At the suggestion of a friend, I listened to a bunch of Peterson’s stuff over the past week and also read the James DeMore memo. I agree with about 50% of it.

They are both intelligent people for sure and I don’t think either of them are coming from a place of sexism or hatred. But they make a number of questionable claims using inadequate evidence to support the gaps in their belief system.



Most obvious is their explanation of gender differences. Yes there are differences between men and women’s personalities and interests for sure but both guys keep expounding the idea that these all have an overwhelmingly biological basis.

Does the empirical evidence support that men and women have different personalities and make career choices? Yes.

Does the evidence support that this is due to biological factors more so than environmental factors? Absolutely not. The nature vs nurture debate is still in its infancy. Any biologist worth his salt will tell you that.

Does the evidence support that neonates of different genders have different interests? Yes, the neonatal brain has had minimal input from psychosocial factors so of course biological factors would predominate in neonates.

Does the evidence support that this difference in neonatal brains can be extrapolated to make statements about adult brains? Absolutely not, for a variety of reasons (epigenetics, synaptic pruning, environmental enrichment, synaptic modulation’s role in learned behaviors etc). The vast majority of neural synapses die before people reach adulthood and this death is heavily mediated by the psychosocial environment (google “synaptic pruning and environmental enrichment” if curious) .

To further support these claims, they pick animals with a patriarchal organization to claim that these are intrinsic to our DNA.

If they instead looked at Penguins for example, or elephants or any of the numerous other species where both men and women take an active role in raising children, more akin to humans, these so called biological differences largely disappear.

I believe that just as significant a factor in gender differences stem from social conditioning and role modeling. People constantly model themselves after what they see, from their parents, their peers and ever increasingly, the media. Until about two decade ma ago, female role models in men centric roles were few and far between, even in the media.

Ads even today show girls playing with dolls and boys playing with cars. The media until recently was inundated with examples of women as home makers and care givers and men as soldiers and scientists. And this feeds into the expectations that parents have for their children as well. Parents unconsciously think of these roles based on their child’s gender and push it on them inadvertently.

This plays a very significant role in gender differences and this is exactly why having more female role models in traditionally male roles and more male role models in traditionally female roles is a good thing. Because only then would people be truly free to pursue what they are intrinsically interested in, and good at, less coarsed by social expectations.

Leisure activities like theater, books, tv, movies, art and parental pressure all emphasize this same women = caretaker, men = aggressive warrior leader stereotype.

Doesn’t that seem like an important factor to take into account? Don’t people in countries like Norway etc fall under the influence of the above issues.

Peterson claims that places like Norway, women self select to female roles and underdeveloped countries have women that perform male tasks more. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that this is because of biological differences.

An alternate hypothesis is that poor people in underdeveloped countries have less opportunity to be conditioned by theater, books, stories, art, tv and movies where as people in a country like Norway are far more exposed to the theater, books, stories, art, tv and movies because they have a lot more leisure time on their hands. This ample exposure to these stereotypes and lack of role models or examples of peers entering these fields in a place like Norway could easily subconsciously push a young girl away from pursuing a STEM field even if she founds the topic interesting, no?


The goal should be to maximize freedom. No one should be pushed to pursue any field of study, they should be encouraged to do what they want. But to maximize this freedom, it is a very good thing that we have now started to provide more examples and role models of females in male roles in movies, books etc.


However some of Peterson’s biggest fans seem to actively despise this trend, as illustrated by reactions like below. His fans are at times far worse than he is because they discount any nuance he provides and instead uses his statements about averages as a crutch to claim they know what a woman’s role ought to be...

way more said:

from this

to this.

It's the cuckening of America, I tell you!

Click to expand...

The new actress was amazing in the movie.Extremely fit (she clearly worked out a lot for this movie compared to whenever that photo was taken), good acting chops and absolutely gorgeous as well. She just had a much more realistic build for a world class athlete than Jolie and people seem to hate her for it. (Guess what people, athletes rarely have lots of body fat/huge breasts).



Two other quick examples (and there were quite a few that I will probably add to this thread later) would be Peterson’s frequent use of biblical statements as if to hold ancient Christianity as being ahead of its time, as if Christianity holds some greater wisdom that surpassed other religions. Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism all predate Christianity by thousands of years and also talked about the roles and responsibilities of individuals, and the suffering of man. Buddhism and the Bhagavat Gita did a far better job exploring these issues than the Bible, as I am sure did many other now extinct ancient religions and cultures.

Also questionable is the complete disregard of any mention of Marlows Hierachy of Needs in shaping people to maturity, groups and society. Civilizations consistently thrive only when they find ways to meet the most basic needs of the most people and push atleast some of them towards self actualization. When atleast a subset of powerful people have most or all their lower needs met and become closer to self actualized/selfless individuals, progress gets a huge jump start. The work being done by the Gates Foundation and by Warren Buffets charitable endeavors are great examples of this.


Peterson is very intelligent and very confident especially now that he is famous. However, these same qualities make him more vulnerable to becoming convinced that he is always right and jumping on anything he reads that seems to support his preexisting view point and neglecting to explore alternative explanations.

And likewise, his intelligence and overconfidence make it easy for people to create a cult like persona around him and believe that everything he says is 100% legit. No One is 100% correct, everyone, even the most intelligent and well read people are wrong fairly often. Intelligent people just happen to right more often than they are wrong.

However, The more confident some one seems, the more likely they are to jump to conclusions without considering alternatives and the more likely they are to be wrong. But their confidence makes it easy to convince others they are right and form a cult like personality around them, because most people will pick confidence over nuance every time.

Update (since this discussion has veered most about the biological differences between men and women):

No one is claiming that biology doesn’t play a role in differences on average between men and women. Brain development happens in stages. Only 1/4 of women get autism, more men get schizophrenia than women.

But biology isn’t everything. Many genetically identical twins don’t all develop the same mental illness. This is why any psychiatrist worth his salt does a “biopsychosocial assessment” on the people they are treating. The pros are well aware that biology matter, but psychological experiences and stressors matter just as much and societal expectations and biases play a big role as well.

For all we know, it is the hypersexualizaion of women and women’s bodies in american, European and Japanese media that accounts for why more women in America, Japan and Europe subconsciously think of themselves as sexual objects and focus far more on things like makeup when compared to women in other parts of the world.

The fact is, we don’t actually know why far more women pursue stem fields in the rest of the world when compared to the US and Europe. Any guess we make as to why these differences exist is just that, a guess. But the fact that women do choose very different courses of study in different countries shows us that culture plays a huge role, not just biology.

There is overwhelming evidence that biology isn’t destiny.

So given this well documented fact, what benefit is there for people to attribute certain jobs, roles or personalities to certain genders. There is no much variation, so many other factors that are as important or more important than biology that categorizing people based on gender (whether its done by the left, or by the right) is silly.

Peterson also engages in the idiocy of using neonatal differences to make claims about the behaviors of adult men and women.
Yes there is evidence of neonatal differences. To extrapolate the findings of that study to make claims about the career choices of adult men and adult women is blatant ignorance.

There are a huge about of differences between neonatal brains and adult brains. And most of those differences in the development of the brain are heavily influenced by the environment and culture.

Just one example, in the height of the synaptic pruning process peaking starting at around age 10, over the span of a few years, the vast majority of all neonatal neurons and neural pathways die off and disappear completely. So even the teen brain is nothing at all like the neonatal brain.

This is just one of the many reasons why using the neonatal brain to make claims about adults is stupid.

The right’s point of view is that the left differs in how in treats men and women, and that is sometimes unfair. They are absolutely correct. But again, the right is also all too eager to focus on a woman’s body and figure than her intelligence, just look at Fox News anchors, or the comments made in right wing forums. Any thread concerning a women is inundated with comments about how attractive she is, much more so than on any left wing forum.

The lefts point of view is that society overall differs in how it treats men and women, and pigeon holes women into certain roles, and that is unfair. Many of these expectations and stereotypes that society puts into women are often disadvantages to women and may discourage women from making the lifestyle choices that they want to make. They are absolutely correct as well.

