Valuetainment - Episode 259： Jordan Peterson - UNCENSORED

00:00:00.000 30 seconds. One time for the underdog. Ignition sequence start. Let me see you put them up. Reach the sky, touch the stars up above. Cause it's one time for the underdog. One time for the underdog.

00:00:17.380 I'm Patrick Bedeve, host of Valuetainment, and today we're sitting down with the one face you keep seeing all over social media. It's the one and only Jordan Peterson.

00:00:24.440 So look, we get a lot of guests on Valuetainment, but one of the most highly requested guests ever by you on Valuetainment has been Dr. Jordan Peterson, clinical psychologist, professor at the University of Toronto, as well as the author of 12 Rules for Life. Dr. Jordan Peterson, thanks for joining us here with Valuetainment.

00:00:44.480 Thanks for the invitation.

00:00:45.580 Yes, definitely. It's good to have you here. You know, this, if you, if you don't know Dr. Jordan Peterson, if you, you know, I would say total views, cause I've seen some of your views, 50 million on Facebook, 80 million, some stuff has gone completely viral.

00:00:58.060 I'd say total billion views, give or take, maybe even more than that with your content that's on YouTube, Facebook, all over the place. People now know the name Dr. Jordan Peterson.

00:01:06.900 And the part I want to spend some time talking to you about today is a couple of things. One, obviously a lot of people who interview you, they're going to talk to you about politics, religion, God, postmodernism, all of these things.

00:01:18.680 And maybe we'll get into some of that stuff. But what I'm very curious about with you is the following. One is who Jordan Peterson was growing up, right?

00:01:25.300 I mean, you read the stories about at 13 years old, you were given a book and you started studying some of, I think, Ayn Rand, George Orwell, and some of these books that were given to you.

00:01:34.600 And then from there, you have other inspirations that came up. And I think at one point at Harvard, you were studying drugs and alcohol and the addiction reasoning.

00:01:43.160 Why do we get addicted? And then you become who you become and you have some strong opinions.

00:01:47.000 But I want to know who you were in high school. If I was in high school today with you, we're in 10th grade. We're classmates. I'm sitting next to you.

00:01:54.600 We're good friends. Who's Jordan Peterson?

00:01:56.980 Well, first, I'm not very tall. I was younger than most of the people in my class because I skipped grade one.

00:02:03.760 Okay.

00:02:04.300 So I was five foot two in grade 10.

00:02:07.440 Really?

00:02:08.100 So, yeah, yeah, yeah. And so I suppose that made me a little bit more agile verbally than I might have otherwise been.

00:02:15.520 Most of my friends were working class guys. Most of them quit school in junior high and early in high school.

00:02:20.800 Most of the friends that I had in high school were very comical people.

00:02:24.020 I had four very close friends from a little tiny town, even north of where I grew up.

00:02:29.320 And there was almost nothing north of where I grew up.

00:02:32.260 They were extremely comical people.

00:02:34.480 And so we told jokes to each other all the time, tried to amuse each other.

00:02:39.220 I spent a lot of time driving around the country, listening to music, drinking beer with my friends out in the bush.

00:02:44.640 In high school.

00:02:45.720 Yeah.

00:02:46.440 That's great.

00:02:47.300 So beer helps to think the way you think right now, I guess.

00:02:50.020 That's the recipe.

00:02:50.740 It's a long winters in northern Alberta, you know, and not a tremendous amount to do.

00:02:55.900 And, well, it's not atypical teenage behavior.

00:02:58.560 That was me in high school.

00:02:59.520 I read all the time.

00:03:00.680 Oh, you did.

00:03:01.360 So you were reading all the time.

00:03:02.400 Yeah, yeah.

00:03:02.740 I read a book a day for years.

00:03:04.200 Are you kidding me?

00:03:05.100 No, most of it was science fiction.

00:03:06.360 I had a neighbor across the street who had a huge science fiction collection, a whole wall.

00:03:10.440 And he used to let me come in there once a week or so.

00:03:12.700 And I'd pick like seven or eight books and take them home and read them.

00:03:15.360 And then I'd come back and get another eight.

00:03:17.920 I read science fiction like that.

00:03:20.120 I don't know.

00:03:20.700 From what age?

00:03:21.600 Oh, 10, probably.

00:03:23.440 One a day?

00:03:24.240 Yeah, yeah.

00:03:24.700 That was my goal.

00:03:26.380 Now, are you a speed reader?

00:03:27.380 Do you go through it first?

00:03:28.080 I'm a very fast reader.

00:03:28.900 Were you always fast back then as well?

00:03:30.360 Yeah, I learned to read when I was very young.

00:03:32.060 My father taught me to read when I was very young.

00:03:34.240 And I'm very fast.

00:03:36.220 Did he teach you how to fast read?

00:03:37.540 Or were you just, you just started reading?

00:03:39.740 So that was something I was very keen to do.

00:03:41.320 Yeah, well, I wouldn't say specifically he taught me to speed read.

00:03:44.600 He just taught me to read.

00:03:45.840 And I guess I happen to be relatively fast at it.

00:03:49.680 So that's been a very useful thing for me.

00:03:53.520 So your dad had a big influence on you.

00:03:55.340 Your father had a big influence on the reading aspect.

00:03:57.080 You bet.

00:03:57.700 He spent a lot of time with me when I was a little kid.

00:03:59.840 You know, he used to come home every night.

00:04:01.740 We'd spend an hour or so reading.

00:04:03.700 He had designed this.

00:04:04.680 He was a teacher.

00:04:05.760 He had a workbook, which I still have, that outlined all the phonics,

00:04:10.960 all the sounds of all the letters, the sounds of all the two-letter combinations,

00:04:16.680 and all of that.

00:04:17.360 And we went over that every night.

00:04:19.940 And that happened for a long time, from the time I was probably three onward, I think.

00:04:25.880 At three years old?

00:04:26.980 Yeah, very young.

00:04:27.780 Now, what did your mom do? 1.00

00:04:28.600 My mom, well, when I was a kid, she took care of us.

00:04:31.660 She stayed home.

00:04:32.360 Got it.

00:04:32.720 She was trained as a nurse.

00:04:34.320 She never practiced as a nurse, though.

00:04:36.500 She had kids.

00:04:37.640 And then later, she became librarian for our local college.

00:04:41.700 And she had a career that lasted about 20 years as a head librarian.

00:04:45.840 And she was a very, is, both my parents are still alive.

00:04:48.700 She's a very pleasant person, very funny.

00:04:50.700 She has a great sense of humor.

00:04:51.920 I used to make her laugh all the time. 0.93

00:04:53.200 So that was, and I still do, sometimes on purpose, sometimes accidentally.

00:04:57.840 And so humor was, did humor, has humor always been part of your MO?

00:05:01.780 Like, have you always been somebody that told jokes?

00:05:04.060 Yeah, definitely.

00:05:04.780 Well, it was a big part of the culture in northern Alberta.

00:05:06.840 Like, it was a big deal if you were funny.

00:05:08.800 I've partied with a lot of Canadians.

00:05:10.320 And we drank a lot of kokanee.

00:05:11.620 And these guys are funny people.

00:05:13.400 They know how to have fun.

00:05:14.740 Yeah, well, there's a lot of Canadian comedians, eh?

00:05:16.640 I mean, we export them down to the States so that you guys have something to laugh about.

00:05:19.860 We need your help because we need some good comedians down here, right?

00:05:23.140 You better be funny if you're going to live through a Canadian winter.

00:05:26.040 That's a good point.

00:05:26.920 You definitely need to be.

00:05:27.600 You better be amusing.

00:05:29.280 And so, yeah, it was an important thing.

00:05:30.840 Like, a lot of what we did when we were kids, when we were adolescents in particular,

00:05:35.200 was just try to sit around and amuse each other, you know?

00:05:38.040 With your dad.

00:05:38.880 Witty, sarcastic comments.

00:05:40.260 I grew up in the, I was in the military, so this is very normal for us.

00:05:43.140 We like witty, we like sarcasm.

00:05:44.600 Some people have a hard time with that, but it's a...

00:05:47.200 I think it's more of a working class thing, you know?

00:05:49.960 I think so as well.

00:05:50.820 That's a good point.

00:05:50.920 Yeah, and I really miss it.

00:05:51.800 I really like it because as I sort of moved up the ranks, let's say, on the academic front,

00:05:57.600 that became less and less common.

00:05:59.240 You get your wit from that side or you think that's part of the DNA?

00:06:01.780 You were born being witty or because you were in an environment that you had to be witty

00:06:05.640 that made you survive so the person doesn't tell the last joke?

00:06:07.540 Oh, yeah, that was definitely part of it.

00:06:08.680 Well, it was also because I was small and mouthy.

00:06:12.580 It was very useful to be sarcastic and witty, too, because it was the only defense that

00:06:17.000 I had, really.

00:06:17.860 That's a good point.

00:06:18.160 So, you know, people would come after me.

00:06:20.300 I mean, everybody gets...

00:06:21.500 There's lots of physical back and forth in junior high and high school, but people would

00:06:27.180 come after me and I could defend myself reasonably well with my tongue, so...

00:06:30.260 I think Ben Shapiro has a similar story as well.

00:06:32.140 Yeah.

00:06:32.440 He's a similar guy as well.

00:06:33.240 Yeah.

00:06:33.420 Because he was a year ahead.

00:06:34.900 I think it's a year, you know, and he was always smaller, so he had to figure out a

00:06:38.100 way to stand up and he was being bullied.

00:06:40.080 I don't think you're saying bully, though, right?

00:06:40.820 Yeah, don't mess with Shapiro, man.

00:06:42.020 No, no, his brain is also...

00:06:43.260 Oh, man.

00:06:43.960 Yeah, yeah, he's fast.

00:06:44.800 The way he is, it's...

00:06:45.900 It's quite impressive.

00:06:46.940 I've watched him lots of times on YouTube.

00:06:48.840 Yeah.

00:06:49.040 You want to mess with him at your peril.

00:06:51.140 Yeah, we've had him on Valentine's Day before, and the way he thinks is also very interesting

00:06:54.660 how we process this issue.

00:06:56.880 So, let me ask you, when you said your dad was teaching you how to read from three years

00:07:00.220 old and he's going through it, and then all of a sudden you pick up and start reading

00:07:02.740 a book a day, would you also have dialogues with your dad?

00:07:06.000 Hey, dad, what do you think about this?

00:07:07.240 No, I wouldn't say, not so much.

00:07:08.860 Okay, that's interesting.

00:07:09.400 No, dad's quite introverted.

00:07:10.920 Really?

00:07:11.600 Yeah, yeah.

00:07:11.840 So, there wasn't a debate type of a format?

00:07:14.460 No, no.

00:07:14.480 So, your family wasn't, I can't believe prime minister did this?

00:07:18.520 No, no, no, very little.

00:07:19.260 Interesting.

00:07:19.540 Very little.

00:07:20.060 Dad figured he would have been happier if he would have been born 100 years earlier.

00:07:23.200 I mean, he grew up in a log cabin, literally, and he grew up on this, well, my grandparents

00:07:30.100 were the original homesteaders in Saskatchewan.

00:07:32.680 Canada, Western Canada is about 100 years behind the Western US.

00:07:35.300 It's a beautiful area, by the way, that whole area.

00:07:36.900 They've got some nice properties.

00:07:38.100 Yes, yes.

00:07:39.020 And so, and his parents were from, his parents were of Norwegian extraction, and they built 0.96

00:07:44.240 a log cabin in the middle of the damn prairie, and that's where he grew up. 0.86

00:07:46.920 And, you know, he's a hunter and a trapper and a fisherman, and he likes to be outside. 0.99

00:07:51.160 He likes to spend time alone.

00:07:53.100 Although he's got close friends, but these are people that he mostly does these, you

00:07:56.580 know, this hunting and fishing with.

00:07:58.020 That's, I mean, he was a teacher.

00:07:59.760 He was the fire chief in our local town.

00:08:01.580 He ran a huge fish and game association, imported elk to northern Alberta.

00:08:07.480 There were no elk up there before the organization brought them up there.

00:08:10.940 And so, but that was his life.

00:08:13.240 And he's a gunsmith and a gun collector, and he has like, I don't know how many guns,

00:08:17.620 many, many.

00:08:18.540 And so that's his culture and his life.

00:08:20.540 And it was never something that I was really part of.

00:08:23.460 I mean, I went hunting with him.

00:08:24.720 I went fishing and trapping with him.

00:08:26.020 We used to camp all the time when I was a kid.

00:08:27.640 We weren't a particularly political family or a philosophically oriented family, for

00:08:32.320 that matter.

00:08:32.860 I mean, my dad's very smart.

00:08:35.100 Philosophically oriented family?

00:08:36.240 Not particularly.

00:08:37.040 No, no.

00:08:37.340 Was it a religious family?

00:08:38.400 Was it a church-owned family?

00:08:39.380 No, not really.

00:08:39.700 Was it let's read the Bible every day?

00:08:41.160 Let's pray?

00:08:41.580 Oh, no, no, no.

00:08:42.200 Definitely, no, definitely not.

00:08:43.800 So where did the debate come from?

00:08:45.360 Where did your ability to be able to listen, process, respond, where did that ability come from?

00:08:51.900 Was it when you went into academia?

00:08:53.480 Is it post?

00:08:54.820 Yeah, probably.

00:08:55.880 I think to some degree it's a natural ability.

00:08:59.800 I mean, even when I was a graduate student, when I was first teaching, I seemed to be good

00:09:04.480 at it.

