I suspect the comments section will include some sentiments along the lines of good, let these woke types kill themselves with the aid of the medical profession. The devil on my left shoulder whispered it to me and surely will to others.
The beyond brilliant and frequently misrepresented Jordan Peterson made me realize how inhumane our a…
I suspect the comments section will include some sentiments along the lines of good, let these woke types kill themselves with the aid of the medical profession. The devil on my left shoulder whispered it to me and surely will to others.
The beyond brilliant and frequently misrepresented Jordan Peterson made me realize how inhumane our attitude to 'incels' is, and this is much the same. We are experiencing a wave of pathologically disillusioned youth, including the trans mutilation surgery for minors.
These young people do not have the empowering dignity of work, any work. They are fragile to the point of not being able to bear the demands and responsibilities of adulthood, which includes challenge as well as joy.
A click-hungry media and self-glorifying narcissists have created a story for our times that is a dark and dystopian one, of catastrophic climate change, systemic racism, focussed on the dark aspects of our history while dismissing the good. A culture of victimhood and resentment, rather than dignity and gratitude.
We need to have compassion for these troubled youth, effective compassion. Such compassion includes tough love. It includes combatting lies with honest appraisals of both our weaknesses and our many incredible strengths and successes, in Western culture. It includes reassessing the dole. Includes combatting the lucrative story of climate catastrophe with realistic appraisals. It includes changing the post-pubescent educational system to incorporate real work in the real economy, and maybe public service, so that teens are not just in a world of busywork. it includes teaching the history of the 20th century, including economics, with an understanding of the positive outcomes of science and capitalism versus the tyranny and failures of communism.
Speaking out, as this article does, against accepting a culture of despair, is important.
The entertainment segment of the media is largely to blame for the rise is nihilism, IMO. When all you see are dark, dystopian stories your world view is … not gonna be good.
I've been reading social critics blaming popular entertainment culture for societal ills and youthful delinquency and despair for over 50 years. And I've also read the counterpoint of critics mocking the very idea that it could ever be a problem.
I used to be on entirely the side of the mockers- and still am, up to a point. I mean, viewing comic books and Elvis and Little Richard and the Beatles- or even Boy George, Frank Zappa, NWA, Scarface, and Eminem- as the downfall of society, that always sounded like wolf-crying to me.
But popular entertainment values have slid so far since the 1990s- particularly in the glorification of graphic violence, gore, and sadistic villain-heroes- that it's just plain objectively worse. Incomparably. What used to be the outer limit is now mainstreamed as routine. Once it becomes routine, it begins to resemble rote conditioning. I can't imagine growing up on a cultural diet built out of combat shooter video games, death metal, horrorcore, trap-hop, bizarre superhero movies featuring gun battles using weapons on full automatic with bottomless clips, and car chases weaving the wrong way through downtown traffic at 100mph, without getting the wrong idea of the world. And it's ceaseless, unending. If that's the only input for a teenager- and it's easy for it to be that way, there's so much of it- it's a turnkey operation for ending up ignorant and damaged.
You might wonder why I didn't include "sex" on that list; it's because the bodies and faces of media renown are often so modified, plasticized, lip-plumped, tattooed, self-starved, lipo-injected, or otherwise superficialized that anime cartoon characters look natural in comparison. And my reaction tends to be like "hmm, there once might possibly have been an attractive female human being underneath all that gaudy artificiality." That isn't sexy, it's sickness. A culture of insecure selfie-obsessed narcissists. Pleasure Island, in Pinocchio.
Thankfully, it isn't the only youth culture out there. But it's the part that's ubiquitous. The part that's inescapable. Whereas the healthy part, it's a real quest to try and find that. It really helps to have parents who didn't succumb to the sickness themselves. But even good parents can find their kids slipping into the whirlpool of despair. There's so much garbage influence. Garbage in, garbage out.
I agree. I work with some of these and my advice is always get a job. Not for the money necessarily but for the sense of satisfaction from a job well-done. One right step makes the next one easier.
Jordan Peterson couldn’t cope with a bunch of woke students. He thinks those of us who know Russia is losing the war in Ukraine are naive. He is less than brilliant.
Jordan Peterson is a self-professed liberal. Why the loonie left decided to make an enemy of him is anyone’s guess - my guess is, because they’re loonie
Because they are shallow. I have listened to one or two of his interviews. One was quite in depth & very personal about him & quite long....I was just curious about who he is. I did not get from listening to him what his political perspective is.
I wonder if your opinion is based on actually listening to him, or if it is based on out of context excerpts. Having listened to and read him extensively, I am increasingly impressed at his care in communication, insight, humility and thoughtfulness. He is the first to agree that not every tweet he has tweeted has been optimal, yet he continually subjects his ideas to challenge and growth.
I will make one observation. When a highly intelligent person communicates an idea, it is often understood differently by listeners of different intelligence. A person with significantly lower powers of discernment will often create inferred meaning based on a few key words, without understanding the intended meaning. It is an interesting problem to communicate complex, subtle ideas in a simple and engaging way, so they can be understood by most people. I think Peterson does a pretty good job at that, given his comfort with an extensive and specifically accurate vocabulary.
He is the first to admit it. Well, not the first! Plenty of people call him on his failings. What makes him exceptional is that he considers criticisms thoughtfully.
I suspect the comments section will include some sentiments along the lines of good, let these woke types kill themselves with the aid of the medical profession. The devil on my left shoulder whispered it to me and surely will to others.
