Jordan Peterson Destroys Q&A | 25 February 2019

[Music] [Applause] good evening and welcome to qnet live from Melbourne I'm Tony Jones here to answer your questions tonight political and military adviser to author Katherine McGregor Canadian author Jordan Peterson who's 12 rules for life and stand against political correctness made him a philosophy rockstar Labour frontbencher Terry Butler the federal government's special Minister of State Alex hork and writer activists and Twitter Queen then Baron please welcome our panel thank you now Q&A is live in eastern Australia on ABC TV I view at Newsradio but a lot of interest in Jordan Peterson and more questions that we can possibly answer so we've asked our panelists to keep their answers brief under a minute if possible I will be interrupting if they go too long let's go straight to our very first questions from Dean trough my question is for professor Peterson professor Peterson your rise to global stardom appears to be based largely on I guess the millions of people in the West who've been disenfranchised whose worlds have been rocked and world views have been cracked by global movements that they are powerless to influence movements like socialism globalism and feminism people particularly young men appear to regard you and look to you as a savior what is it that you what do you think they believe they need saving from Jordan Peterson welcome to Australia well it's funny to regard me as a savior because what I tell people consistently is that they have to look to themselves and it's not because I believe that people are in full control of their lives you know we're all subject to bad breaks and sometimes to terrible luck but your best bet is to do what you can to take care of yourself properly to treat yourself like you're someone responsible for helping which is rule 2 by the way partly because I do believe in this ancient fundamentally Western idea that people are of intrinsic value I mean look we're all given the sovereign right to organize our own States the responsibility to vote or our state or very state assumes that you have the wisdom to keep the ship of state sailing straight and it's because there's something about you that at least in principle has the possibility of being remarkable if it can be manifested and I'm reminding people that that not only do we believe that but that it seems to be true and it isn't obvious to me that there is anyone or there has been anyone for the last four or five decades let's say who's done incredible job of drawing a relationship between the meaning and life that you need to sustain you and responsibility and not just for you it's not an individualistic idea it's responsible for you responsibility for you and your family coming up to your community that'll do the trick just draw you to the final part of the question because there's this fascination that many young men have for your message and I guess he's suggesting our questioner there that's something you do with them needing saving from socialism globalism and feminism is there any truth to that in your mind well there is there is truth to the idea that they might need a certain amount of existential rescuing from the idea that the West is fundamentally best characterized as an oppressive patriarchy which isn't absolutely it's absolutely observed proposition and that as a consequence whatever actions they might take that are forthright and ambitious in terms of participating in that system are bye-bye by the very nature of the system destructive it's very difficult for me to understand how anybody can be properly motivated if that's the fundamental view of society and male participation in it and I don't buy any of that I think the idea that the West is fundamentally an oppressive patriarchy is an appalling idea and the notion that the proper way to view history is as a battleground between ethnic identities or identities in general or between men and women is it borders on the pathological and so maybe it exceeds just merely bordering on the pathological let's say let's get around the panel on that because there's plenty of time and other questions to explore that van better I just find it really interesting like I'm a 44 year old like middle-aged woman who lives in country Victorian because I'm a feminist I'm suddenly terrifying I mean that's kind of flattering but the the bigger issue is looking at disenfranchisement people are disenfranchised if you're being sold that it's feminism and movement for equality that's never throw a bomb that's never picked up a gun that's disenfranchising you or globalism or socialism we have not lived in socialist economies in the West in a very long time it's been four decades of neoliberalism and it's neoliberalism which has smashed communities it's neoliberalism which has made consumption and material acquisition dominant values in society if neoliberalism that has destroyed the workplace and made jobs insecure and made our experience of economies so unstable if people are feeling disenfranchised if men feel are disenfranchised please let me reassure you that women feel disenfranchised as well because we are all living in this destabilized economy and we are all suffering from that kind of consumer ideology Alex Hawk dick man to start with this do you think you think young men feel disenfranchised and is it by those various isms I do you know I'm not sure that's helped me helping like what van bottom said there about that destabilizing message I mean it's true to say in some ways feminism things like that haven't thrown a bomb or committed violence but the worst violence you know can be the violence of the mind and I think men today in our society are told you know from virtually from the young age to now and when they grow up that they're they're doing the wrong thing that they have done the wrong thing historically that there's no place for them and I think that's what Jordan speaks to a lot of young men and look I'm my father of three young boys under five and you know reading a lot of Jordan Pearson's works through the book I can understand why people want resonates with a lot of people because men today have lost their identity and and I think feminism has become a movement to overtake masculinity and let's look at the empirical evidence so it's good apparently in our schools it's boys who are falling behind now actually in primary schools it's boys who are falling behind at universities it's young men who are suffering and have the worst mental impacts it's the the highest were rates of youth suicide you know it's it's a serious issue and I think you know the question is right I mean yes there's a lot of disenfranchisement in the world but there is there are movements persecuting men in today's well that's not true oK you've made that choice Rebecca I mean Alex I think that it's almost as though we're talking about a structural issue and you're talking about a personal issue and people who take personally the idea that we need to change structures I think I miss misreading what the complaint is that people have and so for me the problem that I have with kind of structural rigidity of gender roles for men and women is that they hurt men and they hurt women they hurt both they hurt the men who want to stay home longer with their kids they hurt men in real physical ways because we do have a problem in this country where women are more likely to be violent the victims of violence at home men are more likely to be the victims of violence in public but in both the common factor is it's men committing the violence are by and large not exclusively but by and large and so these rigid kind of ideas of masculinity heard everyone and so when we talk about feminism when we talk about changing those structures it's to create an equality for the benefit of everyone and to get rid of some of the things that hold everyone back you want a brief response of that mother well the first thing I would say is that I'm not anti feminist per se I mean I think the idea that the world would benefit from the movement of talent from both sexes into the workplace as rapidly as possible is something that anyone with any sense should share given the rather the rarity of talent and the necessity for for utilizing it I do stand by my original statement though that there's a brand of more radical feminism that that insists that our culture is best characterized as an oppressive patriarchy and I think that first of all that that's an appalling sociological doctrine and I think it has very negative psychological effects and they won't be limited to men because if it's true that there's something toxic let's say about masculinity per se what that will inevitably mean is that as women adopt more masculine roles traditionally what is that toxicity somehow going to go away but that's so true man because no one says there's anything toxic about masculinity per se what do you mean no one says that they the determine exists strong man but where did the term come phrase that's used about forms of masculinity that are harmful to men and women it's not about masculinity per se you must know I read the American Psychological Association guidelines for the treatment of poison