00:09:05.060 The classes that I taught as a graduate student, and that was without any previous teaching

00:09:09.520 experience, were popular.

00:09:11.660 And then, well, now I've been teaching.

00:09:13.560 I've been lecturing for multiple times a week for 30 years.

00:09:17.140 And so, and I also very seldom relied on notes.

00:09:21.620 I mean, to begin with, when you don't know a topic very well, you have to scaffold the

00:09:25.540 conversation with notes.

00:09:27.420 You know, but I always very loosely stuck to my notes.

00:09:30.420 I would prepare a lot beforehand, but then, so I'd always try.

00:09:33.160 If I come, you're not going to give a PowerPoint speech, here's what we're doing.

00:09:36.340 Right.

00:09:36.560 You're just going to speak and talk.

00:09:37.720 You know, when PowerPoint first came out, I used it more, I relied on it more than I

00:09:45.020 did once I got accustomed to it.

00:09:46.680 But no, it's better to, it's better to sketch out your, your talk and then rely on your notes

00:09:51.500 as little as possible if you can manage it.

00:09:53.780 And I learned to do that.

00:09:54.680 And I, like, I practiced doing that so that I could get to the point where I could speak

00:09:57.820 extemporaneously.

00:09:58.940 How do you practice that?

00:10:00.080 You just try to stay farther and farther away from your notes as you, as you develop

00:10:03.720 your lectures.

00:10:04.160 Oh, I see what you're saying.

00:10:04.400 Yeah.

00:10:04.540 So I'm saying, do you role play?

00:10:06.080 Do you sit there with the notes first and then you set it aside?

00:10:07.920 No, no, no, no, no, no.

00:10:08.980 Usually what I do, that, that's a good question.

00:10:10.840 I mean, first of all, I, I try to be over-prepared in some sense.

00:10:14.420 So, I mean, I believe that if you're going to, if you're going to give a 20 minute lecture,

00:10:17.660 you should have an hour of material at hand because that way you have an opportunity to

00:10:22.460 sort of move spontaneously through the material.

00:10:24.900 But generally what I do now, because I have a lot of material at hand, a lot of stories and

00:10:30.500 a lot of things that I've, knowledge say that I've accrued over the years, usually

00:10:34.620 before a lecture, I'll, and this is the hard part, and I can do a lecture without doing

00:10:39.400 this, but it's better if I do this.

00:10:41.000 This is the hard part.

00:10:42.180 I'll sit down for 20 minutes with my eyes closed and I figure out what the, what the

00:10:46.860 central topic is.

00:10:47.840 So there's always a question.

00:10:48.840 What's the question I'm trying to address in this lecture?

00:10:52.180 And then I'll figure out a pathway through it.

00:10:54.580 It's like, okay, well, here's the argument.

00:10:56.600 Here's point one, here's point two, here's point three.

00:10:59.720 And there's possible branches off those.

00:11:02.080 And then with each point, I usually have a collection of stories and facts that I can

00:11:06.840 use to make the point.

00:11:09.620 Validate the point.

00:11:10.580 Yeah.

00:11:10.820 Yeah.

00:11:11.140 And, and to buttress it and to make it interesting.

00:11:13.100 And so it's a little bit, it's a little bit like improvisational jazz, I would say,

00:11:17.880 or even improvisational piano, because I play a little bit of piano.

00:11:20.960 So you lay out the, the story and then you can use the responses of the audience to guide

00:11:26.960 how you're going to walk through it.

00:11:28.660 Not duplicatable.

00:11:29.740 You have to have that ability to do that.

00:11:31.620 Do you, would you say you have some kind of a photographic memory a little bit or no?

00:11:34.740 No, no, no, not at all.

00:11:36.400 Not at all.

00:11:36.940 So all these books, you're either kind that you can say paid 73 seconds.

00:11:40.100 No, I don't think like that.

00:11:41.160 No, it's not.

00:11:41.800 I know I've known people like that.

00:11:43.500 Like I had professors.

00:11:44.860 Because you seem like you may have a little bit of that because the way you.

00:11:47.600 No, I don't organize myself that way.

00:11:49.520 I knew professors at, at Harvard, one particular professor, Richard McNally, who was a walking

00:11:54.460 library, man, he, he, he, extraordinarily well-read person, very, very smart, very fast

00:12:00.320 on his feet.

00:12:01.300 And that's really how he seemed to organize his knowledge.

00:12:04.500 He would know the author.

00:12:05.440 He would know the page.

00:12:06.440 He'd know the source.

00:12:07.480 He'd know where the book was on his shelf.

00:12:09.020 That's so interesting to me.

00:12:09.460 But I'm not like that.

00:12:10.420 Got it.

00:12:10.680 I thought you were for sure some of the, okay, so let me.

00:12:13.200 So I have a theory that I've been working on for a very long time.

00:12:17.160 And what happens when I read something is I plug it into the theory.

00:12:20.420 So I know the full outline of the theory.

00:12:22.840 It's, it'd probably take me 45, 50 hours to lay it out in lectures.

00:12:27.680 I've done that online.

00:12:29.120 And then, but I keep, it grows and grows and grows and grows.

00:12:32.120 And I know where to put everything.

00:12:33.400 So if I read something, I think, oh yes, that slot's there.

00:12:37.040 And so.

00:12:37.600 And so you store it as well.

00:12:38.760 If somebody asks you a question, you need to use that fact.

00:12:40.720 You have it somewhere stored where you bring it and say, okay.

00:12:42.680 But it has to be related to this work that I've been doing over time.

00:12:45.760 Got it.

00:12:46.140 Yeah.

00:12:46.520 Got it.

00:12:46.800 So it's kind of like there, there, there's this technique called memory castle that people

00:12:51.500 have used for centuries to remember things.

00:12:54.100 And so what you do is you, you, you, you sit and you, you imagine a, might be a place

00:12:59.680 that, you know, like a lit, a geographic place, a house.

00:13:02.900 And then you can place the things that you remember.

00:13:05.520 Imagine you walk through the house, you can place the things that you want to remember

00:13:08.500 at different locations in the house, but you have to, you have to turn what you're

00:13:12.800 remembering into an image and then you can walk through the house and, and you can lift

00:13:17.200 things up and find what it is that you're trying to remember.

00:13:19.720 I sort of do that with this theory.

00:13:21.680 It's like, it's, it's been, I've literally worked on it for, it's been 40 years.

00:13:25.760 And so I know the, I know the story and I know its branches and I keep adding to it and

00:13:30.820 adding to it and shifting pieces around from time to time.

00:13:33.860 And so that's how I remember things.

00:13:35.640 And I forget a lot of what I read, a tremendous amount of what I read.

00:13:38.780 That's now and then something pops up and it sticks, you know, that changes the complete

00:13:42.820 perspective for me a little bit, for me to know that your views obviously has been vested

00:13:48.320 for many years, but you're also constantly working on it.

00:13:50.320 I guess this leads to me wanting to ask this question from you is I think for my opinion,

00:13:55.560 I think I run a business here.

00:13:57.180 I'm an entrepreneur.

00:13:57.980 We do what we do with value attainment.

00:13:59.600 I believe the people that make it to the top of any space, they learn how to process issues

00:14:04.520 better than others.

00:14:05.320 They learn how to put things together, a system that helps them make a good decision.

00:14:09.980 And then from there, they come out with their opinion, maybe based on some facts, based on

00:14:13.500 whatever they collect together, data to say, this is what I believe about God.

00:14:17.600 This is what I believe about politics.

00:14:19.680 Here's how I view economics.

00:14:21.160 This is what I think works.

00:14:22.320 This is what I think is the way we ought to live the 12 rules for life, right?

00:14:26.040 Here's what I think boys need to do or women or men, or this is based on this.

00:14:30.300 What do you do?

00:14:31.180 What is your processing when a topic enters your mind?

00:14:34.280 How are you taking the next necessary step to come up with an answer or a belief that

00:14:39.560 you're very comfortable saying, this is what I believe in?

00:14:41.700 I know one of the questions you don't like to be asked is, do you believe in God?

00:14:44.820 And your response is phenomenal because you said, one, I don't know what believe means

00:14:48.360 to you and I don't know what God means to you because the word believe in God may be

00:14:51.680 a different meaning to me.

00:14:52.840 So that's a very interesting answer to give.

00:14:55.420 But how do you process issues here when a new topic comes out to you?

00:14:59.800 Kavanaugh comes out.

00:15:01.380 Everybody goes through the issue with Kavanaugh, right?

00:15:03.480 And you come out and, you know, afterwards, like, well, I think he needs to, you know.

00:15:07.680 Well, I usually do think about it.

00:15:09.500 But I want to know, like, what's the step?

00:15:10.900 Is it a step process?

00:15:11.720 I'd love to hear that part.

00:15:12.780 Sure.

00:15:12.960 Well, I mostly, I can think in images.

00:15:15.880 And so if I'm building things, because I like to do carpentry and fix houses and that

00:15:19.860 sort of thing.

00:15:20.380 And so I like to build things.

00:15:21.480 And if I'm figuring out how to build something, I can picture it.

00:15:25.660 And so I can think in pictures.

00:15:26.980 But I don't usually think in pictures.

00:15:28.820 I usually think in words.

00:15:30.280 And I think pretty formally in words.

00:15:32.360 Like if I'm sitting down, let's say, with the Kavanaugh issue, there was a question.

00:15:36.000 The question Eric Weinstein asked was, was there an alternative to him being confirmed

00:15:41.140 or not confirmed?

00:15:41.920 Because he sort of thought both of those wouldn't bode well for the country.

00:15:45.500 And I thought, okay, well, what could the option possibly be?

00:15:49.480 So I think that through in words.

00:15:51.080 And then I think, well, he could, well, I eventually thought, well, he could be nominated.

00:15:56.760 And then how would I feel in a situation like that?

00:15:59.640 Well, my nomination would be very contentious.

00:16:02.720 Is there a way that I could help dampen the contentiousness and still retain my reputation?

00:16:10.160 I thought, well, you could be nominated and resign.

00:16:12.300 What would be the advantages to that?

00:16:13.720 And then I lay out one side of the argument and then I lay out the other and another and

00:16:17.960 another and have an argument and like an inside.

00:16:20.860 With yourself.

00:16:21.220 Oh, absolutely.

00:16:21.980 That's what you're doing.

00:16:22.760 Oh, absolutely.

00:16:23.360 Got it.

00:16:23.740 Yeah.

00:16:23.920 Basically what you do, and this is really what you do when you think, is you, you know,

00:16:29.320 if thinking is an internalized conversation, which at least is one form of thinking, is

00:16:33.920 that you spin off avatars of yourself and you say, well, you take this position and you

00:16:39.260 take this position and you take this position and then you have each fictional part of yourself

00:16:45.000 lay out the argument and, and argue it through.

00:16:47.840 So for example, when I write, so that's another thing that I've done a lot of to prepare for

00:16:52.700 my lectures.

00:16:53.560 You know, I've written, well, I've written two books and one of them took 15 years.

00:16:57.260 I wrote three hours a day for 15 years every day.

00:16:59.840 That was the first book.

00:17:00.820 That's a technical book.

00:17:01.640 It's a very technical book.

00:17:02.540 It's a very hard book that.

00:17:03.740 So, so I laid out, I laid out that argument, but the way I did it was, well, first of all,

00:17:08.840 you generate your ideas.

00:17:10.520 Okay.

00:17:10.720 That's the first part.

00:17:11.660 There's actually a technical process that goes along with this.

00:17:14.300 I use a computer in a particular way.

00:17:16.360 So imagine I've laid out an essay.

00:17:18.520 Okay.

00:17:18.740 Well, then what I'll do is I usually use two screens.

00:17:21.860 I take a paragraph out, put it on the other screen, break it into sentences.

00:17:28.220 Okay.

00:17:28.440 So I put spaces between all the sentences.

00:17:30.520 Got it.

00:17:30.820 Then I look and see if the sentences are organized properly, if that's the proper order, try to

00:17:36.020 reconstruct them so that they make more sense, they flow better.

00:17:40.720 Then I take each sentence one at a time and try to write a better version of the sentence,

00:17:45.020 maybe three or four times.

00:17:46.600 And every time I try to write a better version of the sentence, I try to think of all the

00:17:49.920 ways that sentence is wrong and could be fixed.

00:17:52.280 So at the level of the word, at the level of the phrase, at the level of the sentence.

00:17:55.780 That's technical.

00:17:56.520 Oh, you bet.

00:17:57.220 Like for Maps of Meaning, the first book, I probably wrote every sentence in that book

00:18:00.380 50 times.

00:18:01.200 Are you kidding me?

00:18:02.080 Oh, no.

00:18:02.280 Absolutely.

00:18:03.200 And then, well, there's more.

00:18:04.640 So then I'll put the paragraph back together.

00:18:07.900 And if it's better than the original paragraph, then I'll put it in.

00:18:11.300 So then I have a replacement for it.

00:18:13.300 But then also imagine it's a chapter.

00:18:16.000 Well, then the chapter has a structure.

00:18:18.800 So I'll outline the structure.

00:18:20.740 So this is real helpful too if you're writing a chapter.

00:18:23.560 It's like, well, boil it down to 10 sentences.

00:18:29.180 So you've written a chapter.

00:18:30.040 Boil a chapter down to 10 sentences.

00:18:31.040 You've got a chapter, write a 10-sentence outline.

00:18:34.380 And that forces you to condense what you wrote.

00:18:37.380 And with 10 sentences, you can see the arguments.

00:18:39.920 Does that argument make sense?

