As someone who resonates with your history of leftism and tried to get into JP, let me try to explain where he’s maddening and hypocritical. I agree with most of what you wrote and For the most part I think JP is more good than evil, although I do think what he’s talking about (clean your room, personal responsibility, or whatever) is a fine message, it’s stuff most of us kind of know already, just repackaged with lots of “science” and verbosity.
In my estimation and experience, it’s clear that JP attracts far-right online trolls, Trump supporters, and various other misogynistic scum and there’s something about him and his message that resonates with this unwholesome fan base. So while JP does a good job of pointing out the inconsistencies of the far left, he does next to nothing talking about the right, which historically is far more dangerous than a bunch of overzealous social justice warriors.
He also misrepresents history and communism, equating today’s progressives with Stalinist Russia, when the philosophies and circumstances where they emerged are quite different. Whereas on the right there is a clear vein of fascism that has remained quite virulent throughout America’s history. Because he doesn’t speak out about this, he is — -to use his own words — being irresponsible. He’s using his public platform as an intellectual to attack leftist ideology without really understanding it (see debate vs zizek) and refusing to investigate his premises.
I don’t know if he’s conscious of his motivations for not doing so, but I’d say it’s probably because he wants fame at all costs, which is doubly irresponsible. He won’t talk about far right fascism because there’s a sizable portion of his fan base that comes from there, and so he’s not motivated to say anything about it. He’s famous because he speaks about leftist dogma, and so he sticks to that script without being a true intellectual.
His recent hospital visit magnifies this. How am I supposed to take the advice of a man who got addicted to benzos, refused to look at the origins of his anxiety, and instead wrote another self-help book to cash in immediately afterwards?
