Mini Decoding: The Descent of Jordan Peterson
Added 2024-03-26 05:28:42 +0000 UTCWe take a look at a recent conversation between Jordan Peterson and the streamer Steven Bonnell (AKA Destiny) and use the opportunity to reflect on Jordan's journey as a public intellectual and guru.
We consider how his stances have changed, whether he is more extreme now than when he emerged or if it is just his presentation style that has shifted. Along the way, we look at his demon-infested understanding of the COVID-19 vaccines, his climate change denialism, and address the unresolved question of the ages: Were the Nazis actually right-wing?
Links
Jordan Peterson Podcast: Streaming, Politics, & Philosophy | @destiny | EP 433
Video of Jordan Peterson on climate change and climate policy at the Cambridge Union
Reuters: Fact Check: No evidence to link UK excess deaths to COVID-19 vaccines
Jordan Peterson is Back! - Bret Weinstein's DarkHorse Podcast
The Guardian: Jordan Peterson’s ‘zombie’ climate contrarianism follows a well-worn path
Comments
We wanted solar panels on our roof, but we get too much shade from our trees.
Linda Sears
2024-03-29 20:43:16 +0000 UTCTime, as has been well-established, is relative
Guruspod 2
2024-03-29 20:20:28 +0000 UTCAbsolutely. If a 4th year honours student pitched that idea to me I’d have strong doubts about their potential!
Guruspod 2
2024-03-29 20:19:43 +0000 UTCI mean he definitely knows more about them than me… but I don’t think we can entirely blame the gurus for Chris’s fractious personality ;)
Guruspod 2
2024-03-29 20:18:07 +0000 UTCAlso we might break it. First time we put Jordan through it, the front fell off
Guruspod 2
2024-03-29 20:16:16 +0000 UTCYep. As the saying goes, it’s pretty hard to convince a man to believe something when his livelihood depends on him not believing it
Guruspod 2
2024-03-29 20:14:35 +0000 UTCCheers. Yup, in my my mind the utter incoherence, the random scattershot ideas and unlikely speculative connections that forms the scaffolding for his cloud-castle theories — it’s absolutely damning.
Guruspod 2
2024-03-29 20:11:11 +0000 UTCHere in Queensland, even though there are Zero government subsidies for solar, getting panels on your roof is incredibly popular, because it saves money. Our electricity bills are tiny because most of our power comes off the roof.
Guruspod 2
2024-03-29 20:04:44 +0000 UTCElectric cars would be another good example. We call them cars because they perform the same function, not because they run on gasoline.
Ben Godek
2024-03-28 19:23:33 +0000 UTCNope, he already scored very high anyway!
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-28 08:34:28 +0000 UTCFair enough. I'll listen with pleasure to your decoding about Finkelstein and I'm sure it will touch on the "rhetorical tactics used to make [a] case in the absence of substance" and not a letter he once wrote to a noisy neighbor. I'm very curious because I haven't heard anything other than he speaks slowly and is a choleric old man - but you guys are the professionals and I am always willing to learn. Best of luck.
Jovan Popov
2024-03-28 07:54:18 +0000 UTCLast reply on this. You seem overly invested in both Norman Finkelstein and Destiny and to judge both primarily on your agreement with their politics, which is your prerogative but not an approach we share. I'll repeat a point already made: someone being an academic and having expertise does not, in any sense, make them incapable of behaving like a guru. Once again, you should consider that Jordan Peterson was an academic with many publications and that various Nobel Prize winners have gone on to promote various pseudosciences. If you want some relevant evidence about Norm not being a normal person that is entirely outside of his debates on I-P. Go look up the letter he sent to his noisy neighbours. That's the behaviour of an odd narcissist. We already said that we are going to do an episode on Destiny and probably one on Norm too, and we talked about points we agreed/disagreed on with Destiny so your confusion over who is 'befitting of scrutiny' does not make any sense. Indeed, you do not seem familiar with the premise or goals of the podcast as your comments imply a) that if we cover someone, they must be an exploitative guru and b) we should only cover people if we dislike them and want to attack them/disagree with their politics. None of that is what the podcast is about. Again, repeating another point from above, it is not just that Norm is angry; it is his constant self-aggrandising, indulgent, and highly rhetorical method of arguing. That we agree with his point on various points does not negate this behaviour. Destiny also behaved better than a streamer debate bro typically would but he too relied on rhetoric at times and made edgy statements, like we discussed. As far as Destiny and Peterson, Destiny was simply correct in almost every argument he had with Peterson. Whether you like him or not, does not change that point, nor are people in our audience likely to hear someone say basic information about vaccines and the WEF and go sign up for a Twitch account. To be honest, Jovan, it sounds like you want to listen to a different podcast, one that will praise Norman Finkelstein as a great and respected academic. This is not the podcast for that.
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-28 00:39:37 +0000 UTCWell, they have now done two podcasts in a row focusing the majority of their guru-decoding powers on the person squaring off against Destiny - so I think it's pretty easy to draw an implicit conclusion that the other person can serve as an anti-guru in the sense that they are in stark contrast to the person whom they are criticising - a lot of words to say something pretty obvious just by listening. To your point, they gave very little pushback to Destiny and when they did they didn't really discuss any of the "rhetorical tactics used to make [a] case in the absence of substance" (what I was told this podcast was about). I also don't understand how Finkelstein came off "looking worse" and didn't really understand on the podcast other than he was angry and used ad hominems. When pressed I was told they have seen plenty of other of his videos and content and he is always like this? I read this podcast was about "how smart people employ rhetorical tactics to make their case in the absence of substance," so I'm just having a really hard time understanding how Norm Finkelstein - someone who has taught International Relations and has written many books on the Israel Palestine conflict - is more befitting of scrutiny than a 35 year old YouTube influencer who started researching the I-P war on Oct 7th. What's funny is that anything of substance they actually gave to Finkelstein, yes it's not fair to say that innocent murdered kids were leaving a Palestenian base, yes it's not fair to say dropping a nuke on Gaza is not genocide (although one of the podcasters had a doubt - would it really be genocide to nuke all the Palestenians into oblivion? what a great question! /s pretty ludicrous line of thought imo, but to each his own) and yet the entire discussion was centered around on how Finkelstein was so terrible because he was angry. Now I'm just being told I just don't get it, and that may just simply be the case.
Jovan Popov
2024-03-27 23:40:14 +0000 UTCI also think it’s relevant that you didn’t really cast him as an “anti-guru” on the episode with Finklestein. You, for example, fact checked him on the claim about the people Israel killed that they claimed were coming out of a Hamas base which was contradicted by journalists on the ground. I agree Finklestein came out of that episode looking worse but I disagree that you cast Destiny as the good guy. If anything, you cast the relevant historians as the good guys.
Andy
2024-03-27 22:15:53 +0000 UTCGreat episode lads. Thanks.
LaserRange
2024-03-27 20:42:31 +0000 UTCEven if you believe that the Nazis held mostly left-wing political positions, they are still not "problematic" because of them. The argument is completely pointless unless you want to argue that the real problem with the Nazis was excessive government spending or too much government interventionism.
JK-F
2024-03-27 18:37:26 +0000 UTCOn the climate aspect, Texas, that bastion of conservatism, is the largest producer of wind power in the U.S.
Linda Sears
2024-03-27 17:39:56 +0000 UTCPeterson duality is indeed quite ridiculous. Not sure I follow what you're saying about Jones. He still churns out laughably insane ideas with regularity, but conservatives have decided to ignore those because he regularly says things like on immigration etc? Regardless, my primary point is that Jones espouses much more evil ideas and has caused direct harm to many people purely so he could make money. I think likening JBP to him downplays that evilness. I don't see a rebuttal there. And I don't say that as some apologetic when I really think JBP should be taken somewhat seriously, or that he has good intentions and is just confused or misunderstood. He's a narcissistic clown with bad ideas. He just has some morals-- Jones doesn't.
Trees
2024-03-27 13:04:50 +0000 UTCWe will do an episode on Destiny, but it won’t make any difference to his following. If we cover Norm it won’t either. You should listen to the episodes where we discuss the motivations for the podcast if interested in why we would do decodings.
