04 Jun 2018

Jordan Peterson on Peter Pan Syndrome

Jordan Peterson 65 Comments

I just saw some guy on Twitter proudly declaring that he was a libertarian even though he likes CNN and hates Jordan Peterson; he ended his tweet with “fight me.” I scrolled through his feed (partly to see how many followers he had; it was not pretty) and saw him RT a meme that said Jordan Peterson teaches his fanboys that all their problems are due to feminism. It took me a whopping 38 seconds to locate this counterexample:

65 Responses to “Jordan Peterson on Peter Pan Syndrome”

  1. Dan says:

    You’d think all the people that despise the alt-right types would love Jordan Peterson considering is whole message to them is to get their act together and stop blaming the world for your problems.

    • baconbacon says:

      The message from the left has been “you need help, vote for us to help you”, Peterson’s approach is mostly “you can do more yourself than you think, time to start trying”. The two are fundamentally incompatible for a political platform.

      • Dan says:

        I was more thinking of left-libertarians and those types that despise the alt-right, but also despise Peterson as if his message isn’t the opposite of nationalists. But even with lefties, I’d get it if they were attacking Peterson for being too much of an individualist, but they attack him for being the exact opposite of what he actually believes. It’s utterly bizarre.

        Some of it is obviously malicious as you can see when they selectively edit his statements, or align him with unsavory groups that actually don’t like him. But a lot of people just seem to hear him say things that he isn’t actually saying. That’s the stuff that I just don’t get.

    • Keshav Srinivasan says:

      Dan, if a random psychologist wrote a self-help book about taking responsibility for yourself, there wouldn’t be any controversy over it. There’s probably many such books on the market already.

      What makes him controversial is his statements on political issues, not his self-help advice.

      • Dan says:

        You should tell that to all the people who accuse him of telling men that feminism, or whatever else, is to blame for all their problems.

        • Harold says:

          I heard him on the radio a coupe of weeks ago. He said forced feminisation of men was harming them. He did not comment on forced masculinusation that has been around for centuries. He may not have said this was the cause of all their problems but he clearly believes it is one of the causes.

          • Dan says:

            And? What does he think men should do in response? Get your shit together, stop blaming the world for your problems, and take responsibility for your life. Acknowledging something being done to people is bad is not the same thing as blaming feminism for all men’s problems. Especially, when beyond that one specific problem you said he mentioned, he lists a whole bunch of things that men and women are doing to themselves that is destructive.

            • Harold says:

              As Keshav said, there is a difference between his self-help shtick and his political message.

              There may be some people who say he blames all men’s problems on feminism, but that is not that important – it is a distraction from what he is actually saying.

              Here is one site using Peterson as evidence.

              “America has changed completely. The patriarchy is gone. Women are winning. Men are failing. Men in America are now far more likely to die of a drug overdose, drop out of the workforce because of an addiction, commit a felony and go to prison. They fail in school much more often than women do. They kill themselves at many times the rate. Overall, they die years younger. Those numbers are not speculative. They are hard data gathered over decades by nonpartisan researchers. You’d have to ignore a huge amount of settled science in order to repeat the pieties of 1970s-era feminism, and yet this is exactly what our leaders continue to do.”

              All these things have been true for decades, some for centuries. Men pack the prisons and die young and always have done. That is nothing to do with feminism. The problem, whatever it is, cannot be feminism because they have been manifest since before feminism existed. Perhaps the problem is the opposite. Men turn to crime and drugs because they cannot deal with their emotions and relationships.

              So when Peterson says ““There isn’t a shred of hard evidence to support that Western society is pathologically patriarchal; that the prime lesson of history is that men, rather than nature, were the primary source of oppression of women,” he is giving munition to those that talk sexist nonsense. He is blurring his message with caveats so he can argue he is not lying, whilst spreading falsehoods. Yes, we can argue that this is not the “prime” message of history, just a message. We can debate whether the patriarchal society is “pathalogically” so and men are the primary source rather than a major source. Take these caveats out and there is more than a shred of evidence, it is overwhelming.

              There is more than a shred of evidence that Western society is patriarchal and that men oppress women.

              So when he says go tidy your room and stand up straight, that is fine – good advice. He would not be well known for spouting such stuff. When he creates the impression that there is no evidence of patriarchy or oppression that is not fine.

