Having heard Jordan B. Peterson (JP) speak in February 2019 as an ‘alien’ in the audience, I shared my uninformed (Part 1) experience, and vowed to read his 12 Rules for Life and then write a more informed Part 2. Wow! Here we go…

12 Rules covers some pretty wide ground, from Adam and Eve, to Solzhenitsyn and Tolstoy, 50 Shades, to Lobsters, observations of parental control in airports, to Gulags and concentration camps, Freud and Captain Hook, to a “thumb-cocked flick of the index finger on a small hand”, Mao and Tao, Ying and Yang, to serial killers’ inner thoughts, and all the way to Dominance Hierarchies and Willful Blindness. There’s something for everyone in this hefty tome. Even for JP himself (other than royalties and arguments).

The Foreword

Written by a great mate of JP’s, fellow Canadian and Psyc – Norman Doidge – there’s a clear admiration between the two. Norman lays out a pretty compelling argument for why his friend is not right- or left-wing. His family’s Nazi-oppressed past has sharpened “not only radar, but underwater sonar for right-wing bigotry“. JP, in his view, is exactly the person to combat it. Useful (if not a little suspicion-arousing) to have this so compellingly staked out so early in the book.

Norman provides an interesting commentary on the leftist postmodern thesis, claiming that “they” lose all non-judgemental inclinations when you “scccccratccch the most clever postmodern-relativist professor’s Mercedes with a key, and you will see how fast the mask of relativism (with its pretense that there can be neither right nor wrong) and the cloak of radical tolerance come off“! An interesting scenario to contemplate. The description is so graphic and emotive that I can’t help wonder how many Mercs have been scccccratccched as a result of it. I’d imagine there may be a few clever Merc-driving anti-postmodern-relativist professors with their cars in the panel shop as a result of confusion over their political leanings.

The statement also left me wondering how Norm’s radar (let alone his underwater sonar) was tracking that comment.

Like all good friends, Norman calls out a quality that attracted him to JP, and that is his “enthusiasm of a kid who had just learned something new and had to share it. He seemed to be assuming, as a child would – before learning how dulled adults can become – that if he thought something was interesting, then so might others.“. This, I’ve learned recently is neoteny, the retention of juvenile features in the adult. A trait I have recently come to understand and admire too.

As a meandering, sometimes-lazy reader, I’ve always maintained ‘a good foreword is a short foreword’, and for this (and a few other reasons) I can’t classify this book as having one.

The Rules

As the title suggests, there are 12 of them. And if you read the rule titles, you would be able to anticipate what they covered. The titles are very succinct and clear in their intent. Or so you may think.

How the rules play out is a little different. The pattern is typically:

• Rule title
• Rule introduction
• Rule detail – involving deep, complex, sometimes-tangled, Bible-referenced quotes, which combine to easily (and accidentally?) confuse an average-intellect reader like me
• The Trough of Disillusionment – where this reader forgot the Rule Title and what relevance the detail has to it
• Rule conclusion – where two or three paragraphs attempt to save the reader from the Trough, stitching some of the detail together, with the rule title repeated as the last sentence.

If you’re time-poor or detail-intolerant, you could ‘read’ the book by reading each Rule through to the bit where God or Eve or Solzhenitsyn or a Lobster or Mao or Tolstoy is mentioned, then skip to the last three paragraphs of the chapter. In fact, I would recommend this.

Here are some highlights or low-lights from each Rule as I experienced them:

Rule 1: Stand Up Straight With Your Shoulders Back

This Rule could be renamed Behave Like Lobsters, because that’s the message! It introduces the Dominance Hierarchy of lobsters, but it feels like a justification for ‘haves’ and ‘have lessers’. It also fringes on justifying bullying, although I’m sure this is not intentional. It took me back to the unofficial Turkish road code, which, I was told is: “Give way to the bigger vehicle“.

