Joe Rogan Experience #1139 - Jordan Peterson

Joe Rogan 0:03 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Hello, Jordan Peterson.

Jordan Peterson 0:09 Hello, Mr. Rogan. How you doing?

Joe Rogan 0:10 You look very spiffy today.

Jordan Peterson 0:11 Thank you, sir.

Joe Rogan 0:12 This is a new look for you. You're, you've been rocking these a lot, these big, gigantic, uh ... What do you call those things? These concerts that you guys are doing? What do you ... Speeches?

Jordan Peterson 0:21 Well, lectures.

Joe Rogan 0:22 What-

Jordan Peterson 0:22 Discussions is really what I-

Joe Rogan 0:23 Discussions.

Jordan Peterson 0:23 ... think of them as, yeah-

Joe Rogan 0:25 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 0:25 ... because I'm discussing ... I mean, you might think it's kinda perverse to be discussing with a 3,000-person audience, but it's not, because if you pay attention to the audience, they're constantly ... And the individuals in the audience, they're constantly providing feedback. So it's a discussion as far as I'm concerned.

Joe Rogan 0:42 Feedback in applause, laughter. Sometimes they shout things out too, right?

Jordan Peterson 0:48 Shuffling.

Joe Rogan 0:49 Shuffling?

Jordan Peterson 0:49 Yeah. Well, really what you want, if, if you're on track, if you're where you should be, then it's dead silent, and everyone's focused and listening. And so if that's not happening ... I mean, you know, there can be laughter and that kind of thing, but generally speaking, you don't wanna hear noise from the audience. So if, if you're, if you're on a r- if you're pursuing a complicated topic and you're paying attention ... And I'm always looking at individual people in the audience, you know, in the first few rows 'cause that's all I can see because of the lights. I'm trying to make sure that everyone's on track with the talk. And, you know, there's ... People gesture with their face and they gesture with their eyes and they shake their head and they nod and there's lots of things to pick up. And if you're not speaking with notes, you can really pay attention to the audience, and then you know if you're in the dialogue, and that's where everyone wants to be.

Joe Rogan 1:38 Yeah, it's an interesting thing you're doing because you have experience in doing that with lectures in colleges and universities, but now it's the general public, and people just pay to see it, and you fill up these huge, gigantic theaters. I mean, I've seen some of the places that you guys are doing it. You and Sam just got done doing one in Vancouver, and it's huge places.

Jordan Peterson 2:01 We did two.

Joe Rogan 2:02 You did two, that's right.

Jordan Peterson 2:02 Yeah, yeah, back to back, and yeah, so it was about five hours of intense discussion over two days. And you know, we were supposed to talk for an hour each night and then go to Q&A, but we asked the audience ... Brett Weinstein, who was moderating, asked the audience if they wanted to go to Q&A or continue the discussion, and, you know, the, the response from the crowd was definitely continue the discussion, and so we ended up talking for about two and a half hours each night. And again, it was ... The audience is along for the ride.

Joe Rogan 2:32 Hmm.

Jordan Peterson 2:32 You know, and they were good discussions as far as I'm concerned. You know, it was kind of marketed as a take-down in some sense, Harris versus Peterson, you know.

Joe Rogan 2:41 Right.

Jordan Peterson 2:42 But the discussion itself was an attempt on Sam's part and my part to further our thinking about the topic and to bring everyone along for the ride, you know, for the journey, so to speak.

Joe Rogan 2:55 Yeah. Well, you guys had two podcasts that you did, uh, over the phone. So this, these were the first meetings that you guys had in person?

Jordan Peterson 3:03 Yeah, it was the first time I'd met Sam.

Joe Rogan 3:05 The first one that you two had was marred by this discussion about what is truth.

Jordan Peterson 3:11 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:11 And it was a, like s- a strange sort of a ... You got stuck. You guys got kinda stuck in that first conversation. But I feel like the second one was much better.

Jordan Peterson 3:21 Yes.

Joe Rogan 3:22 You c- you ... I mean, uh, both of you kind of recognized that there were some errors made in the first podcast or at least-

Jordan Peterson 3:26 Yeah, we augured in on a definition and, and couldn't-

Joe Rogan 3:29 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 3:29 ... let it go, and so that wasn't so good. Yeah. And, uh, I wasn't in tip-top shape for that first discussion, well, or for the second one for that matter. (clears throat) But they've been getting ... Each discussion I've had with Sam has been getting better, so ... As far as I'm concerned, and I think he feels the same way. And I mean, we're tr- we're trying to sort something out that's really, really difficult, and it's the relationship between facts and values, which is p- parallel to the relationship between, say, objective truth and, and narrative, or parallel to the distinction between scientific f- fact and religious truth. All of those things sort of are layered on top of each other, and it's an extraordinarily difficult topic. And so it's not surprising that it's taking all of this discussion to even vaguely get it straight. It's been a central bone of contention among philosophers for, well, probably forever, but certainly since the time of, of David Hume, several hundred years.

Joe Rogan 4:21 Well, one of the more fascinating things that's coming out of the realm of podcasting is these kind of discussions, these long form live discussions in front of enormous groups of people where you go over very complex issues. It's a new thing. I mean, and it's, uh, it's something that's greatly received by the public, which is really interesting. I mean-

Jordan Peterson 4:39 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 4:39 ... you guys are selling out all over the place.

Jordan Peterson 4:41 Yeah, well, one, one, one ... I've really been trying to make sense of this, hey, because I'm thinking, "Well, what the hell's going on? Why, why am I selling out 3,000-person auditoriums?" And then, and then ... But not just me, obviously. Sam is doing it, and you're doing something on a larger scale but very similar with your long form podcasts. And, and, and then there's this whole rise of, of what Bari Weiss described as the intellectual dark web. That's actually Eric Weinstein's coinage. And so there's a group of us that have been sort of clumped together for, for reasons that aren't obvious, but I've been trying to figure that out as I do these lectures. Another thing I'm doing with the lectures or the discussions is trying to continually further the development of my ideas. I use the, the, the stage, let's say, as a, as a, uh, opportunity in real time to think, and I've been thinking, well, if you're surfing, you don't confuse yourself with the wave, right?That's, that's a real mistake. You might be on top of the wave, but you're not the wave. And I think this long form discussion, and the public hunger for that, is best conceptualized like that. There's a technological revolution. It's a deep one. The technological revolution is online video and audio immediately accessible to everyone all over the world. And so what that's done is it turned, it's turned the spoken word into a tool that has the same reach as the printed word.So it's a Gutenberg Revolution in the domain of video and audio. And it might be even deeper than the original Gutenberg Revolution because it isn't obvious how many people can read, but lots of people can listen. And now it turns out ... So, I mean, you got a little bit of that with TV, right? And you got a little bit of it w- with radio. But there was bandwidth limitations that were really stringent, especially in TV, where you could get 30 seconds if you were lucky and six minutes if you were stellar to, to elucidate a complicated argument, so you can't do that. Everything gets con- compressed to a, to, to a kind of oversimplified entertainment. But now all of a sudden we have this forum for long form discussion, real long form discussion, and it turns out that everyone is way smarter than we thought, right? We can have these discussions publicly and there's a great hunger for it. And I see this parallel to ... And, and this would be, what would you call it? Supporting evidence for this hypothesis. The same thing's happened in the entertainment world because, you know, f- t- TV made us think, "Well, we can handle a 20-minute sitcom or maybe we can handle an hour and a half made for TV movie." But then Netflix came along, and HBO as well, with the bandwidth restrictions gone and all of a sudden it turned out that, no, no, we can handle 40-hour complex multilayered narratives where the characters shift, where the complexity starts to reach the same complexity as great literature and there's a massive market for it. And so it turns out that we're smarter than our technology revealed to us. And I think those of us who've been placed in this intellectual dark web group, you know, there's some things we have in common. We more or less have independent voices because we're not beholden to any corporate masters except peripherally, and we've been operating in this long form space and the technology has facilitated that, and so all of a sudden it turns out that there's more to people than we thought. And thank God for that.

Joe Rogan 7:56 I'm, I'm struggling with, um ... Uh, I want us ... I don't want to use the word hating. Uh, there, there seems to be, uh, a non-acceptance or a, a resistance to the idea that anything of quality could come out of this group of people.

Jordan Peterson 8:13 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 8:13 It's really interesting to me, and, uh, I'm wondering why when I listen to you speak or Sam or Eric or any of these people, B- Ben or Dave, and I, I hear very interesting points and I'm like, "Why are people resisting that these are interesting points?" Why are they resisting this? And I think there's a lot of people that are beholden to mainstream organizations, whether it's newspapers or magazines or television shows, that feel trapped. I think they feel trapped by this format that they're stuck in. It's a very limiting format and it's a format that, in my opinion, is like ... I mean, it might as well be smoke signals or ham radio or something. It's fucking ... It's dumb. You know, this, this idea that you're gonna go to commercials every 15 minutes and, you know, and in between you have 15 people arguing. I mean, I, I watched a panel on CNN once and I, I think we counted 10 people that were trying to talk during this five-minute segment. I'm like, who ... What genius thought that it would be a good idea to get 10 people struggling for airtime, barking over each other, no one saying anything that makes any sense because everybody's talking over and trying to stand out and trying to say the most outrageous things? And I'm, I'm seeing like some of the resistance to this when we span ... I mean, I mean pretty far, you know, from Sam and I lean more left and Ben leans more right and you're what you would call a classic liberal and Eric's very difficult to define and Brett is fiercely progressive. I mean, these are ... I mean Brett in particular's a very left wing guy, but this desire to label and to, to have this diminishing label as like alt-right or, you know, right wing or fascist, it's, it's very strange to me.