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-27 12:37:23 +0000 UTCI'm not really sure what argument you are trying to make. You're saying you wouldn't decode Destiny because it would have no impact? Then why decode anyone at all?
Jovan Popov
2024-03-27 12:10:34 +0000 UTCThere are many many more people who will be praising and criticising Destiny from actually watching the content. Just look at the comments on the video or the commentary videos or in random comments online. Our podcast is not making any significant dent on either JBP or Destiny’s popularity. If we did an episode that was very critical of Destiny or very positive it would make very little difference too. You have the wrong image of the podcast if you think we are aiming to identify heroes and villains. The vast majority of our audience are not becoming fans of any of the people we cover unless they have their own independent t interest.
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-27 11:49:01 +0000 UTCGreat can't wait to hear your podcast opining on Destiny's guruness as opposed to swinging at low-hanging fruit. As it stands you have about half a dozen people praising Destiny in response to this podcast and probably an equal amount in the Finkelstein debate, so by not pushing back at his rhetoric or giving it an even take you are promoting a different guru. Also, and I understand it's my opinion, but Norm Finkelstein is not the same as JBP and Destiny. I'm not going to argue though, but I would appreciate if you want to point out Finkelstein as a guru - and especially if you're already aware of Destiny's "edgelord tendencies" - then as responsible academics you would point out the latter's guru tendencies so people who are NOT aware will not be taken in by a different type of guru. Here you've done two podcasts in a row showing Destiny as the hero, the anti-guru, and people are going to be taken in by him just because he is pushing back against gurus whom you disagree with. In any case, thank you for replying and bon courage.
Jovan Popov
2024-03-27 10:40:35 +0000 UTCI’ve seen Destiny say and do things I don’t agree with. It is also not just the propensity to ad hominem and getting mad that makes us regard Norm as a guru. We are well aware Destiny is a streamer with edgelord tendencies and behaves differently in different contexts.
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-27 08:48:53 +0000 UTCI think you are being blind to Destiny's guruness because he is challenging the positions/people YOU are not sympathetic towards. I haven't listened to the JP vs Destiny fiasco but I imagine you put all your energy towards JP and maybe the off-hand comment towards Destiny - which by the way, I don't blame you in that case - JP is obviously a huge guru. Destiny seems great if he is debating people you don't care for but I really recommend you spend a bit of time on his channel (I had to do this recently because my students keep mentioning him and how smart he is) and you can make up your own mind. To me his is a particularly evil type of guru, the neo-liberal guru, who can espouse such lunatic, blood-thirsty remarks like, "We can nuke all of Gaza and it still wouldn't be called genocide" with a straight face and still hide behind a mask that he is the open-minded purveyor of leftist humanistic values all while making millions and millions of dollars off his followers. I'll give you a couple of videos to start off your research, hopefully you'll do a podcast some day on him because he is GenZ's newest guru and is shaping the minds of the next generation: He uses obfuscation, diverts topics, and then uses euphemisms for really terrible events for things that are at least genocide-adjacent. The following video is really just a mini example of his debate pro tactics in play. At the end he translates "involved violence" into "it would involve transfer of people of property": https://twitter.com/curaffairs/status/1769921076304179691 And, since you qualify Norm Finkelstein as a guru because he got mad and used ad hominems, here he is telling someone he disagrees with to kill themselves: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wrt_9u9DQz0 Here he calls the person he is debating a "retard that doesn't know what (they) are talking about" and then hangs up on them: 1h16.20 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VkVHYdgI3s&t=1579s There are so many examples of his toxic behavior it's crazy, just spend a month on his algorithm and you'll go crazy - I blocked him now to preserve my mental health. I feel so sorry for the new generation that they have voices like this influencing their opinions and world views. I'm sure one day he is going to "debate" someone you like and then you will see him for what he is.
Jovan Popov
2024-03-27 08:36:23 +0000 UTCYes, Jones appeared on Tucker, just for an example. He also has mainstream politicians coming on his show. Jones still says insane things, it's the conservative wing that has become more open to that sentiment. Though I agree Alex is more anti-semitic. Jordan is extremely confused on questions of metaphysics so he likely simultaneously means a metaphorical pattern and a malevolent entity.
