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FROM THE SHARED SHELF · 2006–2026 SAMPLE

12 Rules for Life

Jordan B. Peterson

7 readers recommend it across 4 discussions

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Original Hacker News comments, in the readers’ own words.

jaabe
I read it to see what all the fuss was about, and I can see why it would get controversial reviews. I don’t think it comes off as sexist or right-wing in the big picture, in fact it seems like an extremely old fashioned self-help book founded on liberal (as in enlightenment) and Christian (mainly protestant) values. Considering the controversy already surrounding Peterson the author really does himself no favours. Of course it’s entirely possibly that it’s intentional. Especially the first two chapters would easily be perceived as sexist if you were inclined to feminism. Every positive story Peterson tells in those two chapters is about order (and he uses masculinity to portray it), and every negative story is about chaos (which he uses femininity to portray). It’s so deeply rooted that every positive example story is even about a man while every negative example story is about a woman. Then at the end of chapter two or three he makes turns that upside down by displaying the negative sides of order along with the positive sides of chaos, and makes it clear that too much of either is bad. The path to a “good” life lies within the balance, showing how he’s not actually sexist at all,…