Are Jordan Peterson and Andrew Tate Good or Bad?

eorge grombacher 0:02
Let’s get into it and get down to it. Welcome to figure it out. George grombacher. Joining me always is Centauri minor. Hello folks, helping us move from awareness to action today. Two of the most popular human beings on earth, I would also say the smartest.

Sure, yes, smartest, influential, dangerous, all of these things. So we’re going to talk about Andrew Tate and Jordan Peterson today. So that’s what we’re going to talk about. Okay. I’m sorry. I’m excited. I think there’s, I’ve been thinking a lot about this. And I think it’s always, I think it’s really important to think and be thoughtful about all these things. And once you start thinking about to people like this, my brain just goes in a million different places. But what I wanted to start with is just talking about the circumstances that allowed for Andrew Tate to be the most Googled human being on Earth, and Jordan Peterson, to have risen to the level of prominence and success that he has risen to and vitriol. It wasn’t that long ago that we started talking about self esteem, we didn’t always talk about self esteem hasn’t been that long that we’ve been talking about identity. And now all we talk about is identity. And identity is so incredibly subjective that I can choose today to be whatever I want, like, literally, I can be whatever I want. And I don’t I have opinions on all these things. But I think, as I look at why is why are these two men, who they are? And how is this happened? I think that that those are two of the really key reasons. And the lack of traditional institutions, and traditional values, has created a vacuum where these two people had been able to sort of Occupy so much space and attention and oxygen and everything else.

Sentari Minor 2:14
I think what you just said about the lack of traditional values, and institutions, whatever that might mean, I think what made them so popular, right, is that they created a place for people to be heard. And I know we always talked about not feeling hurt, but they had parts of the population that felt like the world was getting away from them, whether right or wrong, but that they, they provided a voice. And also they were like, Oh, that I like them, because that resonates with me and I not hearing any one over the last few years that resonates with me. So I think for both of these guys, I mean, kudos to them for providing a space for folks to feel to feel heard and also feel like they have an identity somewhere, too. Yeah,

george grombacher 2:53
it’s really interesting. I think a lot of the way in a lot of ways they are are very, very, very similar, and also very different. Yes. And I think that we have the fast thinking part of our brain, and then the slow thinking part of our brain. And the fast thing he part of our brain is Andrew tape. Yeah. That’s a good way of putting it. This this this guy is pretty cool. He’s strong. He’s powerful. He is very, very sure in his in his opinions, and he speaks authoritatively. But when I actually get into it a little bit, I’m like, okay, but he’s kind of a caricature, and he’s probably playing a character. The slow part of my brain is Jordan Peterson. So it’s the other side of that coin, similar people doing what you’ve described, sort of scratching that itch or feeling the need for people who are feeling like, they don’t have an anchor or somebody that I look up to. But Jordan is, I mean, I think he’s the real deal. I like Andrew tape. I love Jordan Peterson.

Sentari Minor 3:59
Okay, um, I don’t have a strong opinion on either of them. Other than I think our entertainers, you did a good job of like, he think he appeals to like, a certain demographic and a certain like, mindset. And so it’s clear, like how he became popular. Also, I do think to rise to that level, you have to be kind of become a character of your caricature of yourself. Like some of the stuff he says it’s not. I know, some people feel like it’s super dangerous. And some of the things he said has not been great, but like, it’s mostly like, Okay, this 30 something year old dude, he’s kind of a douchebag. He talks about this stuff. And that’s fine. And people like it. So, you know,

kudos to him for building that brand. The Jordan Peterson side is actually much more interesting, because, I mean, this guy is an intellectual, right? He has the pedigree, he has the experience, he has the mindset. And so it’s far more interesting to think about kind of the impact that he can have through his through the lens of like he he actually has some gravity behind his words, whereas Andrew Taylor, I don’t get it taken. Believe it. What does it matter?