man and I know perfectly well that this is no strong straw man and it's not only devoted towards what you might describe as the more aggressive ends of masculine behavior it's aimed at at masculinity and a much broader in a much broader range of there's a much broader range of accusations that are underlying that are under the surface than that and so I don't see in what way at all it's a struggle I'm just kind of pulls that I can go to Katherine McGregor and Katherine I mean you've you've lived on both sides of this gender fence so what are your thoughts on on these issues and then just go back to the question that I don't know whether that qualifies me or disqualifies me frankly okay sorry guys i ratted on the team but not for any sociological reasons intensely personal I gather we might address that but look I I'm not entirely out of sympathy with Jordans critique I I I'm the oldest person on this panel by you Tony and in my lifetime I I've seen you know rolling institutional crises through the West you know the great American settlement based on Britain woods and NATO and the United Nations and so on is fraying global in the area that I can talk about with some authority we're seeing a dissolving global order now with the rise of too autocratic totalitarian capitalist States which is replicating the conditions of the 19:30 and together we're not doing the geostrategic stuff but I think it's very alarming when Robert F Kennedy who was my political hero was running for the presidency of the United States in 1968 he addressed disenfranchised African Americans who were wearing the backlash from from many white men who were losing their jobs or perceiving that they were losing their jobs the deindustrialization of the West has jobs are exported to the developing world all of these factors are Bobby Kennedy said it it wasn't Germaine Greer that said it he said when you remove from a man the right to stand before his family as a breadwinner and people will say that's Patrick that's you a minute by the way so right well I'll shut up but the the removal of meaningful work amongst especially unskilled men has a political consequence and it's been washing through the American system since 1980 with the Reagan Democrats the fraying of the New Deal coalition I don't tie early agree with Jordans analysis but the problem can't be gained side and three million books later in 50 languages or whatever it is I bought your book by the way and you're out selling Shane Warne now that's a culture that delights me in two ways of course in Australian cricket no one has more bleached blonde hair or has had more work done than I but Warren is a close second now the next question is a video it's from Milo innopolis in Miami News hey dr. Peterson its herb Meyer you novelists um you talk a good game about standing up for men and for boys and you've certainly amassed a big army of them but if you of us have been wondering recently with your silence on Kavanagh your silence on the innocent Covington boys and then when you've said things like for instance when you told the New York Times as Barry Weiss that you thought I might be a racist when you know I'm not that perhaps your actions aren't matching your words can you explain why although you talk a good game about standing up against social justice warriors and the chaotic feminine but when it actually comes down to it have you always seem to either fold stay silent or betray your allies Oh Jordan haven't seen Milo for quite a long time well first of all I don't believe that I'm obliged to comment on absolutely everything that happens and everywhere in the world I don't think that I am betraying my fundamental base with regards to what happened with Barry and Milo Milo I'd probably just as soon guys to you for that I don't think that I did defend you very well at that particular time I don't believe that you're racist it was a question that caught me off guard in an audience that was exceptionally hostile and surreal and so insofar as that might be helpful to you I'd offer you an apology for that I don't think the rest of your accusations are are warrant and however so that's what I'd like to see you see I did by the way also Milo invite you to talk you know about a year and a half ago when when things first started to collapse around you and we never did get around to that and I don't believe that that was entirely my fault we're not gonna hear back friend do you see him and people like him as being in some sort of competition online for the hearts and minds of young men in particular because he obviously sees it as a competition well I don't really see that I'm in competition with anybody particularly I'm not trying to be in competition with anybody and I'm also by the way not trying to talk to young men I mean one of the things not specifically I mean I'm perfectly happy to be doing that and by the way they're not all that young I think the average age is somewhere near 35 I'm trying to talk to people and like as a university professor 80% of my students approximately were women and that was the case for 30 years and at least 50% of my colleagues have been women and there's been this idea generated in the news by news people who keep reading the news that other news people create that somehow I have a coterie of angry young white men surrounding me because they're angry about feminism and about all these other isms let's say and I don't see it like that at all I'm trying to suggest to people that their best bet in life and this is men and women alike is to adopt as much responsibility as they can for their own lives and I went through this already because that's where the meaning in life is to be found and the notion that that's somehow a message that's limited to young men is it's it's an absurd message why would that be limited not not to not to kind of interrupt your flow but you mean itself but also probably enough we have a question from a young man Ulysses Reid has a question for you with modern feminism fighting for equality between the genders why is it that some self-proclaimed feminists would rather ignore the issues men face when it comes gender inequality while they're doing more to address issues such as have many fathers don't get joint or any custody of their children at all or how men are statistically more likely to commit suicide why does so many people are to disregard this information when seeking to end gender gender inequality or not even acknowledge that this is in fact a problem then we'll stay with you the fundamental truth we need to grasp here is that men are not oppressed because they're men men will be oppressed in their lives for all kinds of different reasons they might be oppressed because they're working class they might be oppressed because of their ethnicity or their religion or their age or their sexuality or their ability status but at no point in human history have all men being judged oppressed disenfranchised kicked out of institutions on behalf of their maleness there just has not happened and I think where a lot of feminists get really frustrated is that we are constantly subject to these crazy literally straw man arguments about you believe in this and you hate all men and you you it's you it's you feminists who are undermining everything and yet where is our control of institutions what has happened in the West is that we developed democracy and democracy actually meant the enfranchisement of all of us it means the conversations about what society looks like what manners are what behavior is what courtesy looks like has changed because it's not one group making that decision anymore and I understand that that's a difficult transition for people who've grown up with narratives where those decisions and those institutions belong to a very narrow demographic of people's which by the way never included all men that it's difficult to get your heads around a new way of behaving and engaging but it's necessary because we are actually a community we are one society we all have an equal right to participate and taking bait from internet misogynists on the oppression of men is is not a conversation that I get into I've been on the internet too long to fall for it men are not oppressed as a general group and my sympathy to any man who does feel a predator in any other part of his life Alex all you know look I hear the core of the question well okay I'd like to because you know some of that you know does my head in I must be honest I'm just a silly male you know I don't get it but yeah I've got to agree with a questioner I think I think tonight we've got a couple of women telling us that this doesn't exist in in in the West at the moment but very much it does I'll worry about it for my three young boys I think I think there is a real identity crisis for the yeah yeah yeah yeah feminism you sort of saying feminism is not the you know the s Jordan has put it it hasn't gone too far out of its bounds and he sometimes oppressing men it is oh I'm sorry projected outbound selling well it's not a better-quality anymore it goes beyond an argument of equality the quote it always starts with a quality that's fine everyone agrees with the quality we're gonna think right