Where Do SJWs Come From?

I love the idea that Christine has evidence that SJWs are easily offended and emotionally unstable.

[dizzlx]

This was 1000% more informative than I thought it was going to be.

[jim]

Guys - make sure you bring 2 mics to something like this. It's important to have consistent production values.

[Blakpepa]

I became familiar with SJW when I moved to BC and it was thrown into my face by white people telling me that I have to be a victim because im black and as such to sit in a corner while they "protest" my "best interest"...really, how do you know my best interest when you are far removed from what I perceive as my best interest and you will not even engage in a discussion with me? Always affluent white people with zero real world experience...all they know about life is what has been constructed by social media. I've always seen it as a mental health illness...you cannot speak to these people in a rational discussion because their response is to cry or scream. their only identity is to be a victim...they completely lose their identity if they are no longer an SJW and when they lose this that's when things get dangerous. I am willing to bet that suicide rates among these people are high compared to the general public

[doc]

I can't imagine(I've only seen glimpses) the type of crap that Dr. Peterson has to go through just because he is brave enough to speak the truth that his colleagues and regressives don't want to hear. Rational brave teachers are at a high premium these days.

[seekerout]

Fascinating. That image of the articulate egalitarian liberals mothering infantile authoritarian leftists is especially powerful. It explains so much.

[SpiralBJJ]

I am the only one in my group of friends who can see through this sjw cult, it's hard to deal with most days.

[growthandunderstanding]

Answer: Misplaced anger and lack of fulfillment.

[malvane]

You'd be surprised how basic probing questions extremely irritate people these days. Questions like "Please explain." "Can you elaborate?" "How do you know that?" "Where did you learn that?" "What was the method?" "Who's 'they'?"

Such questions, slightly extended to topics of race, sex, gender, religion, basically the whole of identity politics, MASSIVELY irritate PC types. Such as asking to explain how Trump is racist through his ACTIONS, or how criticizing a woman in a position in power is sexist.

[drrd]

Yes, I agree with the mood disorder.
I was diagnosed with BPD because I was abused as a kid.
Everything was black and white.
I was very left wing at that time and I couldn't handle different views than my own.
As I recovered and my mind healed, I started thinking more grey, wanting things to be more factual and I don't need people to agree with me because I have a real sense of self now.
I couldn't call myself left or right.
I am not a extreme left now.
I just want a well rounded argument with facts because I am not thinking with my emotions but with my mind.

[phioneus]

Don't be on the far left or far right, rise above the labels!

[markdignam]

As someone who is a psychologist and was an academic for over 2 decades, can I add a few comments.

The Frankfurt school mentioned is CRITICAL THEORY which has a central role in SJ/feminist and cultural Marxist thinking.   It has in fact given a lot of SJ thinking an academic framework, and it is the underpinning philosophy that gives the idea of institutional entitlement and oppression.  That is, entitlement and oppression is part of the cultural, political and economic framework, thus it is imposed on you, and not related to individuals.  As such, white people are more "entitled" simply by being white.  Unfortunately, critical isn't very critical of itself, and is based on outcomes and not inputs or processes for its legitimacy. 

The idea of conservativism being authoritarian has for a long  time been a sacred cow.  It DOES have considerable truth, in that the more right wing you are, the authoritarian you are.   Yet the mistake is considering authoritarianism to be directional.  Left and right wing authoritarianism is both authoritarian, and one of the mistakes on a historical basis is that this issue has been studied in relatively free societies, NOT in communist countries, which were (and still are) authoritarian.  My point is that in the western world, being authoritarian was almost universally seen as a right wing concept, as left wing authoritarianism was not really evident in a society which wasn't communist or socialist (communism is a political model, socialism is  a way of organising economic production).

In 2016, western societies are more centrist (part of the way between left and right) as a whole, but there is now a large body of left wing thinkers and ideologues who now have considerable power.  This was not the case 50 years ago, and you can't logically be authoritarian without any real authority.   So we now observe the paradigm on left wing authoritarianism, though such authoritarianism was always apparent when left ideology is linked to real authority.  It isn't really that complex. 

The reason that there have not been psychometrics to measure left wing authoritarianism is that the underpinning assumption of existing tools is that only right wingers are authoritarian.   Yet this makes the same mistake as does critical theory; confusing outcomes with inputs.

The idea of high compassion among the left is a questionable assumption that is now being shown to be false.  The researchers say that the left exhibits high compassion BUT this is typically with the "people at the bottom" and not at the top or middle.  That is so much like Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals.  Appeal to the people at the bottom BUT that in itself is divisive and bigoted.  And is also authoritarian as you are simply being divisive.

Whilst they claim that the left are "inclusive" this is a semantic issue which is just as exclusive as happens on the political right.  Say for example that 70% of the population are white.  Thus one authoritarian thinker is focused on one group that shows some similarity   This thinker is seen as exclusionary.  Now, the leftist thinker says I want to include all the others - black, brown, yellow, red, whatever.  But this is no more than a them (whites) vs us (the remainder) and is just as exclusionary.  In fact, more so on a population basis.  In short, if you are authoritarian, you both have friends and enemies, you just pick different groups.

I would also say that one reason why the left has been assumed to NOT be authoritarian is that it did not fit the leanings of academic and government institutions that don't want to hear that the left can (and is) authoritarian.  They have been happy to hear than many on the right are authoritarian, and thus it becomes a self-fulfilling paradigm.

Now, if you are to the left or right, authoritarianism as a trait is both power focused.   Both communists and fascists will kill you if you don't like their ideology. 

The compassion trait discussed in relation to Oedipus complex is interesting; what is does NOT overtly say is that such a way of thinking is not about the lived experiences of other people but about how YOU as an individual feel.  Having worked in NGOs at the start of my career, I observed endless examples of this (sometimes called the Florence Nightingale effect or syndrome) where the individual is focused on their OWN feelings NOT on those of others.  It is for that reason, that such a way of thinking is associated with neurosis and personality disorders.    Thus I disagree that it is "compassion", rather, it is self-interest in another form.   If you have a need to help others, you really need to ask why, and whether you are merely applying your own needs to them.

[TinyPandimonium]

Honestly I could watch Mr. Peterson all day

[iAmTheSquidThing]

So essentially, all of our political beliefs are really just us projecting our different emotional problems onto society.

[Nonplussed]

Thank god for this man to bring some common sense in the social sciences. UofT representation!

[nicholasmartin]

My mother was a Greenham Common peace protestor (a US nuclear airbase in the UK). You could not have met a more compassionate woman. She worked as a nurse and gave every to her work. Yet, she was deeply authoritarian. She found any questioning of her vegetarianism or pacifism utterly intolerable. As I grew older (I am now 53) and moved away from radical left wing politics towards a more pragmatic view of life my mother's insistence that I conform to her values placed an enormous strain on our relationship. This very interesting discussion struck a very personal and painful chord for me.

[Mowglibaloo]

I wish there were more professors like Dr. Jordan Peterson at my university.

[johnskelton]

This can't be true because they based their research on controlled scientific methods and not feelings. (And yes, I'm being ironic.)

[magottyk]

It's interesting that the SJW call for diversity is actually a call for homogeneity due to the exclusion of wrong thinkers but the inclusion of physical trait variance and cultural variance, so long as they're all thinking along the same lines.

Diversity of thought it seems is irrelevant and unwanted, unless the SJW's believe that they hold the moral high ground that will be adopted by the minority they're championing.

[barrycooper]

For sjw's I definately blame the parents.