In the underwater world, at the bottom of the ocean where Lobsters lead the way for male/female human relations, 50 Shades of Grey and Beauty and the Beast are used to explain that women like a dominant, irritable man who can be “properly charmed” into becoming a partner because women like these stories as much as men like pornography, and because this is what female lobsters have done to their grumpy male counterparts for 150 million years. Norm’s sonar must have pinged somewhat while he waded through this quagmire of cringe.

I suspect there are as many women who have not read or seen 50 Shades of Grey as have seen it, and of those who have, more who didn’t enjoy it. So using 50 Shades to draw this conclusion about female/male relations would appear at best weak and at worst simply wrong. I’m also pretty confident that female lobsters (if they could read) would agree with their majority human counterparts.

It was Easter Sunday morning that I found myself nearing the end of Rule 1, perched on the edge of the sofa, leaning forward, hunched over the book in my dressing gown reading “So, attend carefully to your posture. Quit dropping and hunching around.“.

I could only laugh out loud.

Rule 2: Treat Yourself Like Someone You Are Responsible For Helping

Heaven and Hell. Adam and Eve. Snakes and self-consciousness. This Rule covers some phenomenal territory.

Here JP delves deep into a key theme that “life is suffering“, that the world is a “hothouse of doom“, elaborating on the “self-evident horrors of existence“, the “tragedy of existence” and “the suffering attendant upon existence as the irreducible truth of Being“.

Wowser, please don’t read this Rule when you’re feeling low.

He also introduces chaos and order in great detail, and I could identify with some aspects of his positioning, like “When your tax return has been filed, that’s order. When you’re audited,  that’s chaos. Most people would rather be mugged than audited“. But then he ruins it all by his reasoning that order is symbolically associated with masculinity. Chaos, with the feminine. The latter, he claims, is obvious because everything we come to “know” is born “of the unknown, just as all beings we encounter were born of mothers“.

This is after he’s staked out an angle that it’s Eve’s fault that all women make men self-conscious because Eve did first when she shared the forbidden fruit with Adam. And women continue to make men self-conscious now “primarily by rejecting them – but they also do it by shaming them, if men do not take responsibility“.

This rule leaves me contemplating my “miserable existence“, thinking about JP’s wife and what her existence must be like, and wondering why Rule 2’s title is not “Read Whatever You Like Into Stories From The Bible”.

Rule 3 – Make Friends With People Who Want The Best From You

Maybe you are saving someone because you are a strong, generous, well-put-together person who wants to do the right thing. But it’s also possible – and, perhaps, more likely – that you just want to draw attention to your inexhaustible reserves of compassion and good-will. Or maybe your saving someone because you want to convince yourself that the strength of your character is more than just a side effect of your luck and your birthplace. Or maybe it’s because it’s easier to look virtuous when standing alongside someone utterly irresponsible.”

Page 79

This Rule’s title makes the most sense to me, without reading the chapter. It’s quite self-evident and good advice. The detail tends to align to the Rule, although I was left with two key observations:

1. JP talks a lot here about dominance hierarchy, aiming up (or down), and makes judgments of people in the hierarchy with statements like “not everyone who is failing is a victim, and not everyone at the bottom wishes to rise” and “Down is a lot easier than up“.
2. JP doesn’t trust people’s decisions to help others noting a reason you might be helping someone “up” is “just to look good”, describing that as “camouflaging your vice with virtue“.

It was here that I first wondered whether JP’s views are skewed by the contact he has with people seeking out his professional services as a psychologist – people in need of help due to challenges in their lives now or in the past. Is this the majority of his contact, and is this why he has quite a negative, cynical, distorted, possible even broken view of people and society? If he had a more balanced engagement with humankind, would his views be different?

Rule 4: Compare Yourself To Who You Were Yesterday, Not To Who Someone Else Is Today

This was the first rule to score a positive (+3) on my ‘How did that rule feel?’ scale of -10 to +10, which I started tracking when I began reading the 12 Rules. The headline advice is sound and sage.