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-27 04:01:08 +0000 UTCI saw The Exorcist when I was a kid and it freaked me out. Now I hear all this talk about some demons grabbing my spine and making me spew unspeakable evils is making me want to projectile vomit. And I would, except I’m enjoying the episode too much. Not to blow smoke Matt and Chris but you guys are like the JBP so called vaccine to me.
Rod Hodges
2024-03-27 03:41:10 +0000 UTCI think Destiny owns JP. JP is a dictionary of conservative talking points.
Tim Tripp
2024-03-27 03:03:03 +0000 UTCJones is more mainstream? Maybe what I'm missing here is that post judgement Jones says less insane things so the bar has lowered. I don't think that changes the facts of the direct harm he's caused to real people. When Peterson says stuff like "malevolent forces" maybe he means social patterns, maybe he means actual demons, but I feel safe he doesn't he mean "The Jews". Can't really say that about Jones.
Trees
2024-03-27 01:59:21 +0000 UTCNah, dude is talking about malevolent entities puppeting climate change activists and controlling the WEF. Alex Jones is more mainstream now on the right that’s true but that doesn’t make him less insane. Tucker is like Alex too. And many of Alex’s content isn’t about interdimensional aliens it’s climate change denialism, anti immigrant rhetoric, and religious tinged bigotry.
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-27 01:45:37 +0000 UTCAlex Jones in a suit is hyperbole. As pointed out in this episode, Peterson's beliefs on climate change and COVID are unfortunately not that fringe; they are common conservative arguments (at least in the US). Jones gets worked up about gay frogs, gay bombs, and interdimensional aliens. He claimed Lady Gaga was summoning the antichrist. More importantly, Jones is a thoroughly evil person. Has Peterson ever done anything nearly as reprehensible as Jones' Sandy Hook campaign? Maybe I'm just too amused by this red-pilled Matthew Lesko to see his true evil, but if Peterson actually got demonetized on Youtube, it would be worrying. Jones on the other hand should be banned from everything.
Trees
2024-03-27 01:35:20 +0000 UTCSaying MRNA vaccines aren't vaccines because it's a new technology is like saying OLED TV's aren't TV's because it's a new technology.
Kieran Lockyer
2024-03-27 00:40:21 +0000 UTCI'm looking forward to this one! I can't get enough of Peterson. (I mean I find him endlessly interesting as a social phenomenon.)
Sonje Finnestad
2024-03-27 00:19:05 +0000 UTCI think it’s quite well known he’s from oil rich Alberta. And the tar sands are not in his town (which is just outside of Edmonton). They are quite a few hours north of there.
Julie
2024-03-26 23:22:06 +0000 UTCThis was a great ep, thanks v much
Minotaurus Rex
2024-03-26 23:21:08 +0000 UTCWonder what Hayek would have thought about Jung
Cranky
2024-03-26 22:54:24 +0000 UTCDeep Hayek energy from Peterson… deep dumb Hayek misreading.
Cranky
2024-03-26 22:53:49 +0000 UTCJordan has some big "colonipin confidence".
Shifty Comfort
2024-03-26 19:08:40 +0000 UTCNot to mention he now makes millions of dollars from The Daily Wire, which is bankrolled by billionaire oil tycoon brothers, Dan and Farris Wilks.
