A Leftist Critique of Jordan Peterson
A Book Review of Myth and Mayhem
Jordan Peterson has had a big influence on me. I don’t consider him a guru, and I didn’t care to follow the drama that arose out of his popularity, but I found his ideas in Maps of Meaning highly useful. I discovered him in 2016, roughly when he started to get popular, and I completely loved his university lectures. In fact, his “Personality and its Transformations” university course was what inspired me to pursue a degree in psychology a year after.
But as I finished his university lectures and his book, everything I saw from him started to become highly repetitive, and I discovered other thinkers that tackled the same problems as he did, and afterwards, I didn’t care about Peterson too much. But this was roughly when he started to get super popular and also get more and more into politics. While I wasn’t following him per se, he kept appearing on my feed for one reason or another. And when he did, it was often hit articles that were complete nonsense, misinterpreting his work and trying to frame him for every possible evil. I didn’t have much of an interest in defending him because I didn’t want to be associated with his followers as he kept getting more and more politized and branding his content as self-help, which I considered a shameful transformation of his work.
But nevertheless, seeing him constantly attacked without good criticism always irked me. Even more so because I always thought that you could easily make some decent arguments against his political and philosophical views. So why were the ones that came up always so misguided and bizarre? This is why I largely hate politics, and the Peterson phenomenon only made me want to stay away even further from it. It seems to poison everything it touches.
But I once came across a video that was rebutting some of his ideas. I didn’t agree with it, but I was impressed by how charitable it was and didn’t resort to mischaracterizations. I later discovered that the guy was involved in a book specifically about rebutting Peterson. Eager to see some well-made criticism of him that wasn’t completely ideological, I figured I should give it a shot.
The book was hit-and-miss. Overall, it is still the better criticism I’ve ever seen against Peterson but it still left a lot to be desired. Some of my disagreements are ones that I can’t confidently say that they’re wrong. I would consider them as different political views, and as I’m not an expert on politics or economics, they can certainly be right (although I don’t think they are, otherwise, I wouldn’t disagree).
But there are a few criticisms which I don’t think are fair. I initially wrote down every single one of them and planned to address each one, but they ended up being over 30, and I don’t have the patience to go through them, nor would it be appropriate for a simple book review. But there were a few criticisms that I still think are quite popular. Basic but still misunderstood. I will cover some as examples.
First, I hate how Peterson uses the term “post-modern neo-marxists”, and there are several problems with it which are worthy of much criticism. However, a common attack is that where are those “post-modern neo-marxists”, as for example asked by Zizek? As if for an ideology to manifest, it has to have an official club. This barely happens with philosophical schools of thought, let alone a cultural and political movement. That was never Peterson’s point. While I disagree with the connection between Marxism and Postmodernism in the terms he puts it, in certain forms, it is undeniable that they greatly overlap, and even Zizek admitted this during the debate. If you can replace a single word from an ideology and it works close to perfect in another, you will have a tough time arguing that there is no common underlying structure.
Another is that somehow an individual is prohibited from acting in the political or social world. This is often associated with the “clean your room” phrase. What he suggests is that your well-being is dependent on things that are under your control, so starting there is good advice. Even more so because changing social and political problems are incredibly complex, and Peterson is mostly talking to an audience that is just started to get into these topics. It doesn’t negate political and social action; it’s just basic advice that it’s easier to start with smaller problems and problems that you can actually solve. It amazes me that this is so criticized as if it was such a political far-right perspective when it is such a basic recommendation that goes back to Seneca and Epictetus of practising the simple things first.
Lastly, the bloody lobster and this one come up a fair bit in the book. They always frame it as if he uses lobsters as evidence that hierarchy is inevitable. And what they have in mind is that it then justifies the current hierarchy. That’s not what he argues. His example of the lobster is that we inherit biological systems that are primed for hierarchies, and it’s natural for them to develop. He mentions this against the view that hierarchies, by themselves, are something one ought to abolish at all costs. He is simply pointing out that we’re primed for it, and hierarchies by themselves don’t have to be viewed as absolute evil. Rather, we should assess if the hierarchy is valid or not. And this is a major theme in maps of meaning which goes exactly in the opposite direction of this rebuttal.