And finally, the word “kindness” is used in the book, when JP talks of a using a nurturing voice to provide encouragement to the critic within. He talks of getting yourself off the couch and doing the dishes, by the kind voice offering a reward of a coffee once the dishes are done.

There’s advice on aiming to make life a little better each day – growth mindset thinking – and it’s reassuring to know that JP buys into this. He practically encourages the reader to ask what could I do, that I would do, to make life a little better? He also suggests the following three questions in sequence are helpful in managing your own circumstances, and I’d have to agree:

1. What is it that is bothering me?
2. Is that something I could fix?
3. Would I actually be willing to fix it?

But like most of the JP Rules, in the midst of this sense-making, he heads off into implausible logic that refutes anyone’s claim that they are an Atheist by arguing that they cannot possible be, saying “No, you’re not” noting “You’re simply not an atheist in your actions, and it is your actions that most reflect your deepest beliefs…You are too complex to understand yourself.”

Jan Hellriegel makes the same point this Rule’s title promises to make in her Sportsman of the Year podcast with a tenth the words and 100x the vividness, when she uses the swim-lane analogy: Don’t look at the people in your neighbouring lanes (that can only slow you down), focus on your own action and direction you’re heading.

Rule 5: Do Not Let Your Children Do Anything That Makes You Dislike Them

Bullying rarely manifests itself in grown-up society [was this a typo, and “really” was intended?]

The basic premise of this Rule is: you need to discipline your child because if you don’t,  society eventually will, and it’ll be harsher than the timeout or rebuke or “A thumb-cocked flick of the index finger on a small hand” that you would administer as a parent.

I found the finger-flicking consequence for bad behaviour a little disturbing, given the precision with which it is described – down to the specific finger that should be used.

I also found the anecdotal evidence presented in this Rule on how parents are parenting “these days” a little flimsy and unhelpful for the points being made. And while there were plenty of footnote references, I had already lost enthusiasm for looking JP’s references up after the first two I searched up from Rule 1 either did not exist (38) or was only available in French (68).

I struggled to get past the view that an “unstated goal of many a mother, including many who consider themselves advocates for full gender equality” is to “produce a little God-Emperor [out of their son] of the Universe“.

But the most disappointing statement in this Rule (possibly even the book) occurs while JP retells a story of a 2 year old standing on his daughter’s fingers on monkey bars, when he concludes “it would have been better for him [if JP had] picked him boldly off the playground structure, and threw him 30 feet down the field“.

OK, that’s not only not ok! It’s absolutely wrong for someone with the size of following and influence that JP has to make this statement. This statement is not acceptable or forgivable. It may be OK for lobsters to write that sort of stuff, but not role models, high in the dominance hierarchy of our society.

Rule 6: Set Your House In Perfect Order Before You Criticize The World

Hang on. Is there such a thing as “perfect order“? We’re told in an earlier Rule that Order and Chaos co-exist and always will. I’d just made sense of, and bought into this by surviving Rule 2.

JP talks about starting to stop doing the things that you know to be wrong. He exhorts the reader to clean up their life. And here he gives the first piece of advice I think he needs to take himself: “Don’t blame capitalism, the radical left, or the inequity of your enemies“, and provides hope that “Perhaps you will become an ever-more-powerful force for peace and whatever is good“.

Rule 7: Pursue What Is Meaningful (Not What Is Expedient)

This Rule lays out the basic advice that we should sacrifice today in order to receive future benefit. It’s all about delayed gratification, and it’s common sense we’re all familiar with.

Why JP goes into Biblical Overdrive to make this point is unclear and unnecessary.

The encouragement of altruistic acts in this Rule felt conflicting against Rule 3’s accusation of ulterior motives at play in an act of generosity, which could be “camouflaging your vice with virtue“.

We’re exhorted to aim up. Pay attention. Fix what we can fix. Don’t be arrogant in our knowledge. Strive for humility. The last two points being further advice JP could benefit from himself.

Rule 7 was philosophically and theologically tough reading and I couldn’t help thinking it would be inaccessible for a significant number of readers (including me).

