It doesn’t sound like the Penguin Random House Canada employees townhall went particularly well:
Several Penguin Random House Canada employees confronted management about the company’s decision to publish a new book by controversial Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson at an emotional town hall Monday, and dozens more have filed anonymous complaints, according to four workers who spoke to VICE World News.
On Monday, Penguin Random House Canada, Canada’s largest book publisher and a subsidiary of Penguin Random House, announced it will be publishing Beyond Order: 12 More Rules for Life by Peterson, to be released in March 2021. The book will be published by Portfolio in the U.S. and Penguin Press in the U.K., both part of the Penguin Random House empire.
Four Penguin Random House Canada employees, who did not want to be named due to concerns over their employment, said the company held a town hall about the book Monday, during which executives defended the decision to publish Peterson while employees cited their concerns about platforming someone who is popular in far-right circles.
“He is an icon of hate speech and transphobia and the fact that he’s an icon of white supremacy, regardless of the content of his book, I’m not proud to work for a company that publishes him,” a junior employee who is a member of the LGBTQ community and who attended the town hall told VICE World News.
Another employee said “people were crying in the meeting about how Jordan Peterson has affected their lives.” They said one co-worker discussed how Peterson had radicalized their father and another, who is talked about how publishing the book will negatively affect their non-binary friend.
“The company since June has been doing all these anti-racist and allyship things and them publishing Peterson’s book completely goes against this. It just makes all of their previous efforts seem completely performative,” the employee added.
A third employee told VICE World News the company’s diversity and inclusion committee received at least 70 anonymous messages about Peterson’s book, and only a couple are in favour of the decision to publish it.
In an email statement, Penguin Random House Canada said it is open to its employees’ feedback.
“We announced yesterday that we will publish Jordan Peterson’s new book Beyond Order this coming March. Immediately following the announcement, we held a forum and provided a space for our employees to express their views and offer feedback. Our employees have started an anonymous feedback channel, which we fully support. We are open to hearing our employees’ feedback and answering all of their questions. We remain committed to publishing a range of voices and viewpoints,” the statement said.
The company did not answer any of the specific questions sent by VICE World News.
The first question would be who is wanting to read Jordan Peterson on any topic, but to each their own, I guess.
In defense of those employees:
They’re in Canada.Report
Just another example of woke left snowflakes trying to censor anyone who they feel offended by.
My friends and all like his lectures and talks.Report
Funny thing is private companies get to do that sort of thing. Governments, not so much.Report
This private company apparently chose not to censor someone that their employees were offended by.
Which is notable? I guess?Report
As I read this, my mind went to some of the endless negotiations my sons often attempt to engage me in. Eventually, I reach a point where my response is: “I’ve heard what you said. Your points are valid. But… no. And now we’re moving on.”
I think it is good that the company made space for their employees to voice their concerns. I hope they listened with open ears and were willing to reconsider their position. If not, then they probably shouldn’t have held the town hall. I find few things more insulting than being told I’m being listened to when, in fact, I’m not.
A problem emerges when people mistake being heard/listened to with having their priorities adopted by others. I can hear and listen to you without agreeing with you. That CAN happen.
And the employees aren’t powerless. They can speak their mind and, if rebuffed, they can walk. I realize that may sound callous but we all have to make choices where we decide between competing interests.
And, at the end of the day, the boss makes the call. That can feel sucky if you ain’t the boss. And if you can’t deal with that suckiness, welp, become the boss.
This is completely independent of who Jordan Peterson is (I don’t know) or what he has/will write (I also don’t know).Report
I wonder if there have been instances of employees complaining about a publisher deciding not to publish a book? How are they handled, and do the publishers ever listen?Report
I wouldn’t know.
I guess I’m a little old-man-crotetchy right now, shaking my fist at underlings who seem confused when their bosses don’t take every cue from them.Report
I’ve read *SOME* Jordan Peterson.
It’s one of those things where the good things that he says were said better by others (Have you read Marcus Aurelius? Read Marcus Aurelius) and the bad/dumb stuff that he says is bad/dumb but it’s not outside of tolerance for established self-help parameters.
He has a number of followers who were/are disaffected males and you know what guys are like when they’re disaffected.
So that backwashed onto Peterson.
Anyway, I think that JP wasn’t that bad, all things considered. Not the best you could read but if someone didn’t have decent parents, I could see someone reading JP and figuring some stuff out that they wouldn’t have figured out without him. I mean, if they’d had as much privilege as I have had, they’d know to read Marcus Aurelius instead.
But they didn’t. They ended up with Jordan Peterson.Report
JP is sure he is brilliant and has insight into everything based on his expertise in a disregarded backwater of modern psychology. The uses of Jung aside, which might have some story telling value, he has no clue how clueless he is about everything else. But as some basic self help he seems okay at that.Report
Eh. It’s like finding out that someone’s favorite movie is Love, Actually or something.
I could see why someone might be inspired to put together a powerpoint on how toxic Love, Actually is, discuss the various pathologies of people who watched Love, Actually a second time, and so on but, at the end of the day, it’s a dumb movie and while I could probably recommend a dozen movies in the same genre that are better without having to resort to Google to do so, I can’t help but notice a weirdness start to creep in when someone starts talking about the people who want to watch Love, Actually 2: Love Actuallyer and starts talking about how much they hate those people and then starts to cry.Report
That’s a hilarious example.