00:18:41.560 Then you can cut and paste the paragraphs from the essay back into that structure.

00:18:46.460 And if you do that three or four times, then you'll have a very, very tight argument.

00:18:50.640 I have a writing guide on my website at jordanbpeterson.com under products.

00:18:55.400 It's free.

00:18:56.140 It's just a Word document, but it outlines how to do this.

00:18:59.260 Imagine if you're writing.

00:19:01.160 So here's what you have to get right if you're writing.

00:19:03.900 The whole argument has to make sense as a whole.

00:19:06.280 Okay, you can think rather unclearly and still make an argument that works as a whole.

00:19:13.240 Sometimes I read essays written by intuitive students, and the essay works as a whole.

00:19:18.500 Like there's a good idea in it, but it's very badly written.

00:19:21.540 But there's an idea there.

00:19:22.680 So it sort of succeeds at the highest level.

00:19:25.420 But then if something's written real well, it's every word is the right word.

00:19:29.600 Every phrase is the right phrase.

00:19:31.220 The phrases are put into sentences properly.

00:19:33.220 The sentences are organized into paragraphs properly, and you have to edit at every one

00:19:37.580 of those levels.

00:19:37.900 That's why I said piano.

00:19:38.820 So it has to be like if one, you know, pianist listened to another person play, and one is

00:19:42.900 off.

00:19:43.160 They catch it, right?

00:19:43.980 Yeah, right.

00:19:44.300 A regular person's not going to catch it.

00:19:45.460 Yeah.

00:19:45.740 So you're going to that level of perfection.

00:19:47.980 Well, then I also read everything out loud.

00:19:50.260 Do you seek perfection in that area?

00:19:53.880 No, but what I seek, I wouldn't say I seek perfection.

00:19:57.180 What I seek is that I can't do it any better.

00:19:59.820 So I know a book is done when I can't write it any better.

00:20:03.500 Yeah, that's right.

00:20:04.180 I max my ability out.

00:20:05.500 So if I can't, and if I'm at the point where when I'm starting to edit, I'm not sure if

00:20:11.200 it's better, then it's time to quit.

00:20:12.820 Interesting.

00:20:13.440 And I also often, if I'm writing, like I'll write something and then wait, like you have

00:20:18.960 to wait a couple of weeks to look at it again.

00:20:20.820 Because often when you're writing and you reread it, you read what you think you wrote

00:20:25.940 because you're still, you still have the ideas in your head that, that are part of the cloud

00:20:29.900 of ideas.

00:20:30.820 And it's not until you forget the context in some sense that you can actually see what

00:20:35.240 you wrote.

00:20:36.220 And so there has to be pauses in your writing as well.

00:20:39.020 Do you have a method for turning off all the noise?

00:20:41.240 I mean, you have a family, you have kids, so is there, and you have things that you do.

00:20:44.720 So what is your method for turning off all the noise?

00:20:46.920 I'm like a junkyard dog, man.

00:20:48.580 It's like, don't come in and bother me when I'm writing.

00:20:51.820 And like, it's been somewhat hard on my family, particularly on my wife, because, you know,

00:20:56.420 like I said, from 1985 to 1999, I wrote three hours a day.

00:21:01.780 And the rule was, don't bother me when I'm writing, like leave me alone.

00:21:05.980 And the reason for that would be, you know, I'd be working on something and I'd have like

00:21:09.840 half an hour of thoughts in my head stacked up to make an argument.

00:21:13.940 And then someone would interrupt me and I'd lose all of it.

00:21:17.460 It's like, that's no good.

00:21:18.820 And so I got, well, I have a mental image.

00:21:21.180 It's like there's barbed wire.

00:21:22.940 It's a barbed wire junkyard and I'm a junkyard dog.

00:21:26.120 Do you ever lose it and it doesn't come back?

00:21:27.580 Oh, definitely.

00:21:28.880 Oh, for sure.

00:21:29.440 Are you a math scientist type or no?

00:21:31.300 Yeah.

00:21:31.960 So, okay.

00:21:32.580 So you do get frustrated, get, you know, upset.

00:21:36.400 You have that side as well?

00:21:37.920 Oh, definitely.

00:21:38.840 Okay.

00:21:39.380 So do you get along with yourself typically?

00:21:41.860 Like, uh, do you know, you know what I'm telling when I say you get along with yourself?

00:21:44.180 Like, you know, sometimes I'm, you know, I enjoy driving.

00:21:47.420 I enjoy my own company at times.

00:21:48.720 Like I'm a guy that for me, therapy is going to the movies by myself at 10 o'clock in the

00:21:52.160 morning, telling my assistant, I got to do something.

00:21:53.840 I come back with popcorn all over my shirt.

00:21:56.200 That to me is therapy.

00:21:57.260 And believe it or not, I think in movies.

00:21:59.540 But do you get along with Jordan Peterson yourself?

00:22:02.360 Like, do you have battles internally when you're battling the topic or an issue or a theory?

00:22:07.020 Oh, I have battles with myself all the time.

00:22:09.020 That's what thinking is.

00:22:10.280 You know, like, see, people think that thinking is you encounter something and thoughts appear

00:22:15.660 in your head and those are your thoughts.

00:22:17.120 It's like that's, you're just barely getting started at that point because you have to

00:22:20.620 take those thoughts and then you have to critically assess them.

00:22:23.720 And that's really, that's where the thinking starts.

00:22:26.180 And that's based on what?

00:22:27.220 That's based on experiences.

00:22:29.460 That's based on data.

00:22:31.020 That's based on research.

00:22:32.260 That's based on influence from a friend or a professor to say, John, what do you think

00:22:35.720 about?

00:22:36.200 What else would you, is it also based on the fact that you're not being lazy about the

00:22:40.680 fact that you're willing to put the additional minutes that you get into a topic to say,

00:22:44.380 I'm going to read a little bit more about this topic.

00:22:46.240 And then is there the idea with conflict?

00:22:48.480 Would you say, some of it is some of it.

00:22:49.980 And I also outlined this to some degree in this writing guide that I, that I mentioned

00:22:53.900 is like, well, the first question might be, well, why write or why make an argument?

00:22:59.460 And the answer is, well, if you're writing to figure out what you think, then you're

00:23:03.800 going to use what you think to guide your action.

00:23:05.780 And the consequence of that is going to be how your life turns out.

00:23:09.080 So I'm dead serious about what I write because, because I know what the pathway is.

00:23:13.740 It's like, you don't, you don't communicate in a false manner because if you do, you will

00:23:18.400 warp the structure that guides your actions.

00:23:20.160 And you will absolutely, absolutely, 100% suffer for that.

00:23:24.480 I mean, one of the things I've learned as a clinical psychologist is that I've never seen

00:23:28.580 anyone, it's really a terrifying thing.

00:23:30.700 I've never seen anyone get away with anything ever.

00:23:34.720 The chickens always come home to roost.

00:23:37.160 So, and sometimes it might, you know, let's say you get away with something.

00:23:39.760 It's like, yeah, you think so, man.

00:23:41.640 You wait five years from now, seven years from now, it'll come back.

00:23:45.540 Is that karma?

00:23:47.140 It's more like, yes, I think it's the same idea, but it's more like you can't, you don't

00:23:54.500 have the power to manipulate reality.

00:23:57.300 Like you have the power to bring about reality in some sense because you confront potential

00:24:02.100 and through your actions and, and, and your communicative intent, you turn potential into

00:24:07.100 reality, but you don't have the, you don't have the power to bend reality without it snapping

00:24:11.700 back at you.

00:24:13.040 You don't think so.

00:24:14.340 So you don't think visionaries and influencers have the ability to bend reality?

00:24:18.380 No, I don't think they bend it.

00:24:19.600 I think that they, they, they, I mean, you can bring new things into being, but you can't,

00:24:25.960 you can't get away with a falsehood.

00:24:28.340 No, you can definitely bring new things into being.

00:24:30.440 You can't get away with a falsehood.

00:24:32.060 Yes, that's it.

00:24:33.140 Maybe, okay, makes sense.

00:24:35.100 And, and you can't get away with weak thinking either because, I mean, any more than you can

00:24:40.160 get away with improper action.

00:24:41.620 It just doesn't work.

00:24:43.320 So you're, you're contending.

00:24:45.060 It's, it's why, I mean, one of the themes in my writing is the danger of falsehood and

00:24:50.580 at any, at every level, it's like, well, if you tell the truth to the degree that you

00:24:54.760 can, or at least don't lie, that I think that's rule eight, then you have reality on

00:25:00.140 your side.

00:25:00.860 You got to decide, man, you want reality on your side or do you want reality against

00:25:04.680 you?

00:25:05.900 I wouldn't recommend the whole reality against you thing because you're not going to

00:25:09.780 win.

00:25:10.200 You're going to get flattened.

00:25:11.060 And so I'm very careful with what I say and I'm very careful with what I write.

00:25:16.360 Like I try to, if I write something down, it's not an opinion.

00:25:19.660 I mean, obviously it is because it's my, my thought.

00:25:23.080 Sure. 0.98

00:25:23.360 But it's, it's, I try to take those sentences and beat them to death.

00:25:28.220 I'm trying only to leave on the paper things I cannot get under and flip over.

00:25:34.140 So, and that's with every, literally it's every sentence.

00:25:37.380 Yeah.

00:25:37.560 Because it seems like for the most part, when somebody, when you, when you're sitting with

00:25:40.760 these interviews and people are asking you questions about whatever topic having to do

00:25:43.980 with politics, it seems like you've recited that answer 50 times to somebody like, you're

00:25:50.600 just kind of dancing with them.

00:25:52.000 And like, you know, say there's a series of a thousand questions.

00:25:55.520 It's like an actor who's role-played these things so much, except you're not the actor.

00:25:59.900 You're a real life person that believes these things that you're reciting back to people

00:26:03.440 because it's been stored here for a while.

00:26:04.740 So it doesn't seem like anything's coming off the cuff.

00:26:06.940 It seems like this has been already thought about and talked about for yourself.

00:26:10.540 Yeah, I try not to answer questions that I haven't thought about.

00:26:13.300 Well, here's a question for you.

00:26:14.400 I mean, you've been viewed a few billion times.

00:26:16.080 What do you not know a lot about that if asked about, you don't really have that strong

00:26:20.740 of an opinion research on those topics?

00:26:22.580 Physics.

00:26:23.600 Really?

00:26:24.160 Quantum physics.

00:26:24.920 Okay.

00:26:25.400 No, mathematics.

00:26:27.000 Mathematics.

00:26:27.380 No, I'm not, I'm not particularly smart mathematically.

00:26:30.060 I've had students who were very gifted mathematically.

00:26:32.120 Wow, piano, I would have thought you would have been a math guy because piano somewhat

00:26:35.180 is a math formula.

00:26:36.360 No, my math intelligence is pretty average.

00:26:38.660 So, I mean, there's lots of things I don't know much about.

00:26:41.340 I don't know much about economics.

00:26:43.140 Now, I'm not sure anyone knows much about economics, but they might.

00:26:46.220 But as a technical science, I certainly don't know much about it. 0.87

00:26:49.820 So there's plenty of room, there's plenty of places where I'm, you know, woefully ignorant.

00:26:54.920 I don't know nearly as much about history as I should.

00:26:57.720 It's quite embarrassing, really.

00:26:59.080 Book a day and you don't know a lot about history.

00:27:00.920 I think you're probably downplaying yourself.

00:27:02.740 Well, there's a lot to know.

00:27:04.920 And, you know, I know enough history to know what, to have some sense of what I don't know.

00:27:10.120 And, man, it's a big expanse.

00:27:12.440 I'd like to know a lot more.

00:27:14.040 Why don't we talk about what you do talk a lot about, men.

00:27:17.460 You talk a lot about, you know, what's going on right now with men.

00:27:20.340 And for me, like, I'll ask this question maybe in a way that will get a different perspective for you.

00:27:24.740 For me, I grew up with a father that taught a lot of the stuff you write in your book, The 12 Rules for Life.

00:27:31.300 You know, stand up straight.

00:27:32.340 My dad's, people ask me, what has your dad told you the most?

00:27:35.940 Never be afraid of the truth.

00:27:37.460 If I tell you how many times, I don't even know how many times.

00:27:40.620 He's probably told me that thing a million times.

00:27:42.340 Never be afraid of the truth.

00:27:43.340 Just say, never be afraid.

00:27:44.340 And it's part of your, one of the rules of life, rules for life.

00:27:48.360 So...

00:27:48.760 See, I think it's wrong.

00:27:50.000 You should be afraid of the truth, but you should be more afraid of falsehood.

00:27:54.220 See, and that's no criticism of your dad's advice.

00:27:57.440 But people are afraid of the truth because often if you reveal it, it causes conflict in the moment.

00:28:02.000 All day long.

00:28:02.720 Oh, yes, certainly.

00:28:03.440 All day long.

00:28:04.080 But it straightens out the future.

00:28:04.620 Sometimes they don't even want to know it.

00:28:05.800 Oh, very often.

00:28:06.700 Sometimes it's very scary to even know about it.

00:28:08.920 Yeah, otherwise it's trivial.

00:28:10.200 But life is boring if we don't pursue that side.

00:28:12.160 I mean, what do you do if you go living, not wanting to pursue the truth?

00:28:14.800 To me, it's kind of like, what is the purpose if we're not at least trying to test our own beliefs to see if we are thinking right or not?

00:28:20.460 If we're not thinking right, what the hell is the purpose of this life?

00:28:22.600 And we've just got eight years to be here and be gone.

