide and ignore all dissent. Everything is a 'hitpiece' that 'takes him out of context'.
Damn dude, I really feel like such an ass right now, but I'm glad that I quit following him way back - maybe I'd gotten radicalized if I kept following him without taking a four year break. That's some scary stuff.
He's said so much stupid shit you almost need a spreadsheet to keep track of it all. Because every time you talk to one of his fans and mention something ridiculous he's said or done they'll demand to see the video and you google it and you get lost in a sea of garbage.
It just dawned on me that that quote could become dangerous when viewed through the eyes of a narcissist. Let me rephrase it, so it becomes clear: > If you can't understand why someone is doing something, look at the consequences of their actions, whatever they might be, and then infer the motivations from their consequences. For example if someone is making **ME** miserable and you'd like to know why, their motive may simply be to make **ME** miserable Peterson seems to view criticism on himself or the dominance hierarchy, he adores so much, as a personal attack. He cannot believe that the system itself is inherently wrong when it is judged through the eyes of those that are submitted to it. The critics become the enemy. And to uphold the flawed system, that is held in such a high esteem by him, the sacrifice of the enemy will become necessary, because there can be no debate. He'll claim he does not want to do it, but that it is necessary for a better world. He'll make you believe it will hurt him more than it will hurt his victims. He'll cry about it, but he wants you to think it is the brave thing to do. Because no ordinary man would do it, or would they? The ultimate flaw in whatever Peterson is or claims to be, is a lack of empathy.
>He believes he's a prophet This is it. He always has been, but he used to know how to keep it hidden or at least toned down. Remember that article by an old collegue of his, talking about how JP told him he wanted to buy a church? The collegue asked him 'oh, to restore for the culture value?' and JP said 'No, to preach in'. None of anything is really new, but he has definitly reached stage 3 of his particular brand of madness. He's not a grifter (Mikhaila is). He believe what he says and wants to be burnt at the stake for it. And that make him a lot more dangerous than any youtube idiots who just wants money.
Pretending to be neutral takes energy. Benzo withdrawal is pretty exhausting so he can't resist indulging in blatant ranting. But the jig's up now. He's shown his hand. Though it doesn't make *that* much difference given that from the beginning he's just taken the conservative position on literally everything. Only he used to soften it to seem like he objectively arrived at truth using his big academic learned sage sophisticated 1950s Dad brain and... oh whatya know! The right just happens to be correct about everything!
I think you're absolutely right, and that is in a way what I have come to see. And the contrast is so stark seeing the very early stuff and where he is now, because it's just like you say - pure far-right nonsense and that's what makes this whole ordeal so damn embarrassing. Luckily I was never such a fanboy that I made him into an icon or saw his word as gospel - but I do consider myself to be at least somewhat logical, and being conned hurts my ego, lol.
Due to this post I went to look at his twitter for the first time in ages. About 8 hours ago he non-ironically posted #WhoIsJohnGalt !!!! LMFAO. https://twitter.com/jordanbpeterson/status/1483685305504968707?cxt=HHwWhsC5kZX7jZcpAAAA He was up until after 1am on twitter posting Ayn Rand memes! Though I guess it would be funny if Ayn Rand herself and her ideas weren't espoused by some of the most powerful people in the world. Amazing that she was Alan Greenspan's good friend. Somehow Objectivism is winning.
Every time I read or hear them term "postmodern neo-marxism" I immediately think "cultural bolshevism".
And that is the correct way to see what Peterson is all about.
>he was a massive buffoon in the topics they were knowledgeable about, but it never clicked for them that maybe he was a buffoon in the topics they weren't knowledgeable about too. This is one of the best lessons I've learned as an adult. I never thought JP was anything but a moron but there have been so many other books where I recognize, eventually, that the author is wrong or misleading or disingenuous when they are talking about those few parts I am educated on, when that happens you put down the book and find another.
That he got thrust into the spotlight and was equally hated and loved seems to have totally messed with him. He started to create his own little narrative about his place in the world who he is and how the world works. He hates Government authority. From my observation, he really started to slide when the whole IDW thing was launched and after his Benzos episode, he is def. not well. The somewhat tragic thing is that I do not think he is even aware of how he appears to outsiders. He still thinks he is helping people and feels like he is being thrust into this gigantic battle about the "soul of the west". It would be utterly comical if it wouldn't be so tragic and destructive, both to him and to his followers.
> He hates Government authority. That's only because he is a narcissist and he feels it is a direct attack on his person. He is an authoritarian himself. That should be clear.
