
© unknownJordan B. Peterson
Watching the mainstream press try to interview University of Toronto Professor Jordan Peterson, one thing becomes exceedingly clear:
they literally can't even.
While the above expression makes my inner grammar Nazi cry, it is possibly the best description of the predictable sequence of befuddled expressions, desperate strawmen, and whiffed shots fired at Peterson from a growing list of increasingly cautious media personalities.
Cathy Newman's
interrogation of the professor has garnered over five million views, and if one were to judge its contents solely on the consequent collection of memes, pundit reactions, and response/splice videos, one would conclude that Dr. Peterson spent 30 minutes deriding and verbally dominating his interviewer, banging his fists on the table and shouting like right-wing cherry bomb Alex Jones - but that's not Dr. Peterson's style.
Instead, the quiet Canadian spent a half-hour discussing free speech, the gender pay gap, and Pepe the frog in such a calm and reasonable manner that even his use of the occasional swear word sounded as though someone swapped "golly gee" out of his script at the last moment.
The interview became a sort of fulcrum for the broader media narrative surrounding Peterson: articles before the interview tried to cast him as a nerdier Milo Yiannopoulos; those since have been notably cautious about casting him as
anything.
People familiar with the New Testament might recall a passage from the
book of Matthew that details a series of exchanges between Jesus and the Pharisees that concludes with this memorable phrase: "And no man was able to answer him a word, neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions."
Peterson, fond of incorporating biblical themes into his teaching, has almost backed the media into such a corner. In fact, the most recent interviews and articles regard him with a strange blend of cautious hostility and grudging respect.
Comment: These illegal settlers attempted to abduct children and what did the world's 'most moral' army do? They provided back-up in order to help these twisted individuals. The New Arab reports that both seem to be re-grouping in order to continue terrorizing this village: