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Dangerous people are filling the heads of young people with dangerous nonsense. Who are these people? They are what Jordan Peterson calls “the post-modernists:”

by kentm 8y ago

Dangerous people are filling the heads of young people with dangerous nonsense. Who are these people? They are what Jordan Peterson calls “the post-modernists:” neo-Marxist professors who dominate our colleges and universities. And here’s the worst part: we are financing these nihilists with tax dollars, alumni gifts and tuition payments. Time to wise up. Calling Marxists nihilists is contradictory, and Jordon Peterson does not have a good track record of accurately discussing either post-modernism or Marxism. So right off the bat, I don't think this video is going to be a valuable use of my time. Edit: Plus the hyperbolic language included in the description indicates to me that I'm not about to hear an even-handed discussion of the issue that seeks to accurately represent the opinions of the other side.

RobertRoberts 8y ago
He didn't call "marxists nihilsts" it seems he said "neo-marxists" are, which is fitting in my opinion. The video is short, it's good to hear alternative opinions that challenge your own.
- kentm 8y ago
  Are neo-marxists not marxists? I talk with actual marxists and not a single one has used this terminology, so this really smells like something made up just so claims like the above can be made. It doesn't seem like a good-faith attempt to understand the positions of the "neo-Marxist professors." In my read of Jordan Peterson's stuff, there's a lot of that going on: claiming misconstrued context or playing semantic games to avoid the heart of the matter that his point of view is just not substantiated. The video is short, it's good to hear alternative opinions that challenge your own. Its good to hear alternative opinions that are well formed, even-keeled, and evidenced. To use an extreme example, I do not need to hear an opinion about how the Earth is flat or maybe white nationalism would be a good thing. Right of the bat, I'm told that these "neo-Marxist" professors are dangerous and encouraged to enter a moral panic about nihilism being taught to kids. That doesn't seem like its going to be a good and informative argument.
- JamesLeonis 8y ago
  Earlier this year there was the promise of Slavoj Zizek and Jordan Peterson debate this October, but sadly that looks like it isn't going to happen. In the spirit of debate, here are two videos that answer some of Mr. Peterson's points. On Post-Modernism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1LhcEh8Ms https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1LhcEh8Ms On Marxism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGld3FbDY6s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGld3FbDY6s
bassman9000 8y ago
Go for Stephen RC Hicks. He's Peterson source, it would seem, into the postmodernism philosophy, and does a much better job at explaining it IMHO. https://youtu.be/pKMwJo9DHUQ https://youtu.be/pKMwJo9DHUQ
- kentm 8y ago
  That looks vastly superior to the above, and I'll make an effort to watch it. Thanks for the source. Edit: Ok so first of all, I think I should state that I am not a Marxist. I'm of the liberal persuasion, in that I think free markets with a good social safety net is the current optimal economic and political structure. That being said, I like to understand Marxist criticism of the above. I don't think that this is a really good or compelling argument with regards to "post-modernism". Basically, the gist of it is that Marxism says X, X has empirically failed, far-leftists chose a childish reaction of not acknowledging the facts and so they embraced post-modernism to avoid having to deal with it. The argument fails on several dynamics. First, it fails to acknowledge that there are multiple political theories within Marxism itself. The Soviet Union, for example, started from Leninism, and there are quite a lot of Marxists that reject that. This allows him to claim that the failure of one type of Marxist thought is equivalent to it all failing without having to actually support that argument. Its pretty intellectually dishonest. Second, he really doesn't seem to understand some of the core things about Marxism. In particular, he boils down the notion of exploitation to a moral argument, using the colloquial definition and emotional reactions of the term. But Marx used the term in a descriptive manner to describe how value created by a worker did not go to the worker but to their employer. Neither does Marxism necessarily involve central planning by the workers which he seems to suggest. It also isn't necessarily focused on sharing. There can still be markets in a such a market-based, Marxist economy, but the products would be produced by companies that are owned and ran by the workers at those companies. Third, he does not really do any sort of deep analysis of capitalism. In particular, he talks a lot about material conditions in capitalist nations vs the soviet union and prescribes things like purges to marxism. But what is elided is the fact that capitalism has also done some pretty terrible stuff in third world countries. All of that is simply ignored in the argument. Fourth, he says post-modernism is embraced without any real evidence. I can't say that the far left is any more post modern than it was in the past, and that statement was just dropped there without any support. Fifth, he says that post modernism was embraced to avoid facing the facts. This is also not evidenced. It could be that those with different perspectives are just looking at different things and facts and are weighing things differently. He uses 1-3 to try to argue that these beliefs are obviously wrong and not supported by reality and then 4-5 to say that a certain set of beliefs are due to child-like rejection of the facts. In other words, his argument is poor, he is incredibly dismissive the people he is criticizing, and is not doing intellectual due-diligence with his arguments.