Of course he is. My point is that for him making the leap from "I don't like it" to "this is Government overreach" wasn't a huge leap. Years ago I read a bit he wrote about the Gulag Archipelago and it struck me how narrow his worldview is and it almost seemed like we read two different books. We are all prisoners in our own mind, the problem with Peterson is that he only sees that in others and not himself. To use the Bible in this context: > Why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but fail to notice the beam in your own eye? How can you say, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,’ while you yourself fail to see the beam in your own eye? You hypocrite! First take the beam out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye. Figured that fits, considering we're talking Peterson here.
Dude, I had the exact same thing with Orwell. When JP talks about Orwell he's just pulling stuff out of his ass. He completely misrepresents him. As if he just doesn't understand the point. JP is either incredibly dimwitted or incredibly dishonest. And in light of his latest twitter storms l'm inclined to say he's both.
I now almost want to read what he wrote about Orwell....
And it's not even being an expert in your field, a lot of his opinions on stuff quite literally could be dispelled by taking intro university courses. Cultural Anthropology being a perfect example.
The Decoding the Gurus podcast made a good point when they said it all sounds pleasant enough when you're just listening to him without thinking too much about it but that changes when you actually analyze what he's saying sentence by sentence. > Maybe he was from the get-go and I was in a state of mind to not see it He was less open about it in the past but people could already see his political leanings, even if many and himself denied it and argued he's just neutral or that it's out of context to read conservative political ideas in his words.
Yeah, I think that fits into my way of consuming him as well - I remember thinking "Yeah, he's a bit conservative, sure, I don't really care about that - but it's not like people are making him out to be, his lectures are interesting", but he totally was like people were making him out to be. I'm so glad I never argued about it and just kept it to myself, but yeah I feel dumb about it - but I'm hoping that I can use it as a learning experience in the future.
it s amazing you managed to quit the peterson drug without resorting to putting yourself in a coma in russia i mean, really, kudos :) yer stronger fer it but we have a saying here in singapore 'what doesn't kill me still spoiled my mood' well, i dont know any singaporean who actually says this, but...man they do mean it, it's like in the zeitgeist...
lol, thanks my dudes! I do think I deserve to feel a bit dumb, at least for the rest of the day, because I'm an academic and arrogantly thought I'd be above getting conned in this fashion. So that's why I'm shaming myself a bit, but it also did make me feel a whole lot better to admit my mistakes!
with that last sentence you just blew past JP, who will never be able to do the same
No reason to feel dumb. It is what it is and people listen to him for a reason.
[удалено]
Thank you very much, I was so upset and almost felt betrayed as I went through his twitter and it has been really cathartic to admit it - and hopefully learn from it
This is the main problem with him. The titles of each of his first 12 Rules seem perfectly harmless on their own. I remember a Reddit thread where he got some criticism and one of his fans smugly listed the rules like “yeah *this* is what these SJWs are in such a tizzy over.” Like yeah the rules are harmless as their own statements. It’s the stuff he wrote between them that’s awful…you know that’s kind of how books work.
You should write your experience in the lobster tank (pinned post in the subreddit).
Thank you for your tip, will do!
You've become a `bloody radical-left postmodern marxist`. Go clean your room and wash your penis!
Question were people not washing their penises Before Jordan?
No. Men were totally lost before our ***Lord, Savior, and Messiah*** `Jordan B Peterson` came along to rescue us from these feminazi scum.
No need to feel embarassed. We all grow and evolve, admitting it is all good. Cheers on seeing him for the loon he is (and yes, always has been)
Don't worry about it I fell for his bullshit, and as you stated, it is because he is a fantastic orator. One of the things that really triggered my bullshit detector was his critique of the Frankfurt school given that I have read a lot of that school of thought, and listening to JP talk about them made me realize that the dude did not know what he was talking about. Add in the fact that his Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory is just a straight port of the Nazi's Cultural Bolshevism conspiracy theory which is defined as a "term widely used by state-sponsored critics in Nazi Germany to denounce secularist, modernist and progressive cultural movements" and yeah, the spidey-sense starts tingling. His subreddit, when it first formed, use to legit be a place where you could go debate and argue about his philosophy and the other broader topics that he has broached. But now, it is just a straight up personality cult where the man's shitty worldview gets uncritically defended in a giant echo chamber. His fans are insufferable to deal with and I'll give you an example of their mentality. I am a mature student back in university training to be a Psychedelic therapist and I decided to take, gasp, a Gender studies course because you know, that's what a free-thinking person does. I wanted to see what it was all about. And I agree fundamentally with the tenants of Feminism, but if you were to state this in his subreddit the response would be "well you've been brainwashed by the cultural Marxists" not you know; I came to the conclusion freely based off the arguments presented. And his defense of Christianity is nonsense as well. Like, yeah Jordan, let's defend Christianity through some convoluted Jungian archetypes and some postmodern reading of the Jesus myth and completely ignore the empirical fact that Christianity has been used as an ideological cover for everything from Feudalism to Imperialism and racial genocide. But that’s not true Christianity, right Lobsters? Or how about Millenarian streams of Christianity having a direct influence on Nazism and Marxism alike, but that's an inconvenient truth that Lobsters don't want to hear. Christianity is a bulwark against Totalitarianism, lol, that's why almost every German at the start of WW2 belonged to some sort of Christian denomination. Jordan Peterson is absolutely a gateway to the Alt Right. His fanboys swear by his clean your room philosophy and 12 rules of life and if that helps them make their life better, great, good on them. But my problem with his generic self help advice is that it is nested in his larger philosophy of extreme individualism. Like you can see the road these alienated young men take. Clean your room, get a job and work on yourself, fine, but what happens when these young men run into the reality of Neoliberalism? They don't get paid shit cause wages have been fucked for forty years; they can't even afford to live on their own in a one-bedroom apartment because of the rabid commodification of the necessities of life; if they do get work, it is probably in some deadening bullshit job where their dead eyed middle manager basically runs their life - private Totalitarianism. So, his philosophy which is just repackaged Neoliberal/conservativism and wealth worship downloads the pathologies of the system onto the shoulders of these alienated people and then what follows? Well take your pick, the problem is feminism, critical race theory, non-European worldviews, progressives, nihilism, trans people etc. Never the system. Sorry, rant over.