Only when we acknowledge that both these things exists, and also accept that individual factors matter far more than biological differences, can we move past using stereotypes that disadvantage any person based on their gender.

Are men shown walking around in their underwear as often as women in Scandinavian television and billboards etc? Or is the sexualization of women in Scandinavian countries by the media far higher than it is in other parts of the world.

In many parts of the world, far fewer women shave, or wear makeup.

That disgusts most western men, the idea of women walking around unshaven, where as a guy that doesn’t shave is considered normal. This is a perfect example of how society and culture conditions us. It is normal and expected in the West that women invest far more time and work into their appearance than men. Many parts of the world do not have this expectation for women.

So again, to claim that both genders are more equal in the West is faulty. In many ways they are more equal, but when it comes to sexualization of women’s bodies they are actually far worse. And these expectations feed into behavior as well.

Every society has pros and cons. Sexual freedom is a very very good thing.

But hypersexualization of one gender over the other by the media, has negative effects to. Pointing out this fact doesn’t mean that I am defending the worst aspects of handpicked countries.

Feeling that each and every single aspect of the West is superior to each and every single aspect of the rest of the world is narcissistic idiocy.

There are many many things that the West got right, but the hyper sexualization of women is not one of them.

If women in the West are expected to spend an hour each day on their appearance, then of course they would be more predisposed to wanting their apperance to be seen and noted. This may well tilt them toward more social jobs. Again this is just a guess. But most of Peterson’s interpretations of studies are the same, guesses.

Society and people are far too complicated for us to be able to point to a couple of studies and say they answer the nature vs nurture debate. Anyone that confidently claims to have the answer is full of shit. And this is precisely where Peterson goes wrong.

Ok so maybe his analysis about genders was not totally correct. But why was it considered "hateful"? Why did it deserve him getting fired from his job?

I'm not gonna address the whole post right now because i'm at work so i may edit it with some complementary text later but here we go:

Nintendo Switch said:

At the suggestion of a friend, I listened to a bunch of Peterson’s stuff over the past week and also read the James DeMore memo. I agree with about 40% of it.

Most obvious is their explanation of gender differences. Yes there are differences between men and women’s personalities and interests for sure but both guys keep expounding the idea that these all have an overwhelmingly biological basis. To support this they pick animals with a patriarchal organization to claim that these are intrinsic to our DNA.

If they instead looked at Penguins for example, or elephants or any of the numerous other species where both men and women take an active role in raising children, more akin to humans, these so called biological differences largely disappear.

I believe the far larger factor in gender differences stem from social conditioning and role modeling. People constantly model themselves after what they see, from their parents, their peers and ever increasingly, the media. Until about two decade ma ago, female role models in men centric roles were few and far between, even in the media.

Ads even today show girls playing with dolls and boys playing with cars. The media until recently was inundated with examples of women as home makers and care givers and men as soldiers and scientists. And this feeds into the expectations that parents have for their children as well. Parents unconsciously think of these roles based on their child’s gender and push it on them inadvertently.

This plays a far bigger role in gender differences and this is exactly why having more female role models in traditionally male roles and more male role models in traditionally female roles is a good thing. Because only then would people be truly free to pursue what they are intrinsically interested in, and good at, less coarsed by social expectations.

Click to expand...

There are two main problems with the bolded parts in your post. The first one is that you present a hipothesis without bringing empirical evidence to back it up. Saying that cultural discrimination is the reason for sex diferences in behavior doesn't make it true even if it sounds like a reasonable hypothesis. The second problem is, there is strong empirical evidence that biological differences play a major role in the way men and women behave and,as a consequence, make different life decisions. The classic one is the "Norwegian gender paradox", which basically shows that in countries with less social discriminations between sexes,countries that did the most to eradicate any form of sex stereotype in their culture,countries who desperately try to push women on STEM fields, the diferences between sexes maximized. There are less women,rate wise,going to engineering in a progressive country like Sweden or Norway than in the middle east countries,or south america ones. If the initial hypothesis, that behavior diferences between men and women are consequence of social discrimination, is true that could not happen,period!

As for the other part of your post,i will answer later after work.


Some sources in case anyone is interested on the subject:

http://nordicparadox.se/
https://www.theatlantic.com/science...nder-equality-the-fewer-women-in-stem/553592/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29442575
This documentary is very good:

Nintendo Switch said:

Most obvious is their explanation of gender differences. Yes there are differences between men and women’s personalities and interests for sure but both guys keep expounding the idea that these all have an overwhelmingly biological basis.

Click to expand...

No they don't, they merely criticize that biological factors are often being completely overlooked for the sake of politics.

Nintendo Switch said:

If they instead looked at Penguins for example, or elephants or any of the numerous other species where both men and women take an active role in raising children, more akin to humans, these so called biological differences largely disappear.

Click to expand...

Which completely defeats the point you're trying to make, since the behavior of these animals is largely determined by environmental and instinctual factors, where gender roles are a fixed constant. This is especially the case for Emperor penguins:

The female population is significantly higher than the male population -- about 60 percent of emperor penguins are females -- so they must compete for males. Despite the lopsided ratio, the males work to attract females, not the other way around. During the breeding season, emperor penguins pair up and remain monogamous, though they may change partners with every new year. When they are ready to find their mates, the male stands in one place and performs a ritual meant to attract females, during which he repeats a sound called a courtship call. Females move through the colony and respond to these sounds with courtship calls of their own until they form couples. Once eggs are laid, the differences between male and female emperor penguins become even clearer -- the females leave the colony. Their partners stay behind and keep their eggs warm, while the females travel about 50 miles to the coast, where they hunt in the ocean and feed. The females travel back to the colony around hatching time, where they regurgitate their food to feed the hatchlings and give the males an opportunity to travel and hunt for themselves.

Click to expand...

If the female penguin dies, the father hangs out as long as he can, until he absolutely has to eat. Generally, the chick then starves or freezes to death. That's how ridiculously determined their gender roles are. This has nothing to do with 'patriarchal' animal societies, you can see the same biologically determined behavior with any other animal, be it bees, ants and even sea horses where the males give birth.

Nintendo Switch said:

I believe the far larger factor in gender differences stem from social conditioning and role modeling. People constantly model themselves after what they see, from their parents, their peers and ever increasingly, the media. Until about two decade ma ago, female role models in men centric roles were few and far between, even in the media.

Click to expand...

Yes, that's partially true as has been acknowledged by a great many developmental psychologists, one of the most influential ones being Lev Vygotsky's 'zone of proximal development' theory. Children learn to socialize by imitating others, especially their parents, hence why they oftentimes adopt the same mannerisms.

Color preference would be such an example, if you consider that pink was actually the color for boys in the past. Back then pink was considered a more 'assertive' color and thus associated with males, while blue was considered a more 'delicate' color. But that all changed, due to various reasons and world events:

In Nazi Germany in the 1930s and 1940s, inmates of Nazi concentration camps who were accused of homosexuality were forced to wear a pink triangle. Because of this, the pink triangle has become a symbol of the modern gay rights movement. The transition to pink as a sexually differentiating color for girls occurred gradually, through the selective process of the marketplace, in the 1930s and 40s. In the 1920s, some groups had been describing pink as a masculine color, an equivalent of the red that was considered to be for men, but lighter for boys. But stores nonetheless found that people were increasingly choosing to buy pink for girls, and blue for boys, until this became an accepted norm in the 1940s. To some extent, the shift happened after WWII, Rosie the Riveter traded in her factory blues for June Cleaver’s pink apron, Femininity got wrapped in pink, and so did products—from shampoos to fancy fashion.

Click to expand...

But not all norms are established like this.

Nintendo Switch said:

Ads even today show girls playing with dolls and boys playing with cars. The media until recently was inundated with examples of women as home makers and care givers and men as soldiers and scientists. And this feeds into the expectations that parents have for their children as well. Parents unconsciously think of these roles based on their child’s gender and push it on them inadvertently.

Click to expand...

As mentioned above, that may be true for some societal behavior norms, but not for others. Little toddlers for example, at a very early age even before social conditioning can take place, show different gender behaviors. When choosing toys, girls tend to gravitate to the human form, while boys are usually attracted to geometrical shapes.