00:28:24.820 We may as well have a little bit of friction to try to figure it out.

00:28:27.000 Yes, well, telling the truth is definitely an adventure.

00:28:29.960 And so if you want an adventure, that's a good one.

00:28:31.900 Seeking the truth or telling the truth?

00:28:33.480 Both.

00:28:34.020 Okay.

00:28:34.400 But seeking for sure, but also telling.

00:28:37.580 What do you mean by that, telling the truth is an adventure?

00:28:39.480 Look, look, look, so, you know, one of the things that you're counseled to do, let's say, if you do a lot of media interviews, is to figure out what it is that you want to accomplish with the media interview.

00:28:49.440 Okay.

00:28:49.620 So you have a goal.

00:28:50.660 It's like, here's what I want to accomplish with this interview.

00:28:52.960 And potentially there's some use in that.

00:28:56.480 But another way of going about it is to just say what you think and see what happens.

00:29:01.300 That's an adventure because you don't know what the outcome is going to be.

00:29:04.220 So, look, there's this old idea that it's necessary to have faith in the truth.

00:29:08.900 And so here's a way of thinking about that.

00:29:11.220 Someone asks you a question and you might think, well, here's the outcome I want.

00:29:14.800 And so here's how I'm going to answer that question.

00:29:17.100 So that's one way of approaching it.

00:29:18.540 But another way of approaching it is you ask me a question, I'm going to think about the answer, and I'm just going to tell you what I think.

00:29:25.740 And it doesn't matter what the outcome is because I'm willing to see what the outcome will be predicated on the idea that there isn't a better outcome than the one that truth produces.

00:29:36.240 Even if it's harsh and terrible in the short term, and sometimes it is, it's like there isn't a better way of doing it.

00:29:41.600 Now, you might say, well, how do you know that?

00:29:43.980 And the answer is, well, I don't know that.

00:29:45.460 That's why it's an article of faith because I believe, and I believe this deeply, the being that you produce as a consequence of telling the truth is good by definition.

00:29:56.940 Even though it's harsh and often uncomfortable because you get in trouble.

00:30:01.760 Yes, but your faith, to me, seems very mathematical.

00:30:07.520 Like when I see your answers about your faith, like you say, I choose to believe that there is a God, but I don't know.

00:30:14.360 So it's a very logical answer you're given, right?

00:30:16.620 I said act as if God exists.

00:30:18.380 Act as if God exists.

00:30:19.040 Right, which is a good definition of belief as far as I'm concerned.

00:30:21.500 Yeah, sure, yeah.

00:30:21.820 You know, believing in something you have not yet seen, right?

00:30:23.820 You see the definition of something.

00:30:24.820 Well, it's what you stake yourself on.

00:30:25.780 Right.

00:30:26.080 You know, like you think, well, how do you know if you believe something?

00:30:28.600 Well, the answer is you stake your life on it.

00:30:30.880 That's how you know.

00:30:32.020 And that's something, I suppose, to the degree that I've been able to, I've staked my life on.

00:30:36.380 It's like, well, do I believe it?

00:30:37.880 Well, it depends on what you mean.

00:30:39.140 I'm acting it out.

00:30:40.680 I'm putting myself on the line.

00:30:42.520 So that seems to be a reasonable definition of belief.

00:30:45.320 You know, if someone says, you know, do you think there's a God in heaven?

00:30:48.520 It's like, well, I don't know how to answer that question because I don't know exactly what you mean.

00:30:51.860 That's what I'm saying.

00:30:52.560 The logical part to me is more honest.

00:30:54.300 I think the logical side of it is more of an honest way of looking at it, saying it's a bet.

00:30:59.280 I don't know.

00:31:00.480 You know, I'm not 100%, but I'm betting there is.

00:31:03.360 If I was to bet to see if there is or there isn't, my bet is, yes, there is.

00:31:07.240 That's the life I want to live.

00:31:08.320 And I think I'm living a better life if I believe there is.

00:31:10.340 Well, it's also, there's also, there's psychological elements that are associated with that, too, that are important.

00:31:15.180 So one of the things I learned from Carl Jung, who I have great respect for, is that we necessarily exist inside a hierarchy of values.

00:31:22.980 And that manifests itself all the time because in order to act, things have to come to a point, right?

00:31:30.100 For you to do something, you have to decide at that moment that that thing is more important to do than anything else that you're doing.

00:31:35.520 And it isn't only how you act.

00:31:37.540 It's even how you perceive.

00:31:38.500 Because when you look at the world, you look at some things, one thing, rather than all the other things you could look at.

00:31:43.880 So even to look at something, and this is technically true, you have to value the thing that you're looking at.

00:31:49.780 Okay, so you're always using values to interact with the world, perceptually and in terms of action.

00:31:54.780 Now, those values are organized.

00:31:56.320 Otherwise, you're a chaotic mess.

00:31:57.880 So they're organized.

00:31:59.000 There's some consistency in what you do, right?

00:32:01.380 There's a narrative driving it.

00:32:02.720 That's another way of looking at it.

00:32:04.060 It means you exist inside a value hierarchy.

00:32:06.460 Some things are more important than others.

00:32:08.320 Some of the things that are important to you are even more important than other things that are important.

00:32:12.040 To other people.

00:32:12.700 Well, to you.

00:32:13.680 Sure.

00:32:13.880 To other people, period.

00:32:14.960 But you're pointing towards something.

00:32:18.100 Now, you might be fragmented and pointing to a bunch of contradictory things, but that's not helpful.

00:32:22.780 Let's assume that you're a reasonably integrated person.

00:32:25.300 Okay.

00:32:25.580 And so you're pursuing something of value.

00:32:30.460 It's at the top of your hierarchy.

00:32:32.700 Functionally speaking, whatever that is at the top of your hierarchy, that's God for you.

00:32:37.220 And you might say, well, I don't believe in God.

00:32:38.920 It's like, well, yeah, but you still have, you either have.

00:32:41.960 Something that's your God.

00:32:42.600 You have an ultimate value that performs the function that a deity would perform.

00:32:46.860 I agree with that.

00:32:47.460 Yeah.

00:32:47.720 I agree with that.

00:32:48.600 Let me ask this question.

00:32:49.920 Do you think a lot of men today struggle with that?

00:32:53.580 Maybe not even men.

00:32:54.620 Men and women today.

00:32:56.000 Because there's a lot of different movements that you see.

00:32:58.900 So it's almost like, you know, there was a band back in the days and the night.

00:33:03.220 They're still around.

00:33:03.840 They perform in Vegas.

00:33:04.680 They're called Boys to Men, right?

00:33:06.120 We're going from boys to men.

00:33:07.420 We are now men.

00:33:08.260 And, you know, life has changed for us.

00:33:09.820 I think we're going from men to boys at times today.

00:33:12.600 You know, sometimes guys are feeling bad about being too manly.

00:33:16.540 Like, here's a man's man.

00:33:17.740 Oh, my gosh.

00:33:18.220 He's a man's man.

00:33:18.900 That's not how you're supposed to be.

00:33:19.900 You don't have any empathy or feelings for other people.

00:33:22.340 And then sometimes on the other side is, you know, you're not bossy enough.

00:33:25.220 You're not this enough.

00:33:26.160 Do you think there is a identity crisis right now for both men and women that they don't

00:33:30.800 really know what position do I need to be to be a real man or a real woman?

00:33:33.760 You think there's some of that going on?

00:33:34.780 I think let's start with the male part of that.

00:33:37.360 So I think that right now our society is criticizing itself.

00:33:43.140 That's part of, let's call it, patriarchy theory.

00:33:45.840 And the idea is the hierarchies that are characteristic of our society are male-dominated and predicated

00:33:52.340 on power and tyranny.

00:33:53.760 Okay, so I don't buy that.

00:33:55.520 I think that any hierarchical structure can degenerate into tyranny.

00:33:59.840 But I think that most of the hierarchical structures in the West are about as good as hierarchical

00:34:04.160 structures ever get.

00:34:05.520 And if you think we can do without hierarchical structures, then you don't know what you're

00:34:08.980 talking about.

00:34:09.600 Because you can't organize your perception without a hierarchical structure.

00:34:12.680 And you can't organize people in terms of pursuing a valuable goal.

00:34:17.040 You can't even say that a goal is valuable without producing a hierarchy.

00:34:20.240 So there's no getting rid of hierarchies.

00:34:21.760 Now, then you can say, well, yeah, but the hierarchy is based on power and it's corrupt.

00:34:25.260 I don't think that's true in the West, although hierarchies can become corrupt.

00:34:29.520 Okay, so let's say you do buy that, though.

00:34:31.360 The hierarchy is patriarchal and it's corrupt.

00:34:34.080 Well, then let's say you're a young man and you're ambitious.

00:34:36.940 Well, then obviously you're corrupt, too, because your ambition is to take your place in 0.74

00:34:40.840 the corrupt hierarchy.

00:34:41.740 And so, because the hierarchies aren't tyrannical and because they're based on competence, your

00:34:47.560 ambition, if you have any sense, is actually to become competent.

00:34:50.880 But if you confuse that with a power drive, and there's tremendous confusion about that,

00:34:55.260 then you confuse young men because they think if they're ambitious and they want to get

00:34:58.820 ahead, let's say, they want to be useful and competent, that they're somehow buying into

00:35:02.820 the tyranny.

00:35:03.860 So you actually punish the young men for their virtues.

00:35:07.180 And I actually think that that's part and parcel of this critical process, because I

00:35:11.000 think that one of the things that drives the people who are theorizing about the tyrannical

00:35:14.980 patriarchy is that they absolutely detest competence.

00:35:18.240 And it's a deep war.

00:35:20.160 So it's very annoying.

00:35:21.740 It's very hard on young men, but it's also hard on young women.

00:35:24.940 So it's hard on young women because they end up with partners who are confused.

00:35:28.580 They're confused about the relationship between masculine and feminine.

00:35:32.400 They're confused about what role they should play out in the world.

00:35:36.440 Apparently, it seems to be fine if a woman wants to play a patriarchal role. 1.00

00:35:41.100 That seems to be perfectly fine ethically.

00:35:43.040 I don't understand how that can be the case if the patriarchy itself is corrupt.

00:35:46.960 It's corrupt, but it's okay if women occupy the positions of power. 1.00

00:35:49.940 It's like, okay, how does that make sense? 0.83

00:35:52.320 Well, none of this makes sense.

00:35:53.880 Part of the reason it doesn't make sense is because it isn't designed to make sense.

00:35:57.260 It's designed to be destructive.

00:35:59.000 Now, there's more complications than that.

00:36:01.460 There's lots of reasons why people are unstable in their roles now.

00:36:06.260 And one of the big reasons is the introduction of the birth control pill.

00:36:09.380 So we still haven't adapted to that by any stretch of the imagination.

00:36:13.700 God knows how long it'll take.

00:36:15.580 It's a huge biological transformation for women to have voluntary control over the reproductive function. 1.00

00:36:20.800 You can't possibly overstate how massive a technological revolution that is.

00:36:27.540 It's like a biological mutation.

00:36:29.680 You know, it's like we're a different species.

00:36:31.440 It's really a big deal.

00:36:33.520 And so there's plenty of waves produced by that, and we haven't sorted that out at all.

00:36:38.880 Do you think that is becoming the norm that, you know, boys, like we had a guy today, Trent, ask the question, hey, I'd love to ask, you know, Dr. Peterson, I'm a new father today, raising kids today.

00:36:49.900 How different is it to be a father today than before?

00:36:52.220 Do you think he who controls the mic dictates how people should live and think, like men and women?

00:36:59.740 And today the mic is controlled by media, and media is telling us everything, and it's controlled by 80% on one side.

00:37:06.460 Do you think that's where the influence is coming from, and that's where the whole postmodernism's influence in the younger generation?

00:37:11.640 Well, I think it's hard to say.

00:37:14.080 I mean, the criticisms that we've been discussing are in some sense justified because it's reasonable to look at a hierarchical structure and to be concerned about the degree to which it becomes tyrannical.

00:37:25.540 The hierarchical structures tilt towards tyranny.

00:37:28.240 You have to be awake, and you have to be ethical in order to keep them straight.

00:37:32.280 But the criticism has gone so far, as far as I'm concerned, that it's critiquing the entire idea.

00:37:38.380 It's gone way down to the bottom and critiquing even the idea of the sovereign individual, which I think is a catastrophic problem.

00:37:45.900 And it's so interesting to see the response to people after my talks, say, or as a consequence of watching my lectures, I have people come up to me every night because I talk to about 150 people a night after the talks.

00:37:57.860 And so many of them are happy because they've put their lives on firm foundation because they found a little bit of encouragement in my lectures, saying, look, it's good for you to go take your place in the world.

00:38:08.260 Have some ambition, have a vision, have a goal, have a strategy, try to be a good person, not because it's your duty precisely, because that's the proper way to live.

00:38:19.940 We're in danger of undermining all of that, and it's not good for people.

00:38:23.600 One of the things that I've really learned, for example, recently, or learned to articulate better, is that there's a very tight relationship between aspiration and responsibility.

00:38:33.440 So let's say, well, the first question might be, do you need to aspire to something?

00:38:38.680 And the answer is, well, yes, because you have to do something.

00:38:41.020 If you just sit there, you'll die.

00:38:42.760 You can't just sit there.

00:38:43.860 You have to go act out in the world.

00:38:45.640 Okay, so act towards what?

00:38:47.940 Well, that's whatever your aspiration is.

00:38:49.840 You have to have an aim.

00:38:51.200 Okay, well, what should the aim be?

00:38:53.040 Well, it should be something worth doing, let's say.

00:38:55.500 Why do something that you don't feel is worth doing?

00:38:58.480 What do you think is worth doing?

00:38:59.660 Well, if you watch other people, and you judge when they're doing something worthwhile, you usually judge them positively if you see that they're taking responsibility, at least for themselves.

00:39:09.260 What, do you want to be completely useless so other people have to take care of you? 0.99

00:39:12.080 That's pretty pathetic. 1.00

00:39:13.240 And maybe you could get your act together so you're taking care of yourself and your family. 1.00

00:39:17.340 And maybe you could even do better than that and take care of yourself and your family and your community.

00:39:21.820 Well, good for you.

00:39:23.340 That's responsibility, and that's an aim.

00:39:25.300 Well, here's one of the things that's cool about that, is that your life doesn't have meaning without aspiration or an aim.

00:39:30.840 Okay, so you need a hierarchy of values.

00:39:32.740 There's got to be something at the top.

00:39:34.280 It's got to be something important.

00:39:35.860 If you don't have that, your life doesn't have any meaning.

00:39:38.280 So if you criticize the hierarchy, or even the idea of hierarchy, you destroy the idea of aspiration.

00:39:45.440 And then people have nothing.

00:39:47.220 Well, that's not helpful.

00:39:48.460 People are built for a struggle, and they're built for a weight.

00:39:50.980 And you want to take on a heavy burden voluntarily.

00:39:53.700 See if you can put yourself together.

00:39:55.580 See what you can do out in the world while you're waiting to die.

00:39:58.780 It's an all-in game.

00:40:00.120 It better be worthwhile.

00:40:02.100 And so there's a tight relationship between responsibility and aspiration and hierarchy.

00:40:07.780 And when you criticize those things, you get rid of the aspiration.

00:40:10.580 But why are those ideas doing good today?

00:40:13.040 Like, why are those, the idea of, you know, feeling entitled or victimhood mentality,

00:40:18.140 why are those ideas doing good today?

00:40:20.560 Why is it becoming a norm to say, people are feeling like I'm a victim,

00:40:23.700 but you don't understand what I'm going through.

00:40:25.140 You don't understand where I'm at.

00:40:25.840 It feels like there's a lot of that going on today,

00:40:27.500 versus a stand-up and do something about your life and take some responsibility.

00:40:30.660 Why are those ideas getting so much attention today?

00:40:33.080 Or is it something that's always been like this?

00:40:35.060 I think, in some sense, it's an eternal battle.

00:40:38.100 I mean, the story of Cain and Abel is a story about that.

00:40:40.840 It's about responsible, proper living, and the jealousy that might be engendered while observing that.

00:40:46.760 So it's a very, very old problem.

00:40:48.700 I think, well, the problem is...

00:40:51.620 Envy? Are you saying envy?

00:40:53.000 Oh, definitely envy. Yes, definitely envy.

00:40:55.820 I don't know if you...

00:40:56.240 Well, just think about discussion of the 1%. 0.85

00:40:58.640 It's like, well, those evil 1%. 0.92

00:41:00.540 Do you know how much money you have to make in order to be in the top 1% in worldwide terms?

00:41:06.520 Oh, worldwide terms.

00:41:07.520 Yeah, because, well, we don't...

00:41:09.240 $53,000 a year?

00:41:10.980 It's $32,000.

00:41:11.860 $32,000.

00:41:12.440 We made a video on that.

00:41:13.480 $32,000 a year.

00:41:14.140 If you make $32,000 a year, you're in the top 1%.

00:41:16.520 Yes.

00:41:17.080 So it's like, well, why do you draw the boundaries so that the top 1% are people that aren't you?

00:41:22.700 If it's not envy, if you're doing okay...

00:41:24.800 I mean, you're doing okay with, say, an average working class salary.

00:41:29.540 You're doing okay.

00:41:30.280 I'm not saying you're doing great.

00:41:31.480 You're not starving.

00:41:32.440 You've got heat.

00:41:33.140 You've got air conditioning.

00:41:34.580 You've got access to electronic technology.

00:41:37.000 You've got some ability to move forward into the future.

00:41:39.860 So you're doing all right.

00:41:40.880 And by historical standards, you're doing damn fine.

00:41:43.840 So why all of a sudden is the 1% that you're envious of only those people who are richer than you,

00:41:48.320 when you're also part of the 1% worldwide, if that's not envy?

00:41:51.520 So I know who the rich is.

00:41:53.140 The rich is always someone who has more money than me.

00:41:56.040 That's who the rich is.

00:41:57.380 I don't put myself in that category, you know, especially if I'm pursuing this victim mentality.

00:42:02.060 And then the other part of the victim mentality is, well, you know,

00:42:04.780 let's say you can have a meaningful life by adopting responsibility, but it's a heavy load.

00:42:08.720 You've got to be awake and alert and on your feet and moving towards something difficult.

00:42:12.520 You have to have some self-control and you have to sacrifice in the present so that the future is better.

00:42:17.760 It's complex.

00:42:18.780 You have to integrate a lot.

00:42:20.480 And when you take on some responsibility, your life has meaning.

00:42:23.080 Think, I want a meaningful life.

00:42:24.360 It's like, maybe you do.

00:42:25.860 If you're willing to take on the responsibility, what's the alternative?

00:42:29.380 Well, to garner a lot of unearned sympathy for your victimization position.

00:42:33.980 And to, at the same time, take down the people who are willing to take more responsibility than you.

00:42:38.360 It's a nasty game.

00:42:40.100 And I see it played out in the universities too.

00:42:41.780 I think if you quadrupled the salaries of sociologists, that most political correctness would go away.

00:42:47.860 I think they're jealous and envious because they see people who aren't any smarter than them doing way better out there in the capitalist world.

00:42:53.900 And that drives their envy and their hatred.

00:42:56.300 Even though they're unbelievably privileged in their positions as, let's say, sociology professors or social work professors or people who are on the faculties of education.

00:43:04.740 All disciplines that have become incredibly corrupt.

00:43:07.860 Envy.

00:43:08.160 Those are two things right there then.

00:43:09.680 Then we're talking media and we're talking about educational system.

00:43:12.980 And the influence of the media and the educational system, 80% is on the left.

00:43:17.240 Well, the media is a complicated, more complicated thing, I think.

00:43:20.420 Because I think what's happening in the mainstream media is that it's falling apart as a consequence of technological transformation.

00:43:27.500 And as it's doing so, it's polarizing.

00:43:29.480 You know, like, well, look, newspapers are having a hard time making any money, right?

00:43:33.840 We all know that.

00:43:34.780 And, of course, cable TV networks are losing all their viewers to things like YouTube.

00:43:39.560 Fault of people like you.

00:43:40.840 And so they're starting to disintegrate.

00:43:44.140 Well, when you start to disintegrate, you get more desperate.

00:43:46.840 And when you get more desperate, well, then you have to attract attention however you can.

00:43:50.500 And I think what we're seeing in the mainstream media is increasing focus on polarizing figures because that drives the remaining audience to view.

00:44:00.220 And so I think a lot of that's being driven by the underlying technological transformations.

00:44:04.300 So media solving for views rather than the truth is what you're saying.

00:44:07.700 Yeah, yeah.

00:44:08.280 So how do you feel about the media yourself when you think about the media?

00:44:11.460 Well, I have mixed feelings about it.

00:44:13.100 I mean, I've been treated very well by some journalists.

00:44:15.860 You know, there's a handful of Canadian journalists in particular.

00:44:18.380 I actually think they're the best journalists in Canada.

00:44:20.680 I hope that isn't mere personal bias who've taken a careful look at what I've been doing and saying and have been very supportive of me.

00:44:28.100 The Post Media Group in Canada, it's an aggregation of 200 newspapers, came out publicly in support of my stance on free speech a year and a half ago.

00:44:36.440 And at some cost to them because it was very contentious at that point.

00:44:39.640 So that's been good.

00:44:42.040 And, of course, the media, so to speak, has also enabled me to bring what I know or purport to know to a very broad audience.

00:44:50.860 And so that's a very positive thing.

00:44:52.920 I've had very, very stressful interactions with many, many journalists.

00:44:57.000 It's certainly been the most stressful part of my life over the last two years.

00:45:01.560 And some of it was absolutely reprehensible.

00:45:04.320 Some of the journalists, MSNBC News, appalling, appalling and amateurish.

00:45:10.420 So both at the same time, it's a bad combination.

00:45:13.920 Vice, another pit of snakes as far as I'm concerned.

00:45:17.540 People who interviewed me and then chopped up the interview to make it look as bad as they possibly could.

00:45:21.660 And that was all laid out by other people on YouTube who spliced back the original interviews and, you know, put out what I actually said.

00:45:29.900 What do you think about CNN?

00:45:30.640 CNN, I've had absolutely no contact with personally.

00:45:33.520 Ever.

00:45:33.680 I don't pay attention to them.

00:45:35.020 Fox.

00:45:36.420 Fox.

00:45:36.900 The Fox people have treated me very well.

00:45:39.020 Look, I don't pay a lot.

00:45:40.060 I ask this question for one reason.

00:45:41.960 Here's the reason why I'm asking this question for it.

00:45:43.680 So I'll sit with people on the left and the right.

00:45:46.240 We've had Gloria Allred, Jerry Springer. 0.99

00:45:48.460 But we've had Prager, Shapiro, McAfee in the middle, Ron Paul.

00:45:52.280 So you've got two left, two right, in the middle, weird.

00:45:54.920 I mean, we've got them all, right?

00:45:56.260 Because I'm trying to get clear for myself philosophically and politically to see if there's some clarity.

00:46:01.880 As an entrepreneur, what are some of the things we ought to pay attention to?

00:46:04.580 Sometimes entrepreneurs, you're so independent, it's like, listen, just leave me alone.

00:46:08.820 Don't bother me.

00:46:09.940 For the most part, most entrepreneurs are libertarian-esque type of philosophies, for the most part.

00:46:15.360 Because just let me get to work.

00:46:16.540 I'm going to make my money.

00:46:17.240 I'm going to create jobs.

00:46:18.300 I don't want to get anybody else into my business.

00:46:21.180 Having said that, I hear Republicans complain about the fact that, well, you know, 80% of media is controlled by the left.

00:46:26.900 You know, and look what they own.

00:46:28.140 They own New York Times.

00:46:29.080 They own Washington Post.

00:46:30.280 They own, you know, they own this and they own that and they own this.

00:46:32.940 And look what they just did to Alex Jones.

00:46:34.860 They just banned him.

00:46:35.820 A hundred different websites banned him.

00:46:37.460 PayPal just banned him.

00:46:38.840 What's this guy going to do?

00:46:39.980 Why can't he get up there and go out there and say what's on his mind?

00:46:42.680 And it's all the liberal media's fault, right?

00:46:44.860 I hear that.

00:46:45.840 Then on the complete opposite side, I say, wait a minute.

00:46:47.680 Time Magazine was just bought by the founder of Salesforce.com for $350 million.

00:46:53.320 You mean to tell me somebody on the right couldn't have bought Time Magazine for $350 million?

00:46:57.780 How much influence does it have?

00:46:59.120 So when I hear that part on the conservative side, the right side, Republicans calling the left snowflakes, I see the other side that sometimes conservatives, Republicans, if you're calling them snowflakes, why don't you go also and compete and buy some media and create some media for yourself?

00:47:12.960 There aren't any social media platforms that are pretty much owned by somebody on the right or conservative.

00:47:18.760 So that's why it's the question from you saying, you know, what do you think about media?

00:47:22.860 Is it majority controlled on the other side?

00:47:24.780 And why aren't the Republicans or the people on the right doing something about it where at least 50-50, media is 50-50, where I can get up and say, you know what?

00:47:33.240 I agree.

00:47:34.080 I disagree.

00:47:34.900 They're full of it.

00:47:35.560 These guys are full of it, but I have an opinion versus 80% tells me to go look one-sided.

00:47:39.700 I think part of it, the argument that the large-scale social media providers were politically biased in some important sense has only existed for about three or four years in any real sense, right?

00:47:50.900 It's really expanded, I would say, since the election of Trump.

00:47:53.820 That's owned by the left?

00:47:55.400 Yeah, yeah.

00:47:55.800 I mean, I don't think people necessarily thought five years ago that Facebook and Google were primarily left, at least to the degree that they're accused of as being now.

00:48:04.940 Well, Silicon Valley, for the most part, outside of Peter Thiel, would be left.

00:48:08.900 If you think about Silicon Valley, the only person that you've got to be worried about is Peter Thiel.

00:48:12.700 Right, but how long has that really been a contentious issue?

00:48:16.300 Like, Google has only been a company that people had mixed opinions about for about two years.

00:48:22.920 Like, people were pretty happy about Google.

00:48:24.460 Let's say a handful of years.

00:48:25.720 Yeah, okay, okay.

00:48:26.060 But nothing to the point where it's out right now.

00:48:27.840 I agree with you.

00:48:28.380 So what I think partly—

00:48:29.800 But if you think about CNN, you know, MSNBC, Washington Times, New York Times, some of that is,

00:48:34.220 is purely—

00:48:34.860 That's true.

00:48:35.420 Sure.

00:48:35.720 But to some degree, that was balanced by Fox News.

00:48:38.600 I think part of the reason that there aren't—

00:48:39.800 One channel against the rest of them.

00:48:41.000 Well, look, fair enough.

00:48:42.020 But to some degree, it was balanced.

