Vox Day - Jordanetics: A Journey Into the Mind of Humanity’s Greatest Thinker

Jordanetics: A Journey Into the Mind of Humanity's Greatest Thinker
Vox Day

Castalia House
Kouvola, Finland
www.castaliahouse.com

This book or parts thereof may not be reproduced in any form, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or otherwisewithout prior written permission of the publisher, except as provided by Finnish copyright law.

Copyright 2018 by Vox Day
All rights reserved

Cover: Steve Beaulieu
Version: 002

Im a smart person. Really smart, actually, and very expensively educated! But half the time, I just cant understand a bloody word Jordan Peterson says. And Ive been thinking recently about why that could be. Ordinarily, I can listen to someone prattling on and quickly get to the heart of what they are trying to express. Thats one of the skills you pick up as a journalist: You learn to quickly identify the core of a problem, the essence of whats being said. You learn to filter out the noiseand to identify bullshitters. But with Jordan Peterson, once Ive filtered out the noise, I dont find a lot left to work with. And theres another problem. He lies.

When he first began to speak about me, Jordan Peterson described me as an amazing person. This was around the time he called me on the telephone, expressing sympathy for the failed assassination attempt on me in February 2017, when I was wrongly accused of supporting child rapists. He offered to do a series of on-camera interviews with me. He described me publicly, and correctly, as a trickster figure, explaining that trickster figures emerge in times of crisis. And they point out what no one wants to see. And they say things that no one will say

He continued: [Milos] brave as can be. And hes unstoppable on his feet. He just amazes me. Ive never seen anyone I dont thinkand Ive met some pretty smart peopleIve never seen anyone who can take on an onslaught of criticism and reverse it like he can. Fast-forward to an on-stage interview with Bari Weiss in June 2018 at the Aspen Ideas Festival. Weiss is talking about about a professor who paired me with Hitler and gave us as examples of Very Bad Things. She alleges that I, the interracially married man, am indeed a racist.

To which Peterson replies: Well, possibly, yeah I havent followed Milo that carefully.

What happened? By his own definition, this is the way demagogues work: by listening to their audience and adjusting their responses accordingly. Why was Peterson suddenly going along with something he knew wasnt true and rewriting history, pretending he didnt know that much at all about someone he had on numerous occasions so intelligently explained? I realize that by asking this question, this youre going to think Im just wounded that someone I once admired has since soured on me. But thats the thing. From the first time I heard Jordan Peterson speak, my nostrils picked up a whiff of sulfur in the airand not just because he dresses in that awful, drab, monotonous Victoriana.

In an era of social justice, we are desperate to hear people defending Western civilization, and doing so forcefully in a way that shows up the progressive Left for the vacuous, parasitical bullies they are. Men, in particular, need superheroes like never before in history, although they like slightly feminized men, like the products of the Marvel universe, so that even when immersed in their masculine fantasies, they are still the biggest dog in the room. Theres nothing less intimidating, or more gay, than the aggressively hypermasculine Thor, the tongue-tied and slightly dim Captain America or Loki, the wily trickster.

Likewise, by presenting himself as an avuncular, asexual, physically frail character, Peterson can be a hero to men without threatening their manhood, much in the same way my homosexuality has also made me a hero to straight men. This is why Peterson has been able to bamboozle some quite clever people into thinking he is the Second Coming. But I have no patience for gobbledygook, and I have no faith in people who, when push comes to shove, will bend for popularity, comfort and an easy life rather than defend what they know to be true.

Petersons manner of speaking is designed to be fascinating. Its easy to get sucked in. He constantly defers solutions, leaving listeners to fill in the gaps and reach the ultimate conclusions themselves. And hes always hedging his own statements with phrases such as, Its something like that. The way he speaks is designed to conjure up a rigorously precise, intellectually humble professor who doesnt want to commit wholly to a claim unless he knows he is absolutely correct.

I do not find this way of speaking fascinating, though clearly Im in the minority. I prefer plain talk. I like simple, clear, unambiguous statements of opinion. I believe in objective truth and such a thing as right and wrong. Im never going to be satisfied by a writer who is constantly pointing to deeper solutions that are endlessly deferred. I want to know what a person really thinks. I have no idea what Jordan Peterson really thinks.

And Ive come to the conclusion that all this constant prevarication occurs not because hes a great teacher, eagerly hoping his charges will make the final leap of their own volition. Nor is it because hes a modest Socratic thinker. No. Its a public relations strategy, deployed so he never really has to commit to saying what he means, because he doesnt really want to be understood, because, like his friends in the risible intellectual dark web, he doesnt actually like or agree with his own fan base. When Peterson is put to the test, he has an established pattern of going soft at the critical moment.

Petersons watershed was a tweet he must now bitterly regret sending, because it gave the game away entirely. He said Brett Kavanaugh should accept his Supreme Court nomination and then quit. Peterson, apparently forgetting everything he knew about the feral Left, claimed that this might somehow soothe the activist wing of the Democrat Party into treating the rest of us with a bit more civility. Ugh, come off it. I remember thinking to myself, Jordan Peterson of all people cannot possibly believe this. And no amount of thrashing around on social media afterwards, claiming he was just engaging in a thought experiment, has persuaded anyone that he was just floating an idea out there.

Petersons reaction to Kavanaugh raises questions about his attitude to and relationships with women, which I havent seen many people discuss. There is something off about the way he talks about his daughter, though I cant work out what it is. And I note in his habit of describing the feminine as Chaos and the masculine as Order a kind of incomprehension and fear of women, which makes him a very poor role model for men. It does explain his appeal to a certain kind of socially awkward, sexually confused guy, who cannot relate to girls. But Peterson is just the same! So he isnt going to help these guys.

There is such a thing as the Chaotic feminine Peterson recognizes. She is the Whore of Babylon, rather than the Heavenly Bride. But Jordan only sees the Whore. This is a fundamental failing in his mythological structure: he doesnt see the Ordering Femininethe Lady as Heavenly City who gives a home to her groom. Men are constantly asking feminists to be more honest about male virtue. They have to do women the same courtesy. Peterson doesnt, and cant.

What really annoys everyone is how, when the going gets tough, Peterson chucks out everything hes been preaching for the past two years and takes the easy route. He tells his followers to read Solzhenitsyn. He says he knows and hates Marxism. But then he tweets: If confirmed Kavanaugh should step down. With these six words, he revealed his true strategy in the face of the enemy. Surrender and appeasement. A light knock and this guy dents like a tin can, warping and distorting himself to evade critique.