Multiculturalism is 'a miracle of STUPIDITY' | Jordan Peterson talks Trump, Sunak and Israel

Jordan, nice to see you, thanks for your time today. You've talked about trying to tilt the world toward heaven and away from hell. Are you saying that we are heading to hell on one hand and that the decline of Western civilization is reversible? You think well, those always exist as possibilities and we all know that in our own lives because you know that things can go wrong or they can go right and you also know that you have some relationship with that because you know that if you continue with that pattern of terrible mistakes that you you are inclined to commit and that you could stop committing if you wanted to, that things could get very bad for you and probably have at different times in your life, so those realities are always laid out before us and the notion of heaven and hell are, you could think of those notions as the ultimate reaches of those possibilities, you know, and we never quite inhabit an archetypal hell, but I would say that Owitz was close, you know he was close enough for me and then with respect to Well, you know you inhabit it from time to time, when I believe that the easiest path to what is classically understood as heaven is often found in love, especially in relationships with children.

Yeah, you know, you see when when I had my wife and I. My daughter lived in a pretty poor area of ​​Montreal and we used to take her around in a stroller and, as is done with babies, one of the wonderful things to see was that even the toughest street kids could see the best in them. If they weren't completely destroyed by their lives, you know you could see them turn on that light, so you know, the ultimate extension of that light is the sky and we make decisions that move us in one direction or another all the time and the way the society develops is a consequence of those choices and, much more directly than people tend to think, are we doomed to an apocalyptic nightmare no more than we have been in the past, although perhaps faster now due to the pace of destruction? technological transformation I don't think things have to be like this.

I don't think it'll ever be the case that things have to move in a hellish direction, but they sure could, but life feels a little hellish right now if you think about war. In Ukraine, recent events in Israel we have had a lot of division on the streets of London in recent days and weeks. Do you think there's a way to reverse the kind of tribalism associated with, say, identity politics? Well, we are experimenting. about how to do that on a large scale this week here in London, so at the conference that that's happening all around us and I think it's possible to reverse it.

I think it is always possible to reverse it. I mean, look, Soviet Russia abandoned the Soviet Union. you know, and maybe you're not very happy with Russia right now, but they decided that that totalitarian experiment was inappropriate, we locked ourselves in miserably for 2 years, absolutely pointlessly playing with totalitarianism by copying China in essence very quickly, but we decided that such Maybe that wasn't a good idea and I backed away, so I don't think things will ever be so miserable that there's no hope and I certainly don't think that's the case for the world right now because the horizon of opportunity that's in front to us it is at least as vast as the Horizon of Catastrophe and I would say vaster because I believe that in the final analysis good triumphs over evil.

I think it's more powerful in the final analysis that truth is more powerful than falsehood virtually by definition, even though we live in this post-truth world, I mean, we've seen some of the debates around Israel this week from people who perpetuate falsehoods. We also live in this society now, where the prevailing attitude is that if you disagree with me, then "Not only are you wrong, but you're a bigot and a racist and you deserve to be cancelled, or worse or worse, so I think there is the perception that Western governments in particular have been weak when it comes to so-called tolerance, that they are in fact extremely intolerant, how does the silent majority cope well with this usually, all too often, perhaps by hiding their heads? in the arena.

I mean, that's certainly the case in my country because it has taken multiple depressing turns for the worse in the last eight years, but it has taken The liberals were led by a very charismatic leader who is extraordinarily narcissistic and who used compassion. Look, if you are really narcissistic and manipulative, the best disguise is compassion and you can become very good at acting that and if you are very good at it it is very difficult to be against you because your constant excuse is well, I'm just doing. this for the sake of someone else not just for the sake of someone else but for the sake of the most depressed and suffering OP, yeah you know, and if you're good at it, it's very difficult, first of all, it's very difficult to suspect enough to really detect the magnitude of that lie and, secondly, it is difficult to oppose it without being easily labeled as intolerant, you know when?

