Part One: The Jordan Peterson Episode | BEHIND THE BASTARDS 

I don't resent rich people for being rich. I resent rich people because they're not helping, and I resent them because they don't think they *should be* helping.

On the point of needing one's life in order first before improving the world, which is often summarized as "clean your room first" I came up with a counter "it's hard to keep your room clean when there's people throwing shit in through the window."

I lost a friend because he got sucked into this weird cult. He couldn't stop talking about Peterson, and the moment he learned that I didn't like the guy, he made it his mission to get confrontational with me any time he could, demanding that "debate" him. I finally did, and my former friend was wholly unprepared for someone actually having sources. So he called me a homophobic slur and blocked me from discord. It's probably one of my proudest moments, but damn I wish this creep wouldn't have had that effect on people.

JBP is a simple kinda guy, with down-to-Earth desires. All he really wants is to be recognized as the "Most Special Boy In History"

Some once said of Newt Gingrich, that he was “what a dumb person thinks a smart person sounds like “. That phrase climbs into my head every time I hear Peterson talk

About 10 years younger than Peterson, but as a 70s/80s kid I can attest that I lived constantly under the fear of nuclear annihilation. For some extra trauma, I grew up near the Lawrence/Kansas City area - i.e. where the TV film The Day After is set. So I got to see places I knew blasted by pretend nuclear fire when I was still in elementary school. 👍

For someone that espouses the idea of being “well” before helping others, he spends a lot of his time being a jittering wreck. That’s not to say being unwell or unstable is wrong, it’s the human condition, but he’s not a shining example of his own ideas. Practising therapists (including psychologists like himself) are ethically bound to regularly seek “supervision”, essentially informed therapy, in order to keep themselves objective and fit to practice. I wonder if he keeps up with his appointments?

And as Cody would later point out in his very concise episode about Dr. Peterson, the point about the military having a minimum IQ requirement isn't even true, because the military aptitude test is not an IQ test.

Finally somebody is saying something about the Swiss. They put those holes in their cheese and tell you it's fancy to SELL YOU LESS CHEESE! Wake up sheeple!

It always seemed to me that Peterson was trying to resolve his own personal issues but was mistaking his personal issues and subconscious views as being universal, objective truths. Instead of questioning himself and his views he declared the world to be broken because it didn't conform to what he saw when he looked at himself.

"Anyone who set out to change the world by first changing other people was suspicious" THAT'S YOU JORDAN. THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT YOU DO.

I always figured his whole "Clean your room first" schtick was to put down students and young people from trying to change anything in society, thus reinforcing the hierarchies that Peterson loves and was firmly entrenched in as a university professor. Basically "You're too young and dumb to know anything, so stop trying." Which is an incredibly right wing/conservative viewpoint.