by kentm 8y ago

RobertRoberts 8y ago

He didn't call "marxists nihilsts" it seems he said "neo-marxists" are, which is fitting in my opinion. The video is short, it's good to hear alternative opinions that challenge your own.

kentm 8y ago
Are neo-marxists not marxists? I talk with actual marxists and not a single one has used this terminology, so this really smells like something made up just so claims like the above can be made. It doesn't seem like a good-faith attempt to understand the positions of the "neo-Marxist professors." In my read of Jordan Peterson's stuff, there's a lot of that going on: claiming misconstrued context or playing semantic games to avoid the heart of the matter that his point of view is just not substantiated. The video is short, it's good to hear alternative opinions that challenge your own. Its good to hear alternative opinions that are well formed, even-keeled, and evidenced. To use an extreme example, I do not need to hear an opinion about how the Earth is flat or maybe white nationalism would be a good thing. Right of the bat, I'm told that these "neo-Marxist" professors are dangerous and encouraged to enter a moral panic about nihilism being taught to kids. That doesn't seem like its going to be a good and informative argument.
JamesLeonis 8y ago
Earlier this year there was the promise of Slavoj Zizek and Jordan Peterson debate this October, but sadly that looks like it isn't going to happen. In the spirit of debate, here are two videos that answer some of Mr. Peterson's points. On Post-Modernism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1LhcEh8Ms https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cU1LhcEh8Ms On Marxism: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGld3FbDY6s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uGld3FbDY6s

bassman9000 8y ago

Go for Stephen RC Hicks. He's Peterson source, it would seem, into the postmodernism philosophy, and does a much better job at explaining it IMHO. https://youtu.be/pKMwJo9DHUQ https://youtu.be/pKMwJo9DHUQ

kentm 8y ago
That looks vastly superior to the above, and I'll make an effort to watch it. Thanks for the source. Edit: Ok so first of all, I think I should state that I am not a Marxist. I'm of the liberal persuasion, in that I think free markets with a good social safety net is the current optimal economic and political structure. That being said, I like to understand Marxist criticism of the above. I don't think that this is a really good or compelling argument with regards to "post-modernism". Basically, the gist of it is that Marxism says X, X has empirically failed, far-leftists chose a childish reaction of not acknowledging the facts and so they embraced post-modernism to avoid having to deal with it. The argument fails on several dynamics. First, it fails to acknowledge that there are multiple political theories within Marxism itself. The Soviet Union, for example, started from Leninism, and there are quite a lot of Marxists that reject that. This allows him to claim that the failure of one type of Marxist thought is equivalent to it all failing without having to actually support that argument. Its pretty intellectually dishonest. Second, he really doesn't seem to understand some of the core things about Marxism. In particular, he boils down the notion of exploitation to a moral argument, using the colloquial definition and emotional reactions of the term. But Marx used the term in a descriptive manner to describe how value created by a worker did not go to the worker but to their employer. Neither does Marxism necessarily involve central planning by the workers which he seems to suggest. It also isn't necessarily focused on sharing. There can still be markets in a such a market-based, Marxist economy, but the products would be produced by companies that are owned and ran by the workers at those companies. Third, he does not really do any sort of deep analysis of capitalism. In particular, he talks a lot about material conditions in capitalist nations vs the soviet union and prescribes things like purges to marxism. But what is elided is the fact that capitalism has also done some pretty terrible stuff in third world countries. All of that is simply ignored in the argument. Fourth, he says post-modernism is embraced without any real evidence. I can't say that the far left is any more post modern than it was in the past, and that statement was just dropped there without any support. Fifth, he says that post modernism was embraced to avoid facing the facts. This is also not evidenced. It could be that those with different perspectives are just looking at different things and facts and are weighing things differently. He uses 1-3 to try to argue that these beliefs are obviously wrong and not supported by reality and then 4-5 to say that a certain set of beliefs are due to child-like rejection of the facts. In other words, his argument is poor, he is incredibly dismissive the people he is criticizing, and is not doing intellectual due-diligence with his arguments.