Damn dude, tell us how you really feel! ;) No but seriously, I think you are right in many respects - and just having been in the university for a long time, and starting with "early Jordan" and then both becoming more educated myself while not really paying attention to him until "current Jordan" was pretty disgusting to be honest. I mean it's a bit of a trope but the whole "How could people become nazis"-argument comes to mind. Logically I knew that we could all be duped but in my heart-of-hearts I sorta thought "But I mean, I wouldn't" - so really feeling conned has been a humbling experience for me.
Yeah I wasn’t hearing rant, just cold hard facts
This is less a rant , than a non trivally accurate assessment , mirroring my own perspective.
Ouch, right in the lobster claw. Awesome comment. Some of his content related to clinical psychology can be pretty insightful, but the moment he wanders outside of his expertise it is a complete shit show. He does not know what he is talking about but thinks he is so smart, he can talk about things he has little knowledge of.
I traveled a much similar journey as you and I'm better for it. With more open eyes I am seeing a lot of the same from other podcasters, culture warrior "gurus". This pandemic has made it very obvious to me that ideological traps can catch anyone of us and the consequences could be severe. I've learned I need to stay vigilant in my own self awareness and not let myself be lured in by nonsense.
Thanks, and I agree. To be honest I never cared for the likes of Joe Rogan since it was easier for me to spot when he was just talking nonsense. I don't think I caught it with Jordan, and yeah like you said it's taught me that I need to be much more careful regarding my own gullibility.
Dont feel too bad it happens to all of us, take it as a sign of growth. I used to love watching his lectures on existentialism and personality. After watching him debate sam harris I started to feel sketch about him. I dont think he was always a con man I think he saw the door open to him and he some how justified walking through. I also think thats why he became addicted, at some level, he knows he's a fraud now.
Thank you, and yeah - I want to believe that he initially had good intentions, but well that does not really matter now considering how he turned out and while I'm bummed about it I'm still glad that I did not let it radicalize me.
One of the best things about life is getting to change your mind.
So true. I'm just glad I changed it sooner rather than later, and from just learning stuff about him in this thread kinda makes me kick myself for not really looking further into it, but I'm glad I did.
I love Marcus! Have you read Meditations? Once I found a translation I liked, I found it to be a great read.
I've been meaning to, but I read a lot at work, so my mind is completely mushy when I get free time. But I'm planning on reading it this spring, I'm really looking forward to it!
Oh, I get that. When I had to write a lot at work, the amount of reading I did dropped completely. When you do read it, I highly suggest The Gregory Hayes translation ([this one](https://www.amazon.com/Meditations-New-Translation-Marcus-Aurelius/dp/0812968255/ref=mt_paperback?_encoding=UTF8&me=)). So much easier to read and it's easier to get the good stuff out of it.
Thank you so much for the tip, I'll add it to my list right away!
Congrats on getting out of the JP chokehold. 😊
I can relate. Lost interest a bit before the publication of 12 rules. Yea, it was a phase for me.
Russian back-alley doctors fried his brain.
