Why Jordan Peterson is Wrong About Responsibility

Through 12 Rules for Life and Beyond Order, I examine Jordan Peterson’s philosophy of responsibility. First, I try to understand what Peterson says about individual responsibility. Second, I take a look at the philosophy of free will and responsibility. I look at determinism, psychology, and history to begin to draw a between what we’re responsible for and what we’re not. Ultimately, I argue that Peterson holds us individually responsible for too much, and that when we look to the history of social movements, we see that social and collective action is just as necessary.

Peterson emphasizes individual responsibility to an unreasonable degree, while discounting the necessity and power of social or collective responsibility.

We also take a few detours down some familiar routes: feminism, postmodern neo-Marxism, and identity politics.

#jordanpeterson #critique #identitypolitics #responsibility

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Sources:

Sources

Selected writings from Reason and Responsibility, Readings in Some Basic Problems of Philosophy, Joel Fienberg and Russ Shafer-Landau

From ‘Social Dimensions of Moral Responsibility’ ed. by. Katrina Hutchinson, Catriona MacKenzie, Marina Orshana:

‘Power, Social Inequities, and the Conversational Theory of Moral Responsibility’ by Michael McKenna

‘Moral Responsibility and the Social Dynamics of Power and Oppression’ by Catriona Mackenzie

‘The Social Constitution of Agency and Responsibility: Oppression, Politics, and Moral Ecology’ by Manuel R . Vargas

Jordan Peterson, 12 Rules for Life

Jordan Peterson, Beyond Order

Michael Katz, The Undeserving Poor: America’s enduring Confrontation with Poverty

Credits

Jordan Peterson imageGage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America, CC BYSA 2.0 via Wikimedia Commons).jpg

B.F. Skinner imageSilly rabbit, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons,

Nelson Mandela image© copyright John Mathew Smith 2001,