The Limitations of Jordan Peterson

Not that I necessarily agree with the whole thesis of psychopathy, which seems to me rather unscientific, but Peterson here fails to take account of socially-sanctioned psychopathy. Or rather, he is too ready to dismiss the possibility a priori.

A psychopath can be behaviourally normative and still act in a thoroughly psychopathic manner. If this short clip is anything to go by, Peterson also seems to be equating psychopathy with anti-social behaviour, but the two are not synonyms. The possibility of social framing seems to elude Peterson: i.e. either that a psychopath can actually behave according to normative standards because the system itself is psychopathic or the psychopath is working within an institutionally psychopathic organisation. Examples abound and I need not labour the point.  I assume the reader has eyes to see and ears to hear.

Maybe this is harsh of me, but Peterson comes across as somebody with quite a naive understanding of the world, you might even call his worldview ‘quaint’. That observation is not particular to Peterson however: increasingly, as I age, learn and read more, I become less impressed by these ‘expert’ talking heads; indeed, experts of all kinds look less impressive to me, and not just in the social sciences.

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We Need More Bigots, Not Free Speech

The more I think about it, the less enamoured I am of “free speech”, which it seems to me is yet another liberal chimera that ignores or smooths over the ontological nature of freedom.

“Free speech” in the practical sense is not offensive speech – which is pure free speech – but instead is defined in a more formal sense as wherever the line of acceptable speech can be drawn within a given culture. Multi-racialism and imposed diversity help us define the line of “free speech” in this multi-culture: it’s whatever does not offend, and the exact position of the ‘offence’ needle on the barometer of acceptability is never constant, always changing. That is, unless you are part of a protected group, in which case you can offend.

Anything that transgresses the threshold of acceptable speech is deemed illegal and potentially prosecutable, per “Count Dankula”.
Looking at the matter with detachment, none of this can be considered a surprise. It is difficult to imagine even a libertarian society that could tolerate liberal freedom of the chimerical sort. Can examples be brought forth? It seems to me that any society in which individuals aspire to be free must reckon with a paradox: intolerance of outsiders as a condition of internal tolerance.

The uncomfortable truth, then, is that unintellectual bigotry is a prerequisite of freedom. The working class blue collar racist, the roughneck who believes in Zionist conspiracy theories, the boorish lower middle-class businessman who wants to stop immigration and keep women in the home, the Tory Magistrate who wants to bring back the birch and close the borders, etc., are freedom’s cutting edge, not because – as the conservative might argue – the maintenance of freedom depends on the advancement and successful sustaining of a chimeric Liberal Order, but rather because the Order itself cannot exist without the people who maintain the relevant values that define it. We are freedom and freedom is us. Freedom means nothing unless we are able to survive and reproduce ourselves. If outsiders are tolerated and welcomed, freedom within that society will be gradually eroded.

That is why non-reactionary liberal societies collapse. They refuse to be bigoted and thereby sow the seeds of their decline and eventual destruction. It’s also why calling for “free speech” abstractly is completely futile. If you want “free speech” in anything other than the pretentious liberal chimeric sense, then the first steps are to close the borders, deport all non-Europeans and return society to communal principles.