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Culture War Roundup for the week of March 11, 2024

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Was JP ever really a TRP influencer? My sense was that, when he had his brief moment of being a Person, he was just a vaguely conservativish ersatz dad figure not really associated with the broader manosphere,

Jordan Peterson was the closest thing to sensible moderate answer to TRP. When it comes to posture towards women and society, he told young men to be strong, honorable, responsible, and honest; while the TRP told them to be strong, crafty, mercenary, and cynical. Of course, very online progressives hated him, though IMO they never gave a coherent answer for why.

The fact Peterson had a mental break, became a drug addict, lost his daughter to Tate, and was cancelled from his job is a good, if anecdotal, rebuttal of his approach to modern problems. The boomer advice memes write themselves.

I never liked JP too much. He has the valuable academic skill of sounding erudite, but when you dissect what he's actually saying, full of literary allusions and digressions, it often doesn't amount to much. The anti-Scott.

Peterson was always kind of wacky philosophy professor, they don’t tend to have hugely stable or normal lives.

There were probably a thousand men or so who took his advice to heart and improved their lives for it. So, he's almost certainly a net positive. I hope he gets his life together and can be happy with that small positive influence he's had.

I think he has his own personal life (if not his daughter). His wife became very ill; it is understandable. He did end up cleaning his room. I think he still has a positive influence.