A new study in Infant and Child Development contributes to this area by testing the toy preferences of children aged 9 to 32 months during a free-play session at their day nursery. The results, though they come with caveats, appear to support the notion that boys and girls display gender-typed preferences before they are old enough to be aware of gender and even in the absence of their parents, who might otherwise influence them to play in a gender-stereotyped fashion.

Note, the researchers themselves do not frame their study explicitly in terms of gender politics – they observe instead that sex differences in toy preference are “of interest in relation to child care, educational practice and developmental theory”.

[...] Among the caveats are the fact that the children may have been influenced by the presence of their peers located elsewhere in the room – prior research has shown that children are more likely to play in gender stereotyped ways when with their peers. Also, it’s of course possible that the children had already been influenced to play with particular toys by their parents or other carers. However, the researchers concluded that “the finding of sex differences in toy choice prior to the age at which a gendered identity is usually demonstrated is consistent with biological explanations of toy preference.”

Click to expand...

Nintendo Switch said:

Also questionable is the complete disregard of any mention of Marlows Hierachy of Needs in shaping people to maturity, groups and society. Civilizations consistently thrive only when they find ways to meet the most basic needs of the most people and push atleast some of them towards self actualization. When atleast a subset of powerful people have all their lower needs met and become self actualization, progress gets a huge jump start.

Click to expand...

Well no, Maslow's hierarchy would actually substantiate Damore and Peterson's position, because it basically states that more important needs (biological needs) have to be met first before you can even think about less important needs (self actualization). This explains why, in well developed liberal countries with a high standard of life, gender differences actually become more pronounced. In poorer countries, where basic needs flat out dictate your job and career choices, these differences becomes less apparent.

Fact: As a percentage of enrollment, there are more female science majors in Burma, Oman, and Morocco than in the countries of Scandinavia.

Fact: American women are 15 percent less likely to reach a managerial position in the workplace than are men—but in Sweden women are 48 percent less likely, in Norway 52 percent, in Finland 56 percent, and in Denmark 63 percent.

Whatever the differences in men's and women's psyches—empathy, jealousy, cognitive abilities, mate preferences—many theories in psychology assume that they result primarily from direct gender socialization by parents, media, and societal institutions. As a result, it is often expected that sex differences will be smaller in cultures with higher levels of gender-related egalitarianism, as in Scandinavia, where socialization and roles are more balanced between men and women and sociopolitical gender equity prevails.

Surprisingly, several large cross-cultural studies have found this is not at all the case. Whether scientists measure Big Five personality traits, such as neuroticism; Dark Triad traits, such as psychopathy; or self-esteem, subjective well-being, or depression, empirical evidence shows that most sex differences are conspicuously larger in cultures with more egalitarian gender roles—as in Scandinavia.

The same holds true for cognitive attributes, including mental rotation and location ability, objectively measured on tests, as well as for physical traits such as height and blood pressure (both greater in men). And among such differences as preferring physically attractive mates, some of the largest psychological variances of all occur among the most progressive people: Scandinavians. The phenomenon is called the gender equality paradox.

Click to expand...

strange headache said:

No they don't, they merely criticize that biological factors are often being completely overlooked for the sake of politics.



Which completely defeats the point you're trying to make, since the behavior of these animals is largely determined by environmental and instinctual factors, where gender roles are a fixed constant. This is especially the case for Emperor penguins:



If the female penguin dies, the father hangs out as long as he can, until he absolutely has to eat. Generally, the chick then starves or freezes to death. That's how ridiculously determined their gender roles are. This has nothing to do with 'patriarchal' animal societies, you can see the same biologically determined behavior with any other animal, be it bees, ants and even sea horses where the males give birth.



Yes, that's partially true as has been acknowledges by a great many developmental psychologist, one of the most influential ones being Lev Vygotsky's 'zone of proximal development' theory. Children learn to socialize by imitating others, especially their children, hence why they oftentimes adopt the same mannerisms.

Color preference would be such an example, if you consider that pink was actually the color for boys in the past. Back then pink was considered a more 'assertive' color and thus associated with males, while blue was considered a more 'delicate' color. But that all changed, due to various reasons and world events:



But not all norms are established like this.



As mentioned above, that may be true for some societal behavior norms, but not for others. Little toddler for example, at a very early age even before social conditioning can take place, show different gender behaviors. When choosing toys, girls tend to gravitate to the human form, while boys are usually attracted to geometrical shapes.





Well no, Maslow's hierarchy would actually substantiate Damore and Peterson's position, because it basically states that more important needs (biological needs) have to be met first before you can even think about less important needs (self actualization). This explains why, in well developed liberal countries with a high standard of life, gender differences actually become more pronounced. In poorer countries, where basic needs flat out dictate your job and career choices, these differences becomes less apparent.

Click to expand...

Great reply, not much I could add without posting a video.

PSlayer answered the first part of the OP pretty well.

Regarding Chrstianity, I believe Peterson focuses on that because it's most applicable to Western civilization. I'm reading the Acts of the Apostles right now and Luke keeps emphasizing how the early Christian community abolished private property and repeating the wording "they distributed to each according to his need." From law to philosophy to fables and idioms, the Bible just informs too much of what and how we think to be ignored. It's important for every civilizationto return to its founding documents to base its actions on something thats actually grounded and weathered. That's why in the Law, you really can't just make stuff up as you go along, you have to actually premise your arguments on past decisions and reasoning.

I'm no expert but I've studied the Gospel a lot in the last year and it's absolutely mind blowing how bottomless and perpetually new it's insights are. My wife has exposed me to a lot of Buddhism over the last few years but a lot of it just does not translate well into English and comes across as unintelligible to me, frankly. I'm actually really surprised at the certainty with which the OP declares Buddhism has indeed answered moral questions decidedly better than the Bible. That is such a conceptually enormous statement to make, I can't imagine how you could possibly back an idea like that up without doing a gross disservice to both religions.

Nintendo Switch said:

Ads even today show girls playing with dolls and boys playing with cars. The media until recently was inundated with examples of women as home makers and care givers and men as soldiers and scientists. And this feeds into the expectations that parents have for their children as well. Parents unconsciously think of these roles based on their child’s gender and push it on them inadvertently.

This plays a far bigger role in gender differences and this is exactly why having more female role models in traditionally male roles and more male role models in traditionally female roles is a good thing. Because only then would people be truly free to pursue what they are intrinsically interested in, and good at, less coarsed by social expectations.

Click to expand...

Here you should askyourself why this is the case? BEcause they want to manipulate children with their worldview or because they have analyzed that it sells more? Things like colors, people in ads etc are all psychological tools to enhance your desires not to manipulate them out of nothing.

So far we know this:
- Babies who are ONE DAY old already have these differences. Babies with a lot of testosterone will concentrate their eyes on mechanical things while the ones without focus more on social aspects like faces.
- We know that babies with a lot of testosterone have trouble with speaking patterns therefore they concentrate more on non social things aka mechanic etc.
- We know that Countries who have the most advanced equality rights see that women not wanting to go into these kind of fields because they do not feel to need to make a statement but rather do what they want to do. In 3rd world countries or countries like Saudi Arabia it is the opposite.

Role models are great but again we should not focus on one gender but rather support the kids in their own free will what they want to do and not push them into these fields because they seem to get more benefits, more hiring chances etc. Also I strongly believe that parents push normally into thing their child likes and shows interest. But maybe that is just me. Telling your kid that "math could also be fun" is wrong in my opinion.

We need to start focusing on the children not their gender IMO.

Nintendo Switch said:

Two other quick examples (and there were quite a few that I will probably add to this thread later) would be Peterson’s frequent use of biblical statements as if to hold ancient Christianity as being ahead of its time, as if Christianity holds some greater wisdom that surpassed other religions. Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism all predate Christianity by thousands of years and also talked about the roles and responsibilities of individuals, and the suffering of man. Buddhism and the Bhagavat Gita did a far better job exploring these issues than the Bible, as I am sure did many other now extinct ancient religions and cultures.

Click to expand...