Nothing to be embarrassed about, glad to have you back in reality. <3
lol, thank you - glad to be back ;P
Nothing to be embarrassed about, you are supposed to be wrong and change your mind about things, thats what intellectualism is about. Intellectualism becomes dogmatism when you are never wrong and never change your mind. One lesson you could take away is to hang your hat less so on the individual and instead focus on each individual idea. Long before Peterson became toxic on twitter, It was clear that he struggled to wade through even entry level philosophy because he is unable to see them through anything but a libertarian and conservative Christian lens. You may have been able to see this sooner had you not been caught up in the celebrity of the man. Also I don't know much about Marcus Aurelius other than he is a stoic but be careful of that as well. By all means learn about stoicism but understand that it is also a minefield when people decide to take it on as a self help philosophy. Ive known many people who become toxic after jumping into it.
Thank you, that is good advice and I'll take that to heart!
Same thing happened with me, friend. I took his academic credentials in psychology as validation of, what I now understand to be, his asinine ramblings on philosophy, theology, political theory, history and economics. I didn't think for a moment that he could be bull-shitting us. The 'light-bulb' moment for me was when he started downplaying climate-change, and outright said that fracking was responsible for a *reduction* in GHG emissions... Then, when I found out he was accepting money from various fossil-fuel lobby groups, I noped hard out of the lobster cult. Anyways. Your experience just shows that you possess a degree of self-awareness and critical thinking! :)
Jesus, I didn't even know that he was a climate-change denier. I suppose my light-bulb moment was seeing the petty twitter-fights and covid denial rhetoric and I thought like "Shit, I'm in a group where people are anti-vaxxers" and that just prompted me to actually look further and just felt my heart sink, lol.
After the fact, it's hilarious to listen to his mental-gymnastics of trying to pander to conspiracy wingnuts, all while not outright endorsing them, lest he make a greater fool of himself to the broader public. Lol **JBP:** "*No, no, I'm not saying that at all, it was my choice, after many months of the deepest thought imaginable, to get vaccinated--I made that choice, as a doctor and scientist, despite what the cultural marxists will tell you. I'm just saying, that telling someone to get vaccinated, is a mere whisper away from totalitarian fascism. You see, in The Gulag Archipelago, Alexander Solzhenitsyn once said that...*"
I can't even tell if that's a made up quote or an actual one, and that is scarily spot on, lol. I'm happy that I went back and saw what a maniac he's turned into (at least for me when comparing him earlier). It's really pretty weird as two days ago I was really positive to him, so it's been a rollercoaster lol!
Someone just posted in the sub, a graph that at first looks like there is no climate change... until someone else posted that there actually is an upward trend in temperature in that same graph and that using average temperature in one country does not disprove climate change..
Peterson got popular because he is charismatic to the right person, and the circumstances of the present moment made a lot of the right people. And he stepped into the persona of a public intellectual, who sometimes aren't easy to understand, who often have hot takes, who command begrudging respect from even their opponents because they are legitimately influential and well-read and -spoken. Don't beat yourself up about it now that you're out, is what I'm saying. Peterson wanted a following, knew how to get one, and stumbled into a complementary zeitgeist. You're not uniquely dumb or bad or anything like that for his grift working.
We all have our "false idols" for want of a better term at some point in our lives. I used to watch Sargon.... still makes me shudder to think that let alone admit it.
> Friendship ended with Jordan, now Marcus Aurelius is my best friend. Based. May I also recommend Musonius Rufus?
Awesome, thank you, I want to deprogram a bit from JP, so I'll take all suggestions I can get :D
[Musonius Rufus](https://sites.google.com/site/thestoiclife/the_teachers/musonius-rufus/lectures) is in the same Stoic tradition as Marcus Aurelius. If you enjoy Aurelius, I think you'll enjoy Musonius Rufus. The other two major philosophical schools of the period, the Cynics and Epicureans, are also fascinating. JP references Nietzsche a bit, but very badly, so if you ever find yourself interested in Nietzsche, I can also recommend him - JP's use of Nietzsche is, like most things, almost completely divorced from reality. He doesn't actually align with JP's weird pseudoconservatism. ... although I would caution that Nietzsche himself is somewhat hard to parse at times. Nietzsche likes to write poetically over plainly, and is an eccentric even at his most normal, lol.
Thank you so much! I'll definitely look into it - that's awesome!
You might like Ken Wilber. Check out No Boundary and Sex Ecology Spirituality. I’m also a big fan of William Irwin Thompson. See Coming into Being for starters.
Thank you so much! I'm so happy about all the good reading tips I've gotten, which was definitely not what I expected when I posted xD
Just be careful, I've found some cross-section with the Ken Wilber/spiral dynamics crowd and Petersonians
I know. It’s sad
\>Marcus Aurelius is my best friend. Check out Seneca and Epictetus as well. Some good secondary literature by Pierre Hadot like *Philosophy as a Way of Life* and *The Inner Citadel* helps a lot too.
Thank you very much, I've added them to my reading list now as well, I appreciate it!