Entry#3: Finding the Truth

The article I chose to write about is called, “How Dangerous is Jordan B. Peterson, the right-wing professor who ‘hit a hornets’ nest’?” This article is published by The Guardian and located under the “science” section. Firstly, I’d like to note that this article attempts to keep things neutral and unbiased; the author provides background information on Jordan Peterson, his followers, what he is arguing, as well as the opposing side views of him. While this is a proper way to write a neutral article, the author uses specific wording to give the tone and meaning a twist, which can be interpreted as being biased against Peterson. Without even getting into the article yet, you can read the title see the choice of words being used and their implications.

                Jordan B. Peterson is a professor at the University of Toronto and has a bachelor in political science, a bachelor in psychology, and a Ph.D. in clinical psychology (Lynskey). He has been in the news within the past two years due to his views on the way society is shifting in an ever-growing political correctness type of way. He adopts a rational/logical, science based approach to thinking about issues in the current world. As the article states, this is what makes him dangerous: a man who actually believes what they’re saying and isn’t pressured to back down by the social justice movement (Lynskey).  Peterson’s beliefs and morals are based on fundamental human rights, such as free speech. Peterson became an icon in the political conversation when a federal amendment to add gender identity and expression to the Canadian Humans Right Act became law in Canada (Lynskey).  As well, the University of Toronto implemented plans for mandatory anti-bias training (Lynskey).  In Canada, hate speech, however that is officially defined, is a punishable offense. Peterson found issue with this, noting that it infringed on his fundamental free-speech. For example, he is known for being against using gender pronouns, as he finds being forced to use specific words is against free-speech. This can be considered hate speech in Canada.

                The Guardian provides a fair amount of detailed information about Peterson, but starts to show its shadowy bias as the article goes on. First off, the title of the article labels Peterson as right-wing, which establishes a preconceived idea in the readers mind about him (Lynskey). The truth is, Peterson classifies himself as a classic British liberal, whose focus is the psychology of belief (Lynskey). Furthermore, somehow The Guardian attempts to support their statement of Peterson as rightwing by stating that, “he is also adored by figures on the so-called alt-light (basically the “alt-right” without the sieg-heils and the white ethnostate), including Mike Cernovich, Gavin McInnes and Paul Joseph Watson,” (Lynskey). Just because some people adore you, does not mean you are associated with them. That is a logical fallacy. Yet, The Guardian attempts to use this as support for the article.

                Furthermore, The Guardian states that Peterson is a supporter of James Damore (Lynskey). You may recall that James was an engineer at Google and wrote a memo about/explaining what the gender pay gap really is, how it applies to Google, and how Google could increase diversity. Damore's memo uses neutral language and explains his thoughts in a logical manner. He was fired by Google for the memo being “controversial.” This connection between Peterson and Damore is used in attempts to further hurt the credibility of Peterson. Feel free to read the memo for yourself at firedfortruth.com. Draw your own conclusions.

                Continuing, The Guardian starts to use quotes from various people that lambast Peterson. Sure, the author technically didn’t say it, but they also didn’t include such impacting quotes from the other side of the issue. Again, this shows bias through selective quoting. Near the end, the author draws the conclusion that, “Peterson’s arguments are riddled with conspiracy theories and crude distortions of subjects, including postmodernism, gender identity and Canadian law, that lie outside his field of expertise. Therefore, there is no need to caricature his ideas in order to challenge them,” (Lynskey). What The Guardian does here is dismiss the strength of his arguments by concluding that they’re all based on conspiracy theories and distortions. This is simply not true, and anyone who watches an interview of him can deduce that Peterson has an established, classical way of logical thinking. He isn’t blasting off on fake moon landings, flat-Earth conspiracies, or anything of that nature.

The Guardian submits to the same problem we are experiencing in today’s political conversation: if someone has a different opinion/says something you don’t agree with, then they must be a fascist, alt-right/alt-left, bigot who has no idea what they’re talking about. That is the opposite of what is needed. We as a society need more people to have open-thought discussions without retaliation or ad-hominems. Otherwise, how are we ever going to progress?

Works Cited

Lynskey, Dorian. “How Dangerous Is Jordan B Peterson, the Rightwing Professor Who 'Hit a Hornets' Nest'?” The Guardian, Guardian News and Media, 7 Feb. 2018, www.theguardian.com/science/2018/feb/07/how-dangerous-is-jordan-b-peterson-the-rightwing-professor-who-hit-a-hornets-nest.