Last November, after receiving complaints about Peterson’s conduct, the College of Psychologists of Ontario ordered Peterson to attend what it calls a “Coaching Program” to improve his professionalism in light of holding a license to practice psychology.
Despite his public bravado, which is what made Peterson both a hero and villain, he now knows his license is in jeopardy after he lost two court fights, most recently last week. The first court ruled against him last August, and he learned last week his appeal was turned down by a three-judge panel.
“They're definitely making an example of me,” Peterson told Fox News last week. “And it's quite an effective example in some ways because I have the time and resources to fight this battle.”
Peterson, a native of Edmonton, Alberta, was a little-known professor and author at the University of Toronto when he publicly criticized transgender-related legislation called Bill C-16. That “gender identity” legislation, which later became federal law in 2017, amended the Canadian Human Rights Act to include hate speech under the Criminal Code and to enforce it with sentencing for hate crimes.
Alarmed by the bill, Peterson emerged from relative obscurity in 2016 when he publicly warned Bill C-16 was policing speech, such as pronoun usage. Under pressure to be quiet and comply, Peterson publicly vowed to refuse to follow the law citing free speech and his own conscience.
Instead of being quiet, which his colleagues were doing, Peterson went line by line through the bill’s content in an hour-long YouTube video that was posted in October 2016.
In a 2017 interview with Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, Peterson said the university was demanding he stop making public remarks that were viewed as hurtful and discriminatory.
"I decided a long time ago that I was going to pay for saying what I thought, not for not saying what I thought,” he told the liberal CBC at the time.
Peterson, in fact, has rarely refrained from saying with he thought. The complaints against him include making "misleading" statements about COVID-19; mocking a plus-size Sports Illustrated model; and calling a surgeon a "criminal" for removing the breasts of transgender actress Ellen Page.
Dr. Charles McVety, who leads Canada Christian College, tells AFN it is unfortunately true Peterson has become a political enemy of his own government.
“He is being persecuted by a hostile government because he doesn’t dance to their tune of forced speech,” McVety says of the defiant Peterson. “And it’s quite horrific because it sets a precedent for other licensed professionals to lose their license simply because they don’t agree with the government.”