Jordan Peterson 10:04 Yeah. Well, there's a couple of things going on. I think (clears throat) one of them is that the technological transformation that I laid out, and then the other is that I do believe that especially for the radical leftist types, the whole notion of free speech among individuals is not only anathema but also something that isn't possible within their framework of reference. I've been trying to think this through very carefully because, you know, f- free speech in some sense has become identified as a right wing issue and I thought, "Well, how the hell did that happen?" And then I thought, "Oh, yes. Well, if you're radically left and you're playing the identity politics game, there's actually no such thing as free speech because you're only the mouthpiece of your group whether you know it or not. So you don't get to talk as Joe Rogan, you get to talk as like Joe Rogan patriarchal white guy." And that's it.

Joe Rogan 10:52 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Peterson 10:53 And your utterances aren't a reflection of your own opinions as an individual but they're an attempt on your part, whether you know it or not, to justify your position in the power hierarchy. And so everything right now ... And, and this is where the technology and the death of the mainstream media and, and this, and this po- political polarization all unite, everything has turned into a political conversation in the, in the mainstream media, uh, media. And it has to be cast as left versus right, and if you're criticizing the left, then all of a sudden you're right and right wing, and it has to be about politics. It's like-

Joe Rogan 11:27 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 11:27 Well, it doesn't have to be about politics. It could be about philosophy. It doesn't have to be cast in political terms and, and then it's also subject to a, a form of, of, of ... Well, it's, it's made more stupid than it has to be by these terrible bandwidth limitations.

Joe Rogan 11:44 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Peterson 11:44 Like, I mean, I've been on mainstream TV talk shows and it's very strange experience because you're definitely content. You know, Marshall McLuhan said, "The medium is the message," right? The medium shapes the dialogue and it does in, in great, in great ... In, in, in a, in a tremendous way, powerful way.... you go on a TV talk show, and maybe it's an hour long, something like that, and there's five guests, and you've got your eight minutes, something like that. And you have to be bright and chipper and entertaining and, and intelligent and sort of glitzy. And it, it puts that façade of momentary charisma on you, and if you don't play that out, you actually fail. Right? 'Cause you can't start a long form discussion when you've got six minutes, and if you're trying to talk about something that's, that's deep and difficult, well, you wanna talk about it because you've got the access then, and the opportunity, but you've got your, your six minutes. You, you can't help but turn into sort of a glitzy entertainer. And so it cheapens everything. And then the other thing that I think is happening is that as the mainstream media, television in particular, dies, the, the quality people are starting to desert like rats leaving a seep- sinking ship. I guess they're good rats if they're quality people, but... Um, and then the, the, there's ever more enticement to use clickbait journalism to attract a diminishing portion of the remaining audience.

Joe Rogan 13:02 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 13:02 You know? It's like, one of the things that's happened, so if you look at the five major indices of violent crime in the United States, the d- they, they've declined by 50% in 25 years. It's absolutely beyond comprehension. It's so good. This includes violent gun crime, by the way. And yet the reports of violence in media have gone up and up and up and up. You think, "Well, what's going on?" It's like, well it's, it's, it's clickbait. It's the es- it's the equivalent of clickbait. And then to turn everything into a polarized political discussion takes no real intellectual energy. But it's also driven by the death spiral of the classic media, I think. And I think that's actually why the polarization seems to be so acute now. Some of it is genuine, but some of it is, some of it is the consequence of this underlying technological transformation and the death throes of the smoke signalers, fundamentally.

Joe Rogan 13:52 What you're talking about when you're, when you're saying, "The people, especially radical leftists, have to concede certain points whenever they discuss things," th- this is so true and so important, because you see that play out over and over again. There's very little variation from the official narrative when they talk about important subjects-

Jordan Peterson 14:11 Mm.

Joe Rogan 14:12 ... or controversial subjects, whatever they are, whether it's, um, you know, uh, transgender rights, or whatever, whatever's in the news that's, that's big and, and c- and, you know, the... It's very popular right now. There's these, these certain things that you're not allowed to deviate from.

Jordan Peterson 14:28 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 14:28 And that, that's an insanely restrictive perspective and it... Who's establishing these norms? Like, who's estab-

Jordan Peterson 14:36 That's a good question, man.

Joe Rogan 14:37 Yeah, who is?

Jordan Peterson 14:37 Well, I, I blame, I blame the universities in large part for this, the activist disciplines.

Joe Rogan 14:41 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 14:42 But that's only a partial answer because the universities are also responding to legislation like Title IX, so and, and so, and so they've been driven into the-

Joe Rogan 14:52 Explain Title IX for people so standalone.

Jordan Peterson 14:53 Well, Title IX, Title IX originally was just a piece of legislation that, that ensured that women would have equal access to sports events and so forth at the universities. That's what it was designed for, but it's become this umbrella legislation that pushes equality of outcome essentially across every possible dimension in the universities, and it's been used as a weapon by the radical left. But, you know, some of that's driven by legislative necessity. Um, what, what's happening, what... The reason that I think this is coming from the universities is because I don't think that this could... Well, there's all these activist disciplines that are essentially subsidized by too high tu- tuition fees and also by state funding, and they've produced an entire substructure of, of activists. And those activists are doing everything they can to lay out the theoretical structure for the radical left, and that's a, that's a structure that involves... There's buzzwords, right? Diversity is one, but that means diversity by race and ethnicity and, and sexual preference, for example, as, as if those have anything to do with genuine diversity of ideation, and they don't, and there's no evidence that they do. Inclusivity, I'm never even sure what that means. Um, equity, which is a marker for, uh, what would you call it? It's a code word in some sense for equality of outcome, which is an absolutely deadly doctrine. I think of all the mistakes that the radical left are making and the moderate left for not calling them out on it, the equity doctrine is at the top of the list. And then there's other associated things like white privilege, that's a good one, and systemic bias, and, which is a... (sighs) It's an absolute embarrassment from the perspective of a, of a reasonable academic psychologist because psychological tests have been used to prove that there's this implicit bias that, that lurks everywhere, and the tests aren't reliable and valid enough to make that claim. That's even the people who've made the test, the implicit association test, have admitted, except for Mahzarin Banaji, who's the chairman of the Department at, of Psychology at Harvard, they've admitted that the tests aren't reliable and valid enough to be used for the purposes they're being used for. And there's also no evidence at all that these unconscious buying- bias retraining seminars have any effect whatsoever that's positive. It's all nonsense pushed by this, the, the, the, the ideological, what, fulminations of the radical left.

Joe Rogan 17:07 Is there any benefit in having these conversations, talking about implicit biases, and recognizing that there's, uh, an extreme pushback against racism or sexism and all these different things, and that even though these things, these, b- b... These, these ideas that they're pushing might not be tested and proven, the idea of putting it out there in the mainstream, that there's a shift in consciousness in terms of like how people will or won't accept racism or sexism or homophobia or whatever is, else is being discussed, that...Maybe it's far left, but maybe it's moving the needle towards where it needs to be.

Jordan Peterson 17:49 Well, I, I think that, well, that, I think that happens. I mean, I certainly believe that there's space and necessity for a constant dialogue between the left and the right. This is also something that I've been developing more particularly during these lectures. So, so I'm gonna lay out a couple of propositions. So imagine that you have to move forward in the world. You have to do things.

Joe Rogan 18:09 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Peterson 18:09 And the reason you have to do things is because, well, if you just sit there and don't do anything, then you suffer and die. So that isn't an option. You have to move forward. You have to move forward towards valued things, so you have to have a value hierarchy. It has to be a hierarchy because one thing has to be more important than another, or you can't do anything, right? You're, you're too split with your choices. So you have to do things. You have to value. You have to value some things more than others. Then you have to act out what you value in the social environment because you're a social creature and you're not gonna do things alone. Then as soon as you start to act out things of value in the social environment, you inevitably produce a hierarchy. And the reason you do that is because no matter what you're acting out, some people are way better at it than others. And, and it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if it's basketball or hockey or plumbing or law. It doesn't matter. As soon as there's something valuable and you're doing it collectively, there's a hierarchy. Okay, so then what happens? Well, the hierarchy can get corrupt and rigid and, and then it stops rewarding competence and it starts rewarding criminality and power. And so there's always the danger the hierarchy will become corrupt. The right-wingers say, "We really need the hierarchies and we should abide by them." That's sort of the motif of patriotism and, and, and, and, and, and, and positive group identity. And the left-wingers say, "Yeah, but wait a second. There's a problem here." A, your hierarchy can get corrupt and might, and B, because some people are way better at it than others, you're gonna produce a bunch of disse- dispossessed people at the bottom. And that's not only good f- not only not good for the dispossessed people, it actually threatens the whole hierarchy, so you have to be careful. You have to attend to the widows and the children, let's say.

Joe Rogan 19:48 Hm.

Jordan Peterson 19:48 The widows and the orphans. Okay, so now and then y- now you can think about that as an eternal problem. You can't do without hierarchies, but, and that's the right-wing claim in some sense, you can't do without hierarchies and they're valuable, but they're also prone to corruption and they dispossess people. Okay, so now that's an eternal problem. The question is what do you do about it? And the answer to that is there's no final answer to the problem. So what you have to do is you have to have a left wing and you have to have a right wing, and they have to talk all the time about whether the hierarchy is healthy and whether or not it's dispossessing too many people. And then the problem with that is, is that discussion can go too far. Because the right-wingers can say, "Hierarchy uber alles," right? That, that, that we've, the state is correct and everything's right. And so that's the right-wing totalitarian types. And the left can say, "We'll flatten everything so there's no inequality." And so both the left and the right can go too far. Now, the problem is we don't, we know how to define... I think one of the problems is we know how to define when the right goes too far. I think we learned that after World War II. I think if you're making claims of ethnic or racial superiority, you get to be put in a box and put off the shelf, right? You're not in the dialogue anymore. It's obvious that the left can go too far, even though they are necessary participants in the discussion, but we don't know when to... we don't know how to define when they've gone too far.

Joe Rogan 21:09 Right. We don't have an obvious example.

Jordan Peterson 21:10 And we, no, and, and, and you might think, well, that's the moderate leftists' problem. It's their moral responsibility to dissociate themselves from the radicals, just as it's the moral responsibility of reasonable conservatives to dissociate themselves from the Birch, John Birch and, and Ku Klux Klan types.

Joe Rogan 21:26 That's a very important point.

Jordan Peterson 21:27 But, but the prob- but it isn't just the moderate left's problem, because even the people on the right don't know what to point to when they say, "No, you've gone too far as a leftist." Now I've tried to... it's complicated because I think it's, it, it might be more than one policy. I think the really deadly leftist presumption is equality of outcome. I think as soon as you start talking about equality of outcome, you should be put in a box and put off the shelf. That's the, but, but it isn't obvious why. Like that doesn't sound like, you know, white people over all. It doesn't have the same guttural punch that the excess of the right has. It's-

Joe Rogan 22:04 Right.

Jordan Peterson 22:04 ... "Well, you're for equality of outcome. Why is that bad?" well, it's bad because when you play it out in society, and there's endless evidence for this, it's an instantaneously murderous doctrine. And I think it's because it shifts so quickly into a victim/victimizer narrative. I, I've had a great opportunity, eh, in the last month and a half. I got asked to write the preface to the 50th anniversary edition of Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago.

Joe Rogan 22:29 Hm.

Jordan Peterson 22:29 And so I've been writing that, and one of the things Solzhenitsyn did, which was one of the things he, one of the things that made that book arguably the greatest work of non-fiction of the 20th century, I mean, it's in the top 10 anyways, was to point out very clearly that the excesses of the Russian Revolution started right away. It wasn't that Lenin was a pretty good guy and then Stalin came in and corrupted everything. It was like Lenin was not a pretty good guy. The revolution got bloody really fast. And what seemed to happen, so imagine you, you're, you're starting to divide the world up into oppressor and oppressed, right? And you're gonna do something about the oppressors. The problem is, is that you can define people multiple ways. This is the intersectionality problem. And almost everybody can be defined, in terms of their group identity, in some way that makes them an oppressor. So like if you're a Black man, well, you could argue that you're oppressed because you're Black, but what about the fact that you're a man? And so does that make you an oppressor or someone who's oppressed? And the answer is, as the revolution progresses, if there's any dimension along which you can be categorized as oppressor, you end up dead. And so that's part of the pathology of the equality of outcome doctrine.

Joe Rogan 23:38 What do you mean by that, like, you end up dead?

Jordan Peterson 23:40 You end up rounded up. You ended up being put into the oppressor camp.... right? And so-

Joe Rogan 23:45 But, but there's only so far you can go with that, right? I mean, you can't put all men in the oppressor camp. There'd be no men left. Like what do you-

Jordan Peterson 23:50 Well, that, but, yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:51 How do you-

Jordan Peterson 23:51 But that, that is exactly the sort of thing that-

Joe Rogan 23:53 So you really think that's how it plays out?

Jordan Peterson 23:53 Well, it is how it plays out. I mean-

Joe Rogan 23:54 When you look for equality of outcome?

Jordan Peterson 23:56 Well, it, it is how it played out in the Soviet Union and China. I mean, in the, in the Soviet Union, we don't know how many people died. The, the, the reasonable estimates look like about 25 million. That's dead. That's not just, that's not imprisoned, that isn't families destroyed, that's just dead. And in Ma- in Mao's China, it might have approximated 100 million. That's just internal repression. And so what, what seems to happen as soon as you decide that the hierarchy's unfair because there are oppressors and oppressed, then you can go after the oppressors with moral virtue. But the problem is, is that y- there's almost no limit to the number of ways that you can categorize someone as an oppressor. The, the category just starts to expand. Like, the communists killed all the socialists. They killed all the religious people. They killed most of the students. They killed all the productive farmers, and they killed the productive farmers because they owned land and, you know, and maybe a little house and a few cows, you know? I mean, (laughs) to be a successful farmer in Russia at the, at the turn of the 20th century didn't mean you were rich, right? It just meant you weren't starving. It's like, they killed all those people because they were oppressors, because they had more than someone else.

Joe Rogan 25:03 That's how they defined it in order to get the people to rally against it.

Jordan Peterson 25:06 Yes. Yes, exac- yes, and it, and the, and the definition kept slipping. Because well, look, look even now, it's like, well, let's say we rally against the 1%. You know? And, and those would be the money owners, let's say. It's like, okay, who's in that group? Well, everybody in North America's in that group.

Joe Rogan 25:23 Worldwide, yeah.

Jordan Peterson 25:24 Well, (laughs) but who, who sets the parameters, right?

Joe Rogan 25:26 But when you ... Right, well it's 34, it's $34,000 a year sets you in the 1% worldwide.

Jordan Peterson 25:32 Right, right. So, so does that make all of us oppressors?

Joe Rogan 25:35 Ba- basically everybody who lives above poverty in America is in the 1% of the world.

Jordan Peterson 25:39 Right, right. And also by historical standards.

Joe Rogan 25:41 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 25:41 And so the problem is, the problem with the oppressor/oppressed narrative is that you can multiply the oppressors endlessly. And there's no end to going after them.

Joe Rogan 25:49 Right. And you, as soon as you make a, a definition, you can move the boundaries, and then the next person is the oppressor.

Jordan Peterson 25:56 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 25:56 And then you keep going.

Jordan Peterson 25:57 Mm-hmm. Well, and you also see the interesting thing too is that ... And this is complicated. So I've been thinking about this proclivity of the left to, to destroy members of the moderate left. It's like there's a, the game, part of the game is, that's being played, as far as I can tell, the ideologically pathological game is, "I'm more virtuous than you." Now, look, if, if you're on the, on the radical left and you say, "Well, you're more virtuous than a right winger," it's like, well, who cares? That's obvious, because the right-wingers are, are, are, are, you know, pathological. So being more virtuous than them, that's not much of an attainment. But if I have my moderate leftist compatriot standing right beside me, and he's pretty damn virtuous, but I'm even more virtuous than him, then that's a real, that's a real, uh, attainment on my part. It's a moral attainment with no effort on my part. If I can figure out some way of classifying that f- previously virtuous person as an oppressor along some dimension, then all of a sudden I get an increment in my moral virtue. And that happened all the time in these leftist revolutions run amok. That was just a constant feature. So it's not good. It's not good.

Joe Rogan 27:06 Why is it ... And this is something that's always puzzled me. Why is it that the left is defined by ... There's like cert- there's certain values, and, uh, one of 'em is, uh, when you look at the right, you, you automatically think of racism, potential racism at least, um, a dislike for gay people, homophobia. There's, there's certain qualities that are always attributed to conservatives, and then there's certain qualities there is ... And that there ... And these are social things, and that, that I'm, I'm not quite sure I understand. Like, why is it that the left is always associated in support of gay rights, the left is always associated in support of, uh, you know, of all races and all genders and there's-

Jordan Peterson 27:51 Well, I think it's the dispossessed issue again. So imagine ... Okay, imagine that, um, we, we make these hierarchies, and they're hierarchies that are devoted towards a goal. And that the sum total of all those hierarchies is something like the patriarchy. Even though I hate that word and I don't think anybody should use it.

Joe Rogan 28:08 It's a weird word.

Jordan Peterson 28:09 I don't like that word at all, but, but, but that's, we're, we're speaking within the confines of that theory.

Joe Rogan 28:13 De- define it how you're using it. What do you mean by the patriarchy?

Jordan Peterson 28:16 Well, the patriarchy is, is, is the sum total of all Western hierarchies, let's say. It's, or it's the left, it's the radical leftist vision of the sum total of all Western hierarchies.

Joe Rogan 28:26 But it's always male.

Jordan Peterson 28:27 Well, that's the theory, is that-

Joe Rogan 28:29 Right.

Jordan Peterson 28:29 ... it's male-dominated and-

Joe Rogan 28:31 What is?

Jordan Peterson 28:31 ... that's-

Joe Rogan 28:31 The patriarchy is a male-

Jordan Peterson 28:33 Yes.

Joe Rogan 28:33 ... dominated word.

Jordan Peterson 28:34 Yes. Well, and it's a funny thing, because of course there's lots of elements, there's lots of sub-elements of the patriarchy that aren't male-dominated. So pr- healthcare, for example, universities, the education system in general, there's lots of places where the, these, these sub-elements are female-dominated. But so I don't know if it-

Joe Rogan 28:50 Do you think that they're defined as the patriarchy?

Jordan Peterson 28:52 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 28:52 I mean, do they, do they define healthcare ...

Jordan Peterson 28:54 Well, that's a good question, Joe. I don't know what happens. If, if, if you have a sub-element of the patriarchy that's dominated by women, is that still the patriarchy? It's like, the structure's still intact. It's still performing the same function. Well, now the women are running it. Well, is that the patriarchy? And the answer to that is, well, we're all vague about what the definition is, so we don't need to address that issue.

Joe Rogan 29:14 Well, here's some clear ones.

Jordan Peterson 29:15 That's the answer.

Joe Rogan 29:15 Here's some clear ones, right? Like, uh, major corporations, the vast majority of CEOs are male.

Jordan Peterson 29:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:20 We think of that as part of the patriarchy.

Jordan Peterson 29:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:22 Government.

Jordan Peterson 29:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 29:24 Uh, never been a male, n- never been a female president. Uh, vast majority of senators, congressmen, et cetera, male.

Jordan Peterson 29:30 Yeah, so I guess we could say, well, the patriarchy is all those elements of hierarchical structure that are still dominated by men.

Joe Rogan 29:36 Law enforcement-

Jordan Peterson 29:37 But-

Joe Rogan 29:37 ... military.

Jordan Peterson 29:38 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 29:38 Male, mostly male.

Jordan Peterson 29:39 Right, but it's a, it's a peculiar definition.

Joe Rogan 29:42 Right.

Jordan Peterson 29:42 Because it means you have to, you have to-... uh, fractionate the patriarchy into pieces. You can't, you, you can no longer talk about it as a uniform structure if you're gonna take out all those pieces that are dominated by women, say, "Well, that's not the patriarchy." But the thing is, is that the whole concept is so ill-defined that it's, that it beggars description. It's always power though, right? I mean, isn't it- Well, that's, that's the other thing. That's the claim. The other claim is that all hierarchies are predicated on power, which is a claim that's absolutely appalling. It's like, plumbers? Are they part of the hierar- hierarchy? You've got roaming bands of armed, aggressive, tyrannical plumbers coming to your door, saying, "Use our service or else." That's not how it works. You go look, when you're going looking for a plumber, you go look for a massage therapist, you look, or a surgeon for that matter, or a lawyer. You go look for the person who's most competent and one of the things the left can't tolerate is the idea that hierarchies are predicated, in part even, on competence, which they clearly are. The best predictors for success in Western hierarchies are intelligence and conscientiousness. Those are the best psychological predictors of success. They only account for about a third of the variation in success. Maybe a third is probably about right. So there's still lots of room for randomness and, and even for systemic discrimination. But the notion that our, our systems aren't predicated in part on competence is clearly wrong. Now, you asked a question about the left. It's like, well, why are the left always on the side of the people who don't fit in, let's say- Mm-hmm. ... or don't fit so easily in? And I, I think that is a matter of the consequence of hierarchical structures, is that ... So imagine in every hierarchy, there are some people who don't do very well in any given hierarchy. Then imagine a ... then imagine across all the hierarchies that there's a subset of people who are very likely to not do well in any of them. So you might say, "Well, they're systemically discriminated against." The left would be on their side because they're on the side, even temperamentally, of the people who are dispossessed. And the thing about that is that it's, it's valid. Look, we need a, we need a spokesperson, politically, for the dispossessed. That's what the Democratic Party used to do when they worked for the working class, is the working class needed a political voice. It's like, okay, that's the Democrats. Well, why do they need a political voice? Well, to, to, to keep the hierarchy from degenerating into rigid tyranny. It's part of the political discussion. But now, the problem is, is, and the pro- this is the problem with the left, is that, well, what's the hierarchy? It's a tyrannical patriarchy. It's like, no, it's not. It's partly corrupt, like every system. But it's less corrupt than most systems and there's a lot of, of elements of it that are devoted towards self-improvement and self-monitoring. You have to be a little nuanced and subtle about these sorts of things, and you can't throw the baby out with the bath water. And the leftist rhetoric has got so intense that the i- the idea is, and, and people believe this, well, the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Everything is getting worse in all possible ways and there's systemic racism everywhere and it's utterly unfair and it should be torn down and rebuilt. It's like, no. It's actually functioning unbelievably well, even though it still has its problems. You know, and there's a big difference between saying, "There's systemic racism everywhere and the reason that there isn't perfectly equal outcomes is because of prejudice," and saying, "No, no. Look, the system is functioning, uh, let's say at 75%. It's doing all right. It's got some problems, including systemic prejudice, which hopefully will work themselves out across time and, and which show every bit of evidence of doing so. And so we don't need a radical solution." You know? And, and one of the things I've started to do with my Twitter account is to tweet out good, non-naive news. Because one of the things that's happening in the world, and there's been half a dozen books on this or more written in the last five years by credible people, is that the distribution of the idea of individual sovereignty and property rights and, and free market economies, et cetera, out into the rest of the world is making the- the- the non-Western world, is making the non-Western world rich really, really, really fast. So between 2000 and 2012, the rate of absolute poverty in the world fell by half. Half. It was the fastest period of economic development in human history. We beat the UN, we beat the optimistic UN target by three years. Staggering. Um, you know, the- the rates of child mortality in Africa are now lower than they were in Europe in 1950. The fastest growing economies in the world are in sub-Sahara and Africa. Many, m- you know, millions of people, millions of people a month are getting access to this incredible technology that's embodied in cell phones. Right? People have access to fresh water like they've never had access before. The chi- uh, the, the kids are, kids are, uh, getting immunized at a rate that's, that's unfor- that's, that's unprecedented. And, and yet we have this idea that's become rampant in the West that there's something ultimately corrupt about the patriarchal tyranny and that it has to be dismantled right down to its core. And a lot of that's being taught by the activist disciplines in universities and I just don't get it. It's not acceptable. So they see these hierarchies- Mm-hmm. ... and their proposal to f- level everything off and to take away the insane power at the very top is a quality of outcome. Mm-hmm. It's unpro- unproven in terms of it's never been th- it's never been done successfully to a utopian p- Right. Well, I, and I also don't even think you can do it in principle because if you accept the proposition, the- the propositions I laid out, which is you have to pursue things of value and if you pursue things in a, uh, value in, in a social space, so you do it cooperatively and competitively, you do it with other people, then you're gonna produce differential outcome because people will be differently good at it. Yes. It's like, okay, you don't believe that? It's like, okay, do you listen to random selections of music online?... or do you do what everyone else does? You go for the 1/10 of 1% of songwriters and you li- only listen to them. You only listen to the one ... You only read the productions of 1/10 of 1% of writers. You only listen to the podcasts of 1/10 of 1% of podcast br- broadcasters. Right? When you watch sports on TV, you only watch the athletic contributions of 1/10 of 1% of athletes. So, like, where's the equality exactly? Where is that in your life, you people who are pushing for equality of outcome? You manifest that in anything you do? You don't. You're unbelievably selective, just like everyone else. And the reason you're selective is because d- y- you ... there are things that are happening that need to happen or that are entertaining and, and interesting, and you want the best in all of those realms. That's how it works. And there is a best, that's the other thing that's so painful. And that, that actually is painful. You know, one ... Here's a problem of dispossession, (clears throat) a real problem. One way to not do very well in any hierarchy is to have a low IQ. And so, IQ is normally distributed, and if you have an IQ of less than 85, it's hard for you to read well enough to follow instructions. That's about 10% of the population, might even be higher than that. Okay, so given that lack, how are you gonna compete? And the answer is, you're not, because low IQ is a good predictor of poverty. Now, they spiral because, you know, if you're, if you, if you're cognitively ... if you're on the, in the ... if you're, if you're less cognitively gifted than ... and you have children, they're gonna be in a less enriched environment, these things spiral, but you still have the essential problem. That's the essential problem of the dispossessed. It's like, hierarchies are complex tools to attain necessary goals, but they dispossess people. What do we do with the people that they dispossess? The answer is, we don't know, so we have to talk about it constantly to figure out how to solve it, 'cause it's an ongoing problem that transforms, and that's the reason that political dialogue is necessary. And then the danger is, is that the political dialogue will polarize into the radical left, no hierarchies whatsoever, or the radical right, our hierarchy is 100% right at all costs. And so those are the ... We have the eternal problem and those are the two poles that we have to negotiate between.

Joe Rogan 38:08 It's interesting because the accusation has always been that what the left is trying to do with this equality of outcome thing is sort of an infantilization of th- the populace, right? And w- the best example of that is sports. Um, when you look at sports, clearly the best people win, right? The, the fastest runners win the race, the, the people that have the best strategy win the game. The infun- inf- that's a weird word, infantilization, I never get it right-

Jordan Peterson 38:38 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 38:38 ... but of that is what we do with children where you get participation trophies and no one wins.

Jordan Peterson 38:45 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 38:45 You know, when my daughter was three years old, she was in soccer, and they didn't keep score, but everyone knew. Everyone knew these kids scored and they didn't ... At the end of the game, they didn't announce a winner. There was no, n-

Jordan Peterson 38:55 Well, you can't. You can't have a soccer game without keeping score.

Joe Rogan 38:58 Yeah, but-

Jordan Peterson 38:58 It's not a soccer game anymore, it's something else.

Joe Rogan 39:01 But the score was kept-

Jordan Peterson 39:02 Of course.

Joe Rogan 39:02 ... it just wasn't discussed.

Jordan Peterson 39:03 Oh, of course.

Joe Rogan 39:04 It was the strangest thing-

Jordan Peterson 39:05 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 39:05 ... but this is, to treat these little kids 'cause they couldn't handle it.

Jordan Peterson 39:09 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:09 Y- you know, she cried when the other team scored. I'm like, that's ... y- it feels bad when they score, so it feels good when you score. It's very difficult to say-

Jordan Peterson 39:18 Right.

Joe Rogan 39:18 ... that to a three-year-old.

Jordan Peterson 39:19 Right.

Joe Rogan 39:19 So-

Jordan Peterson 39:20 But part of it-

Joe Rogan 39:20 ... is she going to run hills? Is she going to practice drills so that she feels that good feeling more? And then there's a point where that becomes too far. There's a point where you become an obsessive over-winner, right?

Jordan Peterson 39:32 Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 39:32 And this is the people that want to crush their enemies.

Jordan Peterson 39:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:34 Then you become Conan the Barbarian.

Jordan Peterson 39:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:36 This is, this is the far end of it.

Jordan Peterson 39:37 Well, okay, so-

Joe Rogan 39:37 And this is what the left is terrified of, right?

Jordan Peterson 39:40 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:41 The, the idea of the left is the demure, the soft, the, the, the, the people that are kinder and gentler. The idea of the right is the conqueror.

Jordan Peterson 39:50 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 39:50 The people that, you know, they're work hard, play hard, go kick ass, go America, that kind of shit. And so these are the type of people that are gonna be crueler, they're gonna do what it takes to win. And the, the people that you would consider that would w- like equality of outcome are the people that are trying to slow that down.

Jordan Peterson 40:07 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 40:08 Does this make sense?

Jordan Peterson 40:09 Mm-hmm. Yes, absolutely. And I think that's how it lays itself out temperamentally too.

Joe Rogan 40:12 Psychologically?

Jordan Peterson 40:13 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:13 This is the motivation for all this?

Jordan Peterson 40:15 Yes, yes, yes. And it's ... Well, and, and the radical left is, is compassion gone mad, although it's also envy, let's not forget about that, because-

Joe Rogan 40:23 Envy?

Jordan Peterson 40:23 Well, absolutely.

Joe Rogan 40:24 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 40:24 I mean, one reason to stand up for the dispossessed is because you're empathetic, you know, and an ... Empathy is not an automatic good, this is something we make a big mistake about. We think, "Well, I'm feeling sorry for you, therefore I'm good." It's like, no, I might be feeling too sorry for you. I might not be demanding enough of you. So and that's the terrible devouring mother, you know, from a psychoanalytic perspective.

Joe Rogan 40:46 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 40:46 "Oh, everything you do, dear, is okay." It's like, no, it's not.

Joe Rogan 40:49 Right.

Jordan Peterson 40:50 And also, so one of the things that Jean Piaget, the developmental psychologist, he was very interested in figuring out a way out of this, and it's very much relevant to your concept, your, your talk about, about athletics. Okay, so, so imagine this, because I ... This is also something that points the way to a proper morality, which was actually something that Jean Piaget was very concerned about. He wanted to r- he wanted to reconcile the distinction between religion and science, that's actually what drove him, even though he was ... people don't know that. He was arguably the world's greatest developmental psychologist. So, so here's the idea, you know how you tell your kid to, uh, be a good sport? You say, "Don't ... It doesn't matter whether you win or lose, it matters how you play the game." Okay, so I've been unpacking that in my lectures because it's really, really complicated. It's like, you tell your kid that and they look at you and they think, "Well, what do you mean by that? A- aren't I supposed to try to win? It's a soccer game, I'm trying ... I'm supposed to win." And you say, "Well, yeah, you're supposed to win, but it doesn't matter whether you win or lose (laughs) it matters how you play the game." You know that that's right, but you don't know how to explain it to your kid.... you say, well, you wanna be a good sport. Okay, so imagine this. This is how it works, and this is crucially important. So first of all, (clears throat) life is not a game. Even a game is not a game, because a game is ... most of the time, a game is the beginning of a series of games. So let's say that you're on a soccer team. Well, there's winning the game, but the game isn't the issue. The game is the whole series of games, so maybe the game is winning the championship. And winning the championship and winning a game are not the same thing, and the reason for that is, well, maybe if you wanna win a game, the best thing to do is let your star player make all the moves. But if you wanna win a championship, maybe the best thing is for your star player to do everything he or she possibly can to develop all the other team members. That's a different strategy, and the reason it's different is because it iterates across time. Okay, so I'll- I'll tell you a quick story. So when my kid was playing hockey when- when he was about 12 or so, he was in a championship game, just at a local arena, you know? And, uh, it was really fun to watch. The- the teams were pretty equal, which is something that you want so that everybody can expand their skills while they're playing. And it was, like, five seconds to- to the end of the game and the other team made a breakaway and came down ... the guy came down nice and scored, it was a beautiful goal and it was 4-3 and that was the end of it, right? And on my kids' team, there was the kid who was the star, and he was a pretty good hockey player. He came off the ice and he was very annoyed about what had happened. He smashed his stick on the cement and was complaining about the refereeing and acting as if he'd been robbed. And his father came up, and instead of saying, "Get your act together, kid. That's no way to display yourself after a loss," he said, "Oh, yeah, man. You were robbed at ... the referees didn't ref right and- and you played b- the best and you should've won." And I thought, "You absolute son of a bitch. You're ruining your son." And then the question is why? 'Cause his son was the star and was trying to win. Why was he ruining his son? Well, you're trying to train your son not to win the game. You're trying to train your son to win the championship, and so that's a series of games. But then, life isn't the championship. Life is a whole bunch of championships. It's a whole sequence of them. And so what you're actually trying to train your son to do is to be a contender in the entire series, and the way you do that is by helping him develop his character. And the- the character is actually the strategy that would enable him to win the largest number of games across the largest possible span of time. And one way you do that if you're a kid is, like, well, what do you wanna do with your kid? You don't wanna teach him to win. You wanna teach him to play well with others, and that's to be reciprocal. So that means to try to win, but also to pay attention to the, to- to developing the other people around him and not to put winning the game above everything at all times, so then he's fun to play with. And this is absolutely crucial. You get, you can, you can help your kid become fun to play with between the ages of two and the age of four. If your kid is fun to play with, then what happens? Kids line up to play with him and adults line up to teach him. And if kids line up to play with him, then he'll have friends his whole life and he'll be socialized and he'll be invited to many games, some of which he'll win, all of which he'll be able to participate in. And if he's fun to play with, then adults will teach him things, and then he wins at life. And so when you say to your kid, "It doesn't matter whether you win or lose, it matters how you play the game," what you're saying is, "Don't forget, kid, that what you're trying to do here is to do well at life, and you need to practice the strategies that enable you to do well at life while you're in any specific game. And you never want to compromise your ability to do well at life for the sake of winning a single game." And there's a deep ethic in that and it's the ethic of reci- reciprocity in games. Part of the reason that we're so obsessed with sports is because we like to see that dramatized, you know? Like, the person we really admire as an athlete isn't only the person who wins. We don't like the narcissistic winners. They're winners and that's a plus, but if they're narcissistic, they're not good team players, they're only out for themselves, then we think, "Well, you're a winner in the narrow sense, but your character is suspect. You're no role model even though you're a winner." And it's because we're looking for something deeper. We're looking for that, the manifestation of character that allows you to win across the set of possible games, and that's a real thing. That's a real ethic. It's a fundamental ethic.

Joe Rogan 46:14 I think what you're pointing out that's very important is we're- we're searching for the person who's got it all nailed, someone who tries their hardest, but is also honest enough about the circumstances to not cry foul when it's gone the other person's way.

Jordan Peterson 46:32 Mm-hmm. Yeah, well, that's part of resilience is, right? Like-

Joe Rogan 46:34 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 46:34 ... look, you're not gonna win t- you're not going to, you're not gonna score on every shot.

Joe Rogan 46:38 Right.

Jordan Peterson 46:38 Doesn't mean you shouldn't take the shots, doesn't mean you shouldn't try to- to hit the goal, but part of, part of being able to continue to take shots is to have the strength of character to tolerate the fact that- that ... in that instance, you weren't on top.

Joe Rogan 46:52 It's more trivial in games than it is in fights, and it's also, the response is much more negative to the f- from the fans if you lose a fight and complain about it. It is, it's ruthless. They're ... because they understand that you've made a- a huge character error.

Jordan Peterson 47:11 Yeah, so why do you think it's more important in- in fights than it is in games? Why do you think it's even highlighted there?

Joe Rogan 47:15 Because the consequences are so grave, because you recognize that the high is much higher and the lows are much lower. To lose a basketball game sucks, but it's nothing like losing a fight. There's no comparison. It's not even close.

Jordan Peterson 47:26 Okay, so- so what do you think it is that damages the fighter if he, um, complains about losing? Why is that a mistake? Why do the fans respond so negatively to that?

Joe Rogan 47:36 Because they know. They know that you lost. They know that you're complaining for no reason and you're not a hero. They want you to be better than them.They want you to be the person that has the courage to step into a cage or a ring or where- wherever you, with whatever the format is you're competing, and to do something that's extremely difficult.

Jordan Peterson 47:52 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 47:53 And when you do that, they hold you to a higher standard.

Jordan Peterson 47:55 Right. To lose with grace.

Joe Rogan 47:56 Yes. And when you fall, especially if you are a champion, that is one of the most disappointing things ever, when a champion complains.

Jordan Peterson 48:03 Right.

Joe Rogan 48:03 And, and i- it is, it's-

Jordan Peterson 48:04 Okay. So, so-

Joe Rogan 48:04 ... response is horrific from the audience.

Jordan Peterson 48:06 Okay.

Joe Rogan 48:06 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 48:06 So that's a great example. So let's imagine, what does the person who loses something important with grace do? And the answer is fairly straightforward. He accepts the defeat and thinks, "Okay, what, what is it that I have left to improve that will decrease the possibility of a similar defeat in the future?"

Joe Rogan 48:24 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 48:24 Right? So-

Joe Rogan 48:25 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 48:25 ... so, so what he's doing is... Because the great athlete, and the great person, is not only someone who's exceptionally skilled at what they do, but who's trying to expand their skills at all p- at all times.

Joe Rogan 48:36 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 48:36 And the attempt to expand their skills at all times is even more important than the fact that they're great to begin with, because the trajectory is so important.

Joe Rogan 48:43 More important, i- in particular, to the audience. It's extremely important-

Jordan Peterson 48:47 Right.

Joe Rogan 48:47 ... to the audience, because you are... The, the person who's competing, you, you are expecting them to live out this life in a perfect way, or in a m- much more powerful way than you're capable of.

Jordan Peterson 48:56 Yes. And so part of that is the skill, because-

Joe Rogan 48:58 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 48:58 ... they put in the practice, but part of that also is the willingness to push the skill farther into new domains of development with each action. And that's really what people like to watch, right? They don't like to watch a perfect athletic performance. They like to watch a perfect athletic performance that's pushed into the domain of new risk. They wanna see both at the same time.

Joe Rogan 49:17 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 49:17 You're really good at what you do and you're getting better. Okay, so you lose a match, which is not any indication that you're not good at what you do. You might not be as good as the person who beat you, but if you lose the match and then whine, what you've done is sacrificed the higher order principle of constant improvement of your own skills.

Joe Rogan 49:33 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 49:33 'Cause you should be analyzing the loss and saying, um, "The reason I lost, in so far as it's relevant to this particular time and place, is the insufficiencies I manifested that defeated me, and I need to track those insufficiencies so that I can rectify them in the future. And if I'm blaming it on you or the referees or the si- situation, then I'm not taking responsibility and I'm not pushing myself forward." And so then you also take the meaning out of it. Like, one of the things I've been doing on my tour, people are criticizing me to some degree for saying things to people that are obvious. Well, first of all, it's not like I didn't bloody well know they were obvious. When I wrote those rules-

Joe Rogan 50:09 What things? You, wh-

Jordan Peterson 50:10 Well, my r- the rules in my book, for example. Stand up straight with your shoulders back. You know, treat yourself like you're someone responsible for helping. It's like, I know perfectly well that those can be read as cliches. The question is... Cliche, let's say, is something that's so true that it's, that it's become, um, that it's become... It's widely accepted by everyone. Well, but we don't know why it's true anymore. And so this, this issue, this, the issue that we're talking about here, or the issue of being a good sport, we need to figure out why that's true. And the reason that it's true is that you're trying to push your development farther than you've already developed at every point and time, and th- that's the proper, that's the proper moral attitude. So... When you see an athletic performance where someone is pushing themselves beyond what they are, you see someone dramatizing the process of proper adaptation, it isn't the skill itself, it's the extension of the skill. And when you see someone acting like a bad sport, then they're sacrificing that, and so they're sacrificing the higher for the lower and no one likes that. In the fights, it's gotta be... See, the question is, that's the thing I can't quite figure out, is why that would be even exaggerated in a fight situation. And you said it's because the stakes are so high.

Joe Rogan 51:24 Yeah, the consequences of victory or defeat, they're, they're just so much greater. There's, uh, your, your health is on the line. It's one of the rare things that you do, where your-

Jordan Peterson 51:35 Right.

Joe Rogan 51:35 ... your health is on the line. Your physical health.

Jordan Peterson 51:38 Right.

Joe Rogan 51:38 So someone-

Jordan Peterson 51:38 So the more extreme victories and more extreme defeats-

Joe Rogan 51:40 Yes. Far more.

Jordan Peterson 51:41 ... so the morality that's associated with defeat is more extreme.

Joe Rogan 51:44 Exactly.

Jordan Peterson 51:44 'Cause there's more on the line.

Joe Rogan 51:45 Exactly.

Jordan Peterson 51:45 Yeah, yeah, that makes sense. That makes sense.

Joe Rogan 51:46 And the, the way people treat the champions, it's, it's a, it's a very different thing. It's the, the respect and adulation that a champion receives is... I- it's the pinnacle of sports, in terms of, uh, the, the love from the audience when someone wins a, a great fight. It's, there's nothing like it, and this is one of the reasons why these people are willing to put their health on the line, 'cause that high, the high of victory. And it's not just a victory, it's a, you know, what, what is the, who was it? The, who i- who said, uh, victory is really the victory over the lesser you?

Jordan Peterson 52:24 Right.

Joe Rogan 52:24 It's the victory over-

Jordan Peterson 52:25 That's always the victory.

Joe Rogan 52:26 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 52:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 52:26 It's, the victory is over... You, you've gotta realize, a guy like Stipe Miocic, who, uh, defends his heavyweight title this weekend in the UFC, he is, uh, he's the heavyweight champion of the world, but he's not undefeated.

Jordan Peterson 52:39 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 52:40 He, he lost in his career. He's lost a couple of times. And he, you know, is, I'm sure he's lost wrestling matches and sparring sessions in the gym and all. And he's a product of improvement.

Jordan Peterson 52:51 Right.

Joe Rogan 52:51 He's a product of discipline and hard work and thinking and strategy and constantly improving upon his skills.

Jordan Peterson 52:58 (clears throat) And so, so in my-

Joe Rogan 52:59 And because of that, he's the baddest man on the planet.

Jordan Peterson 53:01 Okay. So my, in my book, rule four is, (clears throat) this is 12, (clears throat) excuse me, (clears throat) this is from 12 Rules for Life. Rule four is, compare yourself to who you were yesterday, not to who someone else is today.

Joe Rogan 53:13 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 53:13 Because you need to be, you need to have, uh, a hierarchy of improvement. You need t- to be aiming s- for something, and that means you're gonna be lesser than people who've always, already attained along that dimension.

Joe Rogan 53:23 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 53:23 And that can give rise to envy. So the question is, who should you defeat in the final analysis? And the answer is you should defeat your former self. You should be constantly trying to do that. And you're the right control for yourself too, because you're the one who's had all your advantages and disadvantages. And so if you wanna compete fairly with someone, then you should be competing with you. And it is the case, a- and this is what we were talking about too with regards to the self-improvement of the fighter, is, well, if you're improving yourself, then what you are doing is competing with your lesser self.And then, you might also ask, "Well, what is that lesser self?" And that lesser self would be resentful and bitter and, and, um, um, aggressive and vengeance-seeking, and all of those things that go along with having a negative moral character. And those are things that interfere with your ability to progress as you move forward through life. So, it's very necessary to understand that this is why, you know, I've been stressing this idea of personal responsibility as like, well, personal responsibility is to compete with yourself, is to be slightly better than yourself the next day-

Joe Rogan 54:25 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 54:25 ... and it better in some way that you can actually manage. And that's humility. It's, right, like, "Well, I'm a flawed person and I've got all my problems. Could I be as good as person X?" It's like, not the right question. The right question is, could you be slightly better tomorrow than your currently flawed self? And the answer to that is, if you have enough humility to set the bar properly low, then you could be better tomorrow than you are today. Because what you also have to do is you have to say, "Well, here's all my flaws and my insufficiencies, and the best that someone that flawed and insufficient could do to improve and actually do it is this." And that's not worth going out in the street and celebrating with placards, you know? It's like, well, this is why I tell people to clean their room. So, you're not gonna brag to someone that you did that. But someone as insufficient as you might be able to manage it, and that means you actually are on the pathway to self-improvement and you're transcending your former self. And you might say, "Well, what's the right way of being in the world, if there is such a thing?" And it's not acting according to a set of rules. It's attempting continually to transcend the flawed thing that you currently are. And what's so interesting about that is that the mean- meaning in, the meaning in life is to be found in that pursuit. So, I've been laying that out in these discussions too, because I say, well, the, the fundamental issue is that life is tragic and difficult, very tragic and difficult for everyone. And it's also tainted by malevolence because no matter how ... (laughs) Things are tragic and difficult, but there's always some stupid thing that you could do or someone else could do that could make it even worse than it has to be. And so, that's life. And you need an antidote to that because that can embitter you, constant contact with that. Just the tragedy, but the tragedy combined with betrayal and malevolence, (clears throat) that makes it even worse, especially if it's self-induced. Okay, so you need something to set against that so you don't get bitter and resentful. Well, what do you set against that? Doing something worthwhile, by your own definition say. You need some reason to get the hell out of bed on a terrible day, because you've got something good to do. Well, what's the best thing you can do? Transcend your current wretched and miserable self. There's meaning to be found in that, and real respon- and that's, that's a meaning that's associated with responsibility. One of the things that I've been trying to lay out clearly is that life is hard. It's tainted by malevolence and betrayal. That can make you bitter. You need a meaning to offset that. Where is the meaning to be found? Not in rights, not in impulsive pleasure, but in responsibility. You take responsibility for yourself, so you take care of yourself. If you're good at it, you can, you have some excess left over to take care of your damn family. If you're good at both of those, then you have some excess left over to take care of your community. Those are heavy burdens. You pick up the burdens, you find that's meaningful. The best way to pick up the burden is to continually improve yourself, and that's where the meaning is to be found. And so, that meaning is in the continual self-transcendence. That's letting your old self die and the new self be reborn. You, did you watch When We Were Kings? Ali and-

Joe Rogan 57:22 He's got the Ali documentary.

Jordan Peterson 57:23 ... Frazier?

Joe Rogan 57:23 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 57:24 God, that's an amazing, amazing, amazing movie. Uh, right at the end of it, so Ali defeats Frazier basically by letting him defeat himself, right? 'Cause Frazier is angry and he's got a chip on his shoulder and he doesn't conduct the fight properly. So, he exhausts himself chasing Ali, and Ali has basically just trained himself to take the damn blows, right? And to wear Frazier out. That's his plan. Then right at the end of the movie, he knocks Frazier down and, uh, it's pretty much the end of the fight, but Frazier sort of struggles to his feet, you know? He's just getting up off the mat and Ali's got his hand pulled back to just nail him 'cause he's completely laid open, and he puts his gloves down and turns away. That's the end of the fight. And Frazier said, and, and this is true as far as I know, that that fight tamed him. Like, Frazier had a big chip on his shoulder and he was a, kind of a dreadful guy up till that fight. And afterwards, he was affable and he was, he was civilized. Ali civilized him. And so, but th- that gesture that Ali made was the, that great gesture because he could've flattened him, right? And he had every reason to, man. He got, he got, he got taken apart. Ali took punches like mad in that fight. And then in the final analysis when he had Frazier down and he was struggling to his feet, he just let him go, man. Nobility of character right there. Something impressive to behold. So ... yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:38 When, uh, why are you defining people, like, when you're saying this, why are you saying, "Your miserable, wretched life"? Because there's a lot of people that don't have miserable, wretched lives that also just wanna improve. Like, why does it have to be the worst case scenario in order to-

Jordan Peterson 58:53 'Cause it has to work in or-

Joe Rogan 58:54 ... warrant improvement.

Jordan Peterson 58:55 It has to, it has to work, the theory has to work in the worst case scenario.

Joe Rogan 58:58 Okay.

Jordan Peterson 58:59 That's why, so-

Joe Rogan 58:59 So, you're using the worst case scenario as an example.

Jordan Peterson 59:02 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, because he-

Joe Rogan 59:02 But do you think that that perhaps may alienate someone who doesn't have the worst case scenario and just wants improvement?

Jordan Peterson 59:07 No, I, no, I don't, uh, no, I don't think so because I-

Joe Rogan 59:09 No?

Jordan Peterson 59:09 Well, uh, you know, it depends on how much time you have to outline the ideas, but-

Joe Rogan 59:12 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Peterson 59:12 ... you know, what, what I, because even if things are going really well for you now, there's gonna be a time in the future where things are rough, you know? You're gonna be ill, family member's gonna be ill, a dream is gonna fall apart. You're gonna be, you're gonna be, uh, uh, uncertain about your employment status. Like, the, the flood is coming, right? The apocalypse is coming. It's always the case in life. And you have to be prepared for it, and the question is how to prepare for it. And the answer to that is to find a way of being that works even under the direst of circumstances. That's the issue. And so, you outline ... And I, I mean, I am pessimistic about this in my approach in some sense because when I'm talking to my audiences and the same thing happens in, happened in my book, Maps of Meaning and in 12 Rules For Life, I'm laying out the worst case scenario.... and that's sort of like hell. It's things are going really badly for you, and that, there's just chance associated with that sometimes, and you and the people around you are doing stupid things to make it worse. It's like, okay, what have you got under those circumstances? You've got the possibility to slowly raise yourself out of the mire. You've got the, the possibility to do just what the fighter does when he's defeated, which is to say, well, regardless of the circumstances that might have led to my defeat, like even if there were errors on the part of the referee, this is no time to whine about it. This is a time to take stock of what I did wrong so that I could improve it into the future, and that's the right attitude. You know, in the Old Testament, one of the things that's really interesting about the Old Testament stories is, in the Old Testament, the Jews keep getting walloped by God. It's like they, they struggle up and make an empire, and then they just get walloped, and then it's all crushed and they're, and they're, they're out of it for generations. And then they struggle back up and make an empire, and then they get demolished again, and it happens over and over and over. And the, the attitude of the Old Testament Hebrews is, we must have made a mistake. It's never to shake their fist at the sky and curse fate. It's never that. The presupposition is, if things aren't working out, it's my fault, and that's a hell of a presupposition. And you might say, "Well, of course, you know, it's, that, that underestimates the degree to which there's systemic oppression," et cetera, et cetera, and, and the, and the vagaries of fate. It's like, it doesn't over, underestimate it. It's not the point. The point is, your best strategic position is, how am I insufficient and how can I rectify that? That's what you've got, and the thing is, you are insufficient, and you could rectify it. Y- both of those are within your grasp if you aim low enough. One of the things you do-

Joe Rogan 1:01:43 Why do you see the, y- that's another thing you keep saying, "Aim low enough, have a low enough bar." Why do you, why do you mean that?

Jordan Peterson 1:01:48 Well, let's say you've got a kid and you want the kid to improve. You don't set them a bar that's so high that it's impossible for them to attain it. You take a look at the kid and you think, okay, this kid's got this range of skill. Here's a challenge we can throw at him or her that exceeds their current level of skill, but gives them a reasonable probability of success, and so, like, I'm saying it tongue-in-cheek to some degree.

Joe Rogan 1:02:09 Mm-hmm.

Jordan Peterson 1:02:09 You know, it's like, but if you're, but I'm doing it as an aid to humility. It's like, well, I don't know how to start improving my life. Someone might say that, and I would say, "Well, you're not aiming low enough." There's something you could do that you are regarding as trivial, that, that, that you could do, that you would do, that would result in an actual improvement, but it's not a big enough improvement for you, so you won't lower yourself enough to take the opportunity.

Joe Rogan 1:02:34 Incremental steps.

Jordan Peterson 1:02:35 Yes, and, and-

Joe Rogan 1:02:36 So this is also what y- is achieved through exercise. It's one of the most important, you know, things.

Jordan Peterson 1:02:40 Yeah. Well, what do you do when you go and lift weights?

Joe Rogan 1:02:42 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 1:02:42 You don't go and, like if you haven't bench pressed-

Joe Rogan 1:02:43 Right, of course.

Jordan Peterson 1:02:44 ... before you don't put 400 pounds on the damn bar and drop the, and drop the bar through your skull.

Joe Rogan 1:02:48 Right.

Jordan Peterson 1:02:49 You know, you think, look, when I started working out when I was a kid, I was, I was weighed about 130 pounds and I was six foot one. I was a thin kid and I smoked a lot. I wasn't in good shape. I wasn't in good physical shape, and I went to the gym and it was bloody embarrassing, you know? And people would come over and help me with the goddamn weights. Here's how you're supposed to use this. You know, it was humiliating. And maybe I was pressing 65 pounds or something at that point, you know? But what am I gonna do? I'm gonna lift up 150 pounds and injure myself right off the bat. No, I had to go in there and strip down and put my skinny goddamn self in front of the mirror and think, son of a bitch, there's all these monsters in the gym who've been lifting weights for 10 years and I'm struggling to get 50 pounds off the bar. Tough luck for me. But I could lift 50 pounds, and it wasn't ver- very long until I could lift 75 and, well, you know how it goes. But, and I never injured myself when I was li- weightlifting. And the reason for that was I never pushed myself past where I knew I could go, and I pushed myself a lot, you know? I gained 35 pounds of muscle in about three years in, in university. I kind of had to quit 'cause I was eating so goddamn much I couldn't stand it. I was eating like six meals a day. It was just taking up too much time. But there's a humility in determining what it is that the wretched creature that you are can actually manage. Aim low, and I, I don't mean don't aim, and I don't mean don't aim up, but you have to accept the fact that y- you can set yourself a goal that you can attain and there's not gonna be much glory in it to begin with because if you're not in very good shape, the goal that you conta- could attain tomorrow isn't very glorious. But it, it's a hell of a lot better than nothing and it beats the hell out of bitterness and it's way better than blaming someone else. It's way less dangerous. And you could do it, and what's cool about it, there's a statement in the New Testament that's called the Matthew Principle, and economists use it to describe how the economy and the world works. "To those who have everything, more will be given. From those who have nothing, everything will be taken." It's like, well it's very pessimistic in some sense because it means that as you start to fail, you fail more and more rapidly. But it also means that as you start to succeed, you succeed more and more rapidly, and so you take an incremental step and, well, now you can lift 55 pounds instead of 52.5 pounds. You think, well, what the hell is that? It's like, it's one step on a very long journey, and so it's, it, and it starts to compound on you. So a small step today means, puts you in a position to take a slightly bigger step the next day, and then that puts you in a position to take a slightly bigger step the next day, and you do that for two or three years, man, you're starting to stride. You know, and I have so many people coming up to me now. This is one of the things that's so insanely fun about this tour, which is so positive it's, it brings me to tears regularly. It's mind-boggling because people come up to me, and this is happening wherever I go now, and they say, uh, they're very polite when they come and talk to me, you know, and they're always apologetic for interrupting and so it's never, it's never narcissistic and it's never annoying. I'm really happy to see people, and they come up to me and they say, "Well, I know you've heard this lots of times before, but I've really, I've really been putting my life together since I've been watching your lectures." Then they tell me a story about where they were in some dark place, too much alcohol, too much drugs, not getting along with their father, not getting along with their mother, not having a vision for their life, being nihilistic, playing too many video games, you know, like, um-... uh, being suicidal, that, that happens a lot, having post-traumatic stress disorder sometimes as a consequence of combat, whatever little slice of hell they were occupying. They say, "Look, I've been, I've been listening to your lectures and I've been developing a vision for my life and I've been trying to take responsibility and I've been trying to tell the truth and things are way better." And so that's absolutely perfect. It's, uh, it's, it's the right way forward as far as I'm concerned. And those are people who, they took stock of themselves, they said, "I'm in a dark place and I'm a dark person and here are some things that this dark person in this dark place could do, little things that they could actually do. I'll clean up my damn room, I'll make my bed." I've had, um, I don't know how many people have come and told me, it's so strange, they said, "Well, I started making my bed and that made all the difference." It's like, "Well, yeah, you decided to aim up, man. And the first concrete instantiation of that was that you made your bed." And you think, "Well, that's nothing heroic." It's like, no, but aiming up is heroic. That's something. And then l- l- lowering yourself to the point where you're not above the mess in your room, you know, you're not superordinate to that, you lower yourself so that you straighten up, you, you're grateful for what you have right in front of you and you take care of it and you put it in order. It's like all of a sudden things start to get better. And it's so wonderful to be doing this tour because s- s- I see so ... That's what this tour has been about for me. It's not political. I never talk to p- people after the talks, for example, I talked to about 150 people tonight, we never talk about anything political. It's always this: "I wasn't doing very well. I'm putting my life together. I'm getting along better with my father, I'm getting along better with my wife, I'm getting along better with my kids, I've got some meaning in my life. Thanks a lot. It's way better." It's like, yes, that's, that's the right thing.

Joe Rogan 1:07:53 It's very beneficial for people and they, they need to hear that. And there's, there's something that comes along with that that's critical, and what that is is, uh, an honest assessment of yourself.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:05 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:08:06 And honesty, psh, that, that type of honesty, honesty with yourself, it's very difficult for some people and they don't have the tools for it and they haven't been explained how to do this. It's-

Jordan Peterson 1:08:15 Or why you should.

Joe Rogan 1:08:16 Or why you should.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:17 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:08:17 Yeah, one of the things that happens when you go through school, you're told what to do, you're never told how to think.

Narrator 1:08:21 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:08:22 You're never told-

Jordan Peterson 1:08:22 You're also told that you're okay the way you are, that's self-esteem, man.

Joe Rogan 1:08:26 Yeah.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:26 "You're okay the way you are." It's like, "No, you're not." And this is another thing that, that-

Joe Rogan 1:08:30 Well, you are and you're not.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:31 Right.

Joe Rogan 1:08:31 You're okay as a human.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:33 Look, if you wanna be a black belt in jujitsu and you just started your first class, you're okay as you are.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:38 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:08:38 You're a human. But in the goal, you're not okay.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:42 Yep, true.

Joe Rogan 1:08:42 In the greater goal-

Jordan Peterson 1:08:43 That's right.

Joe Rogan 1:08:44 ... the incremental improvement is important.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:08:45 You have to, you have to, uh, honestly assess your position and move forward.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:49 Yeah, well, that's it. You're a position-

Joe Rogan 1:08:51 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:51 ... and a trajectory.

Joe Rogan 1:08:52 Yes.

Jordan Peterson 1:08:53 Right. And, and when you say to someone, "You're okay because of your position," that's not good enough because you have to say, "Well, wait a second, you need a trajectory." And maybe you're okay if you're okay in your position and your trajectory, but, you know, the self-esteem movements in all of that will accept yourself the way you are. It's like, mm, no, 'cause you need a trajectory. And one of the things that, that I think one of the reasons that audiences are responding to what I've been saying in my lectures and what I've been writing about is that I don't tell people that they're okay the way they are. No, I say, "No, no, you could be way more than you are." And they're relieved about that, you see, because if you're in a dark and terrible place and someone says, "You're okay the way you are," then you don't know what to do about that.

Joe Rogan 1:09:32 Right.

Jordan Peterson 1:09:32 It's like, "No, I'm not."

Joe Rogan 1:09:33 Right.

Jordan Peterson 1:09:33 "I'm having a, I'm having a terrible time and I'm hopeless." "You're okay the way you are." Well, then what? What, that's it, that's it, that's where I am? And what do you want to tell a young person? "You're 17, you're okay the way you are." It's like, "No, you're not. You got 60 years to be better and you could be way better. You could be incomparably better across multiple dimensions. And in pursuing that better, that's where you'll find the meaning in your life, and that will give you the antidote to the suffering."

Joe Rogan 1:09:59 The way I always describe it to people is there are disciplines that you can pursue and those disciplines are a vehicle for developing your human potential. And if you get better at these things, you can get better at anything.

Jordan Peterson 1:10:10 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:10:10 And if you figure out what it takes to become better at whatever sport it is or whatever art it is or whatever you're pursuing, the same principles you can apply to the way you treat people, you can apply to the way you educate yourself, you can apply it to the way you keep your body in shape. All those things are connected.

Jordan Peterson 1:10:28 Mm-hmm. That's why you have to import- impose order. People have asked me in my book why I wrote it as an antidote to chaos, you know, because, well, there isn't anything technically wrong with chaos. Chaos is a place of great potential. Well, the question is, what's the proper r- w- what's the proper balance between chaos and order, chaos, potential and order? Um, well, the answer is, look, when you're a kid, you're all potential. It's chaotic potential. It can manifest itself in any number of ways. And you, you, maybe you don't wanna give that up, so you're like Peter Pan, you wanna be a kid forever because you don't wanna give up the potential. And you look out in the world and all you see are Captain Hooks, you know, who've lost a hand, who are chased by Death because that's the clock and the crocodile, it's already got a t- taste of him, he's terrified by Death and he's a tyrant. "Well, I don't wanna grow up to be that, so I won't be disciplined at all." Well, that's no good because the way the potential transforms itself into actuality is through discipline. And so then you, as you said, this is the trick though, you have to pick a d- path of discipline. Whether, what path of discipline you have to pick is a different issue. Cause there could be a rule. The rule could be, the rule might not be follow this rule. The rule might be you have to follow some rules, so it's a meta-rule. And the meta-rule is you have to discipline yourself. And the issue is, well, how? That's not really the relevant question. You can pick a disciplinary path. That's why I often tell my clients, especially young people, they say, "Well, I don't know what to do." It's like, "That's okay." Nobody does. Go do something. Do the best thing that you can think of. Put the best plan you have into practice. It's not gonna be perfect and it will change along the way, but it will change partly because you've become disciplined pursuing the path, and as you become disciplined you become wiser, and as you become wiser you become able to formulate better and better plans. So you can start vaguely and confused and develop a plan that's not so great and you