Actually, the lobster thing is actually a really great example of just how completely ridiculous so much of Peterson's points and arguments are when you really think about them and understand what he's trying to do. Basically, Peterson brings up the lobsters because, he claims, that his opponents claim that all hierarchies are unnatural and hence they should be abolished. This is where Peterson says "consider the lobster" and it basically goes like this: 1) Lobsters have existed for millions of years and they have a mating hierarchy in that, every time mating season comes around, lobster will battle it out for the opportunity to mate with some lobsters coming out on top and some losing out. 2) When a lobster wins this mating battle and becomes dominant in the hierarchy, its serotonin level goes up and it becomes more lively, more active, more aggressive, etc. while, when a lobster fails to win, their serotonin goes down and they become droopy and sad and their brains basically liquefy. Hence, because some lobsters are made happy by the hierarchy, it is beneficial and good. 3) Because lobsters are millions of years ago, hence hierarchies are natural. 4) Both humans and lobsters have serotonin and Peterson claims that humans react the same way when they fail and succeed in our hierarchy and our serotonin goes up and down in a similar way, hence our hierarchies are also natural and beneficial. Now, if you have even three braincells to rub together, you're probably already seeing a lot of problems with this logic! Let's talk about some now! XD 1) This is a blatant appeal to nature and appeal to age fallacy. Just because something is old or natural doesn't mean it's good or right or something we should have in our society. Peterson, in general, is incredibly bad for appeals to nature and age, half of all of his arguments are basically "This thing is old and so therefore must have something of value and is worth preserving". This appeal to nature is also something he's repeatedly called out in his opponents like "eco activists" and yet here he is using it to justify his own worldview. 2) Lobsters and humans operate is such vastly different ways that it's difficult to argue that they can be analogous in any way, not just biologically, but also socially. Lobsters are NOT social animals like humans, they actively hate being put together in the same space as each other. That's the reason why they put rubber bands on the claws of lobsters and crabs in the tanks at the seafood counter or in a seafood restaurant, because, if you don't, then they will literally murder one another until there's only one left standing who then claims the tank as their territory. Humans, on the other hand, can be put in a room together and just make small talk with each other. 3) Just because some individuals benefit from something does not make it good. That's literally what being privileged is, some individuals being PRIVILEGED enough to benefit from a system rather than suffer as a result of it. 4) Humans and lobsters both having serotonin is not unique or exceptional, almost everything on EARTH uses serotonin. Like, plants have serotonin, should we consider the tree and just root ourselves in the ground, passively absorbing nutrients while we wait to photosynthesize? 5) THAT'S NOT HOW SEROTONIN WORKS IN HUMANS AT ALL! Peterson equates serotonin to a mood and reward hormone, but, while it is that in lobster, it is NOT that in humans. He's thinking of dopamine. Serotonin, instead, is much more of a moderating neurotransmitter, it moderates emotional responses and it allows the newer, more rational parts of the brain to override the older, more instinctual parts. When humans have higher serotonin in their systems, they act calm, rational, reasonable, one could say more submissive and deferential, while, when someone has lower serotonin, they become more angry, aggressive, violent, and one could say dominant! It is, in fact, THE EXACT OPPOSITE WAY THAT PETERSON CLAIMS IT WORKS! 6) And, finally, the study he cites as to where he got the information on lobsters and serotonin was done on crayfish, not lobsters. So, this is either a FORMER PSYCHIATRIST who doesn't know how serotonin works in the human brain (can you say MASSIVE SERIES OF LAWSUITS!!!!!) or a ideologue who knows how serotonin works, but is just ACTIVELY LYING about it because he knows his audience won't pick up on it and because it allows him to justify his worldview. And, honestly, as much as I would LOVE IT to be the former, I have to believe it was the latter. I think what happened is that Peterson discovered this study about crayfish, thought "Oh, I can use this to justify my beliefs" and just pretended it was about lobsters because humans and crayfish was a WAY bigger jump than humans and lobsters.

Said this elsewhere… but has someone checked on Peterson’s patients? Are they okay? Because if they are, I think we can agree that it’s despite him…

Coming back from the first break immediately with "Campbell's racism" briefly made me think we were suddenly talking about the soup company and they had a very concerning new product.

George Lucas did have an editor for his first film (and some subsequent ones). She, alongside John Williams, helped save the movie from mediocrity. The editor was his Ex-Wife, Marcia Lucas.

In my head cannon Peterson's middle name is Bellend.

One of my favorite content creators on one of my favorite podcasts. Dope. 🍿

JBP's unquestioning statement that "disorder has always been represented as feminine!" (By whom?) "That's just the way it is! You can't change it or we wouldn't be human anymore" ironically sounds like the overly sure religious statements he rejected as a teen in confirmation class. So... question everything...unless he agrees with it?

Hey, Robert, love the show. Cody is always great. The discussion about Peterson’s followers and their cultish behavior got me thinking about Stephen Molyneaux (I think I got the spelling on there right, the dude’s clearly a bastard just for having a name that’s so difficult to spell). Anyway, a Molyneaux episode with you and Cody would be great. Thanks for the great content! -Tom

This will make a great addition to my "Jordan Peterson is bad" playlist.

I started reading by age three. It’s called hyperlexia and is often a sign of autism. If JBP is telling us the truth, then he might be on the spectrum. That would explain A LOT about his rigid views on everything.