The beyond brilliant and frequently misrepresented Jordan Peterson made me realize how inhumane our attitude to 'incels' is, and this is much the same. We are experiencing a wave of pathologically disillusioned youth, including the trans mutilation surgery for minors.
These young people do not have the empowering dignity of work, any work. They are fragile to the point of not being able to bear the demands and responsibilities of adulthood, which includes challenge as well as joy.
A click-hungry media and self-glorifying narcissists have created a story for our times that is a dark and dystopian one, of catastrophic climate change, systemic racism, focussed on the dark aspects of our history while dismissing the good. A culture of victimhood and resentment, rather than dignity and gratitude.
We need to have compassion for these troubled youth, effective compassion. Such compassion includes tough love. It includes combatting lies with honest appraisals of both our weaknesses and our many incredible strengths and successes, in Western culture. It includes reassessing the dole. Includes combatting the lucrative story of climate catastrophe with realistic appraisals. It includes changing the post-pubescent educational system to incorporate real work in the real economy, and maybe public service, so that teens are not just in a world of busywork. it includes teaching the history of the 20th century, including economics, with an understanding of the positive outcomes of science and capitalism versus the tyranny and failures of communism.
Speaking out, as this article does, against accepting a culture of despair, is important.
Amen sister!
The entertainment segment of the media is largely to blame for the rise is nihilism, IMO. When all you see are dark, dystopian stories your world view is … not gonna be good.
I've been reading social critics blaming popular entertainment culture for societal ills and youthful delinquency and despair for over 50 years. And I've also read the counterpoint of critics mocking the very idea that it could ever be a problem.
I used to be on entirely the side of the mockers- and still am, up to a point. I mean, viewing comic books and Elvis and Little Richard and the Beatles- or even Boy George, Frank Zappa, NWA, Scarface, and Eminem- as the downfall of society, that always sounded like wolf-crying to me.
But popular entertainment values have slid so far since the 1990s- particularly in the glorification of graphic violence, gore, and sadistic villain-heroes- that it's just plain objectively worse. Incomparably. What used to be the outer limit is now mainstreamed as routine. Once it becomes routine, it begins to resemble rote conditioning. I can't imagine growing up on a cultural diet built out of combat shooter video games, death metal, horrorcore, trap-hop, bizarre superhero movies featuring gun battles using weapons on full automatic with bottomless clips, and car chases weaving the wrong way through downtown traffic at 100mph, without getting the wrong idea of the world. And it's ceaseless, unending. If that's the only input for a teenager- and it's easy for it to be that way, there's so much of it- it's a turnkey operation for ending up ignorant and damaged.
You might wonder why I didn't include "sex" on that list; it's because the bodies and faces of media renown are often so modified, plasticized, lip-plumped, tattooed, self-starved, lipo-injected, or otherwise superficialized that anime cartoon characters look natural in comparison. And my reaction tends to be like "hmm, there once might possibly have been an attractive female human being underneath all that gaudy artificiality." That isn't sexy, it's sickness. A culture of insecure selfie-obsessed narcissists. Pleasure Island, in Pinocchio.
Thankfully, it isn't the only youth culture out there. But it's the part that's ubiquitous. The part that's inescapable. Whereas the healthy part, it's a real quest to try and find that. It really helps to have parents who didn't succumb to the sickness themselves. But even good parents can find their kids slipping into the whirlpool of despair. There's so much garbage influence. Garbage in, garbage out.
Agree completely. It’s out of control nihilism now.
I agree. I work with some of these and my advice is always get a job. Not for the money necessarily but for the sense of satisfaction from a job well-done. One right step makes the next one easier.
For the record, I've been reading comments for an hour and not one person has expressed a desire for the "woke" to die.
We're not Twitter. We're better than that.
I am pleased to agree with you! This speaks well of the Common Sense commenters. One more reason to read the comments.
Jordan Peterson couldn’t cope with a bunch of woke students. He thinks those of us who know Russia is losing the war in Ukraine are naive. He is less than brilliant.
Jordan Peterson is a self-professed liberal. Why the loonie left decided to make an enemy of him is anyone’s guess - my guess is, because they’re loonie
Because they are shallow. I have listened to one or two of his interviews. One was quite in depth & very personal about him & quite long....I was just curious about who he is. I did not get from listening to him what his political perspective is.
I wonder if your opinion is based on actually listening to him, or if it is based on out of context excerpts. Having listened to and read him extensively, I am increasingly impressed at his care in communication, insight, humility and thoughtfulness. He is the first to agree that not every tweet he has tweeted has been optimal, yet he continually subjects his ideas to challenge and growth.
I will make one observation. When a highly intelligent person communicates an idea, it is often understood differently by listeners of different intelligence. A person with significantly lower powers of discernment will often create inferred meaning based on a few key words, without understanding the intended meaning. It is an interesting problem to communicate complex, subtle ideas in a simple and engaging way, so they can be understood by most people. I think Peterson does a pretty good job at that, given his comfort with an extensive and specifically accurate vocabulary.
Midwits! Love it! Captures it adeptly.
This is just hate mongering nonsense.
These comments are not welcome here. That's what Twitter is for.
Also, if you haven't noticed, Russia just successfully annexed the territory it wanted. If you call that "losing" you are brainwashed with propaganda
I think Ukraine is about the wheat. Do they know something we don't?
Also about access to seaports
He is brilliant. But fallible.
As are we all.
He is the first to admit it. Well, not the first! Plenty of people call him on his failings. What makes him exceptional is that he considers criticisms thoughtfully.
Me too.