Jordan B. Peterson

Utter codswallop.

Basically, the author's modus operandi seems to have been (more or less):

1. establish an idiosyncratic reading of a few biblical passages (roughly speaking: "Satan" is a code for "chaos"; "God" is a code for "order" and "evil" is a code for "chaos caused by humans").

2. cite some examples of a particular rule derived from his application of the code to some biblical event -- typically such examples come from his own life (although there's no independent evidence to establish show more that these are actual events described without bias -- nor that there weren't other events that refute the derived rule).

3. Generalise the rule to a universal truth in life -- or at least a rule that will help the reader live a happier and/or better -- or perhaps merely more ordered -- life.

I was pretty skeptical after reading the first rule, the thrust of which is to act so that people think highly of you -- because that will fill your system with seratonin, which will make you feel better and more confident, because of which you will accomplish more. Honestly, is one really expected to take this stuff seriously? Anyway, it all went downhill from there. I finally gave up partway through rule 8, and read a Wodehouse instead -- which I reckon did me far more good, as "laughter is the best medicine". show less

I read this through hungrily - not because of its revelations, but rather because of how frighteningly this man has managed to get a following in 2018. He clearly represents a piece of flotsam for any white men desperately searching for a way to escape their sense of persecution. His logic and reason are so blatantly peppered with nonsensical comparisons, cherry picking, and deep-rooted fear and loathing for women and minorities, that it seems artfully designed to both appeal to cavemen and show more to extract delicious liberal tears to enjoy while they gather their war-party.

Because lobster males subjugate lobster females - it's fighting the natural order of things for women to resist subjugation. Because women are outperforming men in school and the workplace, women should be resisted in school and the workplace - so men don't feel outperformed. It hurts their feelings (the feelings they don't have, at that... don't ask me to make it make sense - the point is that it doesn't pass the merest scratch test on any area of its philosophy). Because a man invented the tampon (in a nation and cultural climate where female industry hadn't a prayer of gaining traction), there is no patriarchy (I shit you not).

After telling his audience what an ideologue is, and why they are to be avoided and cautioned against, he reveals to his literate audience that he is exactly that - while the portion of his audience who came for the delicious bowl of red pills yuck it up at the concession stand.

Truly a wine that pairs perfectly with the age of Trump - while proudly parading the irony in front of anyone who knows what irony actually is. Another example of a personality that unintelligent people will mistake for intelligent - because they have the same brands of hate, now with 100% more multisyllabic apologetics. Nothing could be more reprehensible than lying and deception, he says - while paving the hungry minds of confused and frightened white guys with arguments designed to make them think Orwell is holding their hand up the cattle chute into an age of tyranny.

Please teach your children well. Otherwise, some of them will be drawn under this tent - where might always makes right, and the downtrodden and disenfranchised are asking for it. show less

Hm. Lots to say about this book.

First things first: There's no reason to be prejudiced against someone's book because of who they are. That's just the ad hominem fallacy, really. Lots of folks really really REALLY dislike Dr. Peterson, and they're allowed to, of course. But his book ought to be taken on its own merits.

In my mind, those are:

1) This book is really, really thoughtful. It's abundantly clear that it's the product of much deep thought, soul searching, and incredibly wide reading show more (plus some select deep reading).

2) This book is challenging. I've read quite a few books this year, and this one has made me think the most. There were times, quite a few, when I disagreed with something Peterson had said, but I had to stop and think of why I disagreed, and that's a good thing. A book that truly makes you think, even if it's only to eventually disagree with it, is worth reading.

3) It's unafraid. Peterson's views—if you really look at them—are usually quite internally consistent, but also defy classification according to most binary conservative/liberal modes of thinking. There are views he holds that many a conservative would deeply object to. Clearly, he has views that infuriate liberals. And yet he calmly and reasonably lays out his thoughts for the world to judge. Basically, no matter who you are, there's something in this book you'll dislike, and Peterson knows that and wrote it anyway. That's brave, and I respect it.

All that being said, the book does have a few flaws, and these are the reasons it didn't earn five stars from me:

1) It's a bit of a slog. I'm no stranger to thick, dense books, but this one is something else. I'm not sure if it's just Peterson's style (as a highly intelligent dude who might struggle to write for more of a popular crowd) or if he just needed a tougher editor. Either way, this 430-page book easily could have been (and probably should have been) 300 or even 250 pages instead. Peterson is a much better speaker than writer—you can get most of the core content of the book from a 90-minute talk he gave, delivered with much less depth but arguably more emotion.

2) Some bash on Peterson for not "staying in his lane" with psychology, which I find an absurd criticism. People are perfectly capable of having a high degree of interest, proficiency, or even expertise in something that's not their day job. That being said, Peterson's view and understanding of Christianity in particular seemed ... shallow? I'm not sure of the right word. He's clearly read the Bible and thought deeply about it. But it seems like he turns to Jung to interpret it instead of, say, Augustine (or someone similar). That's fine, to a degree; it fits his area of expertise and it makes sense for Peterson to view the world through a lens of psychological analysis. But it did feel lacking a bit, not to mention the very broad brushstrokes used to define Christianity in general (e.g., stating that a core tenet of Christianity is that works are irrelevant to salvation, when that precise argument is part of the core disagreement between Catholics and most Protestants).

Is 12 Rules for Life perfect? No. Is Peterson perfect? Um, no. Is that actually a prerequisite for reading and enjoying a book? Of course not.

No matter your politics or view of Peterson, this is a book that—if you read it honestly—will make you think.

And that's a book worth reading. show less

"… the insistence throughout Exodus that redemption is found through continual voluntary exposure to that which is threatening." (pg. 338)

I must admit to being a bit blindsided by this book. Moving on from his 12 Rules – or 24 Rules, if you count Beyond Order – Jordan Peterson's next step has been a retrenchment of his ideas rather than a new chapter. Hewing much closer to the tone and depth of his 1999 academic masterpiece Maps of Meaning than the more consciously user-friendly, show more quasi-polemical bestsellers 12 Rules for Life and Beyond Order, I was slightly unprepared for this shift and struggled to engage with parts. Even when I managed to lock myself in, I found We Who Wrestle with God to be a more intensive analysis of ideas already addressed in previous books – and in the lectures and podcasts where Dr Peterson's message truly thrives.

In the last few years, Jordan Peterson has been delving much deeper into the stories of the Bible, with lecture series on Genesis and Exodus and with the religious allusions that had always been there in his work becoming more overt and less apologetic. We Who Wrestle with God is a summary of these last few years of thought, providing exhaustive commentary on the main stories of those first few books of the Bible – Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, Noah, the Tower of Babel, Abraham, Moses and Jonah – through the lens of Peterson's Logocentric philosophy, underpinned by his astute psychological observations. Fans of Peterson's work will already be familiar with how he utilises the story of Cain and Abel (for example), and this book is in effect the definitive written record of Peterson's perspective on such things.

There are drawbacks to this. There is a lack of freshness here, at least for those of us who already have a longstanding interest in Peterson's work. I personally feel that the Biblical stuff Peterson talks about works better in small doses, in the digressions in his lectures and podcast appearances, or as the profound examples that illustrate wider, more freewheeling points in 12 Rules for Life. We Who Wrestle with God, however, is – at 570 pages – certainly not a small dose. At its best, it feels like Maps of Meaning, that astonishing but heavy-going tome that requires academic grit and endurance. At its worst, when it's exhaustively querying what a feature of a particular story tells us about what God requires of us, or presenting different translations of Bible verses, it can feel like an extended hardback version of one of those leaflets that get pushed through your door.