Judaism is part of Christianity. Often when Peterson talks about religion, he talks about things that appeared in the Old Testament - a set of books Jews read too and that were written waaaaayyy before Christianity appeared. In his Bible lectures he has also talked about older religions too.

I think he thinks Judaism - or at least what parts of Judaism is included in the Bible - holds so deep layers to what comes to the human experience that it just surpasses whatever other religions he has gone through, and that Christianity makes the most sense as the logical conclusion for that. You can't talk about Christianity without talking about Judaism. And Judaism also has connections to older Sumerian religion. In his Bible lectures he even went through the Sumerian myth of the origin of everything.

The gender differences ARE there and there IS an overwhelming biological bias. Your examples of penguins and elephants are not very good while Peterson selects examples that exhibit features similar to humans (of course penguins don't have an over reliance on their mother, they eat regurgitated food, elephant calves do rely on their mothers but they are helped out by the herd).

Social conditioning is a factor, but definitely NOT a larger factor. Go check out how things work in Nordic countries, where they try really hard to remove gender barriers, women and men typically end up doing the type of work they like. Women are more inclined to work in certain fields and men in others, when you remove obstacles this tends to become even more pronounced rather than zeroing out.

I think it is pretty clear why girls would gravitate more towards playing with dolls than boys, given our biological roles. You are simply not going to have more female role models in certain fields because females are perhaps not as interested in them AND they also have the added pressures that come from having to contend with being mothers some day.

There is also the huge biological difference in strength between a typical male and female. Hence why there are less female soldiers, firefighters, police officers, etc.

I'm not going to get into any of the religious stuff you mention, since that is not something I would want to use in illustrating a point due to subjectivity. Suffice to say, I disagree with most of what you have said. In general, I would agree with what Jordan Peterson has postulated. Most of your points are based purely on opinion and speculation, while Dr. Peterson has a much more well articulated and researched point of view, backed by years of professional work in the field of psychology.

The only mistake that Damore made in his memo was he assumed that people would have a basic understanding of (or even care about) statistics.

One of the big questions for me is exactly how we deal with these statistics, even if we dispute the origin of the symptoms. The gender equality paradox is definitely a thing - it's well observed and documented. Should we push harder to find solutions or accept that this is our cultural reality? Do women in general just not want to do certain jobs?

I'll ask about a personal example. My field is... 97% men, I'd say. Probably more, to be honest. It's not from lack of trying; I know my company actively recruits on college campuses but most women hired leave within a few months because of the strain of being away from friends and family for extended periods of time.

But here's the dilemma for me. Men seem to handle that particular stress a little better. Obvious answer is to retain female employees, you change the parameters of the job so that we're not in the field for so long. At that point though, you've admitted that women can't handle the same job and this snake eats it's own tail. If we're conceding this is a problem, what solutions do we have left?

It's Jeff said:

One of the big questions for me is exactly how we deal with these statistics, even if we dispute the origin of the symptoms. The gender equality paradox is definitely a thing - it's well observed and documented. Should we push harder to find solutions or accept that this is our cultural reality? Do women in general just not want to do certain jobs?

I'll ask about a personal example. My field is... 97% men, I'd say. Probably more, to be honest. It's not from lack of trying; I know my company actively recruits on college campuses but most women hired leave within a few months because of the strain of being away from friends and family for extended periods of time.

But here's the dilemma for me. Men seem to handle that particular stress a little better. Obvious answer is to retain female employees, you change the parameters of the job so that we're not in the field for so long. At that point though, you've admitted that women can't handle the same job and this snake eats it's own tail. If we're conceding this is a problem, what solutions do we have left?

Click to expand...

The group-level distributions don't matter unless it can be demonstrated that they are a direct result of discrimination. The solution is to focus on equality of opportunity at the individual level, which I think we already do a pretty good job of in Western society.

It's Jeff said:

One of the big questions for me is exactly how we deal with these statistics, even if we dispute the origin of the symptoms. The gender equality paradox is definitely a thing - it's well observed and documented. Should we push harder to find solutions or accept that this is our cultural reality? Do women in general just not want to do certain jobs?

I'll ask about a personal example. My field is... 97% men, I'd say. Probably more, to be honest. It's not from lack of trying; I know my company actively recruits on college campuses but most women hired leave within a few months because of the strain of being away from friends and family for extended periods of time.

But here's the dilemma for me. Men seem to handle that particular stress a little better. Obvious answer is to retain female employees, you change the parameters of the job so that we're not in the field for so long. At that point though, you've admitted that women can't handle the same job and this snake eats it's own tail. If we're conceding this is a problem, what solutions do we have left?

Click to expand...

Equali....

matt404au said:

The group-level distributions don't matter unless it can be demonstrated that they are a direct result of discrimination. The solution is to focus on equality of opportunity at the individual level, which I think we already do a pretty good job of in Western society.

Click to expand...

... beaten

matt404au said:

The group-level distributions don't matter unless it can be demonstrated that they are a direct result of discrimination. The solution is to focus on equality of opportunity at the individual level, which I think we already do a pretty good job of in Western society.

Click to expand...

Sure, I can respect that. Do you think that representation, in general, matters? An inverse example I can give is kindergarten teachers, which is I think is about 2.5% male. Teaching in general is around 25% male. As long as the opportunity is equal, the results are what they are.

It's Jeff said:

Sure, I can respect that. Do you think that representation, in general, matters? An inverse example I can give is kindergarten teachers, which is I think is about 2.5% male. Teaching in general is around 25% male. As long as the opportunity is equal, the results are what they are.

Click to expand...

No, I don't think it matters as long as it's a reflection of personal choice. Achieving equal representation requires us to force people into roles they may not necessarily want to do, which can only lead to widespread unhappiness.

As a father of a daughter and a son where we did the least amount of social conditioning the son went for typically male pursuits and the daughter for typically female pursuits. A lot of it is pretty chemical and biological. Yes the world has an impact on them but neither was bombarded by advertising in the way I was when I was growing up as their exposure to commercials was been pretty low. We can scream and pound against the wall all we want and even try to break it down but the wall just rebuilds itself.

It's Jeff said:

Should we push harder to find solutions

Click to expand...

To do that you would do what some people accuse society doing. Conditioning. So no we should not push harder but rather give people opportunities and support any child regardless boy or girl regarding their own found interests.

And when some jobs are 80:20 or even more who cares as long people are freely can chose their profession and doing what they actually want to do and not feeling like they are being forced into fields and future jobs.

matt404au said:

No, I don't think it matters as long as it's a reflection of personal choice. Achieving equal representation requires us to force people into roles they may not necessarily want to do, which can only lead to widespread unhappiness.

Click to expand...

That's fair. I think all of this stems from equal representation being seen as the desired result, which could be a flawed philosophy.

Dunki said:

To do that you would do what some people accuse society doing. Conditioning. So no we should not push harder but ratehr give people opportunities and support any child regardless boy or girl regarding their own found interests.

And when some jobs are 80:20 or even more who cares as long people are freely can chose their profession and doing what they actually want to do and not feeling like they are being forced into fields and future jobs.

Click to expand...

Absolutely, and everyone should pursue their own interest. I've seen it argued - going toward the kindergarten example, that when nearly 100 percent of the teachers are women, children at that age begin to identify that teaching is a woman's job. It poisons the well for boys thinking of going in that direction.

It could be. It's hard to prove, but it makes sense in concept. Wouldn't bet my life it, though.

It's Jeff said:

That's fair. I think all of this stems from equal representation being seen as the desired result, which could be a flawed philosophy.

Click to expand...

It is fundamentally flawed because it is focused on equity, not equality, and they are two very distinct terms. Equality sits at the input end of the system, whereas equity is at the output end.

Hey OP, I'd recommend The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature by Steven Pinker both for examples of the basis for biological differences (not necessarily based on gender but humans in general) and also philosophical arguments why we need to accept biological differences and shape our values and politics around them rather than downplay or outright deny them.

It seems like you are critiquing Peterson and Damore with some pretty big assumptions a lot of which might be addressed by Pinker.

matt404au said:

It is fundamentally flawed because it is focused on equity, not equality, and they are two very distinct terms. Equality sits at the input end of the system, whereas equity is at the output end.