00:48:43.560 I think part of the reason that there aren't more conservative social media platforms is because it wasn't obvious until relatively recently that that was a necessity.

00:48:52.520 But I still think your point is well taken.

00:48:54.380 If the conservatives want to do something about the hypothetically liberal bias of the large-scale social media companies, then they're free to go out and do something about it.

00:49:04.220 But I don't think they've—I don't think they've considered that a problem for that many years yet.

00:49:09.640 You don't think they have?

00:49:10.020 You don't think they've seen that as a problem?

00:49:11.940 Well, for how long, do you think?

00:49:13.880 I mean, I've been following American politics, say, for—I mean, I come from Iran.

00:49:19.860 So for us, we know Jimmy Carter, the influence played in Iran, and my mom's family's communist, dad's side's imperialist.

00:49:25.800 I lived in Germany two years, refugee camp.

00:49:28.220 So I've had to follow politics for quite some time because it's affected my life, right?

00:49:33.040 And when you see politics here, I would say 20 years of me at least looking at it.

00:49:37.480 I think a lot of it's been on the left.

00:49:39.560 But the reason why I'm asking this is I'm not looking for it being right.

00:49:42.940 I don't think it's good to be 80 percent either side.

00:49:45.280 Like, I think what you, Shapiro, Rubin, Rogan, some of us, what we do on Value Time when we talk about capitalism, I think that is very healthy.

00:49:53.720 But I also think John Oliver is good.

00:49:56.780 I also think John Stewart is good.

00:49:58.420 I think some of that is also good because we need both sides to say—

00:50:01.160 Well, and it's certainly the case that the people that you just described aren't having any shortage of opportunity to get their message out over—

00:50:07.800 They're not.

00:50:08.280 I mean—

00:50:09.280 But the control at the top.

00:50:10.580 That's the thing when I say control at the top.

00:50:12.140 There's distrust at the top, too.

00:50:14.460 You know, like Rubin tweeted out yesterday.

00:50:16.600 He said that he's got reports from hundreds of people that have been unsubscribed from his channel.

00:50:22.620 You know, and the problem is, well, is that true or is it not true?

00:50:25.100 The problem is that, well, the trust for YouTube, for example, has been damaged.

00:50:29.400 You know, and Google shut me down.

00:50:31.080 They shut my YouTube channel down.

00:50:32.520 They shut my email channels down, all of them one day.

00:50:35.520 Everything.

00:50:36.340 I had thousands and thousands of emails on Gmail.

00:50:38.820 Everything for the last 15 years.

00:50:40.660 Completely.

00:50:41.160 I couldn't get access at all.

00:50:42.140 I couldn't get access to my calendar.

00:50:43.240 So what do you think about that?

00:50:43.760 Oh, I was appalled.

00:50:44.960 It was absolutely horrible.

00:50:46.820 It was horrible.

00:50:47.420 Does it not concern you a little bit?

00:50:48.380 Of course it concerns me.

00:50:49.580 So what—

00:50:49.980 I switched to DuckDuckGo yesterday.

00:50:52.260 Did you really?

00:50:52.860 Yeah.

00:50:53.200 Well, I'm starting to play with it.

00:50:54.500 Yes.

00:50:54.820 And you said you're going to get off—

00:50:56.000 You were thinking about getting off of Twitter.

00:50:57.380 I don't think it's a good idea, but you said you were considering—

00:50:59.000 That I should be on it or I should be off it.

00:51:00.220 No, you're saying I'm thinking about no longer going on Twitter and kind of writing more articles on my—

00:51:04.640 because your son recommended that you write more—

00:51:07.260 Well, and there's other.

00:51:08.040 Like I could use Reddit more, for example.

00:51:09.740 I don't use Reddit much, and I already have a good YouTube following.

00:51:12.700 You're deep.

00:51:13.060 I think you're writing—

00:51:14.260 When you write—

00:51:15.560 And I read the article, obviously, when you wrote on your website, I said,

00:51:18.220 I shouldn't have just said this on Twitter.

00:51:19.760 Yes.

00:51:19.860 Let me elaborate.

00:51:20.660 And when I read it, you know, and then you said to yourself,

00:51:23.900 Look, just because I say something doesn't mean I'm right.

00:51:26.220 I was thinking it.

00:51:27.120 Not every thought I'm saying means I'm right, but I was thinking about that, right?

00:51:30.420 So—

00:51:31.080 But when you go deeper into it, I see that part.

00:51:32.900 I say, wow, this is interesting how he's wired.

00:51:34.680 No, my only concern is the fact that, look, in Iran, the Shah was worried about today.

00:51:39.520 Today was a group of communists in Iran, and everything they wanted to do was find him

00:51:43.180 and trying to get rid of him, right?

00:51:44.320 I said, oh, my gosh, we can't have these concepts coming.

00:51:46.080 And then people were so afraid of today that they forgot about Khomeini.

00:51:49.760 Oh, Khomeini's in, you know, France. 0.99

00:51:51.300 They never have to worry about it.

00:51:52.380 He came in, and then boom. 0.90

00:51:53.360 So the fear of communism, of what if they could take over, made him kind of give more ability

00:51:59.480 for Khomeini to create influence that led to a revolution with 9 million people in the

00:52:03.020 streets of Iran revolt, and boom.

00:52:04.960 Iran goes from one day, one of the best countries in the Middle East coming up, and the Middle 0.94

00:52:08.560 East was safe.

00:52:09.600 Next thing you know, the war, half a million people getting killed, and all this other stuff.

00:52:13.080 So I think sometimes being worried about what other people are going to say they disagree

00:52:17.240 with, I don't think it leads to good things.

00:52:19.420 But today, 100 social media platforms are controlled on one side.

00:52:23.700 That's a scary thought, George.

00:52:25.140 If all of a sudden capitalism becomes a curse word, and anybody uses capitalism, hey, you

00:52:30.160 know.

00:52:30.760 I actually see things in the U.S. balanced quite nicely.

00:52:33.720 You know, I mean, there is tremendous control on the, say, left-leaning end of things in academia

00:52:39.520 and in the classic mainstream media.

00:52:41.800 But, you know, the electoral process seems to have balanced that out quite nicely because

00:52:46.080 the Republicans have.

00:52:47.040 I agree.

00:52:47.320 I agree with you.

00:52:48.380 The American system seems to work pretty damn well.

00:52:50.160 I agree with you.

00:52:50.840 Absolutely.

00:52:51.500 It'll be really interesting to see what happens in November's elections.

00:52:54.760 American system works well.

00:52:57.520 However, this is the one part that I think we have to realize that, you know, Ron Paul

00:53:03.780 started social media influence on politics.

00:53:06.160 Ron Paul raised, I think, $6 million in 2004 on MySpace in 24 hours.

00:53:12.520 In 24 hours, he raised $6 million.

00:53:14.020 And everybody's like, Obama's like, what?

00:53:16.480 This guy raised $6 million in 24 hours a month?

00:53:19.200 And he's how old?

00:53:21.100 I'm young.

00:53:21.920 I'm cool.

00:53:22.420 I'm handsome.

00:53:23.340 I want to raise billions.

00:53:25.080 And then he took social media and he raised, and he's a two-term president.

00:53:28.800 And then Trump, you take Jack Dorsey's Twitter out.

00:53:31.740 I don't know if Trump's president today.

00:53:33.060 So Trump learned how to use Twitter to his advantage.

00:53:35.920 Now that everybody knows the power of social media, the concern now becomes everyone knows

00:53:42.240 what you need to do if you want to be a president two years from now or six years from now, right?

00:53:46.200 You know if you play the game of social media, whoever's got the big following.

00:53:49.100 So now the people at the top who control these social media platforms are more powerful than

00:53:54.360 some governments are.

00:53:56.100 So this is why when you say the electoral college, you know, the system works, it works today.

00:53:59.960 But, you know, that doesn't necessarily mean...

00:54:03.180 Well, we have no idea how all this technological transformation will destabilize and transform

00:54:08.500 things going into the future.

00:54:09.700 That's what I'm saying.

00:54:10.340 I mean, part of the reason that I'm going on this tour, for example, and talking to people

00:54:14.000 about individual responsibility is that I see this, like everyone does, this unbelievably

00:54:19.500 rapid process of technological transformation approaching us.

00:54:23.040 I think, well, we better be wise enough to handle it because we can't predict it, right?

00:54:27.140 So to the degree that we have character flaws that could be rectified, the consequences,

00:54:32.080 those are going to be magnified by our increased technological power.

00:54:34.980 So I'm hoping that everybody can try to get their act together a little bit more carefully.

00:54:38.940 And that's also been extraordinarily fun.

00:54:41.680 And like the lecture, so I've been in 85 cities since March.

00:54:45.760 That's amazing.

00:54:46.960 Yeah, since it is, it's been...

00:54:48.700 It's unbelievable.

00:54:49.740 Yes, and I've been fortunate because I've had lots of good people helping me make sure this

00:54:52.780 works and it has worked so far.

00:54:54.240 But it's really quite, it's very heartening because all these, every night I talk to about

00:54:59.780 2,000 people, not every night, but like four nights out of four nights in a week.

00:55:03.660 As far as I can tell, they're all primarily coming there because they want to put their

00:55:06.980 house together from a psychological perspective.

00:55:08.820 They're interested in developing a vision for their life and taking on responsibility.

00:55:12.600 And I have dozens of people every night who have told me that over the last couple of

00:55:17.980 years, their lives have been transformed.

00:55:19.620 They've gone from a bad place, you know, where they were really lost and nihilistic.

00:55:23.080 They've decided that they were going to do something with their life.

00:55:25.540 You know, I had, I tweeted out something today that some kid wrote me, he said, two years

00:55:29.760 ago, he didn't have any friends.

00:55:31.420 He didn't, he didn't have an intimate relationship.

00:55:33.440 He didn't know where he was going in his life.

00:55:34.780 He didn't have a job.

00:55:35.580 Like he was just, you know, nothing was going for him.

00:55:38.020 And he's doing a philosophy degree.

00:55:39.980 He's in his second year.

00:55:40.700 He has a good job.

00:55:41.480 He's got a girlfriend.

00:55:42.280 He's got friends that care for him.

00:55:43.700 It's like he's put his life right together.

00:55:45.620 And so I hear this sort of story from people all the time.

00:55:48.320 People stop me on the street and tell me this, which is lovely, right?

00:55:51.000 To go to a city you've never been to, this happens to me all the time.

00:55:54.180 I'll be walking down the street.

00:55:55.180 Someone will come up and say, I'm sorry that I'm bothering you.

00:55:58.880 And they're not because people are very polite.

00:56:01.080 They've been very polite to me.

00:56:02.280 They say, you know, I wasn't in such a good place a year ago, two years ago.

00:56:06.420 I've been trying to put my life together.

00:56:08.140 I've been listening to your lectures.

00:56:09.260 And here's a bunch of things that are way better for me.

00:56:11.480 It's like right on, man.

00:56:13.100 The more of that, the better.

00:56:14.360 And I think that's the right way forward, you know, which is why I don't really regard myself

00:56:18.180 as a political person.

00:56:19.160 I have political interests, but mostly I try to operate at the level of psychology.

00:56:25.280 It's like better for people to put their lives together.

00:56:27.840 It's important.

00:56:28.580 And I think each person is crucially important.

00:56:31.300 I think that's a predicate of the democratic state, right?

00:56:34.600 We wouldn't let people vote.

00:56:35.880 People wouldn't have the responsibility to vote to determine the outcome of the state

00:56:39.800 if there wasn't a deep belief in our culture that each person was vital.

00:56:43.900 And I do believe that.

00:56:44.860 I believe that the world is constructed so that each person plays a vital role.

00:56:48.100 And so every time that someone gets their act together, it's like, great, great.

00:56:52.180 That's going to have way more positive effect than you think.

00:56:54.480 And stave off an awful lot of trouble.

00:56:57.080 Because someone who goes bad can do an unbelievable amount of damage.

00:57:01.960 So even just not going bad is a good thing.

00:57:04.500 So, you know, sometimes you read these, you know, articles or videos.

00:57:08.600 America is more divided than it's ever been before.

00:57:11.100 And then you read some research and it says, you know, it's actually not the truth.

00:57:13.700 America is more united than we've ever been before.

00:57:15.740 It's a better place than it's ever been before.

00:57:17.800 I know you're a Canadian looking in, but you're going also speaking everywhere.

00:57:21.580 85 places you speak since March.

00:57:23.040 That's a lot of people you're shaking hands with that you're talking to.

00:57:25.580 And the 150 people that stick around afterwards, they're having a dialogue.

00:57:28.440 This is more info you have here than the average human being.

00:57:32.180 What are you feeling about the conditions of America?

00:57:35.240 Are we more divided than we've ever been before?

00:57:38.960 Or are we actually...

00:57:40.060 We're definitely not more divided than we've ever been before.

00:57:42.280 Because, I mean, you guys had a civil war.

00:57:45.020 And we're certainly not at that point.

00:57:46.500 And I don't think that the current division is any greater than it was in the 1960s.

00:57:50.620 In fact, I think it's less.

00:57:52.300 I think there was more tension while the war was going on.

00:57:56.380 Well, yes, there was a war.

00:57:57.340 I mean, that makes a big difference, you know.

00:57:59.100 I mean, people, young people particularly now who haven't been through that don't realize what that's like.

00:58:05.220 It's not like I've been through that personally.

00:58:07.120 But a war is a big deal and a universal draft.

00:58:10.020 I mean, that was high stakes bargaining, you know.