I was in political trouble for the first time, say in Canada in 2016. I spoke out against a bill that I thought was an unwarranted intrusion into the realm of free speech and free thought, which is what it was, but it was disguised Well, we. You only care about the least of the Least, which in this case were people confused about their sexuality and their gender, let's say trans people, and you know, the immediate accusation towards me was that I was hateful and bigoted, well, you know. , is Why did you choose this hill to die on? Why don't you worry about these poor suffering people?

Can't you just use the language that would make them feel better and then if you do, you also know why governments are weak on that? That kind of thing, I talk to conservatives and classical liberals from all over the Western world, individual by individual, and although this is starting to change to some extent, they are all terrified of being torn apart by the bloodthirsty mob and it's no wonder, but that suggests that the politicians may have lost their nerve and I wonder what their analysis of Ry is. No, the mob simply became more effective, well maybe, but they met with some Tory MPs.

I mean, has unabashed Sunak conservatism lost its way? You know, to be fair and B, how Boris Johnson was lured down the Net Zero path is beyond my comprehension. I think he probably had something to do with his young wife, you know, but he took the bait and sunk into the apocalyptic narrative that implied that the only way. moving into the future was to decimate the poor and make energy more polluting and 10 times more expensive, which is a quite absurd plan, as we can see from how it has been proposed in the United Kingdom and even more surprisingly in Germany and in the poor sunx of a The position he has to get to seems like it was a mistake, which is not really a glorious vision of leadership and I really don't know what he's supposed to do with that mess, now what he's been doing is to reverse it to a certain extent. and you could say maybe not fast enough and I guess I'd be inclined to agree with that, but by the same token I'm glad I'm not in your shoes, which the conference here this week was designed to suggest, to the less in part, it was a broader vision than just the vision of Oops, it seems that we have made a mistake on the energy and environment front, although there are some conservative voices that you just mentioned in this interview that are motivated , you know you cure Miriam Kates. or Danny Krueger talk about the value of family, yes, and then there are people waiting in the wings to reprimand that you are being sexist, you are being derogatory to women by referencing their role in a family, you have become a scapegoat.

He let some might argue once described, I think how he was a pseudo intellectual hero to the incel community, that was a pretty good line for me, but what is his reaction to that kind of criticism that must be very hurtful, well, it was hurtful for a long time, but after a while they became comical because they became more and more absurd. Each category has an ideal in the center and a margin in The Fringe and if the center is destroyed, the margin will now be demolished too. The radicals think that you can bring the margin to the center but that is absurd because a margin is a plurality and if you bring plurality pl to the center you demolish the you demolish everything, you demolish the category, see if you have the nuclear family as The minimum ideal obviously excludes simultaneously to some extent those people who are not in that constellation, but if you destroy the constellation itself, they all disappear, so I'll give you an example, so we had LGB and then we had LGBT, well, now that's destroying. the L and the G and the reason for this is that the margin will devour itself and then it could be the case that my Pro-Am stance marginalizes but it is even more true that the stance that says anything old goes destroys AB absolutely everything. and you are naive to think that that is not the case and I think what is happening is that 80% of children who undergo at least before this recent explosive epidemic on the female side, 80% of children who undergo undergo gender transformation surgery unnecessarily are homosexuals.

Well, that's a classic stellar example of what happens when the margin takes center stage. The margin cannot take center stage now, which raises a real problem that leftists point out: how do you have a category, for example, with family? that nuclear family as the minimum ideal without prejudice against other people and it's something like an informed and humble tolerance, you know, there is divorce in my immediate family, you know, and certainly in my extended family, my sister is getting divorced, my brother is getting divorced, my daughter. When divorced, every family has people who are single, widowed, or in homosexual relationships.

I mean, family is an ideal that is broken more than it is fulfilled, but that doesn't mean you can sacrifice the ideal. It still has to stay and then we have to live with the tension between the ideal and the fragments that surround it and that really make it up even if you are in a dedicated marriage. There have been times in my marriage with my wife when the relationship was very tense so we moved away from the ideal but you don't throw away the ideal just because it is difficult to achieve and because it excludes what is not ideal because then you destroy everything if you don't have an ideal there is nothing to do. work and the notion that we can somehow go beyond the minimal nuclear family, I just don't think there's any evidence for that and I would also say that in contemplating that maybe we want to look at those who are truly the most vulnerable and the victimized. and those most vulnerable and victimized by the breakdown of the nuclear family are 100% children.