Devin Poore
2024-03-26 18:32:35 +0000 UTCChris notes Peterson's inconsistent application of judgement between "utopian visions" (exclusively of those he perceives to be on the left) and MAGA. It's long been my biggest and most damning critique of Jordan. He is incoherence incarnate. How's that for a Jungian archetype? This is just one example and I'm glad Chris called it out, but, if you listen to him enough (God forbid), there is an endless stream of these kinds of contradictions. And what they tend to reveal (in my estimation) is that someone isn't operating from a baseline set of carefully considered principles or heuristics, but rather they're letting a variety of biases dictate their conclusions and working backwards from them. The issue is that when you have enough raw brainpower (as Jordan unfortunately does), you can put it to work quieting the contradictions that inevitably arise from such an unconsidered worldview and you have the endurance required to perform the mental gymnastics necessary to maintain the illusion of conviction in perpetuity. I think Jordan ends up fooling himself just as often as he fools his audience. Perhaps the most quintessential and revealing example of this is Jordan's burning hatred for postmodernism, which he has expressed at every possible opportunity. However, his own track record of redefining well established terms & concepts in order to shoehorn them into his bespoke worldview would suggest that he is happy to indulge in postmodern thinking when it suits his predetermined conclusions. But the list goes on and on of this kind of thing. And seeing as one of my carefully considered heuristics is putting little to no intellectual stock in people who clearly haven't considered theirs, Jordan has easily been disqualified from getting anywhere close to the group of people I consider intellectually worth my time for many years. His influence on the political discourse, however, cannot be denied. To my endless fucking chagrin. Edit: Finishing up the episode and happy to hear Matt and Chris vocalizing a similar kind of analysis regarding Peterson's patterns of reasoning.
Devin Poore
2024-03-26 18:19:38 +0000 UTCDepressing and hilarious, truly the lords work here lads
Jarod S
2024-03-26 14:32:55 +0000 UTCI would love to see a conversation between Destiny and Sam Harris. Does such a moment exist on the interwebs anywhere?
Nicola DiNicola
2024-03-26 14:17:58 +0000 UTCIt's the same thing here in Norway where I live. We have made a fortune extracting oil. That is reflected in the population by a high degree of denial that humans are changing the climate.
Kent Inge Olsen
2024-03-26 14:05:24 +0000 UTCYeah, that's probably true. But my point still stands, does it not?
Dries T.
2024-03-26 13:01:00 +0000 UTCWell said! Hear hear!
Guruspod 2
2024-03-26 12:58:27 +0000 UTCA deeper knowledge??? No no no, Chris’s brain is filled to the brim with details and trivia. I’ve got to keep my brain clean of all that nonsense, and my eyes on the horizon, to see the bigger picture
Guruspod 2
2024-03-26 12:53:09 +0000 UTCOn the topic of Jordan Peterson, climate change and cognitive dissonance, a fact that's not well known is that he comes from an oil boom town where they extract tar sands, a type of oil with high costs an environmental impact. Having spent his formative years in the community that suffers the most when lawmakers implement green policies or social programs financed by oil money might have had an impact on his opinions.
Jean-François Melançon
2024-03-26 12:29:22 +0000 UTCChris is sacrificing himself to save the mental health of Matt and those of us who cannot stomach listening to such things. He is a martyr to the cause.
Linda Sears
2024-03-26 12:10:57 +0000 UTCAre you going to do an updated gurumeter?
lun
2024-03-26 11:16:18 +0000 UTCWell it depends on what your definition of "mini" is and it depends on what your definition of "decoding" is, man.
weltysparrow
2024-03-26 11:04:57 +0000 UTCSoup-stained LLM lips slip synch lyrically spilling magic guru-journey beanz: 🙂 Copilot Visitors to Jaw-Jaw’s shop were greeted by a cacophony of ticking clocks, each set to a different time zone. Shelves sagged under the weight of peculiar artifacts: crystal spheres that whispered forgotten secrets, mechanical birds that sang haunting melodies, and tarnished mirrors that reflected fractured realities. One fateful evening, a young girl named Elowen stumbled upon Jaw-Jaw’s Curiosities. Her eyes widened as she beheld a brass key, its teeth shaped like constellations. “What does it unlock?” she asked, her voice barely audible above the clatter of gears. Jaw-Jaw grinned, revealing a set of mismatched teeth. “Ah, my dear, that key opens the door to the Realm of Lost Whispers. A place where dreams and nightmares collide, and where the echoes of forgotten tales linger.” Elowen hesitated, her heart fluttering like a moth drawn to a flickering lantern. “Why would anyone want to visit such a realm?” “Curiosity, my child,” Jaw-Jaw replied. “Curiosity is the spark that ignites adventure. But beware—the faulty wiring in your mind may unravel truths you’re not prepared to face.” Elowen clutched the key, its cold metal pulsing with hidden energy. She stepped through the shop’s back door, into a swirling vortex of colors. The air smelled of ancient parchment and distant storms. As she crossed the threshold, she glimpsed other versions of herself—warrior, scholar, pirate—all existing simultaneously. In the Realm of Lost Whispers, Elowen encountered creatures made of stardust and sorrow. She danced with moonlit shadows, conversed with forgotten gods, and tasted memories long buried. And always, the key hung around her neck, a compass guiding her through fractured realities. Jaw-Jaw watched from his shop, his eyes alight with wonder. “Remember,” he whispered to the wind, “sometimes the most extraordinary journeys begin with a single step—and a dash of faulty wiring.” And so, Elowen wandered, collecting fragments of stories, piecing together her own existence. For in the heart of Cogsworth, where time flowed like molten gold, she discovered that reality was but a delicate illusion—one that Jaw-Jaw’s Curiosities had shattered forever. 🕰️✨ 1of30 Show learn more suggestions • Tell me more about Elowen's adventures. • What other curiosities does Jaw-Jaw have? • Is there a villain in this world?