signal creep in the Labour Party let you answer that he let you answer so hold on I'm the only one getting interrupted tonight know what Mike what is this if we wanted to make a political point about it Terry the liberal plays a part of the individual individualism is the only antidote to some of this identity politics is on the March it's eating away at Western society treating people as a collective yeah all men are the same all women are the same or all of one ethnic group are the same or we all behave or think the same way it's just not true so you're right identifying people as individuals is is the only way well if you if you want to join or get your form [Applause] but the identity politics is a real thing and at the moment we've certainly gone from a 50/50 equality into all abide by the rules Terry it's your turn and no one here from Jordan on this obviously well it's back to you well I guess Alex the what you say about everyone agrees with in with with equality with addressing inequalities is that agreeing with the need to address inequality is one thing but actually doing something about it here's another and I did have a bit of a cheeky go with you about the Liberal Party but that's because your representation is down around the 17% mark in the Parliament announces up near the 50% mark and that's because we didn't just acknowledge that inequality is a problem we did something about it we changed the way that our rules work we got more women into Parliament interesting fact about doing that by the way we changed our rules and then no-one ever had to use them because suddenly when you change the structures suddenly women feel like they can run they're ready to put their names forward and that's what happened in our party it's almost impossible to find someone who ever had the benefit of our quotas in a in a strict way because we didn't need to we changed the culture by changing our rules and I am a very strong component of more liberal women in Parliament as well because I think no me no obvious nobody sure sure I think that once we do have all of the parties becoming more equal then it'll be a more respectful place because people will have more of an opportunity to understand where each other we're coming I'd like to go back in a minute to our questioner Alissa's if he's if he's there but Jordan go ahead well I think we don't address a lot of this systematically we talk a lot about equality but there's various forms of equality there's equality of opportunity which we discussed briefly which i think is a very admirable goal and then there's equality of outcome which i think is a well I think it's an impossible I think it's a totalitarian impossibility and I think it's often conflated with with equality of opportunity equality of outcome of course is the doctrine that every every occupation should be occupied by people in precise proportion to their proportionality in the population so bases in politics example or quotas in business as far as how many women should be on borders how many women should be politicians yes quarters on the base of group identity let's say so for example in Canada our Prime Minister and enlightened soul decided that he would he would make 50% of the cabinet women despite the fact that only 25% of the people who were elected in his in his party were female which meant certainly from a statistical perspective that he did not hire the most qualified people for the cabinet and he did that to virtue signal to his to his base and it turned out to be a very big mistake that's you into a minute by the way we'll come back to these points I just want to hear quickly from our question and now Ulysses did you get an answer to your question first of all you think I think that my question was more painters why do you believe that certain people not feminism is a broad spectrum but certain feminists in general not in general but specifically choose to ignore the statistics and disregard them when they are brought up in arguments against them regarding gender in a party like who Ulysses like for example and over my head in the January Joette ad when all these people were going either against or for Gillette for their so-called toxic masculinity attack when people start pointing at real facts like how men are more likely in Australia alone at a minimum of a three-to-one ratio to commit suicide in our states they would disregard this information and just start attacking them as being misogynist and anti-feminist so women on the internet yes women on the Internet yeah of all the women mature women or young women who are testing out I actually I think P be fair we shouldn't just be cross-examining a question these these are all large questions but again what the point van made is very difficult to argue with in the sense that we'll start on a level playing field it's no coincidence that women have only been largely voting and participating in democracy in Australia in the 20th century now is that a total lack of intelligence capacity or fairness or I don't know it strikes me that you only have to look at most of those metrics to realize that the the empowerment of women the emergence of women from life beyond child-rearing and this is not to derogate child rearing at all it's a foundational vital foundational institution but as women's horizons have expanded in a finite number of opportunities some men have lost out especially with autumn as we as we've automated the expansion of technology that has removed a huge amount of emphasis on on traditional masculine attributes of physical strength and so on the workplace has changed it's a fluid dynamic environment men are feeling threatened by this and there is a sense that some men are translating it as they're losing as a the point I made about the afro-americans in the last wave of this in the United States with affirmative action and so on that's evened out to some extent I'll close and it's cuz I don't want to take up too much time I got much more ground to cover but I think it's a lazy term identity politics all politics as identity politics parties campaign on identity it's it's whether they say we're a party of individual freedom that's that's an identity it's a concept the idea that identity is purely costed around you know rainbow politics or feminism or race and and again I sound like I'm having a better try and I probably am because I'm torn on this I was a bloke this day seven years ago so I've been on both sides I don't believe I was toxic as a guy but I you know I could go back through my career and have plenty of times I didn't cover myself in glory locker room talk the whole lot so I'm not gonna you know I'm not going to pretend that were land a level playing field but likewise I just think this this identity politics thing now is a lazy slogan that's eliminating real differences in politics is about these symbols and it's terrific Laurel here having this disagreement tonight because that's the great strength of the West is that we do this in public in that no one D platform this gentleman which would have been reprehensible and I'm thrilled that we're here having this discussion teryn batten this is a question for the panel but mostly for Jordan Peterson do you believe that a stay at home full-time mother is adequately valued in today's society as a stay-at-home mother myself I don't feel valued by wider society as most of what I hear focuses on women getting back to work as soon as possible and you don't hear anything about the benefit of staying home and the benefit for the children Jordan Peterson stay well I certainly noticed that when my wife had small kids and we used to go out together you know and of course I have the small kids too but it was III mean I stated that way for a purpose you know when we would go to restaurants and so forth together she was often treated with less respect than she would have been had the kids not being with her and that was that was very bothersome because you know it's it's a it's quite a sacrifice and a very useful sacrifice to have small children and people who have them should be treated with respect I think that we do an awful lot of lying to women in our society and I think that's a better answer to your question because I think and I think the data indicates this - that what kind of Lies do you mean Jordan that career is the most important thing in life and is most likely to be the case that way for men and for women I think it is important for more men than for women because women take the primary role for a very early child rearing but it's clearly the case as far as I can tell that for most people and and the statistics bear this out that family is by far the most important commitment that people make in their lives and I think we lied to eighteen to nineteen year old women non-stop especially in universities and educational institutions by the way okay well by telling them that career is going to be the fundamental purpose given the fundamental purpose to their life and for most people that's simply not the case nor should it be Terry Butler going straight to the question does not feel valued in society what is it that's caused that feeling do you think it's actually really fascinating to me because