Jordan Peterson George Orwell's Wigan Pier, Marxism and the Working Class

[@johneyre9493]

I’m from Wigan, my grandad used to talk about how hard the mines were, he was quite lucky though he got into his 70s before pit disease got him. You can listen to the audio book of road to Wigan pier on youtube.

[@DadsAmazingAdventures]

Thanks for the comment. Here is the audio book on my channel, just in case you wanted to revisit it. kzbin.info/www/bejne/hIrSamd4o6-SjsU

[@DadsAmazingAdventures]

kzbin.info/www/bejne/hIrSamd4o6-SjsU

[@lucylou780]

Same I'm from Wigan but my grandad a pit mon died age 47.

[@loafersheffield]

I'm from Horwich. My dad was a boilermaker. (Welder) worked on steam trains, then diesel and rolling stock. He was offered a job in the foundry when the industry was decimated in the early 80's. Dad said that there was no way he'd work in the foundry. I can only imagine how much more horrible it must have been to be a miner. I still listen to the sons of miners and steelworkers in pubs recounting how hard their dads worked in the mines and foundries around Sheffield. Missus forced me to emigrate to Yorkshire. I think Peterson has a point with regard to the attitudes of the bourgeois, left intellectuals of the 30's when I see how the modern Labour party have been decimated. I read a book. Paul Embry. Labour Party member and trades unionist (Fire brigades union) "Despised: why the modern left loathe the working class." Nowt seems to have changed albeit that former mining towns are now voting Tory. Doesn't compute? I recommend checking out the Triggernometry podcast on yout tube with Embry. A real eye opener.

[@lucylou780]

I live in wigan. My grandfather was a miner from Wigan he worked hard and sadly died at the age of 47. My grandparents and great grandparents had it hard they were all pit men.

[@Frederas11811]

Sorry for your loss. What did they mine?

[@simplelife7522]

@@Frederas11811 most likely coal, coal mines are scattered all over England

[@johnpickering5797]

After reading Road to Wigan Pier I've more respect for the miners and the communities they lived in. It was a brutal existence, and these guys help usher in the industrial revolution.

[@loafersheffield]

Many working class communities in The UK voted for the Conservative Party. Many being former mining communities who had been Labour held for generations. I rather think that the modern left despise the working class or at least focus on minority issues. I read a book by a Labour Party member and trades unionist Paul Embry. Despised: Why the modern left loathe the working class. I think Peterson was onto something recounting the bourgeois elites of the 30's. It's come back with a vengeance and it's bit the left on the bum. There are loadsa interviews with Embry on ewe choob. Perhaps the best is the Triggernometry podcast. Quicker than reading a book.

[@paulwinstanley904]

I’m a pie eater too!

[@theunion6024]

I’m from the north east of England and I can tell you not much has changed here

[@kabukikommandofourthworld5266]

How's Derbyshire this time of year? The UK intrigues me to no end, but I know I'll never see it.

[@Bibbo8844hdbks]

One of the most enlightening book I ever read

[@jonoessex]

I’m reading it at the moment and not finding some of it very easy to read. For example he says about class ‘it is a money-stratification but interpenetrated by a shadowy caste-system like a Jerry-build bungalow haunted by medieval ghosts’. What the hell done that mean?

[@the0nlytrueprophet942]

​@@jonoessexWe still have shadows of medieval thinking in our culture with class. They are like dark shadows looming over us.

[@GilitySpark]

Good lecture! Halfway through the book now

[@philthycat1408]

Give Kellogg Durland a read. His works includes, ‘Among the Fife Miners’, 1904. Wonderful read, with a window into past that should always remain open. I’d be very much surprised if Orwell wasn’t his biggest fan.

[@brentonsmith6920]

Never heard of him. But I am keen to find more eye opening books. Cheers for the recommendations

[@markletts8802]

Get Well JP the world needs you...

[@adamwade1808]

@13:40 YOU GOT THAT RIGHT!!! so true this message needs to be sent to all voters!

[@karlljungquist7388]

the source link doesnt work for me, what is the lecture that this is taken from? Id like to see the whole thing.

[@DadsAmazingAdventures]

I believe it is listed on Jordan Peterson's own channel - kzbin.info/www/bejne/hperaXx9bKaqoZI . Thanks for commenting. Please stay well Karl.

[@stuish6017]

I don't think Jordan Peterson read the entire book. Orwell detailed why people might object to socialism, what negative perceptions they might have of the social activist, and he did this to help the cause. He fully believed in socialism, which he defined as a sense of justice and common decency, and wanted socialists to do a better job of convincing others. It should also be mentioned that there is nothing in the book about Stalin's murderous dictatorship, presumably Orwell didn't feel it was relevant to the socialist debate in Britain.

[@3brenm]

I was going to say something similar. One can easily criticize the character of plenty of socialists. God knows plenty of them deserve it, but the injustices of our systems and how they tend to pile up at one end are still inexcusable. But what Jordan is completely correct about is the utter foolishness of thinking someone is automatically legitimate in their self professed goals and compassion (and should be trusted or given power) just because they claim to be.