Click to expand...

Until you introduce the complete subjectivity of justice and fairness which muddies up the whole thing. I won't introduce that mess, nor that stupid graphic of the three people standing on boxes we've all seen a million times before.

Peterson is very focused on the western, white, male perspective. He is well read on this single perspective but he comes of having almost no knowledge of eastern religions, eastern philosophies or eastern cultures which makes it hard for me to take him seriously as an authority figure in this field that he claims to be.

Lots of helpful insights here, I’ll definitely explore these topics more. What I’ve read so far suggests nurture play just as big or perhaps an even bigger role than nature when it comes to gender roles, but I am definitely open to reading more about it.

As for the religious stuff, I’ve read quite a bit about the New Testamentc the Old Testament, the Koran and the Bhagavat Gita and I think the focus on just Christianity by Peterson is very wrongheaded. Each of the religious texts have many profound insights worthy of discussion. To dismiss the rest and focus on just one suggests ignorance, quite the opposite of the authority that he claims to have.

pramod said:

Ok so maybe his analysis about genders was not totally correct. But why was it considered "hateful"? Why did it deserve him getting fired from his job?

Click to expand...

I agree completely. Not a single person in this thread suggested that any of this warranted the man getting fired. So I’m not sure who you are addressing with that reply.

FYI, men are much more pressured than women to get into computers and engineering. Regardless, people should chase their interests, and interests are more than essentialism.

Workplace culture does have an impact on women when they get into these fields, and gender stereotypes do exist. They're getting in and leaving, to the point of it being a phenomenon. Other than babies, this is an example why: http://www.apa.org/science/about/psa/2014/10/women-stem.aspx. So companies like Google should be looking into these aspects, and I don't think that anyone has a problem with that.

Pipeline is the biggest issue, and companies are fighting for scraps as much as they wish they were not. If Google opens a women's stem program, I don't mind because it's pulling people of interests. However, we shouldn't be forcing a woman who gets great grades in math to go into STEM, because that's just shitty.

It is kinda funny that the countries with the highest gender equality also have high gender gaps for stereotypes. It's kinda curious that in high ranking countries like Algeria where significantly more women go into STEM degrees, significantly less of them are working in STEM jobs post-college (due to irrational factors based on gender).

The biological differences between men and women are huge though. Testosterone can affect so much in your body and brain. There's a reason why hard labor jobs are dominated by men.

Nintendo Switch said:

Peterson is very focused on the western, white, male perspective. He is well read on this single perspective but he comes of having almost no knowledge of eastern religions, eastern philosophies or eastern cultures which makes it hard for me to take him seriously as an authority figure in this field that he claims to be.

Click to expand...

As for the religious stuff, I’ve read quite a bit about the New Testamentc the Old Testament, the Koran and the Bhagavat Gita and I think the focus on just Christianity by Peterson is very wrongheaded. Each of the religious texts have many profound insights worthy of discussion. To dismiss the rest and focus on just one suggests ignorance, quite the opposite of the authority that he claims to have.

Click to expand...

Care to back those loose statements up?

Ads even today show girls playing with dolls and boys playing with cars. The media until recently was inundated with examples of women as home makers and care givers and men as soldiers and scientists. And this feeds into the expectations that parents have for their children as well. Parents unconsciously think of these roles based on their child’s gender and push it on them inadvertently.[

Click to expand...

Advertising is a fairly new phenomenon in the history of humanity, and is more an aspect of the 1st and developed 3rd world rather than a universal, so it seems rather short-sighted to hang the general mores of humanity upon its shoulders. There was no internet or TV in the Amazon 150 years ago. How did those tribal communities organise themselves? What about the Maori's for instance? Or any other tribal group outside of general western religious influence?

Peterson has the most grating, shrill, gravely sounding voice that I've ever heard. He sounds like what I'd imagine an elderly geodude to sound like.

I have no clue how this dude gets people to pay to listen to him.

He went from being a woe is me victimized dork to some sort of motivational guru for other dorks.

I don't get it.

He makes all these smug faces in interviews like he thinks he's actually saying something that's deep or intelligent.

I just don't get how someone so boring and un-charismatic was able to secure a cult of personality around him.

Tapioca said:

Peterson has the most grating, shrill, gravely sounding voice that I've ever heard. He sounds like what I'd imagine an elderly geodude to sound like.

I have no clue how this dude gets people to pay to listen to him.

He went from being a woe is me victimized dork to some sort of motivational guru for other dorks.

I don't get it.

He makes all these smug faces in interviews like he thinks he's actually saying something that's deep or intelligent.

I just don't get how someone so boring and un-charismatic was able to secure a cult of personality around him.

Click to expand...

So you somehow thought it would be a good idea to come into a discussion disagreeing with JP's views and post about how you hate how he sounds and looks and cannot believe other peope are looking past that?

Raynes said:

So you somehow thought it would be a good idea to come into a discussion disagreeing with JP's views and post about how you hate how he sounds and looks and cannot believe other peope are looking past that?

Click to expand...

I never said anything about the way he looks, just sounds, which is absolutely awful.
I commented about the faces he makes, which is an action, not a comment on the way he looks.

He has a lot of corny views as well.

Such as women wear makeup at their workplace to be more sexually appealing.
I wear make up to work and have 0 co-workers. I see no one and no one sees me. I guess I'm attempting to seduce myself.

It would be like saying, the only reason why men lift weights is to appeal to the opposite sex, which can clearly not be the only reason. He's a joke and is using his knowledge of psychology to prey upon low self esteem male fan base.

Kadayi said:

Care to back those loose statements up?

Advertising is a fairly new phenomenon in the history of humanity, and is more an aspect of the 1st and developed 3rd world rather than a universal, so it seems rather short-sighted to hang the general mores of humanity upon its shoulders. There was no internet or TV in the Amazon 150 years ago. How did those tribal communities organise themselves? What about the Maori's for instance? Or any other tribal group outside of general western religious influence?

Click to expand...

He did a number of lectures about the wisdoms contained in the Bible.

It’s not just ads or tv shows or movies. Back then people had the law (women couldn’t vote or own property or for a while even attend school) to enforce a patriarchal society. Back then theater, books, stories, art and parental pressure all of which emphasize this same women = caretaker, men = aggressive warrior leader stereotype.

Doesn’t that seem like an important factor to take into account? Don’t you think people in countries like Norway etc could easily be influenced by the above issues.

He claims that places like Norway, women self select to female roles and underdeveloped countries have women that perform male tasks more. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that this is because of biological differences. An alternate hypothesis is that poor people in underdeveloped countries have less opportunity to be conditioned by theater, books, stories, art, tv and movies where as people in a country like Norway are far more exposed to the theater, books, stories, art, tv and movies because they have a lot more leisure time on their hands.

There have been several woman leaders and warriors in history that were very effective and successful, but even the stories about leaders like Cleopatra are hyper sexualized instead of focusing on her amazing leadership skills. Anecdotally, women seem to seek out leadership roles less often but when they do end up in a leadership role, many seem to be fantastic leaders.

Just looking at animals. It seems like animals that frequently have to fight (lions, gorillas etc) end up with a patriarchal hierarchy.

Animals like penguins and elephants where fighting and aggression are not a daily part of their lives develop a balanced hierarchy or a matriarchal hierarchy.

Humans don’t have to fight to survive nearly to the same extent that they may have to during the hunter society. It seems natural for our society left to its own whims without this need for fighting to survive to develop a balanced or even a matriarchal society.

Just throwing some ideas out there because they seem like interesting areas of discussion to explore.

Tapioca said:

I never said anything about the way he looks, just sounds, which is absolutely awful.
I commented about the faces he makes, which is an action, not a comment on the way he looks.

He has a lot of corny views as well.

Such as women wear makeup at their workplace to be more sexually appealing.
I wear make up to work and have 0 co-workers. I see no one and no one sees me. I guess I'm attempting to seduce myself.

It would be like saying, the only reason why men lift weights is to appeal to the opposite sex, which can clearly not be the only reason. He's a joke and is using his knowledge of psychology to prey upon low self esteem male fan base.

Click to expand...