It is simple and absolutely simple. Children without parents, for example, do much worse, much worse, and yes, yes, yes, the evidence that has accumulated about that. side is not convincing to you, then no evidence about anything would be convincing about anything, although the alternative to that would be that you are stigmatizing single mothers by saying that because you might actually have an extreme: I am stigmatizing single mothers is that a However, the problem is that if you have a strong, empowered woman who is raising a family in the absence of a father who actually maybe his absence is welcomed, maybe the father was not a good influence, arguably you would be better off with a strong mother than with a strong mother. two weak parents, well we, obviously, there are exceptional cases where exception is the preferable alternative, yes, obviously, that's what people take when they get divorced, you know, most people who get divorced don't They are happy with it, but they accept it.

Broken marriage is a reality preferable to continuing the relationship and I have certainly had couples, for example, or people in my clinical practice for whom divorce was clearly the correct alternative, were married to people who were narcissistically psychopathic who were doing of their lives an absolute hell, but that doesn't mean you can escape the ideal without the price of stigmatization. You can do a good job as a single mother, but that doesn't make it an ideal, or a partnership. Any idea you mention narcissism again? I mean, do we think that individualism has become ISM narcissism and that there is a greater prevalence of narcissism?

As a narcissist, would you describe, for example, Harry and Megan as narcissists? I have to tread carefully with that categorization being a clinical psychologist, you know, I'll let myself speculate, well, twang is the best source on this and she believes, and I think there is some The truth is that hyperemphasis, for example, in development of self-esteem at all costs in the educational system, which was a pathology generated by the faculties of Education, you know, damn it, it has produced another generation of young people. that they are more inclined in a narcissistic direction and this constant insistence that you can define yourself, you know, independently of all social relationships and that you must pursue what is hedonistically desirable in every second, no matter what,all of that is by definition narcissistic, so it's just me.

I think mainly about what it has produced, although probably more than what you would say is an epidemic of narcissism is that it has produced an epidemic of depression and anxiety, and Jonathan Height is writing about it right now. He is a social and psychological psychologist. famous personality, very good and who is documenting evidence that he spoke at this conference here this week. He has documented evidence that the typical woman, the typical liberal-identified young woman in the United States, is statistically more likely to have been diagnosed. she with a mental illness she is less likely to yes, so she is the majority, she is particularly affecting young liberal women and so is narcissism.

I think it mainly manifests itself in an excess of misery. There is also some narcissism. You probably have to lean that way. For starters, you know? Can I ask you about

multiculturalism

? Yes, because we have witnessed some extraordinary scenes on the streets of London, we have received the call for an intern from London to Gaza, we have a great division in the At the moment between some sections of the Muslim community and the Jews we have seen a rise of Islamophobia and anti-Semitism in recent times, does that suggest that

multiculturalism

has failed? Well, multicultural philosophy did not exist, it is so purile and how moralizing and unsophisticated, it is a kind of

miracle

of

stupidity

.

I mean, first of all, we've always had a multicultural world, that's why there have been wars, so along with multiculturalism comes wars when cultures don't get along, so what happens when that matters, two things: either you import under a unifying rubric that would be something like the Melting Pot in the United States or you preserve multicultural divisions, okay, and you could say, well, we benefit from diversity, which is arguably true, you know? When I arrived in London in the 1980s, I went to a reasonably good restaurant and was fed canned spaghetti. You know, the food here was depressing to call, it was an absolute compliment, so one of the benefits of multiculturalism has been radical diversification, let's say. in Cooking and that is a great benefit, but if you think you can import a multitude of cultures without a unifying rubric and not import the problem of interpersonal and social conflict, you are either blind or stupid or both, and both are a terrible combination.

