What Postmodernism IS and REALLY ISN'T - Jordan Peterson analysis

I find you a confused person, let PJ take a divisionary path, and make extreme statements. A leftist view itself is an abhorrent aberration. Yes, Resentment, arrogance and deceit describe failed LEFTIST, looking for ground headlessly.
A leftist can't be a liberal, they are subversive by nature and delusional in the outcome of any subversion.

Being a postmodernist doesn't automatically make you a threat to conservative American values. But I sure am.

He got his understanding of postmodernism from a book that misunderstood it. Sad really. He also tried commenting on Carefree Wandering’s channel and got something basic wrong. I think it was saying someone else’s name when it was obviously Baudrillard.

when peterson says “postmodernism,” what he generally means is “cultural bolshevism” (or as he likes to call it, “cultural marxism”). not gonna outright call him a nazi or anything, but i think it’s v telling that he essentially uses the same flattening technique fascists use to crudely lump all their undesirables into a single enemy. this technique is def not unique to fascism, but i do think it’s one of fascism’s defining characteristics, as any gains to be made by fascism generally come at the expense of liquidating the other

Thanks for the insight!

Hume was a modernist who was very anti-conservative thought. It's silly to apply modermity or post-modernity to political viewpoints

I'm not a fan of postmodernism, but it's because I think reality is more than entirely subjective. I could and would never agree with Jordan Peterson's point of view. Postmodernism is a school of philosophy like Plato's "world of forms" or Kiekegaard's "dread". It's something to be discussed and prooven or refuted on the merits of its arguments. That's what philosophy is.

Failing to understand that the new left is based in postmodernism, which is what Dr. Peterson is addressing negates all the pseudointellectual comments and dialogue. Pretending this is a neutral academic post is so much fun to watch.

Late to the party here... Petersen is a great communicator in that he's able to make people feel like he's given them a target for their unhappiness. He is not great at communicating actual concepts in a relatively objective way. And he isn't interested in doing that.

The pushback against postmodernism in less vitriolic circles is easy to explain - PM doesn't just do away with grand narratives. It does away with all Enlightenment values - objective truth, free speech, etc... It no longer matters what people say - the only thing that matters is what each individual hears. They believe the entire universe was a chaotic mass until we structured it with language, and since the interpretation of each word is entirely up to the individual no on can tell another person anything about reality.

What Peterson is really mad at is the extension of postmodernism, "woke culture" or "critical studies" or whatever they want to call it, which combines postmodernism with Hegel/Kant/Marx dialectical thought to create a world where everything that happens can be described in terms of an oppressor doing something to the oppressed. They believe that an experiment conducted by by a straight white cisgender man will return different results than the same experiment conducted by a gay black woman because the differences in their relationships to power make it impossible for them to arrive at the same truth, so it's the most anti-science philosophy we've seen in the last 300 years. It's more like Scientology than any real philosophy, but less rational and optimistic.

“Very measured critque of JP. I’m going to use this as an opportunity to vomit my trembling emotions in the comment section.”

Jordan Peterson is very interesting but he repeatedly pushes straw man fallacies. Great video

With some searching you can find an old video of Jordan Peterson on Canadian Public Access, where he rails against women in the workplace, feminism and the emasculated man. I think he has found ways to modulate his rhetoric over the years, and to obscure his misogynism, homophobia and xenophobia with fairy tales and academic vernacular.

Peterson has it right. Postmodernism questions everything not as to what is best but to tear it all down so doubt is cast over everything. In other words, it's like the media bombarding us with so much stuff no one knows what to believe. It doesn't want a narrative for what is good. It wants chaos.