I just speak to a lot of different people who feel that their group that people who share their identity you're talking about your identity don't feel valued and so women to go to work often feel undervalued because they feel stretched or women who stay at home for longer feel undervalued because they go to a party and someone says what do you do for a living and they feel like they're being judged I'm just staying at home but one of the great things about being a feminist is that you want everyone to be valued for the inherent dignity that they have as a human being it's pretty similar to something that Jordan said earlier of course and I sometimes think that in these debates we're arguing about things from different perspectives without really understanding each other's perspective so can I say this I think at the same time is saying that perhaps we lie to women and I I don't I don't accept that of course but to go back to the question of what's different what's the difference between toxic masculinity and masculinity it's toxic masculinity to tell boys that they must be providers that it's somehow weak to stay home with the kids that the people who take the men who take a year off to look after children in early childhood somehow lesser than men who are out there aggressively fighting for their career these strict gender-based roles damage everyone I was allowed out of the way well you know the breastfeeding law is Tony you know does she breastfeed does she not breastfeed you judged for breastfeeding you judged for not breastfeeding you judge for breastfeeding too long you judged if you go into formula too soon if you go into for if you go into solids at four months that's a bad thing is it a good thing the constant politics of motherhood are deeply frustrated rubbish because ultimately we all love our kids Terry gonna throw to Alex now now look I agree with everything I think that's been said there but you know again I think the pendulum might have swung a bit too far and sometimes we don't value motherhood mothers staying at home or indeed father staying at home at any stage and sometimes this manifests in the political realm in the sense that you can't even raise these issues that matters of policy we subsidize day care child care 50% higher you know increasing depending on your income levels but we can't sort of discuss policies like perhaps do we create tax incentives for people to stay at home of equal value to value not strangers looking after your kids even when they do a fantastic job even when it's absolutely necessary because you need two incomes to sustain your household but plenty of people would make the choice if we had that tax incentive to stay at home parent their own children but we can't even discuss this topic in today's environment I think that's a big problem why can't you can discuss anything you'd like and you come up with whatever policy you like right of the election see now Alex for the next election I approved go ahead I prefer to say to semi-free all right I think that's a semi policy that we haven't really heard the Dean Zahra remember if you hear names on QA lists no on Twitter keep an eye on the RMIT ABC fact check and the conversation website for the results the next question comes from Cathal Arkin hi my question is also for Peterson and while I very much stand with the women's advocates in the room my question is sort of on a different topic you have a whole lot of fans or former fans kind of so called now our X lobsters people like Brenda chief and a lot of these people talk about your you have very simple answers to complex questions you know you I think you often you talk about your individual responsibilities other things that we it's impossible for individuals to actually have responsibility over you look at the extortionate housing market the precarious gig economy like things that are well out of our control so I want to know what is your answer to young people for some of the really big problems facing humanity like the you know climate catastrophe like economic crisis like the precarious job market because they just don't like you talk all this much about individual responsibilities most of us are never going to be able to afford to have all of these assets to have responsibility over so what is your advice beyond banal comments like clean your room it's actually rather difficult to answer a question that ends with your comments are banal politely I would consider that more of an opinionated personal and political statement than actually a question so why don't you try reformulating that so that there's an actual question there so what is your advice to young people when you talk about you need to be individually responsible but when there are things that are so far out of our control like climate catastrophe like the precarious job economy like what is your answer do you think that you're worse off than your grandparents I think there are different challenge do you think you're worse off than your grandparents Jordan once again we're not gonna cross-examine a questioners so try answering the question about collective responsibility on climate change for example pick one part of that because the argument I think is the individual responsibility does not change the climate does not fix the problem that needs global collective responsibility so I think that's the core of the question do you have a theory about that well fundamentally I'm a psychologist and my experience has been that people can do a tremendous amount of good for themselves and for the people who are immediately around them by looking to their own inadequacies and their own flaws and the things that they're not doing in their lives and starting to build themselves up as more powerful individuals and if they're capable of doing that and then they're capable of expanding their career and if they're capable of expanding their career and their competence then they're capable of taking their place and the community is effective leaders and then they're capable of making wise decision instead of unwise decisions when it comes to making collective political decisions not suggesting in the least and have never suggested that there's no domain for social action I'm suggesting that people who don't have their own houses in order should be very careful before they go about reorganizing the world which happens in many ways if a young person believes that the client at the global warming problem on the climate is something that needs to be tackled quickly and they can't wait until they grew up and become Prime Minister's to do it do you think collective responsibility overrides individual responsibility in a huge issue like that no I think generally people I think generally people have things that are more within their personal purview that are more difficult to deal with and that they're avoiding and that generally the way they avoid them is by adopting pseudo moralistic stances on large scale social issues so that they look good to their friends and their neighbors I'm gonna get flamed more than you tonight Jordan taking the taking or fast but I don't see this as binary in one sense in that point Jordan makes us self-evidently truth when I was young after I left the military I went through a very belated youthful rebellion and flirted with the Communist Party of Australia I didn't join thankfully which would have made my subsequent life in the Labor Party more difficult but I was inducted into a cell in Canberra by people who were smoking their own body weight in marijuana and there's a reason they call it dope not smart fair dinkum you know these guys are saying you know your military training will be invaluable and start the alarm bell started to go I didn't see myself as the pointy end of the revolution but when you can't make the rent and you can't keep the power on you make a pretty poor revolution right and I'm that's flippant but it's the truth you know that whatever whatever will we attempt to impose on the world has to come from some kind of authentic life that is that we've it's somewhat in some ways dealt with own defects our demons as you know damn so to say I'm gonna go right across the other end of the panel back we have to recognize we're not powerless and the example of insecure work is a really good one there is a mass mobilization against insecure work in this country and it's called the trade union movement and the trade union movement realized a long time ago and so many of the things that we really value about Australia you know like equality in the workplace equal pay the right to occupational health and safety were won by the mobilisation of working people through trade unions and if you're feeling disenfranchised and you're feeling powerless whether it's about the workplace or whether it's about climate change the vehicles for change for you to add your own individual gift to a mass movement they exist for you we are not powerless in a democracy the fact that anybody thinks they're powerless has to do with relentless attacks by corporate interest to smash the structures that can resist grace to that overtime there Alex can you fix a global problem like climate change without global action rather