Channel 4: Jordan Peterson and gender

It's very clear what your tactics are here. Make a totally ridiculous comparison between trans activists and Mao to completely discredit the former and then justify it by making the most tenuous link, before claiming you weren't saying they were actually like Mao.

Mao believed in taxation for public services. I believe in taxation for public services. I guess i'm like Mao? If you zoom out to the extent you are doing, you can find similarities between anything.

I'm absolutely fed up with people on the right or left, who consistently accuse those they disagree with of being like Hitler or being like Mao. Trans activists are not in favour of giving the government power to totally control free speech. That is something you've made up. They want legal protections.

I;m not really that worried about ending up in the Trans gulag. The battles are over whether Trans women should be able to enter all women shortlists in the Labour party. Not over who is going to wield total power in the aftermath of a revolution.

Logic and reasoned debate on Trans issues is serioulsy lacking from a whole lot of those who appose the T in LGBT. Most opponents seem to be unable to understand, or are willfully ignorant of, the difference between biological sex and gender identity. It;s like expecting a black person to be up for arguing with a white supremacist on whether he is really a classified as a human, instead of just going "**** you, I want to be treated like a person and recognised for who I am" and just going about ways to realise that goal instead of debating with bigots.

I suppose there is a bit of a Bolshevik type zero sum game to it all. There is no neutral safe ground, Trans people have some of the highest suicide rates and mental helath problems etc by default. You have to fight if you want to get out of that situation, just like how black people had to fight.

Sighs. You're just not listening at all.

You are free to think my comparison is ridiculous, but you have not given any rational argument against it.

The argument you seem to think is valid is to point out all the differences between Mao and radical left wing activists in the west.

I agree there are those differences. I have agreed with you on all those differences.

However, there is ALSO this similarity. This really can't be that hard to understand...

You've put words in my mouth here too. I agree the radical left wing activists are not asking the government to 'totally' control free speech. However they are asking for compelled speech for collectivist reasons, a form of free speech control never seen before in the west. It's counter to the liberal tradition and comes from a radical left wing collectivist ideology.

Mao also believed in repressing free speech due to that collectivist ideology.

Yes, there are all these differences between Mao and radical left wing activists. Yes, they are not the same.

But there is this similarity.

You clearly can't accept that fact. No amount of dancing around, straw manning or projecting some invented tactics onto my position is going to enable you to do anything except look like you're trying to dodge this fact.

This is getting kinda boring. You're not engaging with my argument and you keep saying things that I've argued against as if I never made the arguments.

If in your next response you don't deal with the fact that there is an ideological similarity between Mao and radical left wing activists that they repress free speech for collectivist reasons then I'm done with this discussion. You can just argue against yourself in your own mind if you're gonna keep inventing straw men to argue against.

A lot of them are saying someone born male can be a woman.

I do not doubt some people, especially religious people, disparage both sexual and gender identities under the catch-all argument that it's not natural or something or other, but that's neither me nor Peterson nor anyone else in this thread that I can see.

People should be free to act as they wish. It's a free country. But the philosophical argument is riddled with contradictions. Honestly, if a man says "I feel like a woman", why are you supposed to treat that as gospel? How does he know what being a woman feels like? If gender is fluid then does "feeling like a woman" even have meaning? I can get the argument that it may be nice to these people to ignore all this and just accept what you're told, but I feel that sets a rather bad precedent about the value of truth.

Holocaust denial isn't illegal in Britain, exactly because free-speech. It was made illegal in Germany and a couple of other countries in the immediate aftermath of the war which I think we can agree was a special circumstance. "Racism" is also not illegal, per se.

But whatever. These people are acting in a way which shares more than superficial resemblances to the cultural authoritarianism of communist regimes. Plus they have clearly been influenced by left-wing academia, which has long been influenced by Marxists, communist-sympathisers and related philosophies. But maybe you're right and it's just coincidence. I mean, it's not, but whatever.

Whatever, if you don't see how kicking people out of their jobs for saying legal, relatively commonplace things is censorious then I don't know what to tell you. Especially when the critisism was obviously politically motivated. I mean, some of the Labour MPs criticising Young hardest have said they stand by Jared O'Mara...

I've dealt with your 'argument' several times.
Your point gets no less ridiculous.

If you try hard enough you can find the most tenuous links between anything. You're trying to discredit trans activists by making an absurd comparison to a brutal dictator.