I appreciate this video and the last one (PM for beginners). Fact is, we (GenX and onward) are postmodern generations. GenX arguably is the least postmodern of the four (Millennials, GenZ, and genAlpha). I am GenX. We were brought up by the last modernity-embracing generation and have parented the younger generations. We are the ones grieving lost aspects of modernity and appreciating found aspects of postmodernism. I agree with you, that there are so many different ways of looking at PM that we can easily get lost in the debate. However, coming at it from the cultural point of view, as you do, is quite brilliant. GenX and the older Millennials grew up with The Simpsons, Princess Bride, Star Wars, Star Trek, and countless stars that are now brilliantly referenced in satire and non-satire alike. We love this. We are drawn to kids' movies like "Trolls", because they use our cultural references and music and redefine them, giving them, inadvertently, a new life. Why do we like this? Because we are of the AGE of postmodernism. We cannot help but be of this age. It is the very cultural air we breathe. We think, dream, and live in these boundless realms of invention through reinvention. What PM architecture started, TikTok has completed. This aspect of PM makes us all post-modern. However, the philosophical side, the rejection of Metanarratives of any kind, the embracing of Marx and Engels from a new perspective ("the only reason it failed in history is that they didn't do it right - WE will do it *right*, you'll see"), the distrust of anything or anyone that has been "favored" to be replaced with that which has been "oppressed" without regard for any sense of truth, the very distrust of the word and concept of truth itself... well, that is a problem in society that has lead us down paths that have, at best, been unconstructive. Living without boundaries, the very discarding of the possibilities of boundaries has not led to the freedom earlier postmodernists hoped for but rather has left us confused, willing to risk, lost, and grasping for anyone to rescue us from this state. It has not created a super generation, able to ascend and become the Ubermensch we so desperately hoped to evolve into. Instead, it has, in so many ways, bankrupted us intellectually and socially. By each becoming his own island, her own definition of truth, their own set of morals, we are rapidly falling into anarchy of individualism instead of unity of society, where we honor one another and the world around us. We are no longer able to embrace anyone who is "other" than our own little bubble of "reality" and lash out at each other, attempting to bully each other into the submission of our own world, doctrine, and narrative. Our rejection of Metanarratives has caused countless micronarratives. These are fun to explore in film but difficult to make a cohesive society out of. The question now is this: What will come next? Where do we go from here?
Thank you, again for these great videos. I will actually be using them in my Postmodernism class this afternoon. Let's see how they will grasp this subject...

Thanks for the video!

🙄🤔😕🤧. Pretty much Semantic Equivocations and Evasions.

Definitely not STEEL MANNING Peterson here. If that’s the best refutation that can be had, then JP clearly carries the day.

Jordan Peterson. The thinking man's idiot.

I have my own view on Postmodernism ... I learn from Hegel of course. But you are so disturbingly agreeable you would probably respond by saying I make good points ... which would shatter me. I am much happier when told I am talking bollocks.

My postmodernism mainly comes from symbolic anthropology and really dislike how the term postmodernisn is then used as an umbrella term to incapsulate what it is.
Peterson evaluation of postmodernism is hurtful especially because he comes from a point of ignorance and he didn't actually read any postmodern intellectuals like Focault or Derrida, he got his summary from a book that attacks all of postmodernism.
This is the case with many of its attackers they hate the philosophy so much that they won't get into to it to understand it. Or as I said they pick a way that postmodernism might have been used in a certain context or field and think that represent the whole of it.
Ironically Peterson hates Foucault who was largely influence by Nietzsche who is often considered the Father of postmodernism which is one of Peterson's own personal influential figure he looks to a lot aside from Jung.

You lost me when you referred to Karl Marx as a "great thinker."

Oh, we don't really need Peterson to "plant the seeds of doubt and distrust in places like the soviet union". We've got history.

I think it's called history? Challenge it, cool! But there can be NO discussion on reparations, white male privilege or gender. I say this because, when have people in power ever left a good ideas alone?
They have abused it & tuned it into something ugly in the name of doing good. There's money & power in dividing us especially when I say It's not for me, it's for the children!

What I personally like about Peterson: He keeps me on my toes. You can never be sure whether he is profound or wrong at any given moment, so I have to keep attention and can't take anything for granted.