These are just a few ones in the book that are popular, and I’ve seen them being made often, but there were many more. But not everything was bad. The beginning of the book described Peterson’s philosophy, and I found this was done quite well. Certainly better than anything I’ve seen from someone arguing against him. I think some of it was still misinterpreted or badly attacked, but I can’t expect to agree with everything. After the introduction of his philosophy, an introduction of his rise to the political sphere was explained. Again, I didn’t agree with how many things were framed, but it provides a good timeline and the context for the rest of the book.
After the introduction, it has several chapters by different authors. I liked this approach. For one, it gives more strength to the criticisms that they’re coming from different people, and even more so from different backgrounds. But this also had the consequence of making the book seem a bit disjointed at times. Some articles seemed quite ideological at times, while others I found very good.
For example, Matthew McManus made the point that Peterson’s account of the rise of nihilism was the scientific revolution and the division of the objective and subjective. This is certainly true, but there were also many other factors that played a role, which he goes into it. Peterson’s philosophical system is incredibly vast, which has the tendency to shrink and crush events and ideas to fit the narrative better. But once you dig deeper into them, his account is a bit oversimplified, which puts his higher-order arguments into doubt. Another good criticism is when Peterson simply gets stuff wrong. For example, he misquotes the bible several times by not understanding or explaining the surrounding context. This is the type of mistake that most certainly should be addressed. It is easy to correct and doesn’t require ideological battles.
Perhaps what I think Peterson misunderstands the most is postmodernism. There was almost a whole chapter about it, and I found it incredibly well done. It is a similar problem to what I mentioned above; he oversimplifies a lot. Even more, so things he doesn’t have a deep knowledge of. This is made worse because I think he can get quite arrogant at times, which compounds this problem. Because now, not only does he not understand Derrida, but he thinks he understands Derrida, and if that’s cast into doubt, he certainly does not think he should look deeper into it. This also happens frequently regarding the social sciences, which while I think Peterson’s critique of it has some validity, he certainly dismisses them too quickly and has a very shallow understanding of them in most cases.
My favourite chapter was one of the last ones, which debunks Peterson’s “10 flawed propositions” of Marxism which he stated at Zizek’s debate. And this is quite telling because I’m certainly not a fan of Marxism. But the chapter was incredibly well written. It directly addressed Peterson’s point very carefully and showed why it’s wrong or misframing Marx’s position. It wasn’t ideological at all, which I can’t say for other sections of the book. I didn’t agree with most of it, but it was the best rebuttal of the book, and I found it very interesting to read.
I was right in thinking that this book would rise higher than the typical articles that are written against Peterson. They’re much more carefully crafted, and they tend to address the points more directly without strawman’s or just accusing him of sexism, transphobia, and so forth. Nevertheless, I still found that many rebuttals were misunderstandings of his position and could have been better made. But I’m also conscious of my own bias. I don’t put against an ideal hypothetical book in which their interpretation lines exactly with mine, and I agree with everything. I got this book exactly because I wanted what I shared with Peterson challenged. Sometimes done well and others not so well, that was achieved.
What I disliked the most, regardless of the specific counter-argument, is the overall Marxist overtone of the entire book. It was way stronger than I expected and, in some ways, was disappointing because economics was the aspect I cared about the least. However, because I am so new to it, I also enjoyed reading some nuanced positions about Marxism that I wasn’t exposed to before and increased my respect for it.
What I took the most value from Peterson’s work was Jung’s ideas, and they are not touched often in the book. When they are and offer some criticism, I found it badly made every single it. Jung’s analysis of the female and masculine archetypes was constantly interpreted as an oppressive/patriarchial framework. And in one essay, it’s almost used to justify Peterson’s “anti-feminist”. It’s very absurd.
If you’re interested in criticisms against Peterson, this is certainly the best you’re going to get. It has some flaws, but likewise, it makes some great points and explores them in-depth. Just take into account that most of the criticism is within the political and economic sphere, which I think is the shallowest thing to take from Peterson, although I understand that they’re more concerned with his cultural and political impact.
If you like his ideas, it’s worth reading. Just be patient with it. There are many arguments that irked me due to how ideological they seem or how they seem to miss the point completely. But it’s always easy to think that your view is the current one. If you want your beliefs to be shaken (assuming they have some overlap with Peterson), I recommend reading this.
I have another article on Peterson you might be interested in:
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I also have a philosophy podcast. If you want to check it out look for Anagoge Podcast.
Tiago V.F.
