I'd forgotten he existed. Must've managed to resist saying anything too spectacularly stupid for a while.
Maybe one day I'll be able to say the same about Greer.
Maybe one day I'll be able to say the same about Greer.
Peterson, Harris, etc....
- Thread starter prath92
- Start date
Pretty much how I see him. There's the largely academic version of Peterson who stays in his lane and generally talks about things in the Psychology realm. That is where he is more effective imo. Then there's the IDW/anti-postmodernism crusader Peterson who goes around and cherry picks things from a variety of different disciplines ranging from philosophy to evolutionary biology to mythology to anything else he has an interest in - to support his own advocacy projects related to things like human agency, sovereignty of the individual, self-ownership etc. This is where (imo) he runs into a bit of trouble since his understanding of some of these topics is either incomplete and/or he cherry picks elements from them to support his grand narrative and omits other things that don't support it. That's why the above video where a YouTuber questions the veracity of Peterson's references to Derrida and Foucault comes into play. There are other instances where he plucks things from other fields or completely misinterprets them to fit his narrative. He is going to have to tighten up his game in this area to be taken a bit more seriously imo.
So recently I heard Peterson talk about workplace sexual harassment and more generally about men and women working together. He didn't say what you quoted here (although he may have at some other time) but his POV is that women and men have only recently started working together so we don't really know the rules of engagement. Make-up is meant to spark sexual arousal, so women who wear make-up at work risk 'arousing' men - although it is worth noting that he specifically made a point to say that men sexually assaulting women is unacceptable.
Underlining his thinking is the following theory: because women and men have only been working together for 35~ years, we don't know whether they can work together yet. We don't have enough data.
Truthfully I find his line of reasoning on this topic arbitrary and daft. Not sexually assaulting someone shouldn't be too difficult. Not placing them in uncomfortable situations shouldn't be either. And his solution, that men and women wear the same monotone uniform, seems unnecessary and impractical. And in what world is 35 years of something happening 'not long enough' to understand whether it works or not?
With that said, he articulated what i wrote above much better than I have, but i still disagree with him.
What Jordan Peterson is doing is recycling stupid points that were debunked and ridicularized 10.000 years ago. Deep thoughts like: "if you act in a ethical moral way you're not really atheist. You're a believer in god at some level, you just dont realize it". Its not a literal quote tbf, but its what he is preaching.
Jordan Peterson is a very limited individual who somehow managed to be seen as a public intellectual.
In the past he would need be endorsed by the Academy. But now with the social medias you only need good oratory skills.
Jordan Peterson is a very limited individual who somehow managed to be seen as a public intellectual.
In the past he would need be endorsed by the Academy. But now with the social medias you only need good oratory skills.
A lot of replies from people who think atheism is anti-theism.
What irks me most about this thread is Shapiro and Hitchens lunped together by the way.
Shapiro is a muppet voiced wum cnut, Hitchens is an actual person with an actual brain.
Shapiro is a muppet voiced wum cnut, Hitchens is an actual person with an actual brain.
35 years ago it was 1983. To suggest men and woman didn’t share work environments before that date is preposterous.
He may have said 50 years, I can't remember how he defined "recently", and I think he was talking about working together "en masse" rather than denying specific instances where men and women worked together historically. But whether he used 35 or even 60 years as a frame of reference, I agree with you.
His line of reasoning on this subject is bizarre.
Agreed. I dont know who Harris is but Hitchens is very different from that cretin Shapiro who is very different from Peterson etc. It's a bit disingenuous to lump them all together.
I'm not sure his goal is to really be taken seriously in those academic areas though.
It's to spread his theories to as many people as he can while making some money in the process. He's realised he's hit the jackpot after coming to notoriety and most of his followers don't really give much of a feck about academic credibility.
Your first sentence doesn't make grammatical sense.
You misspelt 'lumped'.
You describe someone as a 'muppet voiced wum cnut'.
You describe Hitchens (presumably Christopher, not Peter) as an actual person, implying that Shapiro is not in fact a person.
You describe Hitchens as having an actual brain, as opposed to simply having a brain. Again, seeming to imply that Shapiro does not have a brain.
It's remarkable what people say with apparent disregard to their own appearance when they can hide behind a computer screen. Truly remarkable.
muppet voiced wum cnut is great
His first sentence makes perfect sense to anyone who isn't a raging cnut. Are you planning on ever contributing anything of substance, or are you going to continue correcting non-native English-speakers minor mistakes and insinuate that anyone who dares criticise your darlings are just dummies who lack the intellectual capacity to do so?
(Apologies if I made any mistakes. Underdtand that I did not make them in order to offend your superior brain. I am but a humble simpleton for whom English isn't a native language.)
wtfHang on, wasn't it you who did this to me as well and never returned when I replied to you?
EDIT: Yes it was:
Out of interest, can anyone nominate any impressive thinkers who could counter the more erroneous crap put about by Shapiro, Hitchens, Peterson et al? There does seem to be a big gap in the market. Conservatives seem to be all over the interweb, moaning about free speech and influencing impressionable youth. I'm actually quite worried about the lack of any sort of coherent spokesman/woman for a more liberal, left-leaning view of the word. Right now, the whole thing seems very much like a one way street.