Great thinkers like Marx!?

Your version of Post modernism is a soft academic tool to use to understand what is happening in the social media dominated world, but I think it is only a thin slice of post modernism. It is a useful way to look at the world as a warning of how we could become deceived on a massive scale. Peterson’s understanding is that Post Modernism is fundamentally (and correctly!) an extension of Marxism and Communism, a violent ideology that caused so much pain and suffering for so many people … this is the source of his rage. To say that he is just trying to support his conservative ideas is a huge understatement of why he is so passionate about this. He is ANGRY because Marxist Communism murdered at least 100 million people and he wants its rotten heart and its deadly offspring to be seen by all. If used as an academic tool, it is of some merit and use. If used as an ideology to destroy all knowledge and scientific truth, it is deadly.

For all the people confused on what Postmodernism means i want to explain.
I love Postmodernism since I am one but it just means you think like a Hippie, and Postmodernism means more than 1 truth and "Individualism"/Subjectivity

The biggest Anti-Postmodernist i know is Dr. Jordan Peterson because he says Postmodernism is the reason for all the evil in the Postmodern world of the 21st century

Peterson means that people are making bad decisions because they're too Individualistic and selfish

Modernism = 1 truth/Objectivity


The reason why Postmodernism is an attack on Christians is because Educated people associate Transgendered people with Postmodernism because they take the literal meaning of the word which is the Postmodern Philosophy which nowadays means Sex and Drugs which is not Good.

The reason I call myself a Postmodernist is because I like learning about that stuff because I like Abstract ArtYeah Abstract Art is up for interpretation and Subjective which is why it is classified as Postmodernistic Art

Amazingly, Peterson is the very epitome of the same Postmodernism he denounces. First, he creates a simulacrum of the concept of Postmodernism. Then, he converts his pseudo-postmodernism itself into a grand narrative (a cabal of post-Marxists engaged in a malevolous plot to destroy the West). Finally, he chooses no other than social media as his vehicle to deconstruct this grand narrative. In short, he takes all aspects of Postmodernism to their utmost expression: simulacra, deconstruction of grand narratives, hypermediation, the appeal to subjectivity, individualism... In other words, the loudest anti-postmodernist is himself the ultimate postmodernist (and the immense irony in all that is also remarkably postmodern). 🙃

Either you blind or you don't want to see

Petersons "real-world" definition of postmodernism is based on ACTUAL EXPERIENCE WE, THE NON-MARXISTS, ARE EXPERIENCING.

Postmodernism is built on inconsistency. It is built on dismissal of facts - only "personal perception" is important- that creates all the insidious professional victims, we have seen lately.

tl;dr
You failed. Peterson is spot on. Marxism and its off-shoots WERE PROVEN to be the most toxic, most oppressive, the most murderous ideologies. ONLY BAD PEOPLE PUSH THEM FORWARD.

Great podcast!!

“Lost faith in the structures offered by modern academics”? What about all those French intellectuals who theorized postmodernism? They were held in pretty high regard in France.

Anti-Postmodernism is not something that Jordan Peterson just conjured up. Are you unaware of the antagonism toward it from Noam Chomsky? I wouldn’t call Chomsky a conservative. I absolutely despise this notion of your truth / your narrative. Among other things I can think of no concept more destructive in our age of conspiracy theories, deep fakes, AI, Christian Nationalism and so on. Quit playing with this fire.

I don't want my kids to be exposed to these toxic ideas. I won't be encouraging or funding them to attend a toxic university. Twisting words and meanings won't wash with a thinking person. Thanks for opening my eyes to what I already suspected was going on. I could go on but this stuff just makes me angry. It really is just pseudo intellectual claptrap. Peterson is 100% correct!

I still don't fully understand postmodernism but i would say from my understanding that Jordan uses the postmodernism label because there are some aspects of postmodernism being used by the left to a high degree. However since postmodernism is such a large philosophical concept it hasn't been presented as a full picture. You could argue that the few aspects of postmodernism that are injurious to society is harmful enough to justify rejecting it staunchly or one could argue that it needs to be presented as a whole picture before being judged and Jordan should find a different label.