JP really loves words. He says a massive amount of words, he reads a ton of them. Words have been there for him when people weren’t. So he is willing to wage war for 2-4 letter words…. A “visionary” indeed.

"Clean your room and then lick the boot." - Jordan Peterson probably

Great podcast. I didn't get to quite see it live. Just 8mo late lol

Jordan Peterson stans: "We're not a cult!" Also Jordan Peterson stans: "They're saying something about Jordan Peterson that isn't glowing praise! BATTLESTATIONS!"

Becoming a big fan of this podcast. I'm always here for dumping on JP, it's also nice to be able to hear Cody unscripted. =)

People should absolutely listen to a mentor when they say their mentee is dangerous. It is INCREDIBLY hard to admit someone you mentored sucks.

A self-help guru who is remarkably un-self-aware. So much so that it's kind of hilarious until you consider how many people take him very, very seriously.

4:30 Jordan Be Peterson's voice is just Kermit if he's deathly afraid and on the verge of tears, actually. That's how i get there, anyway.

The thing about personality traits is a hallmark JP technically correct but used to force a weird conclusion.. Yes, those are major personality traits and all psychologists would probably agree. Although boxing people only into those 5 is silly, there's more to people and more personality traits. Also, well, yes, those character traits obviously exist in all cultures, how they'd be expressed can be different. He has such a need to completely understand the world, which is obviously impossible, any definitive conclusions will always be wrong.

That's what I hate about all these "objective truths" logical libertarian (secretly conservative) types like Peterson and Shapiro. They only use that as a way of setting up everything they preach as beyond reproach. It just another form of hard right conservatives invoking "nature" to support all their shitty stances. Both are an ethereal version of the old appeal to authority fallacy.

So happy to meet Cody in this Showdy! :)) - And even more delighted I am, that Robert keeps misgendering Mircea Eliade as "she/her" for a good amount of the time - he would have hated that so much!

10:13 I can believe he was reading at three. Some kids actually start at two. We're talking easy readers, folks. There's a huge variation at that age. What I don't believe is that he's still a reader. Both his academic and public speaking corpus repeatedly return to books he read years ago. He shows no sign of having really read or absorbed anything new since the 1990s and even then he was only reading stuff that validated his priors. This is why he embarrassed himself in front of Zizek. He's read commentaries on Marx, but only from a certain point of view, and he hasn't read a lot of Marx and he was so arrogant that he didn't even bother to review it prior to the debate.

the most apt description of the canadian government ever, lol.

Hey Cody! From Cody Showdy! What a nice surprise!

So funny to relate to Jordan Peterson so much in how he collects and compares ideas, but going in the opposite direction. I'm in uni studying creative writing, sociology and philosophy. I keep comparing how the structure of stories continues and enforces power dynamics. Again, going in the opposite direction. Like ahh yes we are all just humans living in a society, trying to understand.

Bro, you missed a meta-joke about Sirhan-Sirhan assassination Doc Petersen, since you didn’t know he was still alive. JP’s new pal Bobby Kennedy Jr. wants Sirhan outta jail now because he doesn’t think he killed his dad!

I'm like an hour in, and i was really hoping to understand why people pay attention to him. I was told to check him out, and i listened to maybe a dozen hours of him lecturing. It was awful. I love how you guys described it - he just cherry picks random things all the time to prove a point but never actually proves his point. I was just so confused. I'm glad others shared in this experience. I'll keep listening. I still don't understand why anyone thinks he is saying anything worth listening to.

A correction: Mircea Eliade (pronounced Meer-cha Eh-lee-ah-deh) was a man. He is popular for his books about religions, and his novel Maitreyi (Bengal Nights) which involves a relationship between himself and an Indian woman Maitreyi Devi.

Telling peope to "clean their room" when he has a benzo addiction? Yeesh, man needs some humility.