george grombacher 5:02
Yeah, yeah, I don’t think that there’s a lot of substance there. For Andrew Tate, I’ve not done a deep dive into his Hustler’s university. But just based on the title, I don’t think any of us really need to, I have, I have paid attention to people who have dug into it. And it’s, I feel like it’s it’s not super strong, nor is it super valuable. But he is sort of the People Magazine, whereas Jordan Peterson is, you know, the encyclopedia, for lack of a better sort of contrast there. I think that Andrew Tate is, is going to be fleeting, more, so he very well may end up in Romanian prison or wherever he is, I don’t have any comment on that, because we don’t know what’s really going on there. So I don’t think that there’s a lot of fruit or a lot of future there. But I think that Jordan Peterson is is a legitimate, in a lot of ways a hero that should be appreciated. Now, you may not like him, because you disagree with the positions he takes. But to revisit why it is that we know who he is, I think is really, really important. And that’s in 2016, Canada was, was putting forth, I wrote down the actual bill itself, but I’m not gonna be able to find it now. It was like be 16 or something like that. And at that time, Jordan had already been a practicing clinic, he’s he’s, I think Jordan is pretty close to 60. If not in his 60s, he’s probably in his 60s. But he had been a practicing clinical psychologist, he had been a professor at Harvard, he had been a professor at University of Toronto. And I do think that he is a legitimate genius from an IQ standpoint. But he, during that time, the whole thing was, we’re going to compel your speech. And if you do not call me by my desired pronoun, you will get in trouble legally. And he said, Oh, bullshit, there’s no way you will not compel me, you will not compel my speech. And he’s like, this is the hill I’m gonna die on. And there is where where he rose to prominence. There’s a YouTube video. And 16 is really his first one with Him debating college students, like just out in the out on the college square or whatever. And that was really what kind of launched him into the, into the public sphere, in enormous risk, because he essentially lost his job over doing that. And now today, they’re still going after him. I don’t know, if you’re aware, but they’re trying to take his license from

Sentari Minor 7:59
I’ve read about the idea of, sort of, like, if you don’t do this continuing education piece, or whatever it might be, you will lose your license, which is on you know, it’s unfortunate.

george grombacher 8:10
Yeah, it’s re education is actually social media,

Sentari Minor 8:14
isn’t it? It’s like social media re education, which I mean, I mean, we could have a whole conversation about how these guilds in association have they’re out their hands tied around any given professional. So that’s neither here nor there. But I do think, for him, as with all and we’ve talked about this before, kind of assessing the risk from your standpoint as a professional like what you’re willing to do and do and not do. And he’s he’s gone in headfirst saying, like, if these may be the consequences, but I have to tell the story that I have to tell and then that’s, that’s, that’s for his that’s for him to die on.

george grombacher 8:47
And I’ve been spending a good amount of time thinking about, about honor, and living honorably and having a code and living by it. And I really think that that is one of the attractive things about about Jordan Peterson is that he is very pragmatic. I think that what he talks about is, is pretty common sense. But in a world where there’s not a lot of pragmatism, and not a lot of common sense, and lots of name calling and lots of coercion, and lots of same stuff, like toxic masculinity and and white privilege, and and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. We have a lot of people who are just trying to live their life, man. Well, yeah. And, you know, and what he talks about resonates because he is putting his his his career on the line to do the work that he believes to be accurate and important, and it’s certainly resonating.

Sentari Minor 9:54
Yeah, I think, if anything, everyone should have appreciation of how he does to Europe. Wait at the beginning of the show, kind of slow down the conversation and just make people think about it. So whether you agree or disagree it actually, I appreciate the kind of facilitated, forceful facilitation of like, Let’s talk this out. We may not agree about on it, but like, I want to have some really good dialogue debate, which is, it’s been lost in this day and age and so a can appreciate him for that. I will say, I always think it’s interesting. I knew Westwood might be a good person that falls into this, but like, we talked about honor and people doing what they want, but there is sort of like a little bit of privilege in that and that Jordan Peterson, he’s gonna be like, He can say whatever you want. And he’s, he’ll be fine. Like, he’ll figure it out at a base to like, always make money. He may not be a psychologist, but he’ll be able to go on like radio shows. And I think the interesting piece of all of these kinds of folks is firebrands is like everyday people can’t do that, which like, I’m sure there are people everyday people that are like, I would love to be able to say that and do that. But I just can’t, which is unfortunate in and of itself. Right. Which is kind of what he’s debating is like I should be people should be able to do what they want to do or say what they want to say. Not dangerously without consequences. But like there are consequences to, to those actions and some some consequences that we are others depending on who you are.