              A slightly crazy bit from the same article
              “feminists also want Americans to reject male and female nature—and they convince them by twisting bits and pieces of facts to their advantage. “Feminism means… ending mental health stigmas, so that men can go to therapy before they feel like they must resort to domestic violence or suicide…”

              That does not sound like twisting bits of facts to their advantage – it sounds downright sensible in the face of the problems identified at the beginning. Crazy is doing the same things and expecting different results. Telling boys to “man up” and push down their emotions has not worked up to now.

              Sure, there are nutty feminists out there too.

              • Dan says:

                “All these things have been true for decades, some for centuries. Men pack the prisons and die young and always have done. That is nothing to do with feminism. The problem, whatever it is, cannot be feminism because they have been manifest since before feminism existed. Perhaps the problem is the opposite. Men turn to crime and drugs because they cannot deal with their emotions and relationships.”

                You know if you are ignorant of what Peterson says and believes you could just ask. He does not blame men filling prisons on feminism. It is breathtakingly stupid to accuse him of that. Especially considering he brings up why men fill prisons rather than women all the time. He places none of the blame for this on women directly. He places nearly all the blame on the nature of man.

                “So when Peterson says ““There isn’t a shred of hard evidence to support that Western society is pathologically patriarchal; that the prime lesson of history is that men, rather than nature, were the primary source of oppression of women,” he is giving munition to those that talk sexist nonsense.”

                I don’t care if there are people that twist his words for their own purposes. I care about what he actually says and believes.

                “He is blurring his message with caveats so he can argue he is not lying, whilst spreading falsehoods.”

                No, what he is doing is searching for the truth and trying to help people. What you’re doing is projecting.

                “Take these caveats out and there is more than a shred of evidence, it is overwhelming.”

                What? The caveats are the point. They are necessary for for addressing the complaint he is addressing. You might as well have said, “If he made a completely different point that is wrong, instead of the one he made, then he’d be wrong.”

                “There is more than a shred of evidence that Western society is patriarchal and that men oppress women.”

                I should have saved my “breathtakingly” response. He has never denied this, and it should embarrass you to say something like that, but I don’t think you even realize that you have no idea what you’re talking about.

                “Telling boys to “man up” and push down their emotions has not worked up to now.”

                Are you even capable of reciting one true thing that Peterson actually believes?

                And that whole response and you didn’t show one example where he suggests men or women embrace victimhood. No examples of him saying “The feminist are out to get you and you’re all doomed.” Just laughable rubbish. “Hey, man, you gotta, like, read between the lines, man. Have you ever listened to JP backwards while on weed, man. Open your third eye and see the truth.”

              • Bob Murphy says:

                Have you ever listened to JP backwards while on weed, man.

                No but I bet it’s amazing.

              • Harold says:

                Dan, I say when Peterson says what he says he is providing ammunition for those that spout the nonsense. We know this because they quote him in support of their nonsense. They are not mis-quoting him, they are accurate.

                “What? The caveats are the point. ”

                I am glad you acknowledge that because he is clearly setting up a straw man. Most people don’t care if the primary lesson from history is that men oppress women, they care if men oppress women. If he is only attacking those nutters on the extreme he is of little relevance. By using this straw man argument he is setting himself up to be used by the nutters we spoke of earlier, because it is reasonable to interpret his words another way.

                “Are you even capable of reciting one true thing that Peterson actually believes?”

                Yes, several. I heard him in a discussion about suicide in young men that if men are forced to be feminised they will tend to become fascists. Now either he is making an academic point unrelated to the discussion he was involved with, or he meant that men were being forcibly feminised by exposure to feminist ideas. In the same discussion he claimed that he did not say consciousness was masculine, just that it has been labeled such. Very inconsistent with the idea that getting in touch with emotions is feminisation. He would like it both ways. He says truth is best defined as what works. Utter rubbish. That is not truth by any reasonable definition. He believes that the snake symbolism in Adam and Eve is both common in many cultures and staggeringly inciteful in the Adam and Eve story. He wants it both ways again. He believes men cannot cope with women they disagree with because they are not allowed violence against women. He believes hierarchies tend towards corruption by power, yet he is certain the patriarchy doesn’t exist because hierarchies exist in other creatures. This is contradictory stuff as his apparent beliefs certainly allow the patriarchy to be a natural hierarchy corrupted by power. He wants it both ways.