I am new listener. I was hoping / wondering if you would take this guy on I had very good friend ( one if the best I eve had ). However she became a Jordan Peterson fan girl and underwent a total change in the focus of her life . She raged against birth tourism and immigration and the fact she would never be able to afford a house .Eventually we came to a parting of the ways I watched a couple of his interviews and took a look a couple of his books . He , immediately struck me as a Man on the Make / a Two Bit Hustler with a talent for self promotion .It as my impression he became the intellectual darling of the alt right because he saw it as a money making making opportunity ( and a chance to score on a regular basis )

Waiting still for his debate with Prof. Richard Wolff. Or is Peterson's challenge like the rest of his argumentation: hot garbage air?

I think the whole "you have to get your own house in order before you can help others" thing illustrates just how much he can fall victim to confirmation bias. I mean, I somehow doubt he's unfamiliar with AA, and the 12 step program of recovery -of which, helping others is a core component (f.y.i. the 12 steps can be categorized into (1) Trust God, (2) Clean House, (3) Help Others).

Gasp. Cody J. I "know" that guy!

Which episode was referenced that talks about Julius Evola? I can't be arsed to read the jibberish he wrote, but willing to hear a light summary.

I think the host and guest overstate Peterson's public speaking skills. I've heard so many examples of batshit word salad from his speeches and panels that I can't imagine holding that opinion.

"What the dickens!?" -George Orwell

5:55 I'm not sure I'm completely up on my Soviet history and I'd recommend anyone interested to read up on antisemitism in the Soviet Union, which was a very real thing, but afaik early on it was in fact comparatively pretty good to be Jewish in the Soviet Union, or at least the state and party leaders took a pretty decisive stance against antisemitism. By far the worst periods of antisemitism in the USSR started under Stalin and particularly post-WW2, with a second (afaik less brutal) wave after relations between Israel and the USSR soured. Early on there was a pretty strong commitment against antisemitism, at least from Communists. Of course all antisemitism didn't disappear overnight, especially as everyone who wanted to be in the state's good graces joined the party eventually.

I remember the first time I heard of Peterson, and it was when my godfather, a tenured professor of cognitive psychology, was bitching to my dad, a developmental psychologist, about how Peterson visited his collage for a talk, and how bad of a psychologist Peterson was. This would have been in the early 2000s. It was like listening to a couple of old ladies gossiping, but they basically described Peterson as an outdated quack whose understanding of psychology would have been acceptable in the 1960. Unfortunately for Peterson psychology had greatly evolved from that point on. They viewed almost all the Carl Jung's writings were more important for understanding the history of psychology, but had no real use in modern psychology outside of that. They mentioned that intelligence tests were absolutely useless, and yet Peterson put weight in it. And that Peterson's psychology was racist to a disturbing degree. Just as a small note, both of them are almost a decade older than him, and they viewed all of his academic work as terribly backwards.

Oh, it's Cody!

The 80's were rough. We really thought we were going to die.

Damn some real incels in the comments

When the comments are defending a grifter 🤦‍♂️

Raytheon ad break was pure gold.

What's with the guy's fixation on chaos having to be feminine? That only seems to apply to Greek or Romans. Even in Europe, the Norse had Loki as god of chaos and mischief, he was a man. The Celts had Balor, also a male. Once you get out of Europe and into other continents you find a variety of Chaos representation that are also male. Once you pull out of pantheons and into our earliest monotheistic traditions that pit chaos/destruction against order... Ahriman in Zoroastrianism represents the counterpart to order and is also a male.

That voice, when you yell, sounds like the Grand Nagus from Deep Space Nine. Listen back to it and see.

Speaking as an Albertan, our provinces NDP can barely even be called social democrat, and is much more accurately classified as capitalists who accept the national status quo on a few social systems. I note this, because it is extremely common here for people to come to one of two conclusions, either that there is no way to get actual improvements to happen here, or that this utterly status quo party is the exemplification of left wing politics. Regardless of the conclusion, the Texas of Canada continues its inexorable march towards being the first part of Canada to enact its own fascist state, and Petersons read of things is one of the most understandable things about his mental state.

I got an ad for the daily wire featuring none other than JB Peterson before the podcast 😂

Boomer here, born in 1953. When I wasn't having nightmares about nuclear holocaust, I was having nightmares about Jesus's 2nd coming. And, yes. I acquired a bad life-long case of PTSD. Most aware boomers do.