[@codex3048]

LOL @ "sense of justice and common decency." The Socialists were elitist megalomaniacs who were not popular among the working class at all. The ILP (Independent Labour Party), barely had 4,000 members when Orwell joined.

[@ChristianRobotHead]

It's pretty much a certainty he read the whole book and probably more than once too. He just happens to say things you don't want to hear.

[@High_Noon_Sports_Cards]

What a dumb thing to say, of course he read it. I find it hilarious when people champion Orwell as a socialist. There’s zero chance Orwell would be a socialist in todays world. He’s way too brilliant and awake. Even his later books he was basically describing the horrors of socialism even if he did it unintentionally, he would have eventually figured out Socialism is hell.

[@davidpaterson2309]

⁠​⁠​⁠​⁠@@codex3048 To understand why Orwell joined the more radical ILP and not the very much larger Labour Party and why he was not a Marxist and would not join the CPGB you need to understand British (and wider European) political history in the period and to read some of Orwell’s essays and writing other than his novels (he was primarily a journalist) eg in an article he wrote for the “New Leader” in 1938. Scoffing at the small membership of the ILP, however, misses the point altogether.

[@alexanderdean8682]

Ukrainian starvation was intentional. It was not just because of collectivization, Stalin made this happen, he wanted those people to starve, he made it happen.

[@brandonwhitehead6929]

Are those ideas mutual exclusive?

[@radroatch]

Orwell in closing the Orwell's chapter mostly quoted from: Is it childish to be influenced by that kind of thing? Is it silly? Is it even contemptible? It is all that, but the point is it happens, and therefore it is important to keep it in mind. The point is to let anything of JP said here to dissuade you from Socialism would be foolish, and JP saying this is what influenced him away from Socialism (on his most influential books no less) shows not only his inability to honestly understand Orwell but also another aspect how he is fundamentally opposed to Orwell's mindset. In Orwell's own words JP is childish, silly and contemptible.

[@SalmonFume]

I totally agree. This is very dishonest and everyone who has read the book knows it. George Orwell didn't like Roman Catholicism at all. He was a socialist and actually his book was already in 1939 complaining about 'wokeness' which he mocked as bearded fruit juice drinkers.

[@nunceccemortiferiscultu7826]

No, I'm not joining your socialist club just because you don't like a guy in a video you watched lol.

[@High_Noon_Sports_Cards]

I think it’s you who doesn’t understand Orwell. If he was alive today do you think he would be a socialist? You’re a fool if you do. You think the left and socialist care about the working class and the poor? That was his fight and who he fought for. No chance he would be a libtard in 2023. He’s too brilliant and awake for that.

[@DanglerSpangler]

​@High_Noon_Sports_Cards If Orwell was alive today, he would be a 120 year old Ben Shapiro stan. He would have stormed the capitol and lead the charge for investigating MTGs "Jewish Space Lasers." Every morning he would say the pledge of allegiance and down a glass of whole milk before devouring three courses of elk testicles and going for a naked hunt like his forefathers. That's the Orwell we've all come to know thanks to the masterwork JP has produced here. I'm glad we can all agree!

[@ceh5526]

And still, after all of this, what happens to the very poor? Conversation and rhetoric has been moved to a national partisan level, but they are still there.

[@radaroreilly9502]

It’s funny, the word for “good” in Russian sounds like “horror show”...

[@auntiecarol]

Q: Why do KGB agents operate in groups of three? A: One can read, one can write, and the third keeps an eye on those two intellectuals.

[@АнонАнонов-г8н]

Lol!!!

[@ciora1980]

ha, never occured to me ;) you are horribly right ;)

[@sebastianmelmoth7331]

A wonderful book!!!

[@clandestino6438]

An excerpt from Road to Wigan Pier that Peterson will never quote 🤡: "Please notice that I am arguing for Socialism, not against it. […] The job of the thinking person, therefore, is not to reject Socialism but to make up his mind to humanize it… The only possible course of any decent person, however much of a Tory or an anarchist by temperament, is to work for the establishment of Socialism. Nothing else can save us from the misery of the present or the nightmare of the future […] Indeed, from one point of view, Socialism is such elementary common sense that I am sometimes amazed it has not established itself already. The world is a raft sailing through space with, potentially, plenty of provisions for everybody; the idea that we must all co-operate and see to it that everyone does his fair share of the work and gets his fair share of the provisions, seems so blatantly obvious that one would say that nobody could possibly fail to accept it unless he had some corrupt motive […] To recoil from Socialism because so many socialists are inferior people is as absurd as refusing to travel by train because you dislike the ticket-collector’s face." Orwell flat-out says that anybody who evaluates the merits of socialist policies by the personal qualities of socialists themselves is an idiot. Peterson concludes that Orwell thought socialist policies was flawed because socialists themselves were bad people. I don’t think there is a way of reading Peterson other than as extremely stupid or extremely dishonest, but one can be charitable and assume he simply didn’t read the book that supposedly gave him his grand revelation about socialism.

[@ride4lifecbr]

You are conveniently failing to mention Orwells harsh criticism of Socialists right after making that statement in the book...typical socialist, only using things that help your narrative/ideology and ignoring the things that hurt it.

[@jackschwanke603]

The idea that all will put in work is a farse. The idea you can give people resources to live and they will be happy is a farce. And the idea that a government or any body of ppl can make decisions for everyone is a farce..especially since the free market is way more powerful than any body of ppl you assemble.

[@Robertlynschultz]

Ah yes... accuse a man of intellectually dishonesty because he does not highlight one's favorite passage in a book during a lecture. Good Show Sir! Really though, this socialist crapola is a trap, a sweet smelling lure that entices well meaning people to voluntary shackle their personal potential... mind, body, and spirit to the collective mass of society. This has NEVER worked out as intended whenever it was attempted. As an example, we can look at one such experiment that was attempted back in the 1620s in this excerpt from a book: Lessons From A Capitalist Thanksgiving by Jerry Bower based on the memoirs of Plymouth governor William Bradford: The first Thanksgiving was a celebration of abundance after a period of socialism and starvation. The members of the Plymouth colony had arrived in the New World with a plan for collective property ownership. Reflecting the current opinion of the aristocratic class in the 1620s, their charter called for farmland to be worked communally and for the harvests to be shared. You probably will not be surprised to hear that the colonists starved. Men were unwilling to work to feed someone else’s children. Women were unwilling to cook for other women’s husbands. Fields lay largely untilled and unplanted. Famine came as soon as they ate through their provisions. After famine came plague. Half the colony died. Unlike most socialists, they learned from their mistakes, giving each person a parcel of land to tend to for themselves. The colonists threw off the statist intellectual fashions of their day. The results were overwhelmingly beneficial. Men worked hard, even though before they had constantly pleaded illness. Fields were not only tilled and planted but also diligently harvested. Colonists traded with the surrounding Indian nation and learned to plant maize, squash and pumpkin and to rotate these crops from year to year. The harvest was bountiful, and new colonists immigrated to the thriving settlement. ----‐-‐----------‐‐-------------------------------------- Well that about sums it up, eh?

[@3brenm]

Peterson's point is to highlight the danger and foolishness of assuming the legitimacy and competence of an individual or group of political activists based on their professed goals or compassion alone. And on that he is completely correct. Sometimes i feel not enough people on the left are aware of this ever present danger as we get swept along by the fervour of political 'justice'. I see it all the time and i consider myself on the left.

[@codex3048]

Orwell thought that the Socialists would be working class but instead discovered in "The Road to Wigan Pier" that they tended to be nudist colonists, vegetarians, and other eccentrics. Orwell didn't understand at the time (or chose to ignore) that true believers in Socialism were like the Inner Party of "1984." What they desired was the subversion of all values in society to create a Utopia, using the working class as their pawns. Not being stupid, the real working class instantly recognized this, and resented it, which is why Socialism has forever been unpopular with them, but highly popular with upper class control freaks, academics, millionaires, and "philanthropists" who want to reshape society in their image.

[@stevejauncey3086]

People laugh Why?

[@tadaasam2036]

because the book answered a question that Peterson had always asked himself for a long time. It was like "aha" light bulb moment for him.

[@cferguson5937]

Good thread

[@mrlaw711]

Peterson thinks we are all illiterate - much like a minister.

[@wanderingmustang2348]

And don't listen to anything he says about Nietzsche.

[@snakey934Snakeybakey]

Amazon has already censored this book on their e-books, removing some of Orwell's language which they must've felt was "homophobic"

[@Benjamin_Bratten]

do you have a source on this?

[@StevenGrace]

They have censored some bad language in the Audible version as well

[@ironwood5592]

My grandad was a ship right. Xx

[@ironwood5592]

Same

[@retromograph3893]

Orwell was an unbelievable snob. It's all over is books........ but especially Wigan Pier and Down and Out. But i guess he was just of his time. But his snobbery always makes me chuckle.

[@NoThatRyan]

I refuse to belive it's possible for someone to actually read Down and Out and not come away from it noticing Orwell's sympathy for and empathy with the working poor. His connection to them was practically the leitmotif of the book.

[@geoffpoole483]

@@NoThatRyan Check out the antisemitism.

[@JoseSoto-tz4cz]

This comment is ridiculous. Biased. Orwell was no snob.

[@ianinkster2261]

@@JoseSoto-tz4cz Well he confesses to having been a snob in his youth, so he's a self-correcting snob, far more interesting.

[@freakingabagool3510]

@@geoffpoole483 *does shit that disgusts and mortifies people* “oh noooo you can’t hate us that’s wrong!” Big think