than individual action well obviously global action is necessary to fix a global problem and that's part of the problem that we don't have real global sign up from some of the biggest polluters and the biggest economy so obviously global actions necessary but I mean you know I was an Army Reserve Officer I never found the Communists and you know I heal them bad I'm saying but that sounds like a communist attack on you no and this is the problem week we you know constantly the West is under this pressure you know where we've got people assaulting what makes your life as Jordan was about to say you know so much better than your grandparents life the fact is it doesn't matter who you are in our country today we have it so good in this country compared to the rest of the world and we do you know we've got more information in our fingertips we've got more prosperity per person than anyone else on the planet sometimes we get obsessed with our own individual problems but you go to most of the world it isn't a free world Tony it's a it's a it's a non free world most of the world they live in oppressive regimes they don't have more than a dollar a day to live off people who die of all sorts of bad things and people forget that you know in a West and democracy in a neoliberal society we we actually have great benefits at our fingertips you can do a lot in this country low wages insecure I didn't think I'd hear Alex say anything to top the idea that while on national television debating an idea that we're somehow not allowed to talk about that exact idea you do have a platform and you can debate issues and we do it all the time here in Australia so I was pretty shocked by that comment Alex but calling the trade union movement a communist assault on what historically it has been very connected with the Communists come on Alex well if you know you're doing the interrupting and I'm gonna let Terry well I think this idea that suddenly we all need to be scared of democratic institutions like the trade union movement that some hats a communist plot is pretty ridiculous and I say that with great respect because I'm very fond of you Alex's you know but it's ridiculous it's ridiculous but I do want to say I guess this for me I don't think there's a distinction between personal responsibility and collective responsibility because it is out of a sense of duty and personal responsibility that we give up our weekends that we give up our early mornings to go out and be part of a big movement it's not to make ourselves feel better I mean with respect it's just a part of an owner and formulations or ism is really about yourself it's not it's because people feel deeply deeply passionately and concerned about the big challenges of our time my six year old talk to me about drought and climate change the other day he's not doing it out of a sense of wanting to feel better and have his neighbors like him he's genuinely concerned about this and that well can I say the people in the ayc see the young Australians who spend their weekend often protesting me fine thanks guys just to look you're still great they're not doing that because of they want to be liked by their neighbors they're doing it because they have courage and they have the commitment to do it and that's brave all right we're gonna move on to the 70 questions we want to many of them as we can exploration comes from Craig Pett Martin Luther King's dream was that there would come a time when people would not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character how is today's identity politics consistent with their vision Jordan Peterson well I don't think it's consistent with that vision at all I mean the the problem I have with identity politics as a as a mode of philosophical apprehension is that it's predicated on the idea that the appropriate way to classify people is by their group identity in whatever fragmentary formulation that might take and the multiplicity of ways that people can be divided into groups and the classical postmodern and I would also say Marxist way of viewing the world even though those two things shouldn't be allowed together they tend to be is that group identity takes priority over individual identity and I think that's precisely the opposite of what Martin Luther King was hoping for and working for and I think it's unbelievably dangerous because partly because when you when you assume that people should primarily be identified by their group then you can also attribute group guilt to them by their group and then things go downhill very very rapidly and we've had no shortage of evidence of that sort of thing happening say throughout the 20th century are the particular groups that you are more concerned about than others for example the Liberal Party as Terry Butler said earlier is a group other groups that you think there's a it is there isn't a problem with groups the problem is with assuming that the fundamental way that you should categorize people is with their group identity obviously we all belong to groups the issue is whether or not the individual identity is primary and the group identity is secondary or the group identity is primary and the individual identity is secondary if you're a proponent for example of equality of outcome of quotas then you de-facto accept the proposition that it's the group identity that is primary and there's all sorts of dangers that are associated with that that faro whatever good you're likely to do maybe you just think that representative democracy should be representative hmm maybe you just think that women should be equally represented in the decision-making fora of our nation maybe that's really just about having proper equality in a body that's meant to be representative well I do believe that women should have I don't understand your question I guess well how about if you phrase it more clearly instead of just insulting me look at it this way let's talk about quotas for a minute so there's a very wide array of jobs that are fundamentally done by men so for example number of Parliament ninety-nine ninety-nine point nine percent I'm happy to give my minute to Jordan now 99.9% of bricklayers are men should we have quarters for women is prickling representative democracy that has nothing to do with the question the question is if if there's evidence of structural inequality and oppression because women aren't precisely represented at 50 percent in all professions at all levels then why don't we have a conversation about having women represented it in all professions at all levels why do we talk about the c-suite for example why do we talk about politics at positions of power why don't we talk about it across the blueberry well let's just close and but that's because it's Howard you pose a question to Terry Butler go ahead and answer it then we'll hear from the other fellas his question to me well yeah that pre-class you'd like to answer the question about request there's nothing wrong with riku a cottage or distinction between bricklaying and running the government and I was suggesting that a representative democracy should be representative that was the point I made and I represent representative revered by quota sure if that's what it takes I mean yeah well that's exactly what you would read full strategic inadequacy tearing away from the nation for enjoying some life in July I'm really party from people that don't care about us at all in Arab political deeply quite mystifying but the absurdity of the position that Terry puts and is quite a based argument over time it is a reductive absurd argument it's like saying no women vote for men and no men vote for women it is not true and people vote and seek for the best person to represent them in Parliament so quotas you you so quite as a fabulous thing in the load party because they've helped you make a target but there may be a day in Australian Parliament it'll probably come sometime where we have 75 percent women in the parliament that won't be a problem to me do million three hundred years I want you guys know it won't be a problem there it won't be a problem if that occurs that way and it should occur that way if that's what people like a let's this this person finish tonight and let's hear from their embeddable well two things when there is an organization that's campaigning for equal representation of bricklayers and women in trades and I'd like to do a big shout out to wim dye which is the organization that promotes women's participation in trades they do incredible work and I'd like to acknowledge unions like the ETU who do a lot of work to encourage women to become electricians and you know we're not doing ads here let's go to the point you know it's this pretense it's this insistence that things don't exist that do and for example the empirical evidence which exists there was a longitudinal study that was reported in the Harvard Business Review hardly a repository of doctrinaire Marxism that talked about and there was a longer terminal study that looked at 40 years of affirmative action in the workplace and the companies organizations government's committees that did have a quota policy and you know what they found after 40 years those organizations were