Professor Jordan Peterson. Screenshot via YouTube
It only took Dr. Jordan Peterson a little bit of controversy and a few short months to move from being an accomplished academic and tenured professor to a bonafide right-wing star.It took him an even shorter time to turn that fame into some serious bank.Peterson was thrust into the spotlight in December when he declared he would ignore his University's demand to use gender neutral pronouns for his students. The incident sparked a debate over political correctness that resulted in several rallies, a forum, and some pranks against Peterson."Discussions of those sorts that are predicated on group identity have gone so far they pose a far greater threat than any possible good they can do," Peterson previously told VICE.His YouTube videos and media appearances made Peterson a star in the right-wing anti-PC crowd and, apparently, some cash.According to his Patreon page, Peterson, who once taught at Harvard, will make $11,403 US a month which equals out to $136,836 US a year or $183,319 CD. According to this year's sunshine list (public salary disclosures) Peterson made $161,635 CD for his job at U of T."The additional financial support helps me remain confident that I can remain independent in my thinking and less vulnerable to institutional pressure, should that be brought to bear," he writes in a thank you note to his supporters.Jordan Peterson's most recent youtube video.Peterson recently made an appearance on Joe Rogan's extremely popular podcast where he discussed the idea. Rogan described the episode as one of his favourites. On YouTube alone the video of the podcast is pushing a million views.Peterson's Patreon is geared towards him creating lectures for YouTube that he would also release as podcasts, his goal is $15,000 a month. He recently released a successful series of YouTube videos entitled "Professor against Political Correctness.""Ideas presented in lecture format can be less daunting. They can be offered simultaneously to many people. They can be preserved for long periods of time," reads his pitch. "They have proved a more successful means of communicating than my book (which was nonetheless vital to the formulation of my ideas)."Follow Mack Lamoureux on Twitter.
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