                I could go on, but I think that is enough.

              • Dan says:

                “Dan, I say when Peterson says what he says he is providing ammunition for those that spout the nonsense. We know this because they quote him in support of their nonsense. They are not mis-quoting him, they are accurate.”

                Yeah, and I said I don’t care if people twist his words for their own purpose. I care about what he actually says and believes.

                “I am glad you acknowledge that because he is clearly setting up a straw man. Most people don’t care if the primary lesson from history is that men oppress women, they care if men oppress women. If he is only attacking those nutters on the extreme he is of little relevance. By using this straw man argument he is setting himself up to be used by the nutters we spoke of earlier, because it is reasonable to interpret his words another way.”

                I again don’t care if you and your fellow nutters are unable to grasp what he is saying. I already said that if you’re confused you could just ask. It’s not surprising that you’re ignorant of what he says or why he says it, but it is surprising you’d be willing to openly show this to everyone. It’s plain nutty.

                “I could go on, but I think that is enough.”

                Hilarious. You wrote that paragraph and think it shows you get what Peterson is saying. Nutty.

  2. Keshav Srinivasan says:

    “I just saw some guy on Twitter proudly declaring that he was a libertarian even though he likes CNN and hates Jordan Peterson.” That’s great, I wish more such people would come forward. A lot of time it seems as if libertarians are all right-wingers, but there should be more of a spotlight on the fact that there are significant numbers of libertarians who don’t think CNN is fake news, who are against Jordan Peterson, who think Trump is even worse than Hillary, who are more outraged by Charlottesville than by Black Lives Matter, who think the Russia collusion story isn’t a hoax, who think rape apology is a bigger problem than false rape accusations, etc.

    All of those beliefs are perfectly compatible with a belief in the non-aggression principle.

    • Dan says:

      For the most part you can find what you’re looking for from the left-libertarians, although they’re painted as right wingers by the left whenever they show their support for free markets. Although, I think you’ll struggle to find many libertarians of any stripe that think CNN is a quality news network.

      “…who think rape apology is a bigger problem than false rape accusations…”

      Who is an apologist for rape? I can’t imagine there are many people out there saying, “You know, rape really gets a bad rap.”

      • Keshav Srinivasan says:

        Well, almost no one explicitly says “rape is a good thing”. But people argue that there are still significant numbers of rape apologists, like people who blame rape victims for dressing immodestly and the like rather than emphazing that the real problem is the rapists. And people who argue that certain kinds of rape aren’t actually rape, like statutory rape or rape of people who are too drunk to give consent. And people who try to exaggerate the rate of false rape accusations.

        • Dan says:

          So not actual rape apologists. I figured it was people conflating views they disagree with as being a defense of rape. Which would be obvious by the nearly universal condemnation of rape if you asked people “What do you think of rapists?”

          • Keshav Srinivasan says:

            Well, it’s hard to adjudicate such things, it’s often a matter of semantics. it’s similar to how conservatives often call liberals socialists or communists, even though very few liberals would say “I want the government to have control of the means of productions”. And how liberals often call conservatives racists, even though very few conservatives would say “I believe that white people are racially superior to black people.”

            It often amounts to, if someone believes A, and A implies B, then can you accuse them of believing B? Or can you only accuse them of believing B if they believe A and they believe A implies B? Or do neither of those suffice for accusing someone of believing B?

            • Craw says:

              Which of the positions you listed is the A which implies the particular B “rape isn’t so bad”?

              There isn’t one. No position on any topic of public debate implies it. So calling someone a rape apologist on the basis of any of these positions does not fall within the ambit of your excuse. It is just a smear.

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Well, for instance, assuming that it is the case that intercourse with minors or intercourse with people too drunk to consent is indeed rape, then the position that those activities are fine would be an “A” that would imply the “B” that rape is fine (in some cases).

              • Craw says:

                And assuming eating fried eggs is rape then someone who was fine with eating fried eggs would imply they think rape is fine (in some cases).
                By “some cases” you actually mean “according to some definitions of the word not corresponding to its core meaning “.

                I guess you are a smear apologist(in some cases) then?