in better shape companies with more diverse decision-making structures actually made more money organizations that had more diverse decision-making structures actually had higher productivity outcomes were better when more people were involved and related question it's from Peter thanks this is for Jordan initially there has been an increasing trend here in Australia that anyone who has a counter view to the Socialists PC Lobby greens communist Brigade literally and called racists or homophobic so that any form of rational debate is difficult if not impossible to now have how can we counter this Peter I assume you are you're making exceptions you're making an exception for QA I dare say because we are having that debate as we speak I haven't been shouted down there you go so you're making progress Tony possibly you were just wrong jo-ann's beta's ooh well look I've been called every pejorative in the book I think except pedophile well I've got tried to keep track of them one day last year I was called a Jewish shill and not see the same day which was guess a high point your your claim that if we engage in certain types of discussions this kind of reaction emerges is absolutely the case I mean for at least six months after I made what you might describe as my initial political stance I was swarmed by people who were using every possible pejorative to take me out so that none of my arguments needed to be taken seriously how do we deal with that well hopefully we stopped calling each other cheap names that would be a nice start rather than addressing the issues but I would also say a certain amount of persistence is called for if you're mobbed on social media a brief bit of advice by people who are doing exactly the sort of thing that you're describing I would say two things the first is be careful about what you've said and what you've said in the past and maybe it's a bit too late for that the second thing I would say is if you haven't done anything wrong do not apologize that is you a minute and then wait two weeks and it'll go away tell you about do accept any truth to the the basis of the question from your point of view I mean my job is I go and hear different points of views all the time all I hear is debate all I hear is people with different opinions I just don't accept that you can't have an opinion in this country without being shouted down I mean it just seems so so silly we've had a number of right-wing people come to this country and then they've had their their venues targeted they've had to leave the country because of the radicals of the left that won't let them put a point of view that's different to the Socialist Left and it's getting worse you know I've got a lot of gray hair just didn't happen in this country 15 years ago I have to say I've got a lot too but I pretty well died and like we have right here on national television tonight professor Jordan Peterson whom you might know it's a figure of some controversy and so that with respect I don't mean it in a pejorative to me it's a figure especially given the company that you put me in well I don't know what which company he's talking about but we're having a very civilized conversation I think it was people having very different views I don't think it's true that people can't say things in this country and I think that those who say that I carry on whether people are willing to speak out if you keep telling people they can't say things they can't ventilate ideas which is what you're doing then they're going to be scared to do it so you need to take responsibility personal responsibility I would venture do you live early-game okay all right you already know it was let's hear from Catherine yeah look how pulling Kevin links together here I think there's merit in in Jordan's assertion that we are living better than our grandparents and to keep walking both sides of the street that in no small part is due to the Australian trade union movement just to get this clear I haven't cast a Labour vote since 1998 I voted for the center-right tradition in Australia for this entire century but I have enormous respect for the I'm not anti-union and the coalition for reasons of ideology and so on opposed every national wage case when there were national wage cases and Tyrion gray to may know I can remember when they had them the trade union movement has placed a great deal of ballast underneath living standards in Australia and more strength to it and the trade union movement Alex that was a poor rendition of Labor history the Communist Party was broken by right-wing trade unions it might be slightly off just address the Welcome order that question is that people with certain views are being shouted down do you agree with that or not well okay I can give you have a look at my Twitter feed sometime if you want to talk about the tube eration I'm called by the way I found out I was Jewish yesterday too you can fact check that on the ABC Facebook page it does require some resilience and I by the way I actually do think we are approached in certain Robert French earnings extremely eminent and progressive former Chief Justice of the High Court thinks we've got a problem with freedom of speech on campuses I've taught in the university sector fear of offense trigger warnings and so on don't have a place in the Academy they don't there are very few views that are so repugnant that they can't be ventilated I really believe that and I've been on the receiving end of a lot of very fast bowling some of which mean very hurtful but I haven't sued anyone for defamation as yet I've been I've been threatened by such free speech warriors as the online editor of quadrant magazine for making fun of him no more and others and I've sucked up a fair bit of it so I have skin in this game and I've put my money where my mouth is and but I do think there is merit to your point I think especially in the university sector we have got there's got to be some more resilience we've got to hear your viewpoints we don't agree with okay quickly because we're running out of time the next question comes from it actually takes us back in in a sense to where Jordan Peterson's prominence began comes from Tara Park Hill yes this is directed towards Jordan Peterson you stated before to the BBC that by adhering to people's preferred pronouns that it's the starting point to an authoritative or society is it possible however that it's more about giving people more rights and liberty or even something as fundamental as respect Jordan no I never said that what I said was that I wasn't going to allow the contents of my speech to be dictated by a virtue signaling government when in okay never in the history of an English common law society had a government dared to regulate the actual voluntary contents of someone's speech except in a commercial situation just explain Jordan to those in the audience who don't know precisely what you're talking about what was provincial in Canadia they did legislate at the provincial and canadian government or the provincial and federal governments in Canada mandated the use of personal pronouns and made it a criminal offense not to use them at least under some circumstances and there's been a variety of negative consequences of that including the persecution of a teaching assistant at a university known as Wilfred laureate and it isn't a matter of respect at all and look in the 1940s the American Supreme Court and the Americans have a very tight what would you call control or tight respect for a free speech decided that it was not constitutional for the government to place mandatory requirements on what people were required to utter in terms of their in terms of the voluntary speech there are certain things you can't say but the government's not to mandate mandate what you have to say and respect and altruism and all of that is completely irrelevant as far as I'm concerned so just just just to clarify that point if the government had said made it a kind of voluntary thing but with advice that that's what should happen would you've gone along with that well they've been doing that for years and and I'm perfectly look I've dealt with all sorts of people in my life I treat people very politely as a matter of course if I'm dealing with someone reasonable I address them in the manner that seems to be most appropriate to the social situation and most conducive to their let's say well-being mutually agreed upon so as soon as the government decides that they have the right to decide what I have to say because of some false altruism on their port or some underlying and unexpressed ideology then the answer to that is no damn way obviously Jordan's point on free speech has weight and should be attributed weight and my experience of this has been and I've lived it I've been called he and it more often I'm being called it as we speak tonight I know because I get that most days in one form or another I think my Adam's apple is trending on Twitter my last glimpse was any indication I would pick up a couple of points on jurisprudence though Jordan if I may and one is that the government in common law jurisdictions has prescribed speech in all kinds of ways the reason William Shakespeare wrote Hamlet