In this episode of Sacred Tension, I’m joined by journalist Helen Lewis to discuss her new BBC series The New Gurus. We discuss the rise of advice-giving gurus online, whether social justice is a new religion, her confrontational interview with Jordan Peterson, how online cancelation radicalizes people, and much more.
Continue reading “Sacred Tension: Online Gurus and New Religious Movements | Helen Lewis”
I remain connected to the Christian world, even though I’m not a Christian. This is because I value friendship, and I don’t want to cut ties with people who are very dear to me. While having conversations about faith with Christians, though, I’ve noticed a trend that annoys me.
Christians will often make strong, extraordinary, and hard-to-defend claims about the world. But when pressed on these claims, they often retreat to more philosophical, vague, and easier-to-defend claims. This tactic is called the Motte and Bailey. When the Bailey is under attack, they retreat to the Motte.
Continue reading “The Motte and Bailey of Christian Belief”
Some time ago, a person asked me, “what is it with young men being obsessed with Jordan Peterson?”
Well, I thought, I’m a young man, and I’ve historically been obsessed with Jordan Peterson. Allow me to share my personal experience.
Continue reading “The Center of the Cathedral: The Allure of Jordan Peterson”
In this episode of Sacred Tension, I am joined by the hosts of Decoding the Gurus to take a critical look at the gurus of the internet age, including Jordan Peterson, the Weinstein Brothers, and Sam Harris. We do an in-depth run-through of the Gurometer and explore tools to critically analyze public intellectuals.
Continue reading “Sacred Tension: Decoding the Gurus with Christopher Kavanagh and Matthew Browne”
2021 was a hard year, and once again I got through it by gorging myself on books. I completed just over 50 books, and the following are the standouts. A reminder: this is not a “best books” list. These are the most notable and interesting to me personally, including the best and the worst. Finally, a book only makes this list if I have something to say about it. A novel might blow my mind, but if I struggle to write a paragraph about it, it won’t make this list.
Continue reading “Top Books of 2021”
I’ve spent the past few months writing a series on reading challenging books, all of which you can find listed at the end of this post. In my fervor to make the point, I’ve come to realize that something essential was under-emphasized in my previous posts.
Continue reading “Everyone Needs a Safe Word”
I’ve gotten some interesting criticisms of my recent series of blog posts on the importance of reading challenging and problematic literature. The most common is along these lines: “you can get information that is just as good from non-problematic sources, so why not just do that?”
Continue reading “Books Aren’t Search Engines”
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a blog post titled, Jordan Peterson on the Utility of Horror. I expected some pushback, and I got it.
“Fuck that dude all the way.” Wrote one person. “He is a transphobic piece of trash that uses big words to make himself look smarter than he is.” Another response read, “Jordan Peterson a well known con, I guess what I see on the internet is true and The Satanic Temple [my church] isn’t divorced from bigots. Sad to see it.”
Continue reading “The Satanic Practice of Learning From Demons”
I’ve spent a good portion of my online career bashing Jordan Peterson. I’ve often found him clownish and, at times, downright dangerous.
His new book Beyond Order, however, surprised me. The Peterson that emerged from its pages was a far more complicated and interesting figure than I had previously given him credit for. He lives with brutal addiction and depression, and yet doles out advice on how to lead a good life. He’s weird, eccentric, verbose, and surprisingly progressive and conservative at different turns. I found parts of his book genuinely helpful, and other parts frustrating and overly esoteric. None of this is to say that I’m a fan or that I agree with him on everything. It’s simply to say that I found his most recent book worth engaging.
Continue reading “Jordan Peterson on The Utility of Horror”
I’ve been making noise on social media lately about how I deliberately read problematic books. By problematic, I mean that they are deemed, justly or unjustly, toxic or bad by people I usually agree with. I’ve noticed some palpable discomfort when I bring up the topic, so I thought I would take some time to explore why I think reading problematic literature is helpful.
Continue reading “In Defense of Reading Controversial Books”
Stephen Bradford Long 