Once I accepted it would require the same application as Maps of Meaning, I could accommodate my fatigue better, but I think the book would have been better if it had been less exhaustive and closer to the ready engagement an everyman reader could have in 12 Rules for Life. Its methodical approach, combined with the familiarity of its core ideas to regular Peterson readers, makes it less compelling. In previous books, a Peterson argument could sometimes end up in a place that stopped me in my tracks, but on most occasions in We Who Wrestle with God, I knew where Peterson was going and, regrettably, was impatient for him to get there. The message might not be lost along the way, but some of the interest in it is. More a commentary than an argument, the book would've been more charming if it had engaged the reader more on an adventure, rather than presenting them with a schematic of one.

This is not to say, however, that We Who Wrestle with God fails, or is underwhelming. Quite the contrary. The Logocentric interpretations of the stories of Genesis and Exodus are fascinating – if sometimes a little overcooked in some chapters, losing their flavour – and the serious, unashamed advocacy of the value of the Bible to our civilisation and its morals is intriguing in a modern secular society that has longed since decided such things are uncool. We need to "reestablish our covenant with the God" who has oriented us on this path of consciousness, Peterson argues at the end of his book (pg. 505), and he has provided plenty of evidence on why we should do so.

Peterson's contention is that we as a species discover our moral and societal values by acting them out, not only in personal behaviour but through our stories. The Biblical stories are those that have endured – and consequently, might well have the most fundamental things to say about our behaviours. The Biblical stories are "not an argument for the existence of God, rendered against the doubt of believer and unbeliever alike", as the atheists and the dogmatic theists would like them to be, "but a description of what is to be held properly in the very highest of places, so that the continuation of man, society, and world may be ensured" (pg. 173). There are "a million paths of deviation, detour, and defection, and very few (perhaps one) that enable effective, efficient, productive, generous, and unified movement forward" (pg. 457); a common theme Peterson identifies in the stories is that "when terrible things happen… faith, humility and courage… nonetheless constitute the best strategy, the best pathway forward" (pg. 139).

For Peterson, then, the stories are 'true', and God is 'real', in the sense that being oriented by this concept of a God, and following the examples of the stories in your behaviour, lead to positive outcomes that are, in your life, true and real. And this is not a sleight-of-hand argument, but one coming from the proposition that humans are "not the submissive receivers of simply self-evident truths. Every perception is an effort" (pg. xxvi) and has been learned over countless generations of humans observing what behaviour works and what doesn't, and then abstracting those lessons into stories which are then passed down through the generations. This is why we can experience a "sense of revelation… when reading, say, a particularly profound book"; there is a connection between our personal perspective and this "collective unconscious" (pg. 18). It glows because it communicates an underlying shared truth, even if we did not know it.

It is a magnificent and inspiring concept of human development, even if We Who Wrestle with God feels at times like an extensive Appendix to Peterson's three previous books rather than a player in its own right. When I read the Bible myself some years ago, I began it as a scofflaw atheist but more importantly as a lover of literature; I quickly came to appreciate that the stories were meant to be taken in that profound, revelatory way that great literature is meant to, rather than the gotcha-style literalism some of my atheist influences had taken it. Since then, Peterson's recognition – and subsequent curation of – a more "psychological and relational definition" of God (pg. xxv), rather than a literal one, has seemed to me entirely right, and one that I had reached, appropriately enough, through exploration in my own story, Void Station One.

We Who Wrestle with God is the most overt and in-depth curation of this idea, which has been underpinning Peterson's worldview for decades, and the book's sometimes excessive weight serves as a sturdy anchor for it. Readers should nevertheless be advised that they will need to undergo much wrestling of their own should they choose to open it, and consequently navigate some considerable fatigue.

"Those who attend assiduously to their focal 'narrow' concerns will first journey deeper and deeper into the narrowly defined unknown at hand, learning first the details directly relevant to those concerns, but soon after coming to understand the broader webs of associations and causal pathways that are inevitably part of the phenomenon in question. Nothing exists in isolation. Anything studied with sufficient depth thus eventually comes to speak of everything." (pp326-7). show less