                The truth is that someone who thought those things were fine would also not think they were rape so would not be an apologist for rape.they would be advocates of minority positions with which you disagree. I think Murphy’s crackpot economics would result in more murders, but it would be a smear if I called him a murder apologist, or an advocate for more murder.

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Craw, this is the difference I was illustrating in my comment above: “if someone believes A, and A implies B, then can you accuse them of believing B? Or can you only accuse them of believing B if they believe A and they believe A implies B? Or do neither of those suffice for accusing someone of believing B?”

                If an activity is rape and a person thinks it’s fine, can you accuse them of thinking rape is fine? Or can you only accuse them of thinking rape is fine if they think an activity is rape and they think it’s fine? This is partially a matter of logic, and partially a matter of semantics.

              • Dan says:

                “If an activity is rape and a person thinks it’s fine, can you accuse them of thinking rape is fine? Or can you only accuse them of thinking rape is fine if they think an activity is rape and they think it’s fine? This is partially a matter of logic, and partially a matter of semantics.”

                Perhaps, it’d be better to just say they have a different view on what constitutes rape rather than start flinging out inflammatory language like “He’s a rape apologist.”

                Or go around calling everyone who has had a drunken hook-up a rapist and see how far that gets you.

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Dan, how do you feel about statutory rape? Do you think a consensual hookup between an adult and a child is rape? Do you think someone who defends consensual hookups between adults and children should be called rape apologists?

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                And also how do you feel about throwing terms like socialist and Marxist at liberals who say they don’t want government control of the means of production?

              • Dan says:

                “Dan, how do you feel about statutory rape?”

                Depends on the situation. I think when you’re talking about two people capable of giving consent then it’s not rape unless one of them is forced against their will. So, I don’t think it’s rape if an 18 year old has consensual sex with a 16 year old, for example.

                “Do you think a consensual hookup between an adult and a child is rape?”

                I don’t think children are capable of giving consent. So, yes, it’s rape.

                “Do you think someone who defends consensual hookups between adults and children should be called rape apologists?”

                I just call them pedophiles, or pedophile apologists. Wouldn’t have to muddy the waters calling them something they would disagree with when they’d accept their own toxic labels willingly.

                “And also how do you feel about throwing terms like socialist and Marxist at liberals who say they don’t want government control of the means of production?”

                I don’t favor calling someone who doesn’t support the socialist philosophy a socialist.

            • Dan says:

              Well, I think you’ll have a difficult time finding people who actually defend rape considering how universally reviled it is, but if you’d like to try you’d have to show how someone’s position either explicitly or implicitly defends rape. I don’t think any of the things you said were explicit or implicit defenses of rape.

              For example, I doubt you can produce an example of someone who says a rape victim shouldn’t have dressed whatever way who also believes the rape was justified. It’s just an absurd way to slander someone you disagree with.

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Dan, the argument is that when people place blame on women who dress immodestly, they are implicitly taking blame away from the rapists. Because they are implicitly saying “Look at how she was dressed, how could the rapist resist her?”

              • Dan says:

                ‘Because they are implicitly saying “Look at how she was dressed, how could the rapist resist her?”‘

                No, they are implicitly saying “Look how she was dressed, it made her a target of a deranged rapist.”

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Well, it’s one thing to say, “she wore yellow, that made her a target for the rapist because the rapist liked people who wore yellow”. But people wouldn’t blame the victim for wearing yellow. Whereas they do blame victims for dressing immodestly. And the argument is that the reason for the difference is related to that implicit message I mentioned.

              • Dan says:

                “And the argument is that the reason for the difference is related to that implicit message I mentioned.”

                And it’s an absurd argument. Nobody is saying that if a girl dresses a certain way the poor rapist just won’t be able to help himself. They are saying she makes herself a target. They say this explicitly whenever someone accuses them of victim blaming. They use many analogous to make their point like “Telling a man to not wave around his money in a bad neighborhood doesn’t mean you defend muggers.”

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                The response given when people say such things is that women already take plenty of precautions to prevent rape. But people don’t put out tips for avoiding getting pickpocketed as part of the national political conversation, it might just be something a neighbor says to you when you go out at night. Whereas they do put out tips for avoiding getting raped as part of the national political conversation. And the argument is that the reason for this difference is that the purpose of these messages is not really to teach women tips (which they already know about and already take precautions), but rather it’s to make a political point. Namely, the point that the women who are raped deserved what they got because they didn’t follow the guidelines of behavior promulgated by society. And the argument is that insofar as that is the message, that implicitly lessens the blame on the rapist.