00:58:12.840 And then things were pretty divided later under Nixon.

00:58:17.280 That was the end of the 60s.

00:58:18.440 And then they were divided again under Reagan.

00:58:21.360 There were a huge scale protests under Reagan.

00:58:23.720 And the Cold War had really heated up.

00:58:25.440 And everyone was afraid that we were going to push the nuclear button.

00:58:28.060 And so there was plenty of division then.

00:58:30.160 Even in my lifetime, I've seen times when I think that your country, the United States, was more divided than it is now.

00:58:36.160 There is a fair bit of polarization now.

00:58:38.720 I know that if you look at what's happened to political attitudes, the typical Democrat has moved farther to the left over the last 20 years.

00:58:47.840 The Republicans haven't moved that much.

00:58:49.860 They're still relatively, the median Republican is still relatively close to the center.

00:58:54.560 But I think a lot of the polarization is actually being driven by the death of the mainstream media.

00:58:59.260 Like, you know, you always want to look at what the consequence of a technological transformation is.

00:59:04.900 And this is a big transformation.

00:59:06.780 You know, there used to be flagship media sources that were basically attempting to give a balanced picture.

00:59:12.540 And I think they did a pretty good job 30 years ago.

00:59:15.080 Time Magazine, even the mainstream news programs, they had a professionalism that was associated with their journalism that had some degree of objectivity.

00:59:24.020 And that's fragmented.

00:59:25.880 And it's fragmenting because there's all these media sources, like innumerable media sources.

00:59:31.360 And so it's driving people who are trying to get attention to desperation.

00:59:36.240 And they exaggerate the polarity.

00:59:39.160 And so that puts everyone on edge.

00:59:41.000 And Twitter puts people on edge.

00:59:42.980 Like, and this is part of the reason I'd thought about, I'm still thinking about what to do with Twitter.

00:59:46.660 Maybe I should not use it for a month.

00:59:48.780 Because Twitter, I think, my experience with Twitter is that I'm wandering around in the world and everything's fine.

00:59:55.940 The streets are peaceful.

00:59:57.000 The people I meet are doing well.

01:00:00.540 That your cities I've been to, I don't know how many American cities in the last four months, like 40 or 50.

01:00:06.000 They look great.

01:00:07.840 You know, I mean, everywhere I go, there's construction.

01:00:11.340 And the country feels like it's moving.

01:00:13.900 How does one person that's watching the news, and that's where the news they get from, they consume news through media.

01:00:20.820 I'm watching CNN, Fox, MSNBC, whatever.

01:00:23.680 How do I tell apart between the truth and propaganda?

01:00:27.480 I don't know.

01:00:28.180 I mean, when I counsel my clinical clients who are depressed or anxious, one of the things I've always told them to do over the last few decades is to disconnect themselves from the news.

01:00:37.080 This was before the social media.

01:00:38.740 And you still believe that today?

01:00:40.500 Well, I hadn't, see, you asked me about CNN earlier.

01:00:44.300 Like, I haven't watched mainstream television news since like 1985.

01:00:49.860 You've got to be kidding me.

01:00:50.680 No, I'm not kidding.

01:00:51.180 Let me get this straight.

01:00:52.080 I want to hear you say this one more time.

01:00:53.720 You haven't watched mainstream media since 1985?

01:00:57.020 No, very little.

01:00:57.800 I didn't have a TV.

01:00:59.500 I didn't have a TV since about 1985.

01:01:02.240 When's the last time you watched CNN?

01:01:03.540 Probably in an airport for a few minutes.

01:01:05.300 I virtually never watched CNN.

01:01:06.780 So if I come to your place, I know you have some interesting collection of art that you collect.

01:01:11.200 But if I come to your place, your TV is not going to be on CNN.

01:01:13.940 There's no TV.

01:01:14.920 There's no TV in your house.

01:01:15.760 I haven't had a TV since 1985.

01:01:17.580 I realized back in 1985 that news wasn't news.

01:01:21.040 If it was only news for a day, it wasn't important.

01:01:23.300 So I read magazines, you know, I read Harper's, or I'm not at the moment.

01:01:27.940 Harper's, Atlantic Monthly, The Economist, those were my basic sources for news.

01:01:33.280 Now that's changed, you see, because I got tangled up so badly in scandal two years ago

01:01:38.340 that I've been on top of, especially social media, like an obsessed addict for two years

01:01:43.280 trying to manage it.

01:01:45.000 You know, but it's not clear to me that that's been a good thing.

01:01:47.360 For, like, well, I've got to say that.

01:01:49.400 For your sanity or for?

01:01:51.480 Well, it's, certainly, I don't think Twitter is a good thing for my sanity.

01:01:55.880 Twitter is so contentious.

01:01:58.180 It's so, I mean, if you want a daily dose of hate, you can get it in 10 minutes on Twitter.

01:02:02.940 You know, if I post something, you know, there's a number of comments about whatever I posted.

01:02:08.660 And one out of four of them is brutally rude and obnoxious, as nasty as it can possibly be.

01:02:16.340 And that's very, very common.

01:02:17.980 And, like, you know, people are quite sensitive to negative information.

01:02:21.540 We're more sensitive to negative information than we are to positive information.

01:02:24.900 And so, and I'm not complaining.

01:02:26.740 I don't have to use Twitter.

01:02:28.120 It's a completely voluntary choice.

01:02:29.580 And I'm certainly a massive beneficiary of the existence of social media.

01:02:34.240 So I'm not complaining about it.

01:02:35.740 I don't have a right to complain about it.

01:02:37.200 But it exists in absolute contrast to my experiences in the world.

01:02:41.760 Like, it's not like I'm walking down the street and one person out of four jumps out of an alley and, like, curses me.

01:02:48.320 I haven't had a single negative interaction with an individual.

01:02:51.760 That's not true. 0.78

01:02:52.360 I met one really drunk woman in Dublin, and she called me a wanker. 0.68

01:03:00.160 But she was quite the piece of work, though, with a little timid husband by her side.

01:03:04.340 Was it after Connor lost?

01:03:05.600 Maybe she was pissed off because of the UFC fight.

01:03:07.320 Maybe she was. 0.97

01:03:08.200 But I've had thousands of interactions with individual people on the street, let's say, in airports and so forth, in the last six months.

01:03:16.980 And every single one of them has been overwhelmingly positive.

01:03:20.540 So that's reality.

01:03:21.920 Then I go into Twitter, and it's like, oh, my God.

01:03:24.080 It's just brutal.

01:03:25.480 Brutal.

01:03:25.540 Does it really bother you, though?

01:03:26.680 Do you really get bothered?

01:03:27.940 Listen, all of us, you know, no one likes negative comments.

01:03:31.580 Like, right before this, Mario's sitting, I'm preparing my notes, and Mario's like, look at the three negative comments we got today.

01:03:36.640 I'm like, Mario, I'm doing an interview.

01:03:38.260 You're sitting here telling me something.

01:03:39.060 So, obviously, before doing something like this, but does it bother you a little bit when you read those negative comments?

01:03:44.480 Oh, definitely.

01:03:45.000 Really?

01:03:45.540 Oh, definitely.

01:03:46.120 Well, look, when I was still working as a professor, I'm on unpaid leave at the moment, you know, I get my feedback from my students.

01:03:55.180 And my feedback has been generally extraordinarily positive.

01:03:58.460 So maybe there'll be 50 comments from students, and three of them will be negative, something like that, or two.

01:04:03.680 And often quite nasty, the negative ones.

01:04:06.480 And you remember the negative ones.

01:04:08.780 And that is what people are like.

01:04:10.420 We're much more sensitive to negative.

01:04:12.280 And the reason for that is negative things can kill you.

01:04:16.280 Positive things can make you a little happier.

01:04:17.940 So, going back to it, I guess what you are saying is with the social media platform, you're saying from 1985, you didn't consume any content on TV outside of pure accident.

01:04:29.440 There's no TV at your house.

01:04:30.800 In the last two years, you've done it because social media, so you kind of had to be aware.

01:04:33.700 Yeah, I had to be on top of it.

01:04:35.180 Okay, so this is an interesting question.

01:04:37.380 Are you happier now that you're consuming the content last two years, or do you find yourself being, man, I'm a little bit more anxious than I was two years ago.

01:04:45.340 I was a little bit more peaceful.

01:04:46.000 Oh, I'm way more anxious.

01:04:46.540 Really?

01:04:46.920 Oh, yes.

01:04:47.300 So, are you thinking about going on a diet again from social media?

01:04:50.000 Well, no.

01:04:51.560 Look, it's complicated because my life has gone.

01:04:54.900 I mean, my life was fairly broad two years ago.

01:04:59.840 I had a number of businesses.

01:05:01.380 I had my clinical practice.

01:05:02.480 I was working as a professor.

01:05:03.820 I was writing.

01:05:04.740 I was involved in lots of things.

01:05:06.500 And so, I had plenty to do.

01:05:08.160 But since then, it's gone like this.

01:05:10.480 And some of it's unbelievably good.

01:05:13.640 And some of it's really, really bad.

01:05:16.100 And so, the breadth of it has extended.

01:05:18.300 And so, like, there's no shortage of ridiculously positive things that are happening to me on an ongoing basis.

01:05:24.680 I can't even believe it.

01:05:25.920 But the same is true on the negative end.

01:05:27.900 And so, what's happened is the range of my emotional experience has expanded almost unbearably, I would say.

01:05:35.080 So, and again, I'm not complaining about that because I could choose to do it differently.

01:05:40.300 But some of this has also been a matter of management.

01:05:42.800 It's like, it is literally the case that, although it's been a little better over the last three or four months, for about 18 months in a row,

01:05:50.820 I was at the center of a scandal that could have taken me out at least twice a week.

01:05:55.940 So, constant, non-stop scandal of one form or another.

01:05:59.940 And so, that took a lot of juggling and management to see what was going on.

01:06:03.820 And I was paying attention to social media and trying to figure out how to respond in the press and on YouTube and on my blog and all of these sorts of things,

01:06:12.180 trying to learn how to do that.

01:06:13.260 And so, it's been an obsessive learning experience, let's say.

01:06:18.920 YouTube has served me very, very well.

01:06:21.100 My blog works out very well for me.

01:06:24.160 The podcast, I have a podcast.

01:06:26.160 It's very popular.

01:06:27.120 That's worked out really well.

01:06:28.680 Facebook, I don't pay much attention to Facebook, although I post on it.

01:06:32.680 Twitter, that's something else.

01:06:34.860 Twitter is, I don't know what to do with Twitter.

01:06:38.420 I don't know what to do with Twitter.

01:06:40.180 I think I go back and forth.

01:06:44.720 I go back and forth.

01:06:46.620 You know, there's a part of me that there's people I keep up with on Twitter, the people I follow, some of these IDW types, so to speak. 1.00

01:06:52.500 You know, I see what Shapiro's posting.

01:06:54.060 I see what Brett Weinstein's posting and Sam Harris.

01:06:56.740 And I kind of keep in the loop that way.

01:06:59.000 And I feel a moral obligation to keep up.

01:07:02.700 And I have 900,000 followers.

01:07:04.760 And I feel an obligation to them, too.

01:07:06.300 But there's also this addictive curiosity, you know, that what's happening, what's happening, what's happening, what's happening.

01:07:14.180 And I tried to pull myself away from that on the TV news because it's the same thing except in much less concentrated form.

01:07:20.940 And it was good for me.

01:07:22.280 And I do think if it's only important today, it's not important.

01:07:25.360 Right?

01:07:25.560 If it's news, it doesn't matter if you don't know about it for a week.

01:07:28.840 That's powerful.

01:07:29.240 It's still news.

01:07:30.020 But I still haven't figured out how to completely deal with all this social reach I have at my fingertips.

01:07:39.580 I don't know exactly how to manage it.

01:07:41.380 You feel there's an addiction, too?

01:07:42.620 Because, you know, that's the whole thing with social media addiction, to feel like you are committed to seeing what everybody else is doing because it's a part of loyalty.

01:07:48.900 Like, I got to be loyal to them.

01:07:50.780 And I kind of feel like they've been loyal to me.

01:07:52.460 Yeah.

01:07:52.640 You feel there's some of that going on?

01:07:53.820 Well, there's definitely some of that, but there's also that.

01:07:56.540 There's also, like, I am insatiably curious about things.

01:08:01.920 And so Twitter is terrible for that because it's just continual hits of information.

01:08:08.720 I'm sure.

01:08:10.060 Yeah, I mean, if you're talking about reading a book a day and you all of a sudden have all this information to your hands, like, what is this?

01:08:14.660 What's going on over here?

01:08:15.280 What about this?

01:08:15.760 Oh, my gosh.

01:08:16.560 So you can get really caught up with that.

01:08:18.560 And that's starting to happen a lot with social media.

01:08:20.320 Last question here before we go into a speed round.

01:08:22.460 Educational system.

01:08:23.180 You're a professor.

01:08:24.240 I mean, you've been in the environment.

01:08:25.900 You see what's going on.

01:08:27.040 I know sometimes when we're talking about early 80% of media is on the left.

01:08:29.940 One of the stats you read about is that 1 in 12 professors in colleges today are conservative.

01:08:37.220 1 in 12.

01:08:38.140 That means 11 are not, right?

01:08:39.660 So, you know, what do you think is the influence of colleges and how do you feel about the current educational system, period?

01:08:46.420 I've seen large institutions fall apart because they make a fatal error.

01:08:51.100 I think universities are making seven fatal errors.

