Comments by "rockethead7" (@rockethead7) on "Channel 4 News"
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YOU SAID: "But coming back here I think JP is really missing the point ... JP's explanation for the gender pay gap is not gender itself but traits that separate most women and men."
== To be more accurate, he acknowledges that gender discrimination plays a role in the average pay, but, he says the role of gender discrimination is not as large as the radical feminists portray. He doesn't deny gender discrimination, but says there are many more factors in addition to that.
YOU SAID: "Suspecting that JP might exaggerate the biological differences somewhat (not that they don't exist of course)"
== How EXACTLY are they "exaggerated"? He barely even mentions anything specifically. He mentioned the general difference between men and women with regard to how agreeable they tend to be (on average, not every individual, of course, but overall). But, he clarified that it only consisted of about 5% of the discrepancy. So, how is this "exaggerating" anything? He didn't even mention the rest of the factors. He says there are about 18 other factors (1 - gender discrimination, 2 - agreeableness, +18 more). So, how did he "exaggerate" in your mind?
YOU SAID: "I think that explanation could be close to what's actually going on, though I wouldn't be prepared to argue for it myself."
== Um, ok, so why do you say he's exaggerating? I don't understand your point.
YOU SAID: "But JP argues that female traits"
== Sigh. He even corrected this IN THIS INTERVIEW. He said "feminine traits." See, what you're not getting is that he's labeling certain traits as FEMININE, and separating that from being FEMALE. Males can have feminine traits. Females can have masculine traits. Yes, the historical entomology of the word inevitably leads to female = feminine, but, he's trying to tell you that those are actually separate things. He clarified this in this interview a couple of times. Yet, you're still saying the same thing?
YOU SAID: "do not offer reward in the market place AND agrees that things might have been different had markets been governed differently, that is to better accord to more female traits."
== I don't understand the point you're trying to make.
YOU SAID: "Here he is actually making a point he refutes when asked outright about it: that the criteria for job market success is set by men."
== No, the criteria for job market success sets itself. There's nobody in "power" to dictate these things. Take, for just one example, aggression. Aggression is considered to be a "masculine" trait (again, not really intending to say that "masculine" is exactly the same as "male," or "feminine" is exactly the same as "female"). Clearly, the more aggressive individuals succeed in the marketplace more than the non-aggressive individuals.
YOU SAID: "Then he sort of attempts to backtrack and suggests that for the last 50 years or so the experiment has been going on, with 50 percent of the workforce represented by women, and still we see no difference."
== No, he never said there was no difference. He was saying that these things still would sort themselves out naturally, and that, like it or not, it's quite probable that the gender pay gap would still exist under any circumstances, short of artificially induced mandates.
YOU SAID: "But this is a line of argument that collapses. If the managerial and directorship base has not been replaced, there is nothing to suggest that criteria has changed and if it had, his argument in the first place would be defeated. When the presenter suggests that the job market (criteria) is decided by men, JP argues obscurely that markets are in fact run by women because they are the consumers. This doesn't make a whole lot of sense."
== Yeah, I agree with you there. I don't think Newman and Peterson were talking about the same topic. I think Peterson misunderstood what was being asked, and ended up answering a different question than was intended.
YOU SAID: "JP also seems confused about the way competence is rewarded in the job market. Task related competence is not rewarded automatically - instead employees must be proficient negotiators. In that case it is the competence to market ones virtues and dominate others socially that are rewarded...and explains the gender pay gap. At least when it comes to the example JP gives. This seeming paradox becomes more apparent when JP brings up his experience counselling top female lawyers who are "as competent as anyone you would meet", but obviously still were in need of support to enhance their careers."
== I don't understand your point. He was clearly saying that the female attorneys were competent in the TASKS of being attorneys, but that they were NOT aggressive about their own pay negotiations. I fail to understand what you're getting at. It seems that this is likely a wording issue, ironically along the same lines as when Peterson misunderstood Newman's question... but in this case, I think you are misunderstanding Peterson's point.
YOU SAID: "I think it is JP's seemingly dogmatic (because he obviously doesn't really believe in it) belief in efficient markets that sometimes makes him less of a scientific educator and more of a political figure. Not all the time though."
== That's a mighty large claim... to say that Peterson doesn't actually believe what he's saying. Even if he's wrong, that doesn't mean he doesn't believe his own words. In order to make that claim, you'll have to do better than just a couple of misunderstood interpretations of questions/answers.