So on what basis does multiculturalism become peace? You wave a magic wand and suddenly everyone abandons their cultural differences and can live in harmony. harmony defined by why there is some unifying harmony. Well, if there is any unifying harmony, then multiculturalism does not exist. The solution is like unity through diversity, you know peace through war, you know it's an absurd statement, it's an absurd statement, it's nonsense in the extreme and then when there's tension like there is in the world now, you see the cracks emerging and why would they? Isn't that right, especially if you tell people you know to adhere to the dictates of your previous culture?

Yeah, so you know, just a couple more quick questions because I know we're pushing for time. Would a Biden or Trump administration be better next time? Western world I mean, if someone put a gun to my head, I would choose Trump, if he had gum on his head. You know, there was no war under his administration and he brought in the Abraham Accords. Yeah, well, I'd be very happy with someone else. Four years without war and an extension of the Abraham Accords, does that mean Trump would be my preferred candidate? No, who would he be? I don't know.

I'm going to watch and see how things develop. There is a new entry in the Democratic race. Dean Phillips, yes, I know Dean a little bit. Dean is a pretty extraordinary person. I think he is a good person. And I don't mean that he just happened to have had some pretty extensive conversations with Dean. He is an extraordinary person. and then we'll see where he goes he. I saw the first debate of Republican candidates. You know, it was actually a pretty impressive list, as far as I know Mike Pence dropped out. Mike would have applied. I think he would have returned a very administratively oriented Administration. to consider politics as an everyday business, which is really what you would expect if you had any common sense. um VI gramas Swami is extremely creative and enterprising, very dynamic.

I think it's very interesting to see him in the race. Nikki Haley is a tough trainer. Yeah, and it's fun to watch, so you know there are some promising candidates on that side. Now Trump is a formidable force. Yes, and right now he certainly has the advantage, but I'm not happy with Biden for a variety of reasons. I think the Saudis, and I have reason to believe this, would have signed the Abraham Accords two years ago, yes, if Biden had been willing to give Trump some credit, and I think this is something that's particularly prominent right now.

The Democrats didn't go after Saudi Arabia at the time because it would have been inconvenient to give Trump credit, so they isolated and alienated him when they could have given him some credit; credit for what he had done, but they turned him into the monster they needed to fight and now they have the monster back and now we have the situation in Israel, yes, right where Iran is using Hamas to agitate the Islamic world against Saudi Arabia essentially. From what I can tell, that's what's going on, yeah, so I'm not very happy with the Biden administration for that and I'm also not happy with the Democratic inability to deal with the woke left, you know, when, when, the team led by Aocc was promoting the prama protests in New York, the White House spokeswoman came out and denounced them, it was the first time in six years and I talked to a lot of Democrats and actually saw the Democrats draw a line. 40 Democrats I spoke to, some on my podcast, When does the left go too far?

None of them would respond, not even Robert Kennedy, he said, I'm not trying to run a divisive campaign, it's fair enough, you know? You could draw a line between you and the communist psychopaths you know, so that would be a good start. Well, hey, final question, which of your 12 rules of life do you think is the most important? Tell the truth or at least don't lie, yes. You know, if people are wondering, even people who are laboring under the weight of genuine oppression, if they're wondering what they can do to fix the world, one of the things that you can do to fix the world and that you could do is let Lying according to your own criteria of what constitutes a lie is different from telling the truth, you know this because what do you know about the truth?

Honestly, that's hard, but you could stop saying words that you know are false, and in doing so, Stop tipping things towards hell, and that's actually quite a moral achievement and has a much greater effect than you think. you might think. I've spoken to literally thousands, particularly young men, but not just thousands of young men around the world who. They've told me that they decided at some point in the last four or five years to stop lying and that their lives were completely transformed and usually they are left, I mean, in something like a state of shock because a lot of them were in depressing places and They are doing so much better now that you can't believe it, so it's wonderful to see.

Jordan Peterson. Thank you very much for joining me. It's a pleasure. Thanks for inviting me. Thank you.