Straw man. Well done.

Tapioca said:

Such as women wear makeup at their workplace to be more sexually appealing.
I wear make up to work and have 0 co-workers. I see no one and no one sees me. I guess I'm attempting to seduce myself.

Click to expand...

What the hell am I reading here?

There no reason to focus on stupid unrelated things like how his voice sounds, let’s focus on the merits of his arguments.

Blood Borne said:

Straw man. Well done.

Click to expand...

Not really. I don’t recall if he ever said “women wear makeup at their workplace to be more sexually appealing.” but if he did, it’s a perfect example of him jumping to conclusions without considering alternatives.

Plenty of women wear makeup and dress up nice because it makes them feel good, rather than because they are trying to impress anyone. My wife is one of them (and yes I tease her about it whenever she gets all made up even when it’s freezing outside and we are going to spend all day indoor) but it’s a real thing.

Peterson is very intelligent and very confident especially now that he is famous. However, these same qualities make him more vulnerable to becoming convinced that he is always right and jumping on anything he reads that seems to support his preexisting view point and neglecting to explore alternative explanations.

And likewise, his intelligence and overconfidence make it easy for people to create a cult like persona around him and believe that everything he says is 100% legit. No One is 100% correct, everyone, even the most intelligent and well read people are wrong fairly often. Intelligent people just happen to right more often than they are wrong.

However, The more confident some one seems, the more likely they are to jump to conclusions without considering alternatives and the more likely they are to be wrong. But their confidence makes it easy to convince others they are right and form a cult like personality around them, because most people will pick confidence over nuance every time.

Tapioca said:

Peterson has the most grating, shrill, gravely sounding voice that I've ever heard. He sounds like what I'd imagine an elderly geodude to sound like.

I have no clue how this dude gets people to pay to listen to him.

He went from being a woe is me victimized dork to some sort of motivational guru for other dorks.

I don't get it.

He makes all these smug faces in interviews like he thinks he's actually saying something that's deep or intelligent.

I just don't get how someone so boring and un-charismatic was able to secure a cult of personality around him.

Click to expand...

Alright dude you don't like the guy lol. Your arguments are crap reasoning, he must remind you of someone you don't like since you initially go after his voice and how he looks. Which is of course a first sign that the argument is null if you start off with physicallity "oh theyre fat FUCKING LOL dont listen to them" (theres a nice strawman for you)

I hope you're aware that your comments are full of ad hominems and relativistic fallacies that mostly boil down to your subjective experiences and personal taste. I'd have simply shrugged them off, were it not for the fact that after misrepresenting and straw-manning him, you also felt the need to personally insult Peterson. If you think that is sufficient to diminish Peterson's claims, you're not only sorely mistaken, but only demonstrating your own ignorance at least in regard to what he is saying.

Tapioca said:

Peterson has the most grating, shrill, gravely sounding voice that I've ever heard. He sounds like what I'd imagine an elderly geodude to sound like.

Click to expand...

Contrary to you, some people still care about what someone has to say and not what they look like. I couldn't care less about the color of your tie or the fanciness of your dress or the tonality of your voice (something that you mostly have no control over anyway) as long as you have something interesting to say.

If you'd say something like this to one of his many narcissistic opponents, they would completely flip their lid and start screeching. When people said he sounds like Kermit the frog, Peterson on the other hand, embraced it, and was willing to engage in a little bit of self-deprecating humor as he turned it into something worthwhile:

Tapioca said:

He went from being a woe is me victimized dork to some sort of motivational guru for other dorks.

Click to expand...

Peterson has been married for 48 years, has 2 children, is a successful academic, taught at Harvard, had TED talks, published best-selling books and has been treating patients for over 3 decades as a psychoanalyst. Clearly, that guy must be socially inept and everybody who listens to him is a dork too. What, if I may ask, do you have to show?

Tapioca said:

He makes all these smug faces in interviews like he thinks he's actually saying something that's deep or intelligent.

Click to expand...

Contrary to your enlightened, well-informed, totally not condescending and deeply intelligent comments, right?

Tapioca said:

He has a lot of corny views as well.

Click to expand...

Can't be that corny when half a nation looses its shit of what he has to say. Much of what he says should be quite evident and he often says so himself. We are living in sad times, when young people are in desperate need of these messages, because our postmodernist society has woefully failed to convey these basic truths.

Tapioca said:

Such as women wear makeup at their workplace to be more sexually appealing. I wear make up to work and have 0 co-workers. I see no one and no one sees me. I guess I'm attempting to seduce myself. It would be like saying, the only reason why men lift weights is to appeal to the opposite sex, which can clearly not be the only reason. He's a joke and is using his knowledge of psychology to prey upon low self esteem male fan base.

Click to expand...

If you're straw-manning somebody, at least have the common decency to make it a good straw-man. If you'd take a minute and actually inform yourself, you could easily see that cosmetics is ingrained in the behavior of even the earliest humans in our history, not only spanning over every society ever known to man but even predating the invention of the written word and the frikkin' wheel:

The history of cosmetics spans at least 6000 years and is present in almost every society on Earth. Cosmetic body art is argued to have been the earliest form of a ritual in human culture. The evidence for this comes in the form of utilised red mineral pigments (red ochre) including crayons associated with the emergence of Homo sapiens in Africa.

Click to expand...

If you think that something you do out of individual habit is in any way indicative of a behavioral pattern that can be dated back at the very least 12.000 years ago, you're delusional. Cosmetics are not only a fixed behavior pattern in humans, but most other animals use embellishment techniques (and quite complex ones too) for their mating rituals. Not only that, but the use of cosmetics, beauty products and clothing can be linked to the female menstruation cycle. Showing clear evidence that make-up is in fact used to influence sexual attractiveness especially considering that women wear more make-up when they are at peak fertility (i.e. near ovulation):

Several studies have shown that a woman's physical appearance changes across the menstrual cycle. Women's clothing choices are also affected by their menstrual cycle. Saad and Stenstrom (2009) found that women reported engaging in greater appearance-related product usage on fertile phase days than on luteal days. Durante, Li, and Haselton (2008) found that, near ovulation, women preferred clothing that was more revealing and sexy, whereas Haselton, Mortezaie, Pillsworth, Bleske, and Frederick (2007) found that, during their high-fertility period, women showed more skin. Recently, Durante, Griskevicius, Hill, Perilloux, and Li (2011) reported that, at peak fertility, women chose products that enhanced appearance (e.g., choosing sexy rather than more conservative clothing). Similarly, Grammer, Renninger, and Fischer (2004) showed that mated women attending discotheques without their partners tended to dress more provocatively when they had higher sex hormone levels, as is the case during the fertile phase. In the same way, Kim and Tokura (1998) found that preference for warm or cool colors was also affected by the menstrual cycle, and research has found that warm-or cool-colored clothes are associated with variations in women's attractiveness.

Click to expand...

Again, nobody is saying that these are the only reasons why people behave in a certain way, individual behavior isn't necessarily deterministic in that respect. What these scientists are exploring are possible explanations and reasons as to how these very observable patterns of human behavior (i.e. habits) come to be. Only because you aren't subjectively aware of these reasons, doesn't mean that they don't exist. The beauty of these findings is that, as soon as you become aware of these things, you can make the conscious decision to behave differently if you don't like it, essentially giving you more agency over your own actions. So instead of ignorantly dismissing all that stuff, you'd be wise to inform yourself first.

For example:



Once I informed myself about how neuromarketing works, I was able to drastically change my consumer habits when going to the super-market. I look at price tags differently, I don't spend more time there than needed, I also watch the top and bottom shelves, I usually take my smaller shopping bag rather than an over-sized cart, etc... in general I've become a lot more conscious about how, why and what I buy, giving me more conscious freedom when it comes to my own actions.

Nintendo Switch said:

Leisure activities like theater, books, tv, movies, art and parental pressure all emphasize this same women = caretaker, men = aggressive warrior leader stereotype.

Click to expand...

Art draws inspiration from life, from reality.

And since the dawn of humanity, history of mankind consisted in the men hunting, fighting and adventuring into the unknown, while women were caretakers.