You are in the culture war my friend and you just picked a side.

I think Peterson uses his videos to educate the uniformed about the dangers of the failed Enlightenment ideology that has led to the destruction of Western cultural institutions. It is a path to authortarianism and nihilism and destruction of democratic values.

It's in times like this, that I like to remind myself that free will is an illusion and nothing matters.

What a reasoned, calmly rational look at Peterson's hijacking of the term "post modernism" and the problems his inflammatory and divisive talks and ideas create.

This was unfair to Peterson.

Understanding how post modern thinking is unraveling our capacity to actually have this conversation needed to be included.

How about reading Cynical Theories by Pluckrose and Lindsay.

It’s an academic discussion on the origin ideas and why they have been adopted for activism.

Peterson often mixes up post modernism, Critical theory and it's consequences which needs to be picked apart and not just presented in this smashed together demonized manner. I largely agree with his assessment about how these things have effected our current landscape but post modernism has many applications on either side of the argument and understanding why in a culture drowning in media and perspectives we are so angry and incapable of agreeing on axiomatic ideas. Post modernist thought often veers into interestingly reactionary directions.

Postmodernism in the artistic sense, and in the epistemological or political sense is very different, naturally people will disagree, which is very pomo

Its not like the postmodernists dont say exactly what they are about in their literature (they dont hide having found various other ways of dividing society and culture in marksian ways... they state it PROUDLY) They were obviously on the leftest side of philosophy and politics, so they were hard core marksists... and its not like they didnt switch what they were calling themselves once the term "Marksist" was considered bad. I think JP knows perfectly well post modernists reject grand narratives, i also dont think he trusts their integrity not to discard that very principle for power. I think their motivation lies within trying to grab as many cultural branches and institutions through marksist/postmodern fusion (through marksist type division, discarding the old while creating mere simulacras of them) There is enough evidence in all of the domains post modernism has gushed into to fully support JPs arguments. Look up James Lindsays (new discourses) podcast for much more in detail explanations of how these things add up. There is nothing that supports post modernists NOT being what you say it REALLY ISN'T, also we have people that literally define themselves as postmodern marksist like fred newman and lois holzman, their whole thing was implementing marksist thought into postmodernism ... make a third video man

BO-DREE-YARD

I can't stand JP. Thanks for dismantling him without raising your voice. I wouldn't have been nearly as polite.

The paradox of postmodernism is that it is actually a form of conservatism. If reality is so subjective, why do you question whether or not traditionalism is truth or not? It implies that leftism is objective. I consider myself postmodernist, but I am a huge fan of traditional values. In classical music, my profession, I am a fanatic of Bach and Lutosławski equally. In morality, I think that the family is the core of society, without which society fails (Christianity and Confucianism and Buddhism). Radical conservatism is just as bad as radical leftism.

I partly agree with Peterson, but he forgot that Stalinism emphasised traditional Russian values, banned national identity and individuality AND modernism.

If you reject EVERYTHING, you are not critically thinking. Critical thinking, which for me Postmodernism is, requires questioning even leftism itself.

You should rather listen to Stephen Hicks to understand how Marxism died, how it's corpse mutated into postmodernism which then mutated into it's perverted version known now as "Woke" - an absurd version of individualism. Peterson use of term "postmodernism" is imprecise and misleading.

All you need to do is watch when Slavoj Žižek absolutely bodied Lobster 🦞 Boy Jordan at their debate a few years ago, Peterson was looking at a computer to discuss Marxism. JP is nothing but a grifter who uses fancy words.

I didn’t get anything from this video.

America is fascinating. Communism is like a scarlet letter. Red scare echoes to today. Perhaps JP is anti postmodernism because it's the cultural logic that can allow one to question capitalist ideology. Good video 🙏