george grombacher 11:17
Yeah, well, that’s certainly true. That’s certainly true. I think that what he talks about is, is positioning yourself for success in whatever endeavor that you choose. And that if you if you master your fundamentals, and if you have yourself together, and you’re responsible, and you’re doing everything you need to, then it positions you to be able to if you’re financially successful or stable, rather than you can speak your mind and be a little bit more independent. Versus if you are not, then you get stuck, you’re stuck in your dead end job that you hate. Because you’re not moving forward. If you’re not thinking your own thoughts, well, then you’re just being sort of led around by whatever you’re listening to, and whatever you’re paying attention to instead of doing your own thinking. So

Sentari Minor 12:10
are there any particular especially for Jordan Peterson, any kind of controversies or hot takes that you think went too far? Like anything that he said, you’re like, people over blue that? I’m just curious?

george grombacher 12:20
Yeah. The thick, the one that comes to mind is he talked about, he said, enforced monogamy at one point, something like that. Okay. And thing about Jordan, is that Dr. Peterson, I kind of feel silly, calling him by his first name. Think about Jordan Peterson is that he lets it rip man, he will go in. I think that he and Russell Brand, are two of my favorite public intellectuals because they will go and you can actually. And they’re not afraid to actually talk through something on camera or being recorded. And it’s a sign of a smart person. But also, that’s also a very courageous thing. To be able to sort of talk about an idea, and actually pause and be thinking through it. So you can actually see him formulating opinions or working through problems live. And when you do that, and now he’s been he’s been doing that forever. Since 2016. Now, so coming on, you know, 767 years, there’s going to be things you’re going to say which if somebody wants to grab it, and and shove it back in your face, that’s going to be pretty easy, right?

Sentari Minor 13:38
And I think it pulled out to that to that point. And you did a good job of just kind of talking through what it would look like to talk things through on camera. So think of like anything that you do in like your business or personal life, if you’ve got, like 24 hours a day of just you asking me a question, and me being like, I think this, I think this I’m thinking out loud, I might not be married to that idea. But like, let me work through it. And then you got a piece of that. Yes, that would cause a lot of problems. I’m thinking through like some of the stuff I’ve gone through this week, like, thought out loud or tried to get through and people be like, That’s not great, but out of context. So that’s, that’s, that would be pretty hard to do. And to your point, very courageous, because I don’t think I would be able to do it.

george grombacher 14:15
And that’s what we want. Right? It’s really one of the points of the whole show here that we’re doing right is that and one of the through lines to all of it is we need to be able to have space where we can make mistakes, and we can, you know, kick ideas around and let stupid ones die and build on good ones. And that’s part of the problem with what’s going on, particularly with our politicians is you know, we had, you know, whatever Biden didn’t even campaign Katie Hobbs here in Arizona didn’t even didn’t campaign or she didn’t debate that’s your That’s preposterous. Like shame on you. This is I bought your ideas. It’s not about your political affiliation, because it said Democrat that’s the only reason that that that people voted for her. Because they certainly didn’t know what she thought about things because she didn’t debate. Debate. That’s

Sentari Minor 15:05
fair forget, there’s a lot of controversy and like a lot of folks who, me being one of them, it’s like, you know, you have to it’s part of the democratic process, right? You have to get to go up there and kind of see what you what you believe what you desire, what you want for the state, the country, whatever it might be in love, give people the opportunity to learn more about you. So I think at that particular point, I think that was she kind of left people out of the democratic process there.

george grombacher 15:29
Yeah. Are you able to string some thoughts together? Live on stage? Are you just are you just parrot talking points? And that’s this way too many people?