There's no more similarity between them then there is between Trump and Hitler, or the Daily Mail and Hitler. You consistently try and wiggle out of accepting that.

I know it seems to you that I'm trying to wiggle out of it, but that's because your ego is too caught up in trying to be right rather than understanding my position. So your ego constantly invents psychological motives which you seem perfectly happy to impute to me as long as it backs up your conclusion. Awkward! lol.

Radical left wing activists and Mao share a similarity in their ideology in that they both believe in the government having the power to repress free speech for collectivist reasons.

You tried to point to a similarity in ideology between Hitler, the Daily Mail, and UKIP regarding immigration. However, as I explained they are all against immigration for very different ideological reasons. So you've failed to point out an ideological comparison between these things. Though rather than actually respond to this argument I made many times, you preferred to just continue stating your belief that such 'tenuous' link are easily made! Well, prove it !

I 100% agree with you that there are many differences between Mao and radical left wing activists. However, you really seem hell bent on denying that there is any similarity.

When I point out the similarity, you say 'well what about all those differences!!!'

The fact that there are differences does not mean there is no similarity!

I don't think being against free speech for collectivist reasons is a tenuous link at all. It's a very specific and worrying ideological link.

Not good logic my friend! You have not made any rational argument against my position yet.

Trans activists shouldn't have to argue against people who claim that what they have isn't real, just as homosexuals shouldn't have to argue against people who claim homosexuality isn't real, and black people shouldn't have to argue against white supremacists who claim they should not be equal to white people. Trans activists want the same legal protections as the other groups mentioned. It's not exactly Maoist.

You're not arguing on logical grounds.

You keep mentioning 'collectivist' as if it's your trump card. Mao didn't believe in promoting the rights or well being of a group at all. He was a brutal dictator who sought total control over all aspects of peoples' lives and sought to persecute and suppress anyone who opposed him, brutally.

Trans activists are not wanting to suppress your rights. They want legal recognition, in the same way that we have given legal recognition to homsoexuals and different races of people. There just isn't a comparison.

Let's take the Hitler and UKIP example. UKIP are largely opposed to multiculturalism because they believe to an extent that it weakens the bonds of a society. Hitler believed in a much, much more extreme version of that to the point where he wanted people not part of the culture to be killed and persecuted. That is every bit as valid a comparison, if not more so, than yours. Yet you try and wriggle out of it.

Of course it would be stupid to compare UKIP and Hitler because the scale is so so different it negates any valid comparison at all. I don't agree that trans activists and Mao had the same reasons for their actions in the slightest.

Trans activists shouldn't have to argue against people who claim that what they have isn't real, just as homosexuals shouldn't have to argue against people who claim homosexuality isn't real, and black people shouldn't have to argue against white supremacists who claim they should not be equal to white people. Trans activists want the same legal protections as the other groups mentioned. It's not exactly Maoist.

Comparing your opponents to Hitler/Mao is the oldest trick in the book. It's dirty, underhand and dishonest. It's a version of Godwin's law in action.

This sums it up perfectly.

@Rinsed @Lime-man

The trans activists who want the government to legally control people's free speech for collectivist reasons have that similarity with Mao.

Hitler's anti-multiculturalism was based on ancient nordic blood myths related to racial superiority. As far as I know, UKIP's anti-multiculturalism is 100% about culture and 0% about race. So 0% similar to Hitler.

If you can prove to me that UKIP's views are based on an ideology of racial superiority to some percentage, then I'll agree that to that percentage they are like Hitler. That's what you'll have to prove to make this example work though.

Mao was absolutely collectivist in his ideology. Sure, his communism ended up in the same pit of catastrophe as communism everywhere else in the world has ended up. We should learn from that what such ideology leads to!

Do not give the government the power to compel speech for collectivist reasons, it's a terrible idea! It's a Maoist idea. I still don't see you engaging with this claim or presenting an argument against it!

Do you think the trans activists who want the government to legally control people's free speech for collectivist reasons have that similarity with Mao? Straight answer please!

No true scotsman indeed. When it comes to other people's analogies you split hairs, when it comes to yours, you accept it as fact. UKIP's ideology is based very loosely on the want of a homogeneous society. So was Hitler's. That's no less a valid comparison than yours. All i'm doing is zooming out to a ridiculous extent like you do, to find the most tenuous of links.

Trans activists do not want the government to suppress free speech. They do not want to do it to suppress, like Mao did. They want legal recognition and protection. So 0% similar to Mao. Mao didn't want to protect anyone, he wanted to persecute.