Peterson hasn't read any Orwel, maybe a fly sheet or someone else's summary. He knows nothing about Marxism either. In fact Ive never heard him make anclaim that turns out to be grounded in fact.

I'd recognize Cody's voice anywhere! Nice!

The military doesn't actually test for IQ though. They make you take a general knowledge test called the ASVAB (it may have been renamed since I took it in 1995), and it is absolutely NOT an IQ test. It's just general knowledge and is broken down into subcategories to help determine what you'd be good at if you went into the military. Tested really well on science and auto repair? Come be a mechanic! Tested well on general knowledge and everything overall? Come be a linguist and work in intel (which is what I did). Didn't do great on anything in particular? Come be an 11-boom-boom ("11b" aka "eleven bravo" is the Army MOS/job code for infantryman). The funny thing is, where it's just a general knowledge test, people with disorders like dyslexia who struggle with such tests struggle with the ASVAB too. I know people who've had to go through that despite being pretty smart, and it sucks (although being denied entry into the military could be a good thing depending on your perspective...). The space magic religion in Star Wars isn't social darwinist; it's actually quite the opposite. Liam Neeson pointed out in Episode 1 that it was totally random and the Republic had to watch for it so that people with the powers could be trained to use it altruistically for the betterment of society. It's random (not counting Space Jesus and his family) and not inherently good or evil. If you want to see an example of a fictional magic that does lean into social darwinism, look at the Potterverse. And yeah, Sirhan B(umblebee) Sirhan is still alive. He was up for parole earlier this year (2023) and it was denied.

I could be way, WAY off base here… but JBPs deep seated fear that he believes something that might not be true and the consequent pivot toward black-and-white “this is TRUE this is TRUE it is ALWAYS TRUE” … it sounds like OCD, which is what I have Actually I think Peterson and I have the same kind of ocd - the idea that we are immoral and don’t believe the right things causes deep, deep anxiety and it upsets us so the natural response is to overthink and overthink and overthink until we find the ABSOLUTE PERFECT SOLUTION that can NEVER BE WRONG But that never happens, because nothing is perfect. Some people choose to accept this through coaching, some people like Peterson double down and when they find a solution that gives them the comfort of certainty they will drive it into the ground until it’s six feet under. Some people just! Stay anxious! Because again, the solutions you come up with are never perfect. He’s only certain to hide his anxiety about the - for lack of a better term - chaos inherent to belief systems, to solutions, to life. It’s not so much the idea that brings him comfort, it’s the fact that he can convince himself he is right and that there are certain and concrete answers to the questions and fears he has I don’t pity him because he’s a rich white man who enables fascist rhetoric, but I do see my own behaviors inside him and therefore empathize. Thank god I didn’t double down like he did lol

I'm so stupid that I wasn't able to figure out if Raytheon really was a sponsor of the podcast.

Literally couldnt have brought on a better guest!

Keep up the good work guys! Love it when i hear voices of reason in the midst of the right wing BS youtube keeps recommending me.

Well, time to ruin my RU-vid recommendations even more than the Roman history and anime clips did.

I enjoy a lot of Urban Fantasy. If Jordan ever discovered real magic, he would certainly become an evil sorcerer. 😂

There's so many things to be said about Peterson, but one thing I don't see enough is, he's so unconvincing when he swears and gets loud. Like, I've never qualified as a jock, be I would be comfortable calling him a pipsqueak.

I just don’t understand how Peterson’s “teachings” can be helpful to anyone. One of the best things you can be is resilient, put Peterson says that change is bad and you should fight tirelessly against it and reject all notion that society can be better than any form it’s taken in the past.

Why would feminine be chaotic?

"Bring it on like the Swiss bring on" was where my brain finished the sentence by immediately saying "Nazi gold"

Jordan is the incels “Batman”….

