Jordan Peterson: cult psychologist or ‘professor of piffle’?

Jordan Peterson has been ordered to take a social media “retraining” course by a Canadian psychologists’ organisation after recent outspoken tweets.

The clinical psychologist and popular author revealed on Twitter that the College of Psychologists of Ontario (CPO) had “demanded that I submit myself to mandatory social-media communication retraining with their experts”.

Peterson claimed that it was for, “among other crimes”, retweeting comments made by Pierre Poilievre, the conservative leader of the opposition in Canada, and also for his repeated criticism of the current prime minister Justin Trudeau.

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The CPO, which governs his activities as a clinical psychologist, has said that it issued the order in response to a growing number of complaints about Peterson’s unprofessional conduct.

Peterson insisted, however, that the requirement is politically motivated and has nothing to do with his interaction with his clients as a psychologist.

“I am to take a course of such training, with reports documenting my ‘progress,’ or face an in-person tribunal and suspension of my right to operate as a licensed clinical psychologist,” Peterson wrote on Twitter.

Twitter’s owner Elon Musk responded to Peterson’s tweets with two exclamation marks and went on to call Peterson's treatment “extremely concerning!”

Who is Jordan Peterson?

The Canadian psychology professor, clinical psychologist and so-called culture warrior is a divisive figure.

The American feminist critic Camille Paglia has described him as “the most important and influential Canadian thinker since Marshall McLuhan”, while US economist Tyler Cowen believes the bestselling author is “the most influential public intellectual in the western world”.

But his fellow University of Toronto professor Ira Wells wrote a scathing article in 2019 entitled “the professor of piffle”, describing Peterson as a mere YouTube star rather than a credible intellectual. Canadian magazine Macleans has labelled him “the stupid man’s smart person”.

“He’s very much a cult thing, in every regard. I think he’s a goof, which does not mean he’s not dangerous,” Macleans columnist Tabatha Southey said.

Rise of a ‘reluctant star’

Peterson shot to prominence in 2016 with a YouTube series called “Professor Against Political Correctness”.

He had “no truck with ‘white privilege’, ‘cultural appropriation’ and a range of other ideas associated with social justice movements,” said The Guardian. “His reluctance to call transgender people by their preferred pronouns (unless they ask him to) has earned him a reputation as a transphobe, and while his views have marginalised him within the academic community, they have bolstered his reputation in conservative circles.”

Peterson claims to be a reluctant star. “In a sensible world, I would have got my 15 minutes of fame,” he told the Ottawa Citizen last year. “I feel like I’m surfing a giant wave… and it could come crashing down and wipe me out, or I could ride it and continue.”

His 15 minutes of UK fame came in the form of an interview with Channel 4’s Cathy Newman, which has so far been viewed almost 42 million times on YouTube.

At its core, the interview was “an argument between classical liberal ideas and modern identity politics”, said The Guardian’s Matthew D’Ancona.

“Peterson made his case with reference to individual characteristics and attributes; Newman challenged him to consider the structural disadvantages facing, say, women in the workplace or transgender students.”

For many, Peterson’s showmanship was as noteworthy as his ideas. “When he performs his expertise on the media – notably his exchange with Channel 4 News’s Cathy Newman – Peterson cites his sources and references with intimidating confidence,” says The National’s Pat Kane.

But some critics say his research is weak, attacking his book 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos. In it, Peterson uses lobsters as an example to explain human hierarchies. He notes how lobsters who lose enough fights on the ocean floor also lose social status and stop producing serotonin.

But, as Leonor Goncalves, a Research Associate in Neuroscience at University College London, wrote in The Conversation after the book’s release, lobsters and humans are “just not a great comparison”.

“The human brain is hugely malleable and that behaviour and society can influence how it develops,” says Goncalves. “Humans crave change and challenge. We also try to make our societies more fair and balanced and aspire to make humanity better and more advanced.”

Why does the CPO want Peterson to undergo social media training?

The College of Psychologists of Ontario has threatened to withdraw Peterson’s psychology practising licence unless he completes a re-education course.

According to the New York Post, the CPO demanded that Peterson complete its “Specified Continuing Education or Remedial Program” to “review, reflect on and ameliorate [his] professionalism in public statements.”

Peterson has so far said that he will not submit to the CPO’s demands. “I’m not complying. I’m not submitting to re-education. I am not admitting that my viewpoints – many of which have, by the way, been entirely justified by the facts that have emerged since the complaints were levied – were either wrong or unprofessional,” he wrote in the National Post last week.

According to the Washington Examiner, Peterson isn’t being targeted “just because he’s saying the wrong things”. Rather it is because he “is saying the wrong things intelligently. He’s standing as a prominent member of the credentialed academic class and refusing to go along with their latest selection of ideological nonsense.”

Not everyone is convinced by this argument, however. “Peterson’s secret sauce is to provide an academic veneer to a lot of old-school rightwing cant, including the notion that most academia is corrupt and evil, and banal self-help patter,” said Southey in The Guardian.

Equally, Peterson’s objections that he is being unfairly targeted by the CPO ring hollow, said Max Fawcett in Canada’s National Observer.

“There is nothing unjust or illiberal about professional organizations enforcing codes of conduct for their members. The government is not restricting Peterson’s speech or telling him what he can and cannot say, and he’s welcome to tweet all the bile and invective he likes at whichever politicians he chooses,” Fawcett said.

“But his professional organization, which is responsible for protecting the best interests of its members and the public they serve, can also make its own choices.”