My wife loves Love, Actually and watches it every Christmas season. One of our first arguments as a couple was when she made the mistake of putting it on at my old apartment after my roommate and I had been drinking all day watching football. Suffice to say it was not the right time for a RomCom and definitely not that RomCom. Obviously we got passed it, though to this day I am banned from the room any time she wants to watch one of her girl shows. It isn’t necessary anymore but I fully appreciate and respect the ongoing precaution.
One of the things I wish we could accept as a culture is that the type of media a person consumes says very little about them. Maybe not nothing, but certainly not so much that we should feel comfortable drawing all kinds of far reaching conclusions based on something on their book shelf or Netflix history or whatever else.Report
Heh, yeah. My wife loves Hallmark channel mystery shows. There are a gaggle of them all sort of like murder she wrote. A cutesy title about a baker or seamstress who solves murders all very genteel and pretty. Also likes all the NCIS/CSI shows but she isn’t, as far as i know, a murderer nor does she like violence. Again as far as i know. People like what they like for all sorts of reasons.Report
While I don’t actually like the Hallmark mystery shows, I respect them as a matter of craft and enjoy deconstructing them as I watch. The formula is right up front and very well executed. I have always thought it would be fun to swap out the perky female leads once a year and plug them into each others’ shows to see if anyone would notice the difference.
But anyone who has been anywhere near a homicide knows how stressful it is for civilians. It’s tough enough on cops, but how do these bakers, bookstore owners, and librarians manage to get deeply involved in several murders a year without deep psychological trauma. So what I really want to see is a new series called Murder Magnet, in which a shrink deals with women who have been swept up in repeated murder investigations and are having a hard time of it. I even picture the first scene of the premier episode: a few perky Hallmark mystery heroines are waiting in an office, the inner door opens and out comes Angela Lansbury, politely thanking the main character doctor and leaving, while the other patients are amazed.Report
Given that Angela Lansbury is still going she may be a creature that feeds off of murder or at least murder stories. She may never die.Report
(I can’t help it…) Former Marine here. The last book I read (just finished): “Rebecca” by du Maurier. The last thing I watched (just last night for maybe the 12th time): The “Prom” episode from “Buffy.” Fight me.Report
Vive la difference my dude!Report
A Jung man ain’t got nothing in the world these days.Report
I’m handing my pinball crown to you.Report
The problem is there is a vast difference between the claims of offence i.e. “icon of hate speech and… white supremacy” and the reality.
The claim basically is “I disagree with you (or maybe even dislike you) ergo you’re engaging in hate speech and should be unable to talk”.Report
Peterson’s not a white supremacist, at all. He’s a Jungian, so I think he’s got some really fundamental things wrong, but I wouldn’t be in tears if my publishing house printed his book. If you’re making false statements to discourage a publisher from printing someone’s ideas, well, why are you in the business?Report
I really don’t get the crying, emotional meltdown stuff over… a book. That kind of reaction says more about the person having it than the author. It really makes me wonder where these people come from, and how they manage to make it out the front door every day without an emotional breakdown.Report
That kind of fragility seems to be in vogue in certain mostly online circles.Report
Seems so. Every time I hear something like that I have to remind myself that it isn’t real life, and real people aren’t like this.Report
Well what is so odd is it IS migrating into real life. This article is about people talking to their fishing EMPLOYER!Report
It was real at Google in the widely mischaracterized l’affaire Damore, and it was real at the NYT when they threw Bennet out over the Tom Cotton editorial. Inmates are running lots of asylums these days.
I’ve never really bought in to the “employers have all the power” myth, but this makes it even harder to believe.Report
White people should stop culturally appropriating Korean Philosophy.Report
I mean, about 90% of the guy’s schtick is “he makes the liberal snowflakes CRY!!” so, you know, maybe, if you’re opposed to him, then don’t write the marketing for his next self-help book for free.Report
My take was that the JP people should start saying that “This Did Not Happen” and that it’s an exaggeration, there was one person who complained in the breakroom.
AND THEN GET THE PARTICIPANTS TO SCREAM INTO THE CAMERA ABOUT HOW AWFUL IT WAS AND HOW MANY PEOPLE WERE REALLY CRYING FOR REALReport
That may be what some people say about him, but it’s not *his* schtick.Report
Employees who object to a course of action taken by their employer, which they cannot abide, should quit. It’s very liberating.Report
You only need one rule about holding publishing meetings about Jordan Peterson.
Don’t publish things written by Jordan Peterson.
So many problems avoided that way. There are other ways to make money.Report
Jordan Peterson is a good communicator of broad self-help messages to young men that produced something of a cult of personality and a grifting empire. He’s also something of a kook and managed to get addicted to drugs then went to Russia to do a treatment for drug addiction that Western hospitals considered too dangerous compared to the potential positive outcome to try. He also has views on gender that the transgendered community find broadly offensive.
His defamation lawsuits and coziness with people like Viktor Orban suggest he’s no free speech hero either, but likes to posture as such for perceived victimhood status.
All in all, he’s not a man worth getting worked up over and doing so gives him more visiblity than he deserves.
He’s also from my part of the world originally and went to my university, were he was known for being smart and quite odd. On that basis, I have difficulty summoning much ire in his direction.
In the words of philosopher Wayne of Letterkenny, you should all just take 20% off of this.Report