Part Two: The Argument Against Jordan Peterson

“My suspicion is that many of Peterson’s readers feel an affinity to the advice he offers and so don’t look to question his political commitments that deeply. This is problematic because it leads to deep inconsistencies in doctrine that, if applied as stated, would lead to a rather unusual politics.”

In my June 3rd article, I presented the first part of my critique of Jordan Peterson. In that piece, I argued that much of the hyperbole surrounding Peterson, both positive and negative, was overstated. I maintained that he was a talented scholar when he focused on his areas of expertise: namely psychology, and its association with mythology, religion, and literature. This is reflected in the overall quality of his magnum opus, Maps of Meaning. While an overambitious and occasionally grandiose book, it contained many interesting insights into how human beings formulate meaning for their lives. I also observed that Peterson’s recent bestseller, 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos, contained a significant amount of good life advice that seemed to be inspiring to its audience of mostly young men.

However, I also observed that Peterson ran into significant trouble when he stepped outside of his area of expertise and commented on politics. In the last article, I mainly focused on the problems with Peterson’s criticism of Left-wing philosophy and activism. I observed that he did not seem to understand, or know very much about, what he set out to criticize. In particular, Peterson offered very shallow arguments against so-called “post-modern neo-Marxism.” I concluded the article by maintaining that the locus of Peterson’s appeal as a critic of the Left was that many people felt the same way he did about left-wing activism. They, therefore, assumed that he was offering salient criticisms of the philosophy allegedly underpinning this activism. I do not believe this to be the case, which is unfortunate since Peterson has the capacity to be a good scholar when he tries. This makes his unwillingness to engage with the left in any substantive or fair manner disappointing.

In this article, I am going to conclude my critique of his work by dealing with the more constructive dimension of Peterson’s political thought. This consists of his support for “classical liberalism,” meritocracy, and Judeo-Christian tradition. While Peterson is on intellectually firmer ground when invoking these tropes to offer psychological advice, his positions become confusing and even self-contradictory when generalized to the level of politics.