Author Topic: How about a Discussion on Jordan Peterson?  (Read 15860 times)

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Offline Michael Hardner

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Re: How about a Discussion on Jordan Peterson?
« Reply #45 on: October 19, 2020, 09:20:31 am »
People aren't interested in consensus building, largely, which is unfortunate.

Well, the alternative is to grumble forever until the status quo changes, ignore people who have problems with the law, or war I guess.

You are saying that our liberal society can't solve this problem.  Ok.

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  I don't think that's what Peterson has been doing or even tried to do either, at least with his political arguments.  He's been often a political activist essentially, based on issues where in his perception the left is going too far in some cases.  So in that sense, you're right.  He's not going to bring anyone together.  Because when you fight for your rights or other people's rights, very often the people who oppose you will hate you and try to destroy you.

But convincing people who are in the middle is part of consensus building.  If he's preaching to the converted, and that's all he ever intends to do he's even more useless than I suspected.  But I doubt that he's doing that.


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We're in an ideological war in an era of divisive identity politics.  The left, as is their job, is pushing for the rights of the oppressed (Women, racial minorities, LGBT etc.) because sometimes the right goes too far.  This is good in general, but there's times when the left goes too far pushing back and where they infringe on the rights of those who have traditionally held power, such as white people, straight and cis people, and men etc. 

Well thanks for the play-by-play.  Yes, I have been alive for more than 30 years (I picked George Bush Sr.'s calling out 'political correctness' as the start of this) so ... yes I'm aware of the landscape here.  What (I think) Peterson represented, at the start, was the opportunity to revisit our principles and move the discussion forward.

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Any decent person wants ....

And now you are getting into the discussion of the arguments themselves.  That's fine but not as interesting as a way forward IMO.

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  Peterson has always argued for equality of opportunity, not equality of outcome.  But some feminists don't want to hear that, and they get very angry, because it's a threat to their interests, and in their view their rights.

That's one facet of a very long and unsolvable fog of social issues. 

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I don't listen to Peterson because he's got the magic answers to everything, I listen because he brings educated opinions often with data that make arguments against opinions and policies most other people are too afraid to question because we're all too politically correct and afraid to be called a sexist/racist/transphobe and lose our jobs and friends for it etc and become the pariah he's become.

Ok.  I for one don't like to listen to editorialists with whom I agree, at least not too much.  It's pretty clear that a moral case will always fail in this environment, where there are no principles or central leaders.  You said it yourself: people aren't interested in consensus building.

That is where the moralists should focus their criticism - on an expanding set of people who refuse to listen to others.  Peterson covers some of that, but - again - he's not the guy.