Mircea Eliade...sounded like you were saying "she"? He's a he. Name is pronounced mirt-shay-ah (or maybe it's mirt-shee-ah...not sure!) Source is Wikipedia. :-)

How in the fuck are we supposed to steal every catalytic converter in the world if you guys have less than 1000 subs on youtube? im amazed that this podcast hasnt blown up bigger, i love the format.

RU-vid community is just not a fan of this despite it being really popular and I find that funny

1:09:00 - Many psychologists don't believe in the 5 personality types. The model has been criticized many times for lacking scientific support and if I'm not misremembering, wasn't even designed by anyone with scientific training.

1:22:10 I question what he's calling a "while" in this case. The way he speaks it might as well mean "after eternal life for rich people fails and I'm dead".

only recognized Cody at the end. Thanks for being allies to LGBTQ people x

So, I found this channel via Reddit(Hi, Scott Adams you hack). Very great so far! I was more than chuffed at another piece on Peterson, and yet you kept me glued the moment I heard my beloved News Dude speak. What with being all for being Fair and Balanced™️

JP has this weird cultish effect on people where, if you say that you're not really a fan of the guy, his followers will explain to you how, yes, actually you are but you just don't realize it.

The recipe for a fascist is very simple: a fear of chaos that is stronger than the love of justice.

"Stochastic Terrorism" is what they call that I think.

Jordan Peterson's job is literally to teach students. He doesn't get to say whatever he wants to them. If he teaches his students a bunch of bullshit that's a problem for him and the school. You better believe they mandate his educational practices be factual. Respecting the students is also part of the job, and if he can't do that, then he cannot be a teacher.

Does anybody else feel that Robert's Ben Shapiro impression at 28:30 came off more like Jimmy Dore?

I wonder what you guys think about Adam Curtis and his work?

- isn't the swiss hatred a kids in the hall bit? i seem to recall scott thompson doing this bit 🤔😛🤷🏼😂

The irony of Peterson's IQ based calls for basically "what to do with these people" Hes probably changed his views on that since his mind turned to mush.

I can actually see why a business that's in the business of being a business would want to eliminate the chance of an arbitrary word offending a potential customer base. I mean, are we sure this email chain wasn't simply trying to explain that it's probably good business to eliminate linguistically confusing phrases that might lead to offense, even if they're being fundamentally misunderstood? I mean... he does have a history of nailing himself to the cross and then bemoaning his crucifixion

Peterson is gross. I instantly lose respect for people who defend him at this point.

@20:13 ummm, I'm late to this but what did Berny Sanders do?

He truly believes everything says, even though what he may doesn't make sense in that some element truth is there?

The Showdy that is not Cody's?

06:30 - A mistake. Under the Tzar were 1000 laws against Jews. CCCP was the first country ever(!) where Jews were equal to all other nations. “In the U.S.S.R. antisemitism is punishable with the utmost severity of the law as a phenomenon deeply hostile to the Soviet system. Under U.S.S.R. law active antisemites are liable to the death penalty.” -Stalin. 13:00 - The latter two of the three authors were graphomaniacs, harboring a grudge against CCCP. 30:00 - At the entrance of the built museum of Lucas’ art, I wish to see his quote about CCCP. I would argue how important Campbell was if screenwriters still use the phrase “(V.) Propp it up”. 33:30 - Joseph Goebbels’ quote comes to mind about enticing a nation like a woman. 37:30 - Most replayed point of the video. He has nothing to do with psychology; we will see it later. 55:00 - I have this timestamp written down. 1:08:50 - I have met these metrics in another professor of anthropology - The jolly heretic Edward Dutton. However, 30-60% of all psychology experiments cannot be repeated. The heretic is biased.

Yes, my generation grew up with the constant threat of nuclear annihilation. This generation is growing up with the CERTAINTY of slowly being cooked to death, along with the still possible threat of nuclear annihilation. I'll see y'all in 30 years, maybe. Sweet dreams.

never heard that as a slur before, its a bit awkward being that my mom calls my dad Flip because he's named Philip and was a gymnast.

We need an established agreement on something.

All this myth and morality talk combined with this focus on order and chaos and deep desire to be important has convinced me Jordan just wants to be the God Emperor from 40k.

55:20 shots fired