and Richard the third and Macbeth was that it was a an offence punishable by death to compass the death of the sovereign so any of his plays in which the Regal figure was killed during the reign of Elizabeth the first could not you could not actually write an English base to play compass in the death of the sovereign is a massive infringement on free speech satire try telling a flight attendant when you leave town tomorrow that you can't remember whether you packed your bomb in your luggage or not and see how that goes in terms of whether you get your collar felt for a satirical jest potentially so there are all kinds of regulations of speech I don't believe as a minority the trans community can legislate our way to acceptance we can't we have to often in my experience inverted the power relations where a telephone booth minority despite the arguments that there's an epidemic of transgenderism we're more visible and that is destabilizing to people's notions of binary gender I get that I just think your first point in your opening remarks about the individual dignity of the human being being a Western concept and I agree with you 100% on that I would love to think a day will come when we don't need codes like c16 to mandate this that we're the experience I've largely had by the way and especially humbling in the world of global cricket with almost alpha guys around have treated me was just enormous respect and it's a given I've been very blessed I'm more privileged in the most transparent I'm actually I suggested you play for the women's cricket leagues but you rejected doing them no no I didn't I wasn't good enough no great Greg Chappell was an enormous supporter of that so was Pat Howard who suggested I moved to Hobart and I started netting in Hobart yes pitbulls three days a week down there right through the winter I didn't get picked up I've had a lot of support Jason Gillespie and brawny Clive from the the Adelaide franchise were willing to have a look at me Darren Lehman offered me and net was the Australian team I had a rails run I wasn't good enough I'm straddling the gap between the first class system and grade cricket and I I don't disagree with Jordan on the fact that you know that born males have an enormous advantage in support I'm averaging before I cooked my shoulder I was averaging 115 in grade cricket you can fact check that on the my cricket app I think I think you've made that point let's move going all right we're gonna move on to religion the next question comes via Skype is from Gabriel AC in Graystone's in New South Wales yeah okay thanks my questions to Katherine and also to the whole panel that so one thing I've noticed is that the topic of human dignity seems to be one that the whole panel agrees on that people whether in groups or in as individuals we have we have dignity my question is do you believe in God because as a Catholic especially I don't see any other way where we can have a universal dignity beyond there being a God has created us cats right I am Jordan I think that the rest of the panel - all right look this is a huge topic and I I'm not gonna duck it out I believe in God my belief has deepened even through my gender transition I was talking to Jordan about his primary academic interest i I drank way too much I only died from the disease of alcoholism I was raised a Catholic I still have enormous fondness for Catholicism especially its rituals in the lead-up to what happened in my life and the agenda transition and feelings coming to the fore that I had wrestled with and dealt with in maladroit ways right up to the age of 56 I went through a number of stages I was a militant atheist i i i went into quite exotic left-wing politics as a young person it might seem rather strange to people now that I was on the committee for the acquittal of Alastair done in Anderson the East Timor solidarity group name it I was in it and didn't ever get around to the revolution but I but I I do believe and I base that on experience in the sense that there was a I can only describe this phenomenon in response to a very desperate prayer when I was dying in delirium tremens and I've not had a drink since the day that I added that prayer I then became more devout and went back into more organized religion clearly what has happened what I've done and I won't use passive voice what I have done has placed me outside organized religion I've been welcomed in some Anglican communities and I go there because I like the ritual only out of time but without beating my breast in the public square I pray daily I pray in the morning on awakening I pray at intervals throughout the day and I try to meditate I try to Center myself and I try to pray I don't pray for specific outcomes I'll cause this because it is a worthwhile story a former test cricket captain of Australia a beautiful man with whom I shared a platform ahead of a match a guy called Brian Booth is in his 80s very devout Pentecostal from the shire down where the Prime Minister mob race Brian reached out to me through cricket I'd offered to step aside from a panel given his age and that I didn't wish to I didn't want it to be confronting you know the guys at Test cricket captain he's entitled to be the speaker without the distraction and he embraced me and said we're all broken were all sinners he and I read Psalms to one another in a phone call on Saturday a very moving moment bringing together two defining elements of my life and one is a belief and it's not an it's not an unreasonable belief I I act as if I don't Priscilla ties about it I don't run around the sandwich board telling people to repent but I it's the foundation of my my existence Frank's Katherine I only learned today that you're a Christian I am as well I'm Christian very devout Christian and a Marxist yes but at the same time in the great Western tradition of being able to hold two positions at once completely you know the the foundational approach of Marxism is the concept of the dialectic that we have thesis antithesis and synthesis so I found that my Catholicism and my Marxism is an is an excellent tension to come to a moral decision and to think about how to live a good life do you believe in God that I absolutely believe in God and my faith sustains me through darkness my faith gives me meaning and I draw succor from my faith community and and and meaning and these positions are not irreconcilable I get very worried about this you know Clash of Civilizations thesis there you know the idea for example that feminists must be this and communists must be this a socialists are evil and this polarity we are all simultaneous identities we all contain multitudes and my belief in God is absolutely integral to my commitment to socialism and my sense of serving good works and the social justice mission of the Catholic Church well thanks for listening simultaneous identity politics look I believe in God you know a Protestant by tradition and you know I've married a Catholics all my children are being baptized Catholics and my protesting is failed in look I'm not I'm not sure you can be a Christian and a Marxist together and I say that these twigs mutually exclusive they're mutually exclusive but the point I want to make a broader point about the West the West one of the great successes the West was that we separated the church in the state and religion is a private matter and it's a matter for individuals and its metaphor how individuals want to choose to practice their religious faith and we separate it from the operation of the state that is a new concept in human history it's been very successful and I think you know when you look at societies that still have religion and the state intertwine they're not successful they are wholly separate things Terry well I'm agnostic it's a matter husband makes fun of me about it actually because he's like why having a bit both way you're not gonna get into heaven that way but I I've always been a gnostic I've always identified that way but to the questioners point about can you believe in the inherent dignity of human beings if you don't believe in God you absolutely can as a great secular humanist tradition that says that people are inherently valuable because they are people and that you can do the right thing because it is your moral duty to do the right thing without that Murrell Duty being conferred upon humanity by a god and I want to do the right thing because I believe that every person is as valuable as me and that they deserve that I treat them well and that it is my duty as a human to other humans to seek to meet that moral standard Jordan I've actually heard you ask I don't think I've ever heard you give a definitive answer I don't know exactly I think part of it yeah I think it's private you know there's a statement in the Old Testament about thee about the what would you call it immorality of praying in public let's say to make known your your your good works your faith because of the benefits that that might confer upon you that have absolutely nothing to do with the moral actions that might might allow you to truly deserve them I mean I think a lot I think of religious matters a lot I would consider myself a deeply religious person I would