              • Dan says:

                “Namely, the point that the women who are raped deserved what they got because they didn’t follow the guidelines of behavior promulgated by society. And the argument is that insofar as that is the message, that implicitly lessens the blame on the rapist.”

                Yeah, except for the fact that anyone who is accused of saying she got what she deserved explicitly and vehemently denies this, and typically says something along the lines of “Not only did she not deserve to be raped, the rapist should be buried under the prison.”

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Yes, but one can implicitly convey a message while explicitly deny that one is conveying it. It’s called dog whistling, and it’s a real phenomenon. Whether this is a case of dog whistling is another matter.

                In any case, why do you think tips on preventing being pickpocketed aren’t promulgated as part of the national political conversation? What do you think is the reason that rape prevention tips alone are treated differently?

              • Dan says:

                So you think there are lots of people dog-whistling rapists? You know all these people have mothers, sisters, girlfriends, wives, etc. right? They’re just pretending to despise rapists when they advocate murdering them, seeing them buried under the prison, among all the horrific ways they say they should be treated? Sounds preposterous to me.

                “In any case, why do you think tips on preventing being pickpocketed aren’t promulgated as part of the national political conversation? What do you think is the reason that rape prevention tips alone are treated differently?”

                Not sure. I didn’t know tips on robbery prevention were not talked about. I see them all the time. Lots of people advocate carrying a gun for just that case. Lots of people advocate carrying a gun to help prevent rape, too. But, I could see why someone might see rape as such a monstrous crime that they’d spend more time discussing ways to prevent it than muggings.

            • Tel says:

              Well, it’s hard to adjudicate such things…

              No, I don’t think is is particularly hard, you only need to start with the concept that if society is going to have a law then it should be easy to understand, practical and self-consistent. We also recognize that it is impossible to have equal rights without also equal responsibility.

              So, let’s see what happens when a man gets drunk and then decides to drive himself home. Has this man made a conscious choice in the eyes of the law? Why, yes he must have done otherwise if no choice was made then he could not be guilty of drink driving.

              Let’s try that with a woman who gets equally drunk and decides to drive herself home. Because we believe in equality she has also legally made a conscious choice and therefore has no one to blame but herself if she gets hauled up on drink driving charges.

              Now we start with a man and woman, both drunk who choose to get into bed together and no force is used (a very common situation I’m sure) … in order for the law to be self-consistent they must have both made a conscious choice to do this, exactly the same as if either one of them had decided to drive home instead.

              Either one or both of them might wake up the next morning and regret what happened, but that’s no reason to automatically blame the man (which is what feminists are attempting to do here).

              It might be difficult in some other cases where perhaps one party claims that force was used, but there’s no evidence and no independent witness to what happened. Lack of reliable evidence can be a difficulty in a range of situations, not directly related to rape but certainly including rape. However, those are not the cases that have recently been controversial but what we have seen is a situation where feminists want to always believe the woman without question. Obviously that’s not equality.

              • Tel says:

                Opps, quote failure.

              • Bob Murphy says:

                I fixed your quote failure; I have to clean up your messes all the time Tel…

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Tel, I think one can coherently believe that people who are sufficiently drunk cannot give consent, while also dealing sensibly with a case of two drunk people hooking up. One just has to say “The man should not have agreed to the hookup, knowing that the woman was too drunk to give consent, but in his partial defense he was too drunk to recognize the woman’s she inability to give consent. Conversely, the woman should no the have agreed to the hookup, knowing that the man was too drunk to give consent, but in her partial defense she was too drunk to realize the man’s inability to give consent.”

                And when a sober person and a person too drunk to give consent hook up, it would be a more cut and dried matter: the sober person would be the rapist, regardless of the genders involved.

              • Dan says:

                So you think if two drunk people hook up then they both raped each other?

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Dan, yes, at least for sufficiently drunk people, although in each of their cases the fact that they were drunk when they committed the crime would be a partial defense of their behavior.

                It’s similar to what happens when two teenagers below the age of consent hook up. The parents of one or both of the teenager can press charges against the other teenager, but the other teenager’ says young age serves as a mitigating factor in their defense.

