Originally posted by Bruno
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Lobster Boy (was: This Jordan Peterson Guy)
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Originally posted by BrunoHere's my question: who decided for all transgender people that the new pronouns in question were the preferred and correct ones? I don't know the data but I've read that most transgender people prefer either he or she.
I also indicated my refusal to apply what are now known as “preferred” pronouns to people who do not fit easily into traditional gender categories (although I am willing to call someone “he” or “she” in accordance with their manner of self-presentation).
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Peterson, a professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, has said that his position isn't so much against the pronouns, but against efforts to persuade people to use them even if they don't want to.
From the Inside Higher Ed article linked above.
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It appears, then, that he's contradicting himself. "These words are at the vanguard of a post-modern, radical leftist ideology that I detest", very much sounds like he's against the pronouns themselves.
Perhaps he's trying to walk back his position because it was so obviously stupid, and he's got embarrassed by it.
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Originally posted by BrunoI get that, but I'm asking where these new words are coming from, which will surely influence what's considered correct. If anybody can make up any pronoun they want, we could be in for confusing times, especially if you can be fined for using the wrong one.
Also, nobody is getting fined for using the wrong pronoun accidentally. People are getting called on it when they are wilfully and deliberately using the wrong pronoun, which is almost always going to be done as an attempt to demean a person for having a non-binary gender identity.
I also don't understand what you mean by "considered correct". Do you mean the pronoun that someone considers correct for themselves? Surely that is entirely up to them. Or do you mean the pronoun that "society" (in whatever form) considers correct? In which case you're probably creating a straw man.
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Originally posted by BrunoRight, so it seems that the question is whether this just makes him a "prize dickhead" or whether he should also be fined for harassment/discrimination, or run out of his job, or... Since many on the left are in favor of the latter, you can sort of see his point about Mao, as extreme and unhelpfully emotive as it is.
Not that hounding him out of his job would be the equivalent of Maoism. 100 million Canadians aren't going to die of starvation if Jordan Peterson does lose his job for abusing his position.
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The "If anyone can make up any pronoun they want" sounds a lot like "If we let men marry men, next thing people will be marrying their dog or their horse". This is the sort of thing that's going to be an issue with 1 or 2 people out of a university class of hundreds. If you think this is going to be an issue, it's only because you want it to be an issue.
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FWIW I suspect Peterson is a lifelong academic who, either due to his own volition or circumstances, found himself thrown into a hot educational debate. He's clearly the antithesis of media-savvy, and probably didn't expect his musings to be turned into international headlines. Watching his responses to Newman he's clearly learned, or is learning, to consider carefully before replying. He dimly realises he's not in a faculty club discussion anymore. I suspect that's why he's adjusted/moderated his statements since the Toronto Life article over a year ago that UA posted.
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Originally posted by BrunoBut that's really my point. People are going to decide what they want to be called according to what they perceive are collectively accepted or recognizable pronouns. I think it's very unlikely that this will individuate, which is part of why I wondered where these pronouns are coming from.
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Originally posted by BrunoHe just thinks there's an ideological connection that boils down to limiting free speech.
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As well as looking a lot like an anti-trans bigot, his comments on masculinity and women show him to be a total prick. Whenever someone starts wailing against Post-Modernism as the key to all our ills, you know you are in the presence of an idiot.
He might not be alt-right himself, but he doesn’t seem too concerned about being a poster boy for the 4chan arseholes.Last edited by Lang Spoon; 16-02-2018, 18:59.
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I am very weirded out by the idea of “community” deciding the proper use of words. That was the half arsed defense some idiots were putting out for the Old Fat Labour masquerading as Corbynite MP who used the words bent and chinkie at a Burns Supper the other week.
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Although I’ve just read you again Bruno and I guess you are meaning to the non binary community, rather than the wider community.
But not, apparently.Last edited by Lang Spoon; 16-02-2018, 19:15.
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Originally posted by BrunoI haven't seen enough evidence to tell me that Peterson is a bigot. He insists he isn't transphobic. He's skeptical of the non-binary view but I see no implicit hatred or desire to discriminate against or punish anyone for their identities. I could be wrong obviously.
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Originally posted by BrunoWell, the majority does decide what words are acceptable. PC Gone Mad = PC won a majority for the example you mention. Usage evolves.
