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Feminism: Sex and gender discussions

Jordan Peterson Interview with Helen Lewis

170 replies

rightreckoner · 31/10/2018 10:07

here

It's long but I thought I'd give it a bit of a watch since I've heard so much about him. Initial thoughts are - he's not as clever as he thinks he is. Questions he doesn't like he closes down with a bait and switch answer or a terrifying Paddington stare. Comes across as a bit of a plonker. With absolutely no humour. Helen Lewis did a good job I think of not getting annoyed although he is so bullet proof there's almost no point in the discussion.

His basic thesis (if I understand it correctly) is that society is not shaped by the patriarchy but by competence. So the reason men are scientists and women look after babies is that they are better at these skills respectively. There is no such thing as the patriarchy.

There is a good bit at about 1.05.40 where she asks him why women change their names on marriage if not to symbolise their transfer from one man to another and he says - ugh, Margaret Atwood is an idiot.

OP posts:
rightreckoner · 31/10/2018 19:13

Why wouldn’t stronger people who can’t generate valuable human life capture the weaker ones who can and then own them and the offspring ? When life is serious and survival is imperilled (ie, most of human history) that is exactly what you’d do.

It also explains all of colonialism- use your superior strength (guns) to appropriate someone else’s assets and productive capacity.

Does he explain slavery as being a matter of competence also ?

OP posts:
ThatEscalatedQuickly · 31/10/2018 22:40

He eats an all meat diet because of his daughter apparently, not so much any kind of 'macho' thing. She has a blog where she explains that she was very ill as a child with apparently multiple auto immune issues, including arthritis, that required surgeries and she claims that she cured herself via a very strict diet. Petersen apparently had multiple ailments himself and tried the diet, gradually reducing his carb intake to pretty much nil, and also says it's cured him of his health concerns.

I don't buy the claims or the approach they've taken but in this case his decision to adopt such a strict diet was led by his daughter's experience.

AdoraBell · 31/10/2018 22:50

Place marking. Too bloody tired to read links.

birdsdestiny · 31/10/2018 22:54

I just have no understanding why people think what he is saying is new or revolutionary, he is a bizarre mixture of New age mysticism and right of centre thinking. He also has an astounding lack of understanding of anyone whose life differs from his own.

fidgetspinner555 · 01/11/2018 08:11

I don't think what he says is revolutionary but as someone else commented: he talks a lot of common sense and sometimes people need reminding or haven't heard that common sense before.

Some of you seem to be berating him for being conservative - nothing wrong with that! He is a stickler for proper for statistics which is refreshing.

He is clearly unable to fully empathise with what it means to be a female in this world, but that's not unusual in general.

fidgetspinner555 · 01/11/2018 08:14

He also has an astounding lack of understanding of anyone whose life differs from his own.

I said earlier that I wouldn't be surprised if he's on the autistic spectrum.

PackingSoap · 01/11/2018 09:17

Peterson has become wildly successful because he tells lost and confused men some harsh and bitter truths about themselves. He attacks the red pillers, the incels, the MGTOWers as males who have failed to understand how the world and life really works, how their own personal failings have destroyed their lives, and, as a consequence, rage out at women and society over it.

So far so good.

But where he fails, terribly, is in his understanding of feminism and patriarchy. I think, primarily, he cannot see these perspectives because he is a Jungian and Jungian archetypes are civilisational tropes perceived through an early 20th century, western masculine lense. They are the visions of patriarchy.

For example, for many cultures across time, the figure of the father is one of absence. There's no connection with authority or power because fathers do not exist within the home culture. They are, instead, individuals that may appear once every ten years, say, and bring some goods because they are traders, sailors or warriors. 19th century Greek Island society was like this; the entire population was almost entirely women, the economy was women working the land, and often the only male would be the orthodox priest.

So authority in these cultures was matriarchal. It was, to all intents and purposes, the grandmother (in a kind of materfamilias system) which is a very different kettle of fish to the notion that authority is the father (pretty much the paterfamilias Roman system that Victorians decided to adopt wholesale).

But Peterson just cannot see this. And, I think, he refuses to see this.

Again, the whole hunter-gatherer thing pisses me off. I was under the impression that, these days, it was largely thought that women not only gathered but also trapped small animals. Why there is this myth that men went out to hunt huge animals for days while women picked leaves waiting for them, I do not know. It's as though everyone has forgotten humans eat birds and rabbits.

birdsdestiny · 01/11/2018 10:17

No I am not at all berating him for being conservative, I am just not sure why people treat him in the way they do. I think his lack of empathy extends way beyond his view of women. But I also really don't think suggesting people are autistic from watching them on tv is the best plan and not fair to people who have autism.

OatsBeansBarley · 01/11/2018 10:43

He did look tired and seem bad tempered in this interview.

PackingSoap thank you for your post as that articulates pretty much how I feel about JBP.

I find every answer he gives regarding application to women of the archetypes and myths (that seem to be at the heart of his life's work) unsatisfactory if not lame.

To be fair it's unusual to find people who are good at imagining outside their own experience.

I also don't think that he is regarded as revolutionary by his fan base, rather he's showing them a civilisational base the education system hasn't provided for them. (For example he has a lecture series on Old Testament stories.)

His mundane advice reminds me of my Nan's. It's not bad at all.

UpstartCrow · 01/11/2018 11:07

You can ignore your Mum saying 'Do your homework, tidy your room and don't hang around with that crowd, they are trouble'.
JP says the same thing and its a best selling book; and thats the perfect example of how we live in a patriarchy and not a meritocracy.

The 12 rules are here;
marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2018/01/jordan-petersons-12-rules-life.html

Peterson’s 12 rules;
1 Stand up straight with your shoulders back
2 Treat yourself like you would someone you are responsible for helping
3 Make friends with people who want the best for you
4 Compare yourself with who you were yesterday, not with who someone else is today
5 Do not let your children do anything that makes you dislike them
6 Set your house in perfect order before you criticise the world
7 Pursue what is meaningful (not what is expedient)
8 Tell the truth – or, at least, don’t lie
9 Assume that the person you are listening to might know something you don’t
10 Be precise in your speech
11 Do not bother children when they are skate-boarding
12 Pet a cat when you encounter one on the street

OatsBeansBarley · 01/11/2018 11:09

Very true Upstart Crow.

JuliaJaynes9 · 01/11/2018 11:18

Again, the whole hunter-gatherer thing pisses me off. I was under the impression that, these days, it was largely thought that women not only gathered but also trapped small animals. Why there is this myth that men went out to hunt huge animals for days while women picked leaves waiting for them, I do not know. It's as though everyone has forgotten humans eat birds and rabbits

I think it's a bit like the Bible as in you can find something in there to support any argument that you like.
We don't really know how ancestral humans lived (and even if we did...well you can't get ought from is) but you can find some bullshit evolutionary biology argument to support whatever worldview appeals to you or serves your purposes

R0wantrees · 01/11/2018 11:20

9 Assume that the person you are listening to might know something you don’t

I really didn't get the impression that JP follows this rule.

birdsdestiny · 01/11/2018 11:20

Can u disturb a child skateboarding o4f they haven't tidied their room...

OatsBeansBarley · 01/11/2018 11:22

You only have to tidy your room if you want the right to criticise others!

JuliaJaynes9 · 01/11/2018 11:23

I think people assume that he has some kind of mystical magic about him, his 12 rules are just like well durr🙄
He is a stupid persons idea of a smart person... that kind of thing
people assume that he must have some great secret or why would he be so popular but come on the things that are popular are Great British Bake Off, reality TV etc
popularity is rarely synonymous with intellectual rigour/merit ☺️

JuliaJaynes9 · 01/11/2018 11:24

Talking in riddles
Emperor's New Clothes
Smoke and mirrors
Etc

LikeDust · 01/11/2018 12:22

What about being precise? A bit right from someone who waffles on with 40 syllables where 2 would do ..

Coyoacan · 01/11/2018 13:59

Assume that the person you are listening to might know something you don’t

Now that is exacting what he didn't do in that interview.

lucydogz · 02/11/2018 12:14

like him. Especially when he eviscerated Cathy Newman. I don't agree with everything he says but he makes a refreshing change. I think his problem is that he has been on a publicity treadmill for the last 2 years, when he should have stepped back and left the public eye. As it is, he looks steadily more fragile and bad tempered in successive interviews. And also having to deal with frankly disgusting ad hominem hostility from the Left. Check out Marina Hyde's piece in the Guardian as an example.

Melanippe · 02/11/2018 12:33

He looked like a techy toddler. He also spoke like one.

nauticant · 02/11/2018 12:38

I think his problem is that he has been on a publicity treadmill for the last 2 years

He's a phenomenon but only so long as he stays in the public eye. He'll be aware that if he steps back for a period of time to recharge, by the time he comes back there's a good chance he''ll be old news and people will have moved onto something else.

hackmum · 02/11/2018 12:42

Those 12 rules are utterly fatuous. I think we could all come up with 12 better ones, given half an hour.

Freespeecher · 02/11/2018 12:52

He's on Question Time next week. Wonder who they'll put up against him?

OatsBeansBarley · 02/11/2018 12:55

I might have to lift my self imposed rest of life ban on QT.