Men were always "problem solvers" while women were the trophy that men achieved for being good at problem solving. It's basic evolutive biology and no political correctness can change that.

Why does everyone bring up the Nordic gender gap like if it's definitive proof of anything? You mean to tell me that men and women aren't raised differently in Scandinavia, that because institutional barriers have been removed, there aren't incredible social barriers in many instances? The gap actually makes sense from a social constructionist perspective, remove structural barriers in employment and men and women will go where both biology and society dictates.

Guy, Jordan Peterson hasn't solved the nature versus nurture debate. Like anything, there are so many factors at play, that one cannot determine the source of these differences. Those studies cited with babies had like 50 babies, not exactly definitive. And it's impossible to control for how they were being raised (3 month old boys having cars on their blankets, car toys etc. before being brought to the study, or how the children were influenced by their peers during the study itself). There are biological differences between men and women, as well as strong social forces that attempt to box us in. JP negates the latter.

edit: even if biology is the most prominent factor, biology isn't destiny, not even close. People should feel free and empowered to go into the fields they desire. That is not the case in today's day and age.

Subtle said:

People should feel free and empowered to go into the fields they desire. That is not the case in today's day and age.

Click to expand...

That's a lie to me. People in western countries are free to do whatever they want to do.

The problem is some people's ego is hurt because they think women aren't choosing what is socially cool, like being a scientist.

Jon Neu said:

That's a lie to me. People in western countries are free to do whatever they want to do.

The problem is some people's ego is hurt because they think women aren't choosing what is socially cool, like being a scientist.

Click to expand...

well then you're free to ignore the pleas of both men and women. This is also what people generally refer to when they say #ListenToWomen

Subtle said:

Guy, Jordan Peterson hasn't solved the nature versus nurture debate. [...] JP negates the latter.

Click to expand...

By this point you people sound like flat-earthers, anti-vaxxers and climate-change-deniers, only because you're simply unable to get over your ideological prejudices. Nobody, not even Peterson, claims to have solved the nurture vs. nature debate. What evolutionary psychologists and scientists point out is that their empirical findings are simply ignored or even considered 'problematic' for the sake of politics and ideological tribalism. Something that is true and something that should be true, are two very different things.



I'm really starting to get tired of people failing to make the difference between descriptive science and normative science over and over again. Humanities and social sciences have gone so far off the deep end, their normative research has completely detached itself from reality through their continued ideological effort to wage war against empirical sciences.

Jon Neu said:

That's a lie to me. People in western countries are free to do whatever they want to do.

The problem is some people's ego is hurt because they think women aren't choosing what is socially cool, like being a scientist.

Click to expand...

Lmao. You think it hurts my ego that women aren’t choosing to be scientists. How the hell does that even make sense?

I am happy to see the same stereotypical roles constantly put up on media are staring to change. Finally we have women shown on tv in action star roles, women mma fighters, minority scientists etc. I think it’s a good thing for kids and society in general not to be pigeonholed and conditioned into a small group of roles.

Society benefits from diversity of thought. And it grinds my gears when I see posts like one I quoted in the OP that demands that all women in media be expected to have unrealistically big breasts along with a flat tummy (especially since that’s very unnatural).

Nintendo Switch said:

He did a number of lectures about the wisdoms contained in the Bible.

Click to expand...

And? Your conclusion is that because he concentrates on the bible he's somehow diminishing other religions by default? Are you shitting me? I don't think Peterson's focus on the bible is about the elevation of it over other religious works. I don't see him being an advocate for Christianity or Judaism. He's just looking at it in particular because he is familiar with it. I'd say his entire take on it is how any academic would regard such things, as a codification of early societal rules, and an examination of those things and how and why they arose.

But still lets back up a bit here because absolutely nothing that you've said so far supports your assertion that: -

Peterson is very focused on the western, white, male perspective.

Click to expand...

Where're the receipts at?

Humans don’t have to fight to survive nearly to the same extent that they may have to during the hunter society. It seems natural for our society left to its own whims without this need for fighting to survive to develop a balanced or even a matriarchal society.

Click to expand...

Sure we might now need to go out and hunt for some Elk, but day to day survival is still very much a day to day issue for the vast bulk of humanity. In the first world, there's at least a social safety net to catch most people from falling into homelessness, but subsistence living is a pretty miserable existence I can tell you from personal experience. Most people are just a bad accident and two paycheques away from their life going down the shitter.

Society benefits from diversity of thought. And it grinds my gears when I see posts like one I quoted in the OP that demands that all women in media be expected to have unrealistically big breasts along with a flat tummy (especially since that’s very unnatural).

Click to expand...

Honestly, I don't know why the fuck you 've concocted an entire spiel of flimsy arguments attacking Peterson and Demore, just because one random poster makes a pop at Alicia Viklanders physique tbh. If it irked you so much how about you take it up with the person directly in that thread? Rather than launch into some ill-considered diatribe that frankly seems all over the shop? If it's any comfort I thought Jolie was a terrible choice for Lara Croft as well (despite her fake tits), because again just like Viklander she doesn't look remotely English.

Regarding James Demore:

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/women-better-leaders-men-study-a7658781.html

There are twice as many men called John as there are women leading FTSE100 companies.

What's more, the proportion of women declines at each stage of an executive career path.

But a new study has concluded that women are better suited to leadership than men.

The number of female CEOs at the world's biggest companies is falling
The study, led by Professor Øyvind L. Martinsen, head of Leadership and Organisational Behaviour at the BI Norwegian Business School, assessed the personality and characteristics of nearly 3,000 managers.

In nearly all areas, they concluded that women were better leaders than their male counterparts.

Women outperformed men in four of the five categories studied: initiative and clear communication; openness and ability to innovate; sociability and supportiveness; and methodical management and goal-setting.

However men did appear to be better than women at dealing with work-related stress and they had higher levels of emotional stability.

...

Whilst people might think progress is being made, the number of women running the 500 most powerful companies in the US fell by more than 12 per cent last year.

“The survey suggests that female leaders may falter through their stronger tendency to worry - or lower emotional stability,” study co-author Professor Lars Glasø said.

“However, this does not negate the fact that they are decidedly more suited to management positions than their male counterparts. If decision-makers ignore this truth, they could effectively be employing less qualified leaders and impairing productivity.”

Click to expand...

If a woman employed by google passed around an internal memo saying there was a scientific study that women on average have higher communications skills, display a higher ability to innovate, are more supportive, have better social skills, and are more successful when it comes to methodical management and goal-setting, do you think google would have an issue with that?

Would google fire that woman because she was crating a hostile working environment for men? Would google suggest that the woman who wrote that memo was saying men can't be good mangers, when in reality they only used the data in a study to explain why, on average, female leaders would be more effective than male leaders?

Because if people can be convinced google would never have done such a thing, especially if it can be shown that google has a history of pointing to scientific differences between men and women to suggest that women are better in some ways, then it would have to come down to politics why Damore was fired.

Nintendo Switch said:

Finally we have women shown on tv in action star roles, women mma fighters, minority scientists etc.

Click to expand...

Yeah because female gladiatrices, movie- and action stars, thinkers an scientists never existed before 2014, right?

Nintendo Switch said:

I think it’s a good thing for kids and society in general not to be pigeonholed and conditioned into a small group of roles.

Click to expand...

Nintendo Switch said:

And it grinds my gears when I see posts like one I quoted in the OP that demands that all women in media be expected to have unrealistically big breasts along with a flat tummy (especially since that’s very unnatural).

Click to expand...

Way to go, retroactively and sneakily refitting your OP because your arguments didn't hold up to scrutiny. Unfortunately you failed to improve it in any way, only digging yourself deeper into this mess. As if one guy preferring Angelina Jolie as Tomb Raider would be in any way indicative of what Jordan Peterson is saying. Also, do you deny the existence of Angelina Jolie? It's not like she doesn't have a myriad of female fans either... Like, wtf man?

Nintendo Switch said:

No One is 100% correct, everyone, even the most intelligent and well read people are wrong fairly often. Intelligent people just happen to right more often than they are wrong.

Click to expand...