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Originally posted by Lang Spoon View PostAs well as looking a lot like an anti-trans bigot, his comments on masculinity and women show him to be a total prick. Whenever someone starts wailing against Post-Modernism as the key to all our ills, you know you are in the presence of an idiot.
He might not be alt-right himself, but he doesn’t seem too concerned about being a poster boy for the 4chan arseholes.
I mean, that thing about "the West discovering the sovereignty of the individual" is mindbogglingly dumb.
A) There is no consistently defined place or set of ideas called "The West." It has shifted many times and the idea of "Western Civilization" only emerged in the 19th century. It's all part of the old "Have you read 'Rise of the Coloured Empires' but this fellow Goddard..." stuff.
B) Nobody "discovered" the sovereignty of the individual. These things are social constructs that we collectively agree to, or not, because we prefer to live in one kind of set-up or the other. It was an idea invented and pushed by a handful of white guys during the Enlightenment period as a response to their displeasure with feudalism, monarchy, and the Church. It only applied to white male land-owners and, to a large extent, it still is largely confined to that group. It may be a good idea for other reasons, but this notion that you can squint really hard and to discover Natural Law that we are all beholden to is obvious bullshit that should not have survived the 18th, let alone the 19th and 20th centuries.
C) The idealized western liberal democracy that values individual sovereignty and downplays tribal affiliations may have started to emerge in the west first, but in the grand sweep of history, it happened in Europe only a blink before it did other places and did so because of very specific circumstances, not because of any superiority of the "race" or even the culture. So we shouldn't take too much credit.
D) Places outside "The West" adopted some of the ideas we associate with the aforementioned glorious Western Democracy - India had some "republics" in ancient times, Native Americans had some democratic institutions and, at least in some areas, gave women a lot more leadership roles. The Persians should have been the good guys. Islam has historically been far more tolerant and accepting of religious diversity than Christendom. And fascism persisted in the west, in Spain especially, long after India and Japan adopted democracy. Europe still has monarchs, official churches, and landed gentry, FFS. The US elected Donald Trump.
E) It's not at all clear that this "sovereignty of the individual" and the complete destruction of communal identity is such a great idea, at least the way it's been implemented by capitalism.
F) In any event, it's not a remotely Christian idea, unless one's concept of Christianity is confined entirely to right-wing white evangelical American mega-churches over the last 50 years.
That's six major problems with just one of his pronouncements. Have a left any out? I can't imagine reading 400 pages of that.
I'd also add that my experience with clinical psychologists is that they, like many academics, don't necessarily know much about anything outside of a narrow field of research. So his credentials aren't that impressive, really.
Calling trans people by the wrong gender is the equivalent of deliberately and repeatedly getting somebody's name wrong or calling them Chaz when they prefer Charles or Peaches when their name is Elizabeth. It's not strictly illegal, but it's really insulting. Professors shouldn't insult their students and students that are repeatedly insulted have good reason to believe the teacher isn't giving them a fair opportunity.
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Adam Ferguson (now overshadowed by Hume and the willfully misread by bastards like PJ O’Rourke and the Heritage Foundation and obliquely funded dangerous crank UK think tanks Adam Smith) is worth a read HP as far as “Scottish Enlightenment” philosophy goes. In some ways his works are a precursor to modern Sociology, and his critique of Commercial Society puts the boot into the exploiters way more than Smith (whose condemnation of the rentier class and call for universal education as a panacea for the drudgery of industrial labour, and limited protectionism for when country is attempting to develop a new industry would be condemned as Socialism if the pricks who eulogize him actually bothered reading him).
Unlike the agnostic but Smug Racist Tory Hume, and the at least outwardly Religiously Respectable and studiously apolitical Smith, Ferguson was (originally) a Calvinist Minister who could speak the Gaelic of the dwindling minority (through willing emigration/moving to Lowland Scotland/language assimilation/Involuntary clearance for sheep) of Perthshire. Yet his work in comparative religion and of different societies seems strikingly modern and sympathetic. An influence on Hegel and (Jordan’s fave) Marx. Those were different times. I guess the madness of religious zeal could also burn with the fire of social justice in the Name of Christ’s Kingdom.
If I could be arsed to study dialectic enough and still had my wits in full I’d be a Frankfurt School Marxist. Anyone who tries to blame them for the deaths of 100m can get tae fuck.Last edited by Lang Spoon; 16-02-2018, 21:06.
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