Sentari Minor 15:40
Is there. If you had the opportunity to, to meet with Dr. Peterson? Like, what? What current? Like what topics or issues? Do you think it’d be fun to kind of either debate or unpack with him?

george grombacher 15:51
I don’t even know. Honestly, I’ve thought about where like,

Sentari Minor 15:54
I was thinking about that today as like, oh, I

george grombacher 15:55
don’t know, if I had the opportunity to have a conversation or have him on a podcast or something like that. What would you ask? And I don’t I don’t have a good answer to that question. Because I am nowhere close to his. This is not going to shock anyone.

Sentari Minor 16:13
It’d be a very intimidated conversation.

george grombacher 16:15
I’m nowhere close to his intellectual, you know, whatever equal. But I think it’s, I think that that’s really interesting thing for sure. Just to go back to the politics briefly. You watched the Speaker of the House, it went like what they voted 50 times and Kevin McCarthy. He finally won on the first or 17th or whatever. And my initial response was, what a waste of money. And I actually went through, and I’m like, okay, they make, you know, $250,000 a year each of them, there’s 400 of them. So this is costing us like $100,000 a day, or something like that, to watch these. To watch these Yahoo’s do nothing. But that changed my mind. I’m like, this is actually the democratic process and work process. Yeah, they’re making sausage right now. And it’s not ugly. It’s not pretty. And it’s not supposed to be we’re supposed to actually be able to fight about these things, or have robust debates, and then come to some kind of a consensus and come and make concessions to one another. That’s what politics is. It’s not my way or the highway. And so I think that it was a probably a triumph more so than it was a failure.

Sentari Minor 17:29
Yeah, I’m glad you called that out. Because I was always on that camp of like, this is what like, this is what you’re supposed to do, right? There’s debate. There’s people being upset, there’s people going back and forth and conceding and compromising and that’s the way it should be. I think it was 15 rounds, it went. And rightfully so, like we the process worked. And the ultimately I think people can not feel good about. It will however you feel about the outcome and how you feel about them, but feel good about the process. Like we got here. We arrived here because of that process, which I think is it was a great thing for the American people to see because it hadn’t happened in 100 years. It’s like oh, it works this process works which is

george grombacher 18:07
Yeah. I don’t even know thank God for I was gonna say a Republican but there’s there’s no Republicans. I think that I would say thank God for certainly not going to say Thank God for Democrats. So because we are because yeah, because like South Park sets and Tari it always comes down to a giant douche bag versus a turd sandwich. Boy, were they correct? Right. Surprise, surprise, surprise.

Sentari Minor 18:35
George, I’m, I’m curious for just going back to amputate for a moment. I obviously his his brand has been really, really adopted or attracted by three young men who, who probably feel disenfranchised by the overall rhetoric around what it means to be a man. So what do you think is kind of the the future of that population that demographic? Is it more of an entertainer? Is it more of getting back to some sort of normalcy and the pendulum swinging? Like what what do you think happens to young men?

george grombacher 19:08
Yeah, I think I think it all makes sense. And I’m 44. And I, Andrew Tate has that it factor when I watch him and I look at him. He’s interesting, and he’s attractive. And Jordan Peterson is sort of the opposite. He’s, he’s an old guy. He’s sort of frail. He’s a squeaky voice and he’s Canadian. And you know, God bless Canada and all that stuff. But if I were 20 years old, when I saw Andrew take what would I have thought and that was a different season of my life where I wanted to look flashy and be hot for lack of a better term and drive nice cars and be attractive to to women and all that intend to make money and to be rich at 30 That would have been less so and certainly at 40. You know, I just I appreciate him for what he is. but it’s not a draw to me anymore. But I would have, you know, we’re playing armchair quarterback at this point. But again, I think that it’s he is somebody that can have start sort of a, an internal dialogue with with a young person, man or woman say, Okay, this is interesting. Now am I trapped in the matrix like Andrew Tate talks about? Am I interested in, in just going down the traditional path? Or am I interested in pursuing entrepreneurship and sort of making my own path? And I think if you take that away from it, that’s nothing but a positive thing. And then hopefully, that leads you to that other side of the coin with with a deeper thinker, like, like Jordan Peterson, or, or anybody else, or, or reading the Bible, or reading the Koran that’s interested in Andrew Tate just convert Islam?