Anne Stephens
2024-03-26 10:40:18 +0000 UTCTrue!
Christopher Kavanagh
2024-03-26 10:27:00 +0000 UTCThought I'd consult another Oracle (Pythons almost certainly implicated...) 🙂: Write a paragraph of fantasy fiction including the phrases "Jaw-Jaw" and "Faulty Wiring" Copilot In the mystical city of Cogsworth, where gears spun like golden suns and steam-powered carriages glided along cobbled streets, there existed an enigmatic shop known as “Jaw-Jaw’s Curiosities.” Its proprietor, the wiry and eccentric Jaw-Jaw, was rumored to have been born with faulty wiring—a peculiar affliction that granted him glimpses into parallel dimensions. 🤷♀️
Anne Stephens
2024-03-26 10:07:30 +0000 UTCOn the recurring topic of whether Chris is more negatively disposed, and Matt is "the nice one" - isn't this just largely a natural effect of Chris having consumed so much more of the output, and therefore having a deeper knowledge of how awful all these characters are, beyond the content of any given decoding? I guess Matt can still be the more relaxed personality regardless, but if he'd (God forbid!) listened to as many hours of content as Chris, I'd wager some of the mellowness would inevitably drop off.
Dries T.
2024-03-26 09:15:11 +0000 UTCI'm only 26 minutes in, but am really enjoying the analysis between the older clips and the interview with Destiny.
lun
2024-03-26 08:36:28 +0000 UTCI think that's right. Thatcher, for example, increased the overall spending on the NHS. Under her direct direction making, however, the government also completely withdrew direct and infrastructural support to many rural communities that were totally dependent on state activity to provide an income. This was done in lines with her ideological belief that the 'free market' would 'solve the problem'. (It turns out, however, that I.T firms don't drop a factory in the middle of a former Welsh coal mining village.) In terms of Thatcher's impact on the average person's life in the UK the governments under her leadership fostered a more 'right wing' society and outcomes.
Ymirsdreams
2024-03-26 07:36:30 +0000 UTCHis "let's do a survey to figure out if the Nazis were right wing" idea is stupid for another reason (in addition to all the ones you mentioned)-namely that not all policies are equally salient. I'm sure that you could make it seem like they had more left wing policies if you add them up in a certain way, but the fact that they did the Holocaust is going to outweigh a lot of tax increases and public works projects.
Ben Godek
2024-03-26 06:57:05 +0000 UTCRight into my veins
mobitobi
2024-03-26 06:44:38 +0000 UTCAsk a question? Gulag. Do own research? Gulag. Fill out stadium and talk for two hours without citations on topics you aren't qualified in? Straight to Gulag.
Ymirsdreams
2024-03-26 06:44:05 +0000 UTC"Mini" decoding = 84 minutes 😁
Brendan H.
2024-03-26 06:24:52 +0000 UTCBefore this goes up on the non-patron feed; you used the wrong "where" in the description text.
Liam McMahon
2024-03-26 05:59:47 +0000 UTCLooking forward to giving this a listen when I get home
Shane Partington
2024-03-26 05:30:19 +0000 UTC
