Peterson–Žižek debate

During an event at the Cambridge Union in November 2018, Žižek had called Peterson's work "pseudo-scientific", labeled him as his "enemy" and criticized Peterson's work on the idea of a cultural Marxism, stating that "[h]is crazy conspiracy theory about LGBT+ rights and #MeToo as the final offshoots of the Marxist project to destroy the West is, of course, ridiculous."[1] According to Matthew Sharpe writing for The Conversation, "[t]he term 'cultural Marxism' moved into the media mainstream around 2016, when psychologist Jordan Peterson was protesting a Canadian bill prohibiting discrimination based on gender. Peterson blamed cultural Marxism for phenomena like the movement to respect gender-neutral pronouns which, in his view, undermines freedom of speech."[5] Critics have accused Peterson of misusing the term postmodernism, referring to postmodern philosophy, as a stand in term for the far-right and antisemitic Cultural Marxism conspiracy theory.[6]

Peterson said he could meet "any time, any place" to debate and it was announced on 28 February 2019 that the debate was scheduled for 19 April 2019. The two professors before had argued against happiness as something one should pursue. Peterson had said people should seek meaning through personal responsibility and Žižek had said happiness is pointless and delusional.[1]

Around 3,000 people were in the Sony Centre in Toronto for the event. There was a livestream which people could pay access to that peaked at around 6,000 viewers.[7] The debate was divided into two thirty-minute introductions from each participant, followed by shorter ten minute responses and time at the end for additional comments and answers to questions posed by the moderator.[8] Its topic was which "political-economic model provided the great opportunity for human happiness: capitalism or Marxism".[9]

Peterson's opening monologue was a reading and critical analysis of The Communist Manifesto.[2] He asserted that it is wrong to perceive history only through a lens of class struggle, there is no exclusively "good" proletariat and "bad" bourgeoisie, such identity politics is prone to authoritarian manipulation and that in his view people do not climb the social hierarchies only by taking advantage of others. Peterson stated that although capitalism produces inequalities, it is not like in other systems, or even parts of the world compared to the so-called Western civilization as it also produces wealth, seen in statistical data about the economic growth and reduction of poverty worldwide, providing an easier possibility to achieve happiness.[10] He concluded in a Winston Churchill's fashion that "[c]apitalism is the worst economic system, except for all the others".[9]

At the beginning of his opening monologue, Žižek noted avoidance to participate in the debate in the role of an opponent and that both were victims of left liberals.[2][10] The monologue itself was less focused as it touched many topics and things like cultural liberalism, Nazism, Bernie Sanders, Donald Trump, Fyodor Dostoevsky and xenophobia, among others;[2][9] and against the expectation of the debate format did not defend Marxism.[9][10] On the example of China, he tried to connect happiness, capitalism and Marxism as well criticize China itself[10] and that "less hierarchical, more egalitarian social structure would stand to produce great amounts of this auxiliary happiness-runoff".[9]

Later in the debate, Žižek agreed with Peterson's opening analysis and called for regulation and limitation of the market for capitalism to reduce the risk of natural and social disasters.[10][11] Žižek was also critical of the multiculturalist liberals who embody the lie of identity politics and that Western countries should rather fix the situation in immigrants home countries than accept them.[10] Due to lack of defense for Marxism, at one point Peterson asked Žižek why he associates with this ideology and not his philosophical originality,[10][11] on which Žižek answered that he is rather a Hegelian and that capitalism has too many antagonisms for long-term peaceful sustainability.[10][11] In a similar fashion, Žižek asked Peterson to name him personal names of "postmodern neo-Marxists" in Western academia and from where he got the statistical numbers because according to him the over-the-top political correctness is opposed to Marxism, on which Peterson did not mention any names.[2][10][11] Some view this exchange as evidence that the idea of "cultural Marxists" had been invented by Peterson and other members of the intellectual dark web without any evidence of its existence.[12] In the end, they both agreed that happiness is rather a byproduct of life itself.[9]

Several publications such as Current Affairs, The Guardian, Jacobin and Quillette criticized Peterson for being uninformed about Karl Marx and Marxism.[13] Harrison Fluss and Sam Miller of Jacobin reported that Peterson made many factual errors about Marx and Marxism such as misunderstanding the fundamental principle of the labor theory of value, incorrectly associating Marx broadly with identity politics and denying the existence of a Marxist philosophy of nature.[14] The Guardian claimed that Peterson was uninformed about The Communist Manifesto and generally ill-prepared for the debate[15] while Jordan Foissy of Vice maintained that he was "completely vacuous", making claims such as that power is never achieved through the exploitation of people.[16] Der Spiegel concluded that Žižek won the debate clearly, describing Peterson's attempt at arguing as "vain enough to show up to an artillery charge with a pocket knife".[7]

Writing for Current Affairs, Benjamin Studebaker criticized both Peterson and Žižek, calling the debate "one of the most pathetic displays in the history of intellectuals arguing with each other in public". Studebaker argues that "Zizek read a bizarre, meandering, canned speech which had very little to do with anything Peterson said or with the assigned topic. This is a pity, because Peterson made an argument I have seen many times, one which is incredibly easy to beat." Studebaker concludes that "Peterson didn't prepare. There was an opportunity. But Zizek was too busy complaining about identity politics and his status within academia to try. He's the sort of aging quitter we all hope to never be."[17]

Writing for Quillette, Ben Burgis criticized Peterson for having only re-read The Communist Manifesto and not other works by Marx, for equating Marxism with Stalinism and equality of outcome, for having ignored that Marx cited the Paris Commune (a radical democratic experiment) as an example of dictatorship of the proletariat and that it is Communist China, described as "full of private businesses these days, but the state continues to play an outsized role in shaping the Chinese economy", which has driven the most in global poverty reduction Peterson attributes to free-market capitalism, asking: "If one of the primary drivers of the global decline of extreme poverty is its decline in the People's Republic, is this a success story for 'free market' capitalism or for a modified and liberalized form of state socialism?"[18]

Overall, the Croatian media noted that Peterson was more convincing in the defense of capitalism than did Žižek of Marxism, although both are "pessimists".[2] While Peterson was trying to provide a system of solutions, Žižek does not and rather had a rebellious and cynical stance.[9][10][11] It was also noted that their mutual agreements and kindness in a civil discussion differed from their supporters in the audience.[1][9][10][11]

In commenting directly on how the debate was received, Žižek wrote: "It is typical that many comments on the debate pointed out how Peterson’s and my position are really not so distinct, which is literally true in the sense that, from their standpoint, they cannot see the difference between the two of us: I am as suspicious as Peterson. So as I saw it, the task of this debate was to at least clarify our differences."[19]

As of April 2019, the only television station in Europe which has had the rights to broadcast the debate is Croatian Radiotelevision, where it was broadcast on April 24 and fully on April 26.[20][21]

• Cassirer–Heidegger debate
• Chomsky–Foucault debate
• Foucault–Habermas debate