Thank you for stating the obvious, but Peterson never claims any kind of dogmatic truth, narcissism and pride, on the contrary he fights it. If you'd actually listen to his talks, you'd easily see that he is constantly emphasizing the point that humans are fallible beings, himself included.

Nintendo Switch said:

Lmao. You think it hurts my ego that women aren’t choosing to be scientists. How the hell does that even make sense?

I am happy to see the same stereotypical roles constantly put up on media are staring to change. Finally we have women shown on tv in action star roles, women mma fighters, minority scientists etc. I think it’s a good thing for kids and society in general not to be pigeonholed and conditioned into a small group of roles.

Society benefits from diversity of thought. And it grinds my gears when I see posts like one I quoted in the OP that demands that all women in media be expected to have unrealistically big breasts along with a flat tummy (especially since that’s very unnatural).

Click to expand...

I wasn't talking about you personally, more about feminists.

Feminists are the ones who are pushing this "we need more female scientists, CEO's, etc" because they want to inflate their egos. They don't care about more female working in the garbage industry or in the construction, they only care about the "cool" positions so they can feel better. It's not about equality, but just ego.

Where did 2014 come from? Recent means in the approximately past 20 years or so, a blip In long scheme of things.

It’s not Peterson I have a problem with. It’s those that hold him as infallible as if every thing he says is absolute truth, that fail to be open to alternative explanations and adopt all of his statements as truisms, that’s how cults/religions start (by believing someone is infallible and religiously spreading his words even when the person they follow repeatedly state that they are not infallible)

Like you said, he is human and fallible. I think he is right about lots of things and wrong about lots of things as well. He would probably agree that he is wrong fairly often too.

This thread is meant to discuss which things you guys think he is correct about, which things he is wrong about and why?

Nintendo Switch said:

It’s not Peterson I have a problem with. [...] This thread is meant to discuss which things you guys think he is correct about, which things he is wrong about and why?

Click to expand...

Kinda hard to believe when the title of this topic literally states: What Jordan Peterson and James Demore got wrong
(and it's Damore, btw)

It’s those that hold him as infallible as if every thing he says is absolute truth, that fail to be open to alternative explanations and adopt all of his statements as truisms...

Click to expand...

You have any evidence to back this up? Because I highly doubt that, considering the best you could come up with was some guy on NeoGAF preferring Angeline Jolie over the new Tomb Raider. It's even more preposterous considering how much ideological blow-back he is receiving by the political fanatics trying to shut him down. I don't see Peterson's audience engaging in similar hysterical behavior.

...that’s how cults/religions start (by believing someone is infallible and religiously spreading his words even when the person they follow repeatedly state that they are not infallible)

Click to expand...

By your standards, Socrates (and no I'm not putting Peterson on the same level) would be nothing but a cult leader.

He sort of was.

And I hold up your posts in this thread as Exhibit A.

Subtle said:

Why does everyone bring up the Nordic gender gap like if it's definitive proof of anything? You mean to tell me that men and women aren't raised differently in Scandinavia, that because institutional barriers have been removed, there aren't incredible social barriers in many instances? The gap actually makes sense from a social constructionist perspective, remove structural barriers in employment and men and women will go where both biology and society dictates.

Guy, Jordan Peterson hasn't solved the nature versus nurture debate. Like anything, there are so many factors at play, that one cannot determine the source of these differences. Those studies cited with babies had like 50 babies, not exactly definitive. And it's impossible to control for how they were being raised (3 month old boys having cars on their blankets, car toys etc. before being brought to the study, or how the children were influenced by their peers during the study itself). There are biological differences between men and women, as well as strong social forces that attempt to box us in. JP negates the latter.

edit: even if biology is the most prominent factor, biology isn't destiny, not even close. People should feel free and empowered to go into the fields they desire. That is not the case in today's day and age.

Click to expand...

Yes they should always chose the fields they desire that goes for girls and also boys HOWEVER you also should not push them into something you feel to do because there is a clear Gender difference in certain fields.

Also it not only scandinavia its like every fucking country in the world. Conclusion is that the more equal women feel in their country the more they fall back into so called traditional jobs. Mostly because they do not need to feel to fight for equality anymore and finally can do what they actually want to do. If you look at gender differences in Saudi Arabia where are 70% women into stem you can not honestly believe that this is because of their great and equal treatment of women there.

Dunki said:

Yes they should always chose the fields they desire that goes for girls and also boys HOWEVER you also should not push them into something you feel to do because there is a clear Gender difference in certain fields.

Also it not only scandinavia its like every fucking country in the world. Conclusion is that the more equal women feel in their country the more they fall back into so called traditional jobs. Mostly because they do not need to feel to fight for equality anymore and finally can do what they actually want to do. If you look at gender differences in Saudi Arabia where are 70% women into stem you can not honestly believe that this is because of their great and equal treatment of women there.

Click to expand...

But again, how you can claim something is largely due to the biological differences between men and women when there is such a variation from country to country.

Edit:

Moderator 10 said:

MODERATION INTERLUDE.

Apologies for intruding:

Topic creator opens thread regarding an important matter.
Topic creator gets presented well constructed and sustained arguments about the matter.
Arguments don't confirm the Topic creator beliefs.
Topic creator refutes with hollow points.
Topic creator keeps disputing making the matter at hand a battle of attrition.

i will apologize in place of N Nintendo Switch to strange headache and Kadayi (excuses if omitting anyone else), i don't know your behavior in other threads but in this case you 2 deserved a lot better than what you are getting here. Hopefully this doesn't discourage you from engaging at such high level in other topics.

N Nintendo Switch , we'll be monitoring your conduct in this thread from now on and want to see what you have to say. As an advice, approach a debate to learn something from it and not to be "right". Or to confirm your beliefs. i think you are wasting the efforts of people that approcahed with honest intentions and that seem to have a wider knowledge of the topic at hand.

Click to expand...

Moderator10, I was engaged in reasoned conversation in this thread until you chose to single me out. I never violated the TOS in any way.

This place doesn’t need right authoritarians as moderators here any more than it needs left authoritarians as moderators.

You don’t need to apologize on my behalf and I don’t care if you decide to “monitor me” for disagreeing with James Peterson or his supporters.

I will leave this quote from the link below as it highlights some of the points I made in the OP especially about Peterson and how he is half right and half nonsensical.

Needless to say, when someone is this convinced of their own brilliance, they can be unaware of just how far afield they have drifted from the world of sense and reason. The diagrams and figures in Maps of Meaning are astonishing. They are masterpieces of unprovable gibberish:

How does one even address material like this? It can’t be “refuted.” Are we ruled by a dragon of chaos? Is the dragon feminine? Does “the ‘state’ of preconscious paradise” have a “voluntary encounter with the unknown”? Is the episodic really more explicit than the procedural? These are not questions with answers, because they are not questions with meanings.

Click to expand...

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2018/03/the-intellectual-we-deserve

A few more Petersonisms:

“The future is the place of all potential monsters.” The future is the place for all potential everything.

“People do not care whether or not they succeed; they care about whether or not they fail.” Which is apparently different.

“People aren’t after happiness, they’re after not hurting.” I’m actually after happiness, thanks.

“There is no being without imperfection.” No shit.

“To share does not mean to give away something you value and get nothing back. That is instead what every child who refuses to share fears it means. To share means, properly, to initiate the process of trade.” Could mean anything, depending on interpretation: if I share my food with a hungry person, and ask for nothing in return, I may still have “gotten something.” But the maxim could also be interpreted as a defense of avarice. You can find a justification in it for whatever your worldview already is.

“You can’t make rules for the exceptional.” By definition.

“Life is suffering. That’s clear. There is no more basic, irrefutable truth.” Anything is “irrefutable” if it’s not clear what we mean by it.

“You cannot be protected from the things that frighten you and hurt you, but if you identify with the part of your being that is responsible for transformation, then you are always the equal, or more than the equal of the things that frighten you.” Unless you are frightened of leopards, and are subsequently eaten by leopards.

The multiplicity of possible interpretations is very important. It makes it almost impossible to beat Peterson in an argument, because every time one attempts to force him to defend a proposition, he can insist he means something else.

Click to expand...