Your entire argument falls down because the basis is built on sand. Trans activists are not suppressing your right to free speech. They are not requiring or giving the government the power to do anything, other than give them the same legal protections that other minority groups have.

Mao was not collectivist (in the actual definition)in the sense that he did not set out to promote, protect or enhance the rights of anyone. He set out to suppress all.

No.

Largely because they are not doing that and they are not seeking protection for collectivist reasons.

Vegetarians don't eat meat because they think it's cruel to animals. Hitler didn't eat meat because he thought it was cruel to animals. So therefore vegetarians must be similar to Hitler?

Feck me, no wonder trans activists can't be bothered debating with people who are trying to claim that what they have isn't real and they are like Mao for seeking legal protections against such people.

I mean the point about Mao and trans activists he makes is just sheer BS. He does makes some decent points on other topics but when he says stuff like that, he lets out that he is a fruitcake.

If you compare someone or a group to Mao/ a murderous tyrant then you do so knowing the implications. It would be like people comparing Trump to Hitler and justifying it on the basis that they were both opposed to immigration etc. (I called out people on the left who made such a stupid comparison).

If you want to oppose people's arguments then fine but accusing people of being like Mao is sheer idiocy. I'm sure 'trans activists' aren't motivated by 'marxism' nor do they want to kill millions of people.

I'm not a 'critic' of his. This is the first time I've even heard him speak. It would just be good if he didn't feed into the alt right victim mentality and harped on about 'cultural marxism'. His argument about the free market was also pretty weak. Simply because something is the product of the 'free market' does not make it just or fair, nor does it mean we shouldn't seek to change it.

This is a bit of a facepalm lol. Any reason I might give, no matter how accurate, to show how the ideology of UKIP and Hitler's are different, you'll respond to with the 'no true scotsman fallacy'! In other words, everything I say is automatically a fallacy because it disagrees with you :P

So why is it now a law in Canada! Bit awkward that isn't it ! lol.

Well I don't live in Canada otherwise they would be repressing my right to free speech. I certainly don't want a similar law here!

Mao set out to suppress the individual for the sake of the collective. That's collectivism 101.

There's no ideological similarity between vegetarians and Hitler so that's a stupid example as you must realise lol!

If trans activists aren't trying to repress free speech, then why is there now a law doing that in Canada! Slightly awkward fact that isn't it! :P

'If you want to oppose people's arguments then fine but accusing people of being like Mao is sheer idiocy. I'm sure 'trans activists' aren't motivated by 'Marxism' nor do they want to kill millions of people. '

I think he made it clear that he didn't expect trans activists to kill millions of people like Mao did all he did was point out that the ideology they follow is identical.

Dude, you literally just ignored every point I made and passed the buck onto someone else who keeps making the same one.

I'm not saying that being transgender is not 'real', I'm saying that it's not the same. Which is true. Blatantly true. Black people aren't the same as white people, growing up with different experiences that shape the way one views the world creates personality changes. Not all white people are the same, and neither are all black people and neither are all transgender people. I'm not the same as neighbour even though we were both born white and male, why would a trans woman be the same as someone who was born a woman? Or a trans man the same as someone born as a man?

This is a discussion that needs to be had because transgender suicide rates are insanely high. Pretending that they are the same as people born with their gender, and crying out against any claim of the opposite as 'offensive' does them a disservice.

I have no problem using preferred pronouns, that's just common decency, and I don't think being trans makes you any less of a person. But pretending that they are the SAME, is a LIE or a MYTH at best. There are differences, but differences aren't bad. They should be acknowledged so that we can work around them and create not only a fairer society, but a more headstrong one.

I've also never called transgender activists maoist.

Sigh.

No it isn't.

I don't fear ending up in a trans Gulag.

I've already had this debate with four posters arguing that trans activists are like Mao. Can't be dealing with another.

Uh hello do I need to write it in bold next time?

The ideology that they follow is similar but not the people and their aims.

For example both use identity politics. Hardcore Trans Activists seek to use identity politics to spread the narrative that their situation in life is a result of a white men dominated western society that keeps them oppressed.

Likewise Mao used a brand of identity politics as part of his communist revolution (specifically against the landlords).

So you can see that their ideology has a common factor. They both use identity politics and how they use it is similar but that does't mean that trans activists will cause millions of deaths, to say so would be absurd.