Someone like Jacob Mchangama maybe? I'm not entirely certain of his political leanings (but being Danish he's probably fairly left by US standards), he's been critical of the far-right policies in Denmark at least (but who wouldn't?). He's usually very idealistic about his approach to free speech as far as I'm aware (which is based on following him on Facebook).
He does a podcast with a very historical take on free speech. I haven't listened to it though. So yeah.
Noam Chomsky, Douglas Lain, ContraPoints, Chapo Trap House, Bernie Sanders etc.
Harris and Hitchens can hardly be called conservatives, unless you're talking about Peter. Shapiro is probably the only one of them responding to the name, the rest of them seem to go both ways depending on the issue. I guess it also depends on what you mean by 'conservative', but to my mind most of these people seem to be more left-leaning than anything else, even if they're despised by the twitterleft. I'm certainly struggling to see what's particularly right-wing about them.
Last edited:
Sorry, I must have forgotten to reply.
But then again, maybe it's easier not to take seriously those messages from people who decide to write beside their name that they 'enjoys sex, doesn't enjoy women not into ONS'.
Last edited:
Shapiro aside, I don't think any of them are conservatives. They do get branded as such by people who don't like their views on various topics but i haven't seen much in the way of evidence that any of them are.
So taglines is another thing you don't get.
This was a better effort, though you misspelt 'understand', and left out an apostrophe. I have nothing against people not writing correctly, but when in a discussion where they're criticising the brain power of certain people they disagree with, it seems rather ironic that they're unable to formulate sentences properly or express themselves clearly.
I thought Michael Dyson articulately put across his thoughts in his debate with Peterson.
No, sorry.
I don't think you choose your tagline
You are a tit.
You are a twit.
This is a big problem, and it's why I found Stephen Fry's role and comments in that debate so is interesting. A big problem re Jordan Peterson is the people who keep going up against him. They make an ass of themselves and that's chalked up as a 'win' for JBP by his followers. As many in here have pointed out it's a pity Dyson was chosen to represent his point of view because he did it awfully. And that young lady was quite nervous though I think she reached some interesting ideas just didn't have the wherewithal to hammer home on them or discuss them more. I don't blame her for that as it was quite a big stage with some big names, and I still get nervous myself when I debate, which I've done academically and "competitively."
In response to your question, I actually think Stephen Fry is an answer, though not an expert in a particular field really he is as much of one as those one the right, and is a wonderful orator, debater and intellectual. Re Shapiro, another one whose career seems to a great extent built on "look at what someone on the left said that's stupid," the left equivalent (in terms of oneman YouTube talkshow host anyway) is Kyle Kulinski of Secular Talk. Similar age, appearance, style of show, but very different views.
And someone compared Peterson with Zizek. That is an exchange I have long waited for, in large part due to their personalities, the fact that Zizek I think would ignore any ad hominems, and the respective fanboy explosion online.
Funnily enough, Peterson of all peoole has pointed out the need for such voices on the left and has mentioned how left needs right to stop it going too far, and vice versa.
I'm asking this as a genuine question, because people are laughing at you and that's not my intention for this...but, why?
Agree with this and would add Peterson to this. Many people don't really fit nicely into buckets.
I think the reason Peterson followers view him as having come out on top in Munk debates is because Dyson talks like a caricature of what Peterson rails about his other lectures - the identity politics SJW left. Dyson reinforced all of that with his primitive arguments and then proceeded to make a cartoon out of the debate with his bizarre hip hop cadence delivery, calling Peterson and angry white man, and saying "why da rage bruh" and other hilariously idiotic things.
Yeah. Though to be fair a lot of his fans would see him as the victor no matter what!
I hated Dyson's performance in that debate though, shot himself in the foot. And don't like his speaking style. Unnecessarily complicated words to pass himself off as hyper articulate and cover up the shallowness of his actual points (which I find inexcusable given how strong his arguments could be), punctuated by the god awful "What I'm saying to you is..."
A few interesting exchanges here..
This is a football forum, where the language used is frequently informal, and people tend to use hyperbole a lot. Add to that the fact that the people you correct are non-native English speakers, and you come across as a massive cnut when you focus your replies on minor mistakes. Both of the people you've so far smuglorded over wrote posts that make perfect sense to anyone who isn't a thundercnut.
No one expects doctoral dissertations here, half-formed thoughts and poorly articulated sentences are perfectly acceptable, as long as you're adding something to the discussion.
Tell me, how many languages are you fluent in?
You can see my picture in the “I want your pics thread”
Furthermore, I would like to point out that the part about the actual person and actual brain should not be taken literaly.
I have to admit, as far as burns go, yours is quite good. Consider my honour violated. As for the spellingand grammar stuff, I present to you the English-is-not my-first-language-card.
Lastly, is that you Ben? If so, can I get a picture you muppet voiced wumming cnut
On a serious note, I feel Ben Shapiro is not worth the effort of debating and refuting in a rational matter. The guy is a polarizing cretin, it’s obvious in a way it’s obvious that a sunset is more beautifull than a steaming dog turd. Whereas Hitchins, while not uncontroversial himself, has some very interesting theories and talking points. I loved God is not great personally.
I take offense with dumping these men in the same catagory. Shapiro is a hate monger who (or is it whom?!) should be ignored. Hitchens is an actual (har har) intellectual who should be debated.
By the way, droning on for several more paragraphs after starting one with lastly is probably frowned upon as well.
Last edited: