Protest against Jordan Peterson’s performance in Berlin

Jordan Peterson is a man who fills a void. On the one hand between the conservative camp to which the Canadian psychologist feels he belongs and those others which he associates with the “woken cancel culture” and “postmodern neo-Marxism”. He thinks just as little of gender politics as of political correctness. But Peterson leaves another gaping gap, especially here in Germany: He is surprisingly unknown for someone who in many places in Anglo-Saxon countries is already known as the public intellectuals of the modern right.

So it can also happen that the Berlin Tempodrom is sold out when Peterson is reading his book on Thursday evening Beyond Order presented, and in the city, apart from fans and opponents, hardly anyone knows about it. Similarly, this paradox summarizes the action group No Shows for Offenders!, which has now targeted Peterson.

The alliance, which sees itself in the interests of victim protection and previously held rallies against the activities of professional boxer Tom Schwarz and comedian Luke Mockridge, calls for a “Berlin ban for Jordan B. Peterson,” who “has been known since 2014 at the latest as a dubious figurehead of the alt-right movement”.

misogyny, antisemitism, racism and transphobia

Peterson is someone who feels at home in the categories “misogyny, anti-Semitism, racism and transphobia” and who should be given a platform “neither here nor anywhere else”. The protest call is supported by various local Antifa groups.

In fact, Peterson’s statements not only offend people in a political context. Almost as often as he is portrayed as a public intellectual on the one hand, he is deconstructed as a pseudo-intellectual on the other. In what is probably his best-known theory from his bestseller 12 Rules for Life he compares the evolutionary psyche of man with that of a lobster.

Humans, like their shellfish ancestors, have an evolutionary understanding of social hierarchies that should inspire them. Male lobsters that are successful in the mutual struggle for power and mating would dominate their opponents and thus be bursting with serotonin. Men should approach the world just as broad-shouldered and craving for recognition, as this is the only way to secure the favor of dominance-loving women. For some, the mental leap to social Darwinism at this point is only a small one.

The list of scandals and affronts surrounding the psychologist is quite long. In 2019, the University of Cambridge invited him out as a guest researcher after protests. Peterson likes to pretend to be apolitical and wants nothing to do with when a fan with a t-shirt that reads “I’m a Proud Islamophobe” poses for a photo with him.

He has been banned from Twitter since June for violating the “hateful conduct policy.” Meanwhile, supporters see him as one of the last bastions of freedom of expression. In his view, this may also defend Vladimir Putin if he takes action against the “pathological West” in his war of aggression in Ukraine.

Jordan Peterson is currently dividing opinions like no other person in international public life. In the Captain America comic universe, he has already served as a super villain inspiration and the most recent US thriller Don’t worry darling use him as a template for the villain played by Chris Pine. In an interview, director Olivia Wilde called him the “pseudo-intellectual hero of the incel community”. On his world tour, Berlin is noted as the only appearance in Germany. Whether it will also be his last remains to be seen.

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