01:08:54.020 Top heavy administration that keeps growing.

01:08:56.640 Okay.

01:08:57.020 Increase in the number of part-time untenured faculty members who have no administrative or academic power.

01:09:03.460 Massively increasing.

01:09:04.700 Insane increases in tuition combined with indentured servitude for students, right?

01:09:09.840 You get a student loan.

01:09:10.760 You can't declare bankruptcy.

01:09:12.420 So that means that the burgeoning administration has learned how to pick the pockets of the young people's future earnings.

01:09:18.420 They entice them into university and offer them extended adolescence with no responsibility, and the price they garner from them is to garnishing their future earnings.

01:09:27.140 Crooked game.

01:09:28.060 Ethics committees.

01:09:28.960 Absolute catastrophe.

01:09:30.700 The dominance of this weird nonsensical alliance between the postmodern types and the neo-Marxist types, which makes no sense philosophically, given the postmodernist stated, what would you call it, skepticism for metanarratives.

01:09:44.840 Why the hell they've aligned themselves with the Marxists is beyond me, except that I think postmodernism is just a shell game for Marxism.

01:09:52.180 That's another fatal error.

01:09:53.800 The gerrymandering of the grade system.

01:09:56.460 So that's, I think I got six there.

01:09:58.060 All of those, they're not good.

01:10:00.700 They're fatal, I think, all of them.

01:10:03.060 And so I think that, I don't know what's going to happen to the university system over the next 20 years, but I'm certainly not optimistic about it.

01:10:09.360 So, and I've hired some people, this is like, this is a big problem we just discussed, and I've got this little solution, and so I know I'm talking about a little solution.

01:10:17.720 That'd be an interesting book if you were to write about it.

01:10:19.400 Well, I've hired some people, I've hired some people to build an online education platform, and we're, they've been working on it for six months, and we have a bit of a prototype, and we're trying to figure out how to build an alternative.

01:10:30.680 You know, you said, look, if the conservatives are so concerned about the liberal media, why the hell don't they go out and build their own media empire?

01:10:37.200 It's like, well, if I'm concerned about the education system, then why don't I try to generate an alternative to it?

01:10:42.520 You're doing it.

01:10:43.100 I'm trying to.

01:10:43.980 I mean, the probability that it will succeed is like zero, because it's an impossible task.

01:10:47.880 But we're trying to build a platform that would help people use their online time more productively and keep track of it.

01:10:54.480 So imagine that everything that you taught yourself on YouTube could be accredited, and you could be rewarded for that across time, and maybe guided through it so that you could track your educational progress along a whole wide range of potential learning opportunities.

01:11:11.560 We'd like to build an online portal that would make your use of your online time much more productive and engaging.

01:11:18.240 So that's what we're aiming at.

01:11:19.600 Coming soon?

01:11:20.400 Oh, God, who knows?

01:11:21.580 We have a prototype.

01:11:23.160 We have a prototype, and we've applied to Y Combinator.

01:11:25.840 I don't know if we'll get accepted.

01:11:27.180 Maybe we will, and maybe we won't.

01:11:28.480 We've got alternatives lined up if we're not accepted.

01:11:30.340 Well, let us know about it.

01:11:31.040 We have some context.

01:11:31.960 We would love to know more about it.

01:11:33.040 I will.

01:11:33.420 I will let you know.

01:11:33.960 We may connect with the right people.

01:11:35.460 What's next for you, by the way?

01:11:36.620 I mean, what are your aspirations?

01:11:37.780 I mean, you know everybody has inspirations that you're talking about, right?

01:11:40.620 Well, I can tell you what's happening in the next year, but that's as far out as I can look.

01:11:44.340 Oh, so you don't know.

01:11:45.440 I don't know.

01:11:45.800 Things are way too much in flux.

01:11:46.900 Prime minister, politics, nothing like that.

01:11:48.660 So we're never going to see Prime Minister Jordan Peterson?

01:11:51.520 That's not in the equation?

01:11:53.980 Not that I can foresee at the moment.

01:11:56.320 I mean, God only knows because I can't look that far out.

01:11:59.780 I'm more interested in what I'm doing at the moment.

01:12:02.120 I think it's more useful.

01:12:03.060 I can tell you what I'm doing for the next year.

01:12:04.860 Okay, so next month I'm going to Europe.

01:12:06.340 I have like 15 talks in Europe, all over the place.

01:12:09.460 And then Hawaii, Los Angeles, Calgary, Vancouver, more talks.

01:12:14.960 And then Florida.

01:12:16.160 And then I'm going to Australia and New Zealand in February for another lecture tour.

01:12:21.980 If the Y Combinator thing pops up, I'll go to San Francisco for January and February.

01:12:26.100 In March, I'm going back to Europe.

01:12:27.360 I'll probably hit another 25 cities then.

01:12:29.740 From May to September, I'm going to hopefully finish up my next book,

01:12:33.320 which is called 12 Moral Rules for Life, Beyond Mere Order.

01:12:37.120 That's the plan.

01:12:37.760 And then from September to December next year, I'm going to, I did a whole series of lectures

01:12:43.000 on Genesis.

01:12:43.620 I want to go back after that, but go to Exodus and do a series of lectures on Exodus.

01:12:48.700 So that's out for the next year.

01:12:50.420 And after that, I don't know.

01:12:52.120 I have no idea.

01:12:53.360 That's plenty of planning for how fluid and crazy things are right now.

01:12:59.000 If I get through all that, that'll be a miracle.

01:13:01.860 I think if you were to start a university or online university or somewhere to educate

01:13:08.760 thinking, processing, decision-making process, I think that wouldn't just be something that

01:13:14.160 will do well in the states here.

01:13:16.020 That would be worldwide.

01:13:17.080 Well, we also want to build modules.

01:13:19.440 We've been trying to figure out how to do this, to teach people to read, to teach them

01:13:22.860 to think, to teach them to speak and present, to teach them to negotiate.

01:13:27.360 So part of it would be-

01:13:28.200 It's very aligned with what we're thinking.

01:13:29.220 It's so weird, like the stuff he's saying.

01:13:31.220 Yeah.

01:13:31.480 Well, there's a crying need for it.

01:13:33.460 And obviously, with the current technology that we possess, it would be possible to educate

01:13:38.400 everyone, hypothetically.

01:13:40.080 And we'd also like to do it at low cost.

01:13:41.800 So one of our goals is to make a high-quality university equivalent education process that would

01:13:49.420 be like one-tenth to one-one-hundredth of the current cost.

01:13:52.620 That's powerful.

01:13:53.740 And we have a need for that.

01:13:54.940 So the fact that you're doing that, I'm looking forward to it.

01:13:57.120 I think the way your ideas have been growing and people are looking at it and being so receptive,

01:14:04.460 where nowadays everybody's saying, Jordan Peterson, Jordan Peterson.

01:14:06.820 Well, maybe one day, if the man upstairs has plans, who knows?

01:14:10.220 Maybe the Trudeau last name may be replaced by a Peterson last name in a place like Canada.

01:14:16.700 But we'll see what'll happen there.

01:14:17.580 Definitely, you are very presidential, prime minister-esque type of a person.

01:14:23.320 And you're good with fashion as well.

01:14:25.420 You know how to put it together.

01:14:26.420 So you're very fashionable.

01:14:27.420 Anyway, so let's do a speed round.

01:14:28.640 Let's do a speed round.

01:14:29.280 I'll say some things.

01:14:30.680 A name of a person.

01:14:31.700 Just tell me the first thing that comes to your mind.

01:14:33.260 All right.

01:14:33.440 Okay.

01:14:33.560 Whatever it may be.

01:14:34.300 All right.

01:14:34.900 Drake.

01:14:35.640 Male duck.

01:14:36.860 Male duck.

01:14:38.020 Okay.

01:14:38.760 Kanye West.

01:14:40.320 King of the IDW.

01:14:41.880 That's Dave Rubin's joke.

01:14:43.000 Really?

01:14:43.660 Okay.

01:14:43.900 Trump.

01:14:44.680 Anomaly.

01:14:45.400 Trudeau.

01:14:45.920 Justin Trudeau.

01:14:47.640 That, I just shake my head at that.

01:14:49.720 Okay.

01:14:50.160 Oh, man who capitalized without virtue on the name of his father.

01:14:54.340 Wow.

01:14:55.180 Yes.

01:14:55.740 Wow is right.

01:14:56.680 Wow.

01:14:56.840 If he had an ounce of character, he would have never run.

01:14:58.980 I'm not happy about him.

01:15:00.280 He had no right.

01:15:01.360 Well, he had a right.

01:15:02.020 He's a citizen.

01:15:02.680 He can run.

01:15:03.640 He didn't earn his name.

01:15:04.940 Not impressed.

01:15:06.660 Why do you say that?

01:15:07.380 Is it specific?

01:15:08.120 Because his father was very famous.

01:15:10.400 Sure.

01:15:10.760 And so that put Trudeau at a tremendous advantage with regards to moving into a leadership position

01:15:16.820 in Canada.

01:15:17.420 It's not excusable.

01:15:18.800 You should move ahead on your own merits, especially if you're daring to do something

01:15:21.640 like run a country.

01:15:22.680 You have a moral duty.

01:15:23.840 If you have the advantage of a name, you have a moral duty to supersede the accomplishments

01:15:29.220 of the person who bore that name and gave it its weight before you dare capitalize

01:15:33.160 on it in the public sphere.

01:15:34.900 And Trudeau did none of that.

01:15:36.980 He knows how to behave.

01:15:38.560 He knows how to act in public.

01:15:39.820 He had the upbringing for it.

01:15:41.520 Other than that, there's nothing there.

01:15:43.400 Not that I can see.

01:15:44.580 And if there was, he wouldn't have run the way he did.

01:15:48.080 He's not an impressive person in my estimation.

01:15:50.720 Some strong opinions there.

01:15:51.920 Strong beliefs there.

01:15:52.760 He appointed 50% of females to 50% of his cabinet because it was, what did he say?

01:15:58.560 Well, because it's 2015.

01:16:00.400 It's like, no, quarter of your elected members of parliament were female.

01:16:04.320 If you would, your job was to pick the most qualified people, period, regardless of their

01:16:09.700 genitalia, because they're leading the country. 1.00

01:16:11.900 You pick the most qualified people.

01:16:13.700 Instead, he abdicated his responsibility to make those difficult decisions and then wallpapered

01:16:18.360 it over with this casual virtue of, well, I'm going to promote women. 0.90

01:16:22.320 It's like, no, you're going to promote competent people, you weasel.

01:16:26.440 No excuse for it.

01:16:28.300 Wow.

01:16:29.280 I'd say one word, but that was a few hundred words.

01:16:31.700 We'll take it.

01:16:32.620 We'll go with that.

01:16:33.700 Okay.

01:16:33.820 How about vegans?

01:16:34.760 To each his own, man.

01:16:35.800 To each his own.

01:16:36.820 Okay.

01:16:38.020 Jim Jeffries.

01:16:39.100 He's a comedian.

01:16:40.040 More power to him.

01:16:41.080 I like comedians.

01:16:41.940 Kathy Newman.

01:16:42.620 Failure to learn from experience.

01:16:44.520 Alex Jones.

01:16:45.320 Don't persecute someone who's paranoid.

01:16:47.280 It's a big mistake, strategically speaking.

01:16:50.480 You know, lots of people think conspiratorially.

01:16:52.740 It's a mode of thinking.

01:16:53.780 And perhaps Alex Jones a little more than everyone else.

01:16:57.080 They didn't just stop Alex Jones.

01:16:58.740 They stopped all the people that were listening to him. 0.97

01:17:00.500 All those people weren't stupid. 0.80

01:17:02.240 It wasn't like they believed everything Alex Jones said. 1.00

01:17:05.000 She left him the hell alone.

01:17:07.040 So it's not, he's a canary in the coal mine, I think.

01:17:10.920 Karl Marx.

01:17:11.680 A testament to the murderous power of resentment.

01:17:15.800 Elon Musk.

01:17:16.560 Amazing.

01:17:17.900 He's amazing.

01:17:18.760 He's done five impossible things.

01:17:20.820 That's amazing.

01:17:21.560 It's absolutely beyond belief.

01:17:23.120 It's hard to believe he exists.

01:17:25.340 He made an electric car and then he shot it into space.

01:17:28.800 Right.

01:17:29.520 Either one of those things is really hard.

01:17:31.740 But to do them together and to actually do them, it doesn't even seem real.

01:17:35.280 And he lives during our times.

01:17:37.460 That's what's amazing.

01:17:38.180 You know, we talk about Einstein, but he's current.

01:17:40.840 So, hey, thanks so much for coming.

01:17:42.720 Hey, thanks for being here.

01:17:43.060 Really enjoyed it.

01:17:43.840 Really, really enjoyed it.

01:17:44.540 Looking forward to next time.

01:17:45.560 Yep.

01:17:45.980 Much appreciated.

01:17:46.620 Take care, everybody.

01:17:47.320 Much love.

01:17:47.740 Thanks, everybody, for listening.

01:17:49.120 And by the way, if you haven't already subscribed to Valuetainment on iTunes, please do so.

01:17:53.880 Give us a five-star.

01:17:55.280 Write a review if you haven't already.

01:17:56.780 And if you have any questions for me that you may have, you can always find me on Snapchat,

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01:18:09.700 With that being said, have a great day today.

01:18:11.440 Take care, everybody.

01:18:12.160 Bye-bye.

Valuetainment - January 31, 2019

Episode 259： Jordan Peterson - UNCENSORED

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