Sentari Minor 20:56
I don’t know if I did see that. Yes. But that

george grombacher 20:59
is that’s sort of my thought process is, I think, at the end of the day is, is it a net? is are these people of value? And I think that they are, I think that they are of value,

Sentari Minor 21:14
if anything, just to kind of, as they kind of are built to do shake up the system and make people think a different way. I think that’s always valuable, and maybe not agree with it. But again, yeah.

george grombacher 21:24
What do you think?

Sentari Minor 21:28
As it relates to the kind of that conversation about young men? Yeah. Similar to you, I think I definitely see the attraction and appeal, like if you’re a guy in America, and you’ve been told like, You’re an asshole for being a guy in America, like, of course, you’re gonna be attracted to someone who says like, embrace this, embrace this potential. kind of embrace this lifestyle and base, embrace this approach. But I do also agree with you that as you as those folks get older, they’ll just naturally have different priorities in life. And so that will just kind of wane and go away. I’m more so curious about if those those folks who who never kind of outgrow it, what that means for them. What that means for society, because there are there are group of guys who just it seems like there’s been a failure to launch and we’ve kind of failed young men, which is why I was asking that, asking that question.

george grombacher 22:16
Yeah, that’s fair. But you know, part of me says, Isn’t that always the case? There’s there’s bars all across America, its entirety with a bunch of fucking douchebag dudes that peaked in high school. So

Sentari Minor 22:29
that’s fair. Yeah. Never goes away. Every generation has him. That’s fair.

george grombacher 22:36
But I have always rejected category. I reject people trying to try to label me, you know, an adult, I just think that that’s, I don’t you know. And so I don’t think that um, I don’t think I’m, I’m unique there. I think that there’s a lot of people that feel that same way. And when all society seems to want to do these days is is label things and and if I am contrary in my beliefs, or my opinions to dismiss me, well, my impulse says, Go fuck yourself. So that’s fair to say. And agitate is kind of a big middle finger. And again, Jordan Peterson is a more thoughtful middle. Yeah. What’s the Canadian middle finger?

Sentari Minor 23:25
I don’t know.

george grombacher 23:26
Is that fuck themselves? themselves,

Sentari Minor 23:30
putting a please behind it. Yeah. Buddy. Buddy panel.

george grombacher 23:38
Nice. So there it is. So Terry minor, is a member of hustlers University and a massive proponent of Andrew tape. You heard it here.

Sentari Minor 23:48
It’s not like a I haven’t looked into hustlers University. Is it like a set of courses that guys are supposed to take to what it’s like, what what’s the outcome of hustlers University?

george grombacher 23:58
Yeah, it’s it teaches you how to be a hustler. I think it’s I think it’s designed to teach you how to how to how to break free of a traditional nine to five job and find different ways to earn money. So it’s like teaching you how to how to do side hustles and potentially turn them into your, your full time deal to get nice, but I don’t know. I don’t really know. That’s just me watching YouTube videos about people dissecting it instead of actually going straight to the horse’s mouth. So, bear. Yeah. So there you go. All right. Well, we’d love to as always love to get to your feedback and your thoughts on this dear listener, so let us know what you think on social media or you can send some targeted emails directly or call him on his cell phone, whatever you’re into. Anything else, sir? No, I’ve

Sentari Minor 24:54
just had somebody calling me saying like, what are your thoughts on Jordan Peters like it? Where should we begin? Sir, no I love the conversation. Love the dialogue. I know that you and I were kind of going back and forth like what what should we talk about and Adrian Tate’s stuff came up and then I’ve always just been fascinated with how people how people think about the Jordan Peterson piece. I don’t necessarily agree with all those views, but I definitely like that he brings kind of contrarian views to the forefront or also makes people think through things which we can always appreciate. We always need more of so I was enjoyed the conversation.

george grombacher 25:28
Amen. Excellent. Well, share the show, subscribe, do all the things and as always, keep questioning because the struggle is real.

Unknown Speaker 25:41
I love your radio voice. Thank you

Transcribed by https://otter.ai