              • Dan says:

                And just to clarify, you’d say I’m a victim of multiple rapes because I had a girlfriend who didn’t drink, and at times we had sex after I was very drunk?

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Dan, I think if you gave consent to your girlfriend beforehand, then it’s fine. In fact if you give consent beforehand, then it’s arguably even find for her to do things while you’re asleep.

                But if you meet someone for the first time, and you don’t give consent before you start drinking, and then the two of you hook up after you become sufficiently drunk, and the other person is sober the whole time, then that would be rape, regardless of your gender and their gender.

              • Dan says:

                No, we were just normal people that didn’t discuss consent at all.

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Well, consent doesn’t need to be explicit, it can be implicit. In fact, some have even argued that having infercourse with a sleeping person in the context of a married couple is OK, because there’s an implicit consent in the relationship (which can of course be revoked at any time).

              • Dan says:

                OK, cool, so she only raped me the first time we hooked up since I was drunk and she was sober? And, yes, I was sufficiently drunk.

              • Dan says:

                “In fact, some have even argued that having infercourse with a sleeping person in the context of a married couple is OK, because there’s an implicit consent in the relationship (which can of course be revoked at any time).”

                Would you think it is appropriate to argue those people are rape apologists since other people would argue that having sex with a sleeping person is always rape?

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Yeah, if she had no indication that you were okay with hooking up with her before that, then she arguably raped you. Now of course, not all rape victims press charges or are even upset that they were raped. Sometimes a woman is roofied by a man and afterwards she’s not upset because he’s extremely attractive. But that doesn’t change the moral nature of the action.

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Yes, I think it would arguably be acceptable for people who think it’s always rape to call the people who don’t think it’s always rape by the term rape apologist. (I say arguably because it’s in part a semantic matter.)

              • Dan says:

                “Yeah, if she had no indication that you were okay with hooking up with her before that, then she arguably raped you.”

                OK, since I now know I was raped, do you think justice would be served if I pressed charges and got her thrown in prison?

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                You’re obviously being facetious, but various states do have laws that say that sufficiently drunk people cannot give consent. Just like sufficiently young people.

              • Dan says:

                Yes, I’m not seriously going to try to get my ex brought up on rape charges, but my question was serious. Do you think that had I heard your reasoning on why I was raped, and I accepted it, and then turned around and got my ex thrown in jail for rape, that that would constitute justice being done?

              • Dan says:

                Also, since you said consent doesn’t need to be explicit, and since lots of people argue that sex without explicit consent is rape, do you believe you’re a rape apologist? I’d argue that you’re not since you surely detest rape, and simply disagree with them that it’s always rape unless explicit consent is given. I’d also argue that anyone accusing you of being a rape apologist is slandering your good name, and is being contemptible. What say you?

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Yes, I can imagine a scenario where you seriously do not want to hook up with a woman, then you engage in a lot of heavy drinking and in your incapicated state you hook up with the (sober) woman, and she’s arrested and punished for it, and it would be entirely just.

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                Well, I don’t think I’m a rape apologists for saying that, but I do think it would arguably make sense for someone who had different views on rape than me to call me a rape apologist.

                But I don’t know of anyone who actually believes that verbal consent is required for something not to be rape. They’re just in favor of laws requiring verbal consent so that there’s no ambiguity. (Some men tend to assume implicit consent is present even when it’s not.) I would actually be open to such laws.

              • Dan says:

                “Well, I don’t think I’m a rape apologists for saying that, but I do think it would arguably make sense for someone who had different views on rape than me to call me a rape apologist.”

                Well, I guess that’s why we’ll not see eye to eye on this. I think it is absurd for anyone to call you a rape apologist, and you think it arguably makes sense. And I think it’s absurd to say I’m a rape victim, and you think I have been raped.

              • Dan says:

                “They’re just in favor of laws requiring verbal consent so that there’s no ambiguity. (Some men tend to assume implicit consent is present even when it’s not.) I would actually be open to such laws.”

                So if two people have sex without either explicitly giving consent then you’d be open to throwing both in prison for rape?

              • Keshav Srinivasan says:

                No, what I’d (potentially) be in favor of is when there’s a case where one person does the action and the other person just passively receives it without participating back in response, the person who did the action would be punished. In a society where it’s very clearly spelled out that verbal consent is mandatory.

              • Dan says:

                I don’t understand. Why can one person not give explicit consent and not be a rape victim under the law, but the other person must give explicit consent or they are a rape victim under the law?

                Also, what if neither party is passively taking it? Does that mean neither was raped even though neither gave explicit consent?

                Seems like this mandatory explicit consent rule isn’t really mandatory in all cases, but could in some cases be used maliciously to put a person in prison that had consensual sex without verbalizing it.

              • Evan says:

                Hey Dan, appreciate all the attention and energy you’ve put into this. Your point of views are well articulated and nuanced. Very enlightening.

      • Harold says:

        ” 90 percent of adult rape survivors are female. For female rape survivors, 98 percent of the time, a man was the perpetrator. For male rape survivors, 93 percent of the time, a man was the perpetrator.”

        I can’t vouch for these statistics but they sound very likely. Men need not be worried about woment raoing them but men, whichi I think gives them a different perspective. Squeal.

    • Keshav Srinivasan says:

      For the record I didn’t intend to start a debate on rape. I was just rattling off a bunch of liberal beliefs that are perfectly compatible with libertarianism, and which a significant number of libertarians hold. Libertarianism is a political philosophy, it’s not a complete moral philosophy, and it’s compatible with multiple moral philosophies.

      • Craw says:

        But you did start it, on a blog read by minors and drunks.

  3. Tel says:

    Part of the “cultural Marxist” technique is hijacking words. As you noted in your Contra-Krugman recently, they are attempting to pretend that “Democracy” is the opposite of “Populism”… this is simply another word hijack attempt. They disdain any agreed meaning and simply take the word that has a positive emotional connotation and grab that for themselves. Because “Democracy” is seen in a positive light and “Populism” is seen in a negative light, they must be opposites to the “Progressive” mindset, because these guys really are that shallow.

    The word “Liberal” was hijacked long ago, and now they are coming for the word “Libertarian”.

    Personally I’m not a great supporter of Jordan Peterson either, although probably he does help some people. I certainly support his freedom to put forward his own perspective, even when I disagree with quite a lot of what he says (not disagree from a political standpoint, I just always shake my head because I think Peterson is a bit muddled and I find it painful listening to social scientists discuss statistics).

    As for feminism, that’s yet another example of something that got hijacked by cultural Marxists, and it’s another of their techniques that you should look out for. Long ago the feminists had some genuine grievances: they wanted property rights, and they wanted political representation, and they got those things. Good for them. What happened then is another group of people picked up the “feminist” iconography and pretended to be a continuation of the first wave… these people attempted to manufacture additional grievances and assume the legitimacy of the earlier cause.

    Thus breeds the “professional activist” who does not care about genuine grievance, does not even really care about what the cause is right this minute, but only about the struggle for something (anything) that can create divisiveness, resentment, envy and political power. Offer to give people something that’s impossible (offer to women that they can be men for example) and then encourage them to be angry about what they don’t have, rather than being happy with what they do have. Total equality of outcome is unachievable. The concept of “Social Justice” is merely hiding in plain sight “Socialist Justice” which is no justice at all.

    On this issue I agree with Peterson, boys should keep right away from this kind of nuttiness but then so should girls. So should everyone. I just have different reasons to come to my conclusion. Modern feminist theory is pure junk, there’s no value in engaging with it or debunking it, or even giving it deeper consideration than to recognize it as an application of Marxism. If you manage to prove one thing wrong, they quickly change the rules and run with something else. They begin from a position of victimhood and then fill in everything else from there, so trying to engage their rhetoric goes nowhere.

    • excel says:

      There’s “Democracy” and there’s “British Democracy”

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmOvEwtDycs

    • Harold says:

      “Long ago the feminists had some genuine grievances: they wanted property rights, and they wanted political representation, and they got those things.”
      Tel, do you genuinely think that sexism is a thing entirely of the past?

      “offer to women that they can be men for example” I think that is no longer impossible.

      “boys should keep right away from this kind of nuttiness but then so should girls. ” Children are exposed to all sorts of nuttiness. How should we decide which they should be exposed to? Young children, for example, are very gender specific when describing people who do certain jobs. Should this be challenged at all? Boys at 7 are almost completely unable to discuss emotions at all except anger whereas girls are quite articulate on the subject. Should this be encouraged? “Boys don’t cry” and all that.

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