say and I have said this before that I act as if God exists and that I'm terrified that he might and but I don't consider myself an authority on metaphysical issues and I don't believe that my belief in God is it's not something that seems to me to be fit for there's something wrong there's something wrong that I can't put my finger on on on on triumphantly declaiming my belief in one man or another and so it's something that I prefer to leave in the manner that I've left it sorry act as if God exists I try to do my best as a person who's obsessed with religious matters but I'm not willing to place myself conveniently in a box and the next question we really are running over time a good time for one last question is Thomasina yeah actually I've been listening to everybody I actually want to totally change my questions if they'll keep it what it is and so this is a question to Professor Peterson since you said that trying to improve things that about how things would go terribly wrong and even with you have good conditions is it easier for things that go wrong and things to go right that's but the question is the questions to you why are conservatives call kinds of names demeaning humanity Vann July or where they go vandalized harassed and simply is because they're cautious so I just break it down well simpler because if I if I were so I'm not a I wouldn't do it but what if I were to wear a Trump had how are people would punch me how many people would be see I was American politics for three years my dad he's lobbyists in New York and Washington DC so what if I were a trump hat how would you respond in this room how people respond this room that's my question how would you respond if I were trump hat professor Peterson this question I think it's made history there and I think anyone's actually acted out the question from then on this I mean we subtitle this before but there's a sense among conservatives that and if you did wear a trumpet that you would be held down and and maltreated that's what the point is do you think that's correct I think they'd you know if you make a statement you open yourself up to criticism it's very interesting to hear people talk about free speech and a need for free speech that implicitly denies the free speech of other people to respond to that you know if you were wearing a trumpet in my company I would leave I'm not interested in trump hat believes or trumpet ISM and that is an act of free speech as much as anything else I think when people you know this it's a new experience for a lot of conservatives to be criticized you know to not be part of the anymore and the idea you know this this manifestation of these you know socialist green feminists like the greens only poll eight percent like this is not a mass movement of people the fundamental lesson here for everybody and I say this is much to myself as to anybody else the internet is not society and how people behave on the Internet is not how we behave in our homes it's not how we behave in our workplaces it's not how we behave in the street and to take as a representative sample of anything what happens on the Internet is the literal modern definition of madness Alex all look because critiquing your performance I just suggest that you should have bought out the cap at the end and put it on it would have added it to it look I'd say the problem is in the world today I agree with you I think if you did you cap but I have no problem with van leaving but in America it's just real real a lot of television I'm sorry sorry I meant I have no problem someone leaving but the problem is that we saw in the u.s. a young boy we was wearing the cap was attacked and then he was portrayed as a perpetrator of violence on and until it was all corrected and in the United States which is supposed to be a bastion of free speech I think it's I think it's sad today that people feel the need to aid of physical violence or to immediately respond to seeing a support of Donald Trump by attacking them I like it some supporting it's irrational like protestors well I don't I don't believe there's any evidence of that I have to I have to I have to allow everyone to speak and sorry we're just about out of time what finish it quickly no well look I think you're right to raise it it's a problem in the West today people are shouting the Prime Minister talks about this the shouting in Canberra he doesn't mean the politicians he means a whole shouty political class where the public switch off from it because they're not listening and they're shouting at each other sorry I mean the Prime Minister doesn't need a microphone he's that loud in Parliament let's be honest I don't think he should be talking about shouting but to your point I think this I think that if you were a trumpet nobody would punch you here everyone is listening to each other and if I were a pro-choice t-shirt nobody would punch me here everyone's listening to each other respectfully and if someone else was here wearing a hijab then nobody would tell them take it off and let me set it on fire but these things and that happened in my electorate to one wearing a hijab once it was a terrible terrible situation so we know that there are situations where we can have meaningful respectful disagreement and debate and what we all need to do is be better at that I think that's just a fact but we also need to not assume that everybody else is personally victimizing us for our beliefs all the time like what I'm hearing from you guys is that a lot of people in this audience feel personally victimized by feminism I don't feel personally victimized by anti-racist movements even though I'm a white person because I know that it's not about me personally or what I have done it's about trying to change structures so that people get more freedom and more equality in our society and so if we could all stop taking everything so personally and just listen a bit more then I think we'll do a little better Katherine I've been beaten up by my faith I'm not something you know you're having a lot of ideas everything because my value system I've been beaten up not because I was vulgar to somebody but because things that I wore people actually beat me up for it okay all right we'll take that as a comment thank you very much Katherine may be trying to end it on a slightly lighter note if you were a trump cap I wouldn't see it from here which is see the previous answer about age of panel and why I didn't play Big Bash League cricket in the wings like eyes aren't what they used to be but look I think I think it's all been said I if that were to happen it would be reprehensible I suspect in Australia more trans women are bashed for presenting in their affirmed gender than males wearing Trump hats but I could be wrong in fact check it if you wish that if you were Trump had it wouldn't bother me in the slightest I can assure you like this I'm the last person who's going to upbraid someone about okay choices Jordan will give you a better last word as your international guest well 50% of the Americans voted for Trump approximately you know which is being both same right for the last four or five elections pretty much a 50/50 split it seems to me that there's no excuse whatsoever for vilifying someone for wearing a piece of clothing that indicates alignment with well in this particular situation with the elected majority and it does happen and it's appalling and I think mostly it's a consequence of a very small number of very well-organized very radical people who have far more power for Reese that have a fair bit to do with the universities than they should however you know having said that I would say the Trump types and the Republicans in the US are doing a pretty good job of hanging on to their fair share of power and that my observation in the u.s. is that the political system there is actually quite nicely balanced and so despite the fact that you know you've run into personal trouble for the sorts of things that you're describing the political debate between the right and the left which is a very important debate seems to be moving forward in a manner that indicates the fundamental robustness of the institutions of democracy in the United States and I think that's the case in most of the Western world so I don't think that there's any reason to despair on a broader scale even though you may have encountered some things that we're quite nasty personally we're late on that optimistic night that's all we have time for tonight please thank our panel Katherine McGregor Jordan Peterson Terry Baca Alex Hall and [Applause]

Channel: abcqanda

Views: 3,235,354

Rating: 4.8151855 out of 5

Keywords: Q&A, QandA, auspol, australian politics, Tony Jones, politics, abc, abc news, Jordan Peterson, Milo Yiannopolous

Id: TmNSlF7lcaw

Length: 79min 23sec (4763 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 25 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/SmokinDynamite]

Thanks for removing the word ''Destroys'' when transfering the title. I'm tired of these clickbait titles.

[u/ShitPsychologist]

That bitch that called him ‘banal’ is running for election for the socialist party in my area. I hate how the abc intentionally stack the questions.