Jordan Peterson: God’s Warrior Carnivore

A few days ago, Jordan Peterson, the blessed son of God, prophet of total knowledge within himself, talked and talked and talked for hours on Joe Rogan’s podcast. Peterson, perhaps the aspiring Pope of the Catholic Church, recently published We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine (Portfolio, 2024), a book in which he discussing everything he claims to know about the gospels and the Old Testament. I read this book, so you don’t have to.

But first, the podcast appearance. This conversation couldn’t have started worse, as the initial topic was sex, birth control pills. and pornography. Rogan tells Peterson that the point of sex isn’t exactly to have babies, nature tells you, go crazy for 20 minutes because if you thought only about having sex to have babies, well, sex won’t be that good, right?

Peterson interrupts him, being the  prophet that he is, with an absolutely idiotic question: So why did you get married? Rogan must have told him that it’s none of your fucking business. I was just about to write Oh God, but that’s entering Peterson’s sacred territory, so I’d better change it to “Oh, Boy”, we’ve got hours coming, three and a half to be exact, about the supreme and absolute wisdom of this phenomenon or freak named Jordan Peterson.

But Rogan played along…Big mistake. Peterson started off with how the family is the basis of society and crap like that… hello, we’re back to the 1950s! And all his verbiage led me to what felt like a Jeopardy! answer: “Who has the worst sex in the world?” Well, if all he’s thinking about is having babies while having sex, it’s probably Jordan Peterson.

The many versions of JP

Since coming into the public eye, Jordan Peterson has become an expert on…Well, everything. Apparently, this Canadian knows more than every genius who’s ever walked this planet. Which obviously leads him to his next frontier: proving he knows more about God than God Himself.

On the podcast, Rogan let Peterson talk about whatever caught his fancy, including climate change.  Never mind that Rogan cited scientific studies, facts, and everything that people who do serious research know about the subject. According to Jordan Peterson, it’s all a conspiracy theory, a term that seems a bit far-fetched to me for a clinical psychologist to use. It’s as if a patient came in saying she suffered from anxiety attacks and he said, “It’s your fault, because you watched The Exorcist! Read the Bible!”

Well, then I refer to the Bible and Genesis and Noah, who must be watching from somewhere thinking, “I didn’t believe in climate change either, you idiot!”

Peterson’s arrogance and lack of assertiveness, which is masked by his self-belief that the truth resides in him and only in him, turns him into an annoying parrot who repeats himself, with less and less sense every day, regardless of the difference between fact and opinion.

His new book doesn’t present  arguments worthy of a clinical psychologist, but of a simple man who wants to appear more intelligent than he is and who does not dare to say: I believe in God based on this hypothesis or theory. Peterson takes what he writes for granted, as a fact, since he deals with the Old Testament as the literal word of God, not as a metaphorical construct. Everything narrated in the Old Testament, to his mind, is historical facts that God presented to humanity so they can become better and more moral

The pompous title alone reveals his true thoughts This guy sees himself as a warrior of God, a chosen one, and that never works out. Just ask Anakin Skywalker.

And here comes one of the great annoyances of the book. Peterson doesn’t possess the courage to say, definitively, that this is the work of a higher consciousness. He does acknowledge that human men probably wrote the gospel, but did so as messengers of God. In this gray territory, Peterson writes and writes and writes without truly reinterpreting what all of us who’ve read the Bible already know.

Bring the ribs!

One of the juiciest aspects of the podcast was when Jordan talked about his all-carnivore diet. Nothing but red meat. Well, I can understand why someone would simply live in the middle of nowhere and have to hunt, and that would be their diet. The cavemen didn’t have to choose between carbs or vegetables. It was pure hunt or starvation.

I can understand why someone would simply be a meat fanatic and that would be their preference, but when Peterson attributes his carnivore diet the ability to eliminate depression, have total mental clarity, and full energy, from that moment on, I no longer felt like eating meat—if that’s what it would make me become like him. All of this was based on supposed studies that he didn’t specify and that Rogan refuted. If Peterson only eats meat, fine, but promoting it as the only dietary solution is very, very wrong.

And if we go to the Bible, well, I don’t remember Jesus ordering Judas to bring the tray of ribs to the barbecue at the Last Supper.

The Gospels vs. Peterson’s Education

Peterson’s book is not only a fiasco in terms of theological-philosophical-psychological analysis, but it makes no sense at all, starting from its title. It’s a nine-part book from Genesis to Exodus- to the last chapter on… Jonah. There are 576 pages that do not explain God and his possible or non-existence, but instead pay homage to another cult, an honestly mediocre one based on ego and need for attention.

This book is the latest document in a cult of personality that Peterson desperately wants all readers and the entire world to be part of. And believe me, this one is more confusing and extremist than all the gospels combined, as well as hypocritical. Supposedly about the Bible, this book is a long treatise on how vast Peterson believes his knowledge of the “holy scriptures” is, and it really is as unnecessary as brushing your teeth with a cactus.

Furthermore, the book that destroyed everything that Peterson writes, speaks and supposedly bases his ethical and moral life and his values, was cam out a long time ago (2007), from the pen of the late Christopher Hitchens. He titled it God is Not Great.  I have no doubt that Peterson has some sort of wet fantasy about actually debating a heavyweight like Hitchens, but it’s a dangerous fantasy, because Hitchens would have crushed him like an elephant crushes a defenseless little flower.

So enters the question: But why then is everyone praising this book? Well, let’s take a big bite out of the apple of Eden without any compassion.

It’s just another piece in the vast puzzle of Jordan Peterson’s indoctrination machine: Peterson Academy, or something he considers the future of education—university without the need for universities? In any case, it’s a platform that offers 48 courses for an annual price of $3.99 (Our Lord Jesus made it free) and that aims to reformat and create a new educational system based on what Jordan Peterson believes every young person needs to face in ruthless daily life to  become successful.

A few courses caught my attention, like Introduction to Nutrition, which I imagine is a one-minute class where a professor says, “Eat meat!”; Peterson himself teaches a course on Nietzsche; there’s another called “Why We Get Sick?” (my response would be, because you’re just eating meat!); there’s another one on Great Composers; another one on Narcissism; and… this one killed me: “The Sermon on the Mount,” taught by Peterson. I can’t imagine a young person matriculating from Peterson Academy going to look for a job at Starbucks and saying, “Yeah, dude! I graduated with honors from The Sermon on the Mount.”

On the podcast, Peterson assured Rogan that he has over 40,000 students. Wow, poor fools.

Jordan Peterson has once again proved on the podcast that he’s a man who knows how to use vocabulary to express a few brilliant, concrete ideas; his academy strikes me as pointless, his carnivore diet, limited.

As for We Who Wrestle with God: Perceptions of the Divine. I don’t know who Peterson thinks he’s battling or who his ally is. God has plenty of fans in this world and doesn’t need Jordan Peterson’s defense. In any case, one thing is very clear: first Peterson should start by following one of his own 12 rules for life: not only clean his house or bedroom, but cleanse himself of the hatred that he has in the closet of his soul, before trying to to be the new Consigliere of God. Amen!