Rule 8: Tell The Truth – Or At Least, Don’t Lie

A lie is connected to everything else. It produces the same effect on the world that a single drop of sewage produces in even the largest crystal magnum of champagne.

Again, a sound piece of advice, especially when enhanced with “If you betray yourself, if you say untrue things, if you act out a lie, you weaken your character. If you have a weak character, then adversity will mow you down when it appears, as it will, inevitably.”

And more sage advice in “Set your ambitions, even if you are unsure what they should be. The better ambitions have to do with the development of character and ability, rather than status and power. Status you can lose you carry character with you wherever you go, and it allows you to prevail against adversity.“

A sentence on goal setting (slightly out of the blue) resonated with me, and read “If you bend everything totally, blindly and willfully towards the attainment of a goal, and only that goal, you will never be able to discover if another goal would serve you, and the world, better.” A point well made, amongst a sea of other points.

Rule 9: Assume That The Person You Are Listening To Might Know Something You Don’t

A fantastic piece of advice. I wonder how much listening JP does to people who hold views that differ from his.

This was my top ranked Rule, making it to +9. There’s a bit of humour and a lot fewer biblical references. Most of what’s said makes sense, is not burdened with emotion, and flows well.

In this Rule, he introduced a method for progressing in an argument with someone: His suggestion is to agree with each other that you will only progress in the discussion when the other party has (to the satisfaction of the first party) summarised the point the first party has made. Worth giving it a go, next time you’re heading towards an argument with someone.

Rule 10: Be Precise In Your Speech

There is great irony in this title, given how verbose and convoluted much of the book is.

The key message here is to “Say what you mean, so that you can find out what you mean. Act out what you say, so you can find out what happens. Then pay attention.“

My notes on this Rule became brief as I tired of all the Rules and all the details. Perhaps, like Moses, JP should have stopped at 10.

Rule 11: Do Not Bother Children When They Are Skateboarding

After reading this Rule, my previous comment is even more relevant. While it appears JP held his stuff together all the way through the book, he goes thermonuclear in Rule 11.

The ever-present ambiguity surrounding his religious beliefs throughout the first 10 rules ends with his coming out of the alter’s closet here.

And he takes aim at many people for various reasons.

Such as the TEDx lecturer who makes a reference to Earth having too many humans on it, and JP summarises that position as “anti-human, to the core” and likens that view to Mao and the Columbine shooters.

I share a view that Earth is quite possibly over-populated, and who wouldn’t with the number of Earthlings having doubled since 1970, with over 14,000 new additions to the tally in the time that it took me to write this post, and 2,400 added to the 7.7M in the time it’s taken you to read to here. I’m also not anti-human to the core. But in direct contravention of Rules 2, 6 and 9, JP himself, would judge me as equivalent to mass murdering ideologists.

We’re told of an increasing trend that’s hollowing-out the middle class due to men marrying “across and down” while women marry “across and up” the economic dominance hierarchy. We’re also warned to beware of single-cause interpretations, which felt like an arrogant posture to take in breach of Rule 7. More importantly, I feel the reader should beware of multiple-cause and confused or confusing interpretations, which at times appear (intentionally or not) throughout the book.

JP provides evidence that men do not oppress women by citing four examples where men have acted to ease the suffering of women in menstruation and childbirth. Muruganantham (providing Indian women with sanitary pads), Simpson (inventing and evolving child birth anesthesia), Haas (with Tampax) and Pincus (with birth control) are presented as this evidence, in a ‘Men don’t oppress women, culture oppresses women.’ defense. But that’s not all. Our culture was apparently created by menace and women equally so our culture is our making. And that’s OK. We’re told.

I found this the most objectionable Rule in the book, and rated it -9 with “WTF” as the title on my chart.

Rule 12: Pet A Cat When You Encounter One On The Street

As I made my way through the final Rule thinking to myself that there’s just too much detail in this book, too many thoughts and views loosely justified with details from Russian literature, mass murderer’s writings, and the Bible, I thought that perhaps JP is over-thinking things. Over-complicating things. Breaching Rule 10.

Then, in answer to his own posited question “Can Being itself…truly be justified?“, he offers this:

“I also don’t think it is possible to answer the question by thinking. Thinking leads inexorably to the abyss…thinking collapses in on itself…in the depths – it’s noticing, not thinking that does the trick.”

So is this book misnamed? Should it be 12 Rules for Life: An Introduction to the Abyss?

He does go on to suggest that “Perhaps you might start by noticing this: when you love someone, it’s not despite their limitations. It’s because of their limitations“.

This feels almost like an acknowledgement, if not even an apology for over-thinking, over-complicating things in the book. That’s how I read that, and I felt a fraction more at ease.

Coda

There’s a final section of the book, which can be skipped in favour of a dental appointment, exam or ultra-marathon. Suffice to say in summary: JP gets a-hold of a “Pen of Light” and answers a bunch of questions.

In answer to his Pen of Light Q&A, where he asks “What shall I do with a torn nation?” he says “Stitch it back together with careful words of truth.“. And explains “we are dividing, and polarizing and drifting towards chaos. It is necessary, under such conditions, if we are to avoid catastrophe, for each of us to bring forward the truth, as we see it: not the arguments that justify our ideologies, not the machinations that further our ambitions, but the stark pure facts of our existence, revealed for others to see and contemplate, so that we can find common ground and proceed together“.

This captures the essence of my confusion over JP. The book lays out plenty of arguments that are ideological, and as I read them I am left wonder about his motivations and ambitions. Some of those arguments (including the Tertiary Institutes funded to progress views, and ‘men don’t oppress women, culture does’) certainly don’t leave me thinking JP is making them to find common ground. Many of the points JP makes are emotive, inflammatory ideologies, that are polarizing. They’re not stark pure facts, but ideologies and machinations.

My 12 Questions for Jordan B. Peterson

So in the interest of bringing more stark facts to the foreground with a goal of finding common ground, if I could, I would ask JP these questions:

1. Who do you think is your audience for this book?
2. Do you feel your book is tight and fully consistent? Do you care if it isn’t?
3. Do you intend to polarize people (and do you see how you do) with this book?
4. Do you intentionally stake out an argument on an extreme end of a spectrum (beyond where you naturally sit) to pull others toward (but not to) you, or are you actually at that end of the spectrum?
5. It’s interesting that you think the book is an “antidote to chaos”, can you see how there is a risk some might read your book and be inspired to create it?
6. How does your popularity and international idol status sit with you in regards to your views of how Stalin and Hitler came to power?
7. How do your popularity and international idol status sit in regards to the Bible’s view on the hazards of idolisation?
8. In the context of questions 5, 6 and 7, would you step back from the limelight and microphone if there was a risk you could propagate enough polarisation to contribute to a major rupture in society?
9. In Rule 6, you encourage people not to blame “the inequity of your enemies“, and you provide hope that if your advice is taken, “Perhaps you will become an ever-more-powerful force for peace and whatever is good“. Do you spend time reflecting on how you could blame the inequity of your enemies less and focus on becoming a more-powerful force for peace?
10. Do you think that (or do you ever contemplate whether) your views could be skewed by the contact you have through your professional interactions with people in need, and this has resulted in an overly negative, cynical, distorted, possible even broken perspective of people or society?
11. Assuming it’s true, isn’t it a little creepy having Communist Propaganda Artwork all through your house?
12. What legacy do you hope to leave for society?

Conclusion

Jordan B. Peterson is just another human being. Like you. Like me. Like us all. He’s been amplified and vilified and idolised by too many people. I’m not going to join any of those people. I’m going to hold on to my own integrity by acknowledging him as a fellow human being with strengths, weaknesses and biases, and then move on with my own life: taking what I chose to from his 12 Rules and leaving behind what I chose.

He’s just another human being.