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@ElBank2012
YOU SAID: "The rest of the factors, however, I presume he locates in biological differences, no?"
== I don't recall. He certainly didn't elaborate here. And, I'm not exactly a fanatic follower. I've seen some interviews and lectures, but that's about it. I didn't take notes.
YOU SAID: "
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== Whatever you wrote, didn't show up on the screen.
YOU SAID: "Obviously, feminine traits as descriptive categories are induced from propensities in the behavior of "females"."
== Yes, it's a generality.
YOU SAID: "
The point is that there is no natural law which dictates that agreeableness should be a disadvantage within a social system."
== Um, what? How old are you? It's ultra rare to see a company of any significant size, woman owned, man owned, publicly traded, privately held, whatever, where it's not beneficial to argue for more wages. If you just take the wages you're offered, "agreeably," and don't go fight for more, then they're rarely going to just give you more. That's about like going into a car dealership and just taking the first price they offer you, and don't haggle them down. Now, don't get me wrong here. I'm not saying that it's a good idea to become a pain in your boss' side. But, if you're not out there pushing, they're usually not just going to hand you more money.
YOU SAID: "There is no doubt about the fact that in the history of the current economic system, men decided the rules of the game,"
== Good grief. There ARE NO RULES. The marketplace of jobs is wide open for whatever you choose. If you don't like the situation you're in, you either try to change it, or you leave. There's no rulebook for how business owners pay employees (except for union shops).
YOU SAID: "Is it so strange then that the organising principles of the economy is tilted in favour of masculine traits?"
== Nope. But, it's not because of any "rules set by men."
YOU SAID: "What I was referring to was that the condition (of the wage gap) still exists"
== Depends on what exactly you mean. If you take 10,000,000 random women and 10,000,000 random men, and you add up the wages, yes, men make more on average. But, men tend to take jobs that require more risk (and get paid for that risk). Men tend to be more aggressive to move up the ladder. Men tend to hop from job to job more than women (which often results in more money). Women tend to take a few years out of their careers to have children (slowing down career progress) more than men do. Women tend to choose more professions that don't pay as much as men who tend to choose more STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math) oriented jobs. And, yes, in the mix of many reasons, there's some sexism that still exists. But, personally, I think the job choices are the biggest factor.
YOU SAID: "What he indicates is that despite the purportedly approximate equality of opportunity, the gap persists."
== Yup. Equal opportunity doesn't mean that people act on that opportunity the same way. Very few people would really want a system that prevents equal opportunity. But, if you expect equal outcomes, then that would mean that you require more women to go into engineering, more women to go into firefighting, etc. It's ironic that the only way you're going to acquire equal outcome is by taking away the freedom of women to choose the career paths they career. Equal opportunity isn't the same as equal outcomes.
YOU SAID: "Maybe I have misunderstood Peterson on this point, but I thought he was arguing that job markets are systems that fairly allocate resources"
== It depends on what you mean by "fairly." There are too many potential meanings to that phrase for me to possibly address it without more information. Does the market pay a doctor the same as a social worker? No. Does the market pay an attorney the same as a burger flipper? No.
YOU SAID: "When I say that he obviously doesn't really believe in efficient markets, it is evident in what he says regarding the agreeableness/competence issue. But, as I indicate above, he still seems to profess it."
== He gave ONE example (agreeableness), and he said that it consisted of about 5% of the pay dynamic. I'd hardly say that this is "professing" it. Frankly, you're starting to sound more like Newman, as if you just didn't pay attention to his words. He said there were around 20 different factors in that equation. Did he sit there and list out all 20 factors? No. He was disputing her notion that women just get paid less because they're women, period. He said that, yes, that's one factor. He also said "agreeableness" was another factor. And, he said there are 18 other factors. But, it seems to me that you refuse to digest the concept of "an example" (which is exactly what she does in this interview). It's an example.
Newman: All birds are white.
Peterson: No, there are 20 different colors of birds. There's a red one right over there, for example.
Newman: So, you're saying that all birds are red?!!?!
You're doing the same thing. He brought up one example, he said there are 18 other examples he never even mentioned, and you're jumping into the deep end of the pool and accusing him of focusing on the one example... as if bringing up an example is forbidden or something.
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