Jordan Peterson and Equality

An investigation of how Jordan Peterson engages with the idea of “equality.”

It should come as a secret to no one that political ideologies on the political right, including libertarianism and conservatism, have views on equality which differ substantively from those on the Left, such as socialism and liberal egalitarianism. It is important to stress, before going any further, that most ideologies, no matter where on the political spectrum they are, value equality. I say most because there certainly are anti-egalitarian thinkers, such as Joseph de Maistre or Julius Evola. But it is not true that there is no place for equality in laissez-faire capitalist ideology.

To borrow the structure of his own claim, then, we can say that Peterson cannot dismiss left-wing conceptions of equality—and even less left-wing conceptions of equal opportunity—unless he can contend with the fundamental thinkers and arguments on the matter.

Here I want to focus on conservative critiques of leftist views of equality, particularly those in the public discourse. Ben Burgis recently argued in a piece in Quillette that Marx deserves better critics. I would go further and say that the Left, Marxist or otherwise, deserves better critics. The particular critique I want to engage with is the charge made by some conservative commentators that a major problem with left-wing thought is that it advocates equality of outcome as opposed to equality of opportunity. Sometimes they go a step further and associate this line of thinking with Stalin or make apocalyptic forecasts about how such policies lead to tyranny and mass murder. My contention is that this is an inaccurate characterization of left-leaning views on equality, and that the idea of equality of outcome is meaningless when analyzed closely.

The most prominent exponent of this view is perhaps Jordan Peterson, though he is not the only one. Ben Shapiro, for example, has made similar statements. I want to focus on Peterson’s critique because, while often bombastic, it is much more articulate and in better faith than Shapiro’s. For Peterson, advocating equality of outcome is not only a problem but essentially the original sin of the left. In one interview with Joe Rogan, Peterson even called it the left-wing equivalent of racial supremacist ideologies—in the sense that, in his view, it should be immediately shunned without further consideration.