In life it’s wise to be wary of those who tell you they’re free-thinkers; like fame, free-thinking is something better displayed than proclaimed.

To the casual observer, Jordan Peterson bears all the hallmarks an intellectual powerhouse: bestselling books, a professorship in clinical psychology at the University of Toronto and, in a currency that’s increasingly relevant, more than a million YouTube subscribers. A closer look, however, reveals that he’s been providing pseudo-science bullets for the alt-right’s online infantry for some time (including such gems as how serotonin levels in lobsters might justify the gender pay gap).

Footage emerged this week, from a podcast recorded last year, of the professor discussing the conditions that led to the Holocaust. There was the normal equating of fascist and Antifa, on account of the latter’s "proclivity to violence" (as if violence were a moral constant); there was discussion of Hitler’s bravery during the First World War, as well as the revelation that "[he] was very sensitive to disgust". According to Peterson (and I’ve no reason to doubt him), Hitler used Zyklon, an easy version of the gas used in the gas chambers at Auschwitz, to clean rats from German factories – and this, along with the economic instability in post-Versailles Germany, to Peterson’s mind, is evidence that the Holocaust was a logical progression.

That the Holocaust followed a series of logical progressions is, in a sense, true: if one were to reverse-engineer the Final Solution, each step would appear to follow rationally from the one before.

But this – as if it even needs saying – is not proof that the Holocaust was logical (and so unavoidable, an objective response to some natural phenomenon, an earthquake or a weather front for example) but that it was the endpoint of a deliberate process that had started many years before; a process that was constantly testing its contributors by moving the conversation further and further towards what would once have been unthinkable.

Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Show all 30 1 /30 Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Members of the caravan of Central American migrants climb the border wall in Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico EPA Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border US Border Patrol agents seen through the concertina wire where the border meets the Pacific Ocean AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Central American migrants pray at a temporary shelter in Tijuana AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Darwin, a 12 year old migrant boy from Honduras, looks out from under a tarp while taking refuge at a shelter in Tijuana Reuters Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Central American migrants line up for a meal at a shelter in Tijuana AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Angel, a 13-year-old migrant from Honduras looks towards the United States past the border fence in Tijuana Reuters Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Members of the LGBTQ community -who split from a caravan of Central American migrants heading to the US- arrive at the Diversidad Migrante (Migrant Diversity) NGO headquarters, which they will use as shelter, in Tijuana AFP/Getty Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border US military personell install barbed wire fences to stop the passage of Central American migrants EPA Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Young Honduran migrant Daniel Gamez waits with his family in a line for a meal after arriving with the Central America migrant caravan in Tijuana AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Two women, one carrying a child, walk north after crossing illegally into the United States as a Border Patrol agent moves in to detain them AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border epa07165763 People who are part of the first migrant caravan from Honduras start arriving at the border, in Tijuana, Mexico, 14 November 2018. The first migrant caravan advances through the northwest of Mexico as the US has reinforced its military presence at the border. EPA/Joebeth Terriquez Joebeth Terriquez EPA Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A child looks out the window of a bus upon its arrival at a temporary shelter in Tijuana AFP/Getty Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Migrants from Honduras dry their clothes in the sand after washing off in the Pacific Ocean AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Central American migrants at a temporary shelter near the US-Mexico border AFP/Getty Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border US police agents stand guard near the US-Mexico border fence AFP/Getty Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A migrant, who claimed not to be part of the Central American migrant caravan walks on the US-Mexico border fence AFP/Getty Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Eldin, a migrant man from Honduras, awakes next to his seven year old son Jose while taking refuge at a shelter in Tijuana Reuters Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Migrants line up for food at a shelter AFP/Getty Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A man installs concertina wire on top of the border structure on the US side AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Central American migrants sit on an overlook in Tijuana AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A migrant, who is part of a caravan traveling en route to the United States, shouts as he waits to receive food in a shelter in Tijuana REUTERS Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A man tries to get over a border structure topped with concertina wire AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border People who are part of the Central American migrants caravan arrive at a shelter EPA Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A Central American migrant moving towards the United States in hopes of a better life, is pictured next to the U.S. border fence in Playas de Tijuana, Mexico, on November 13, 2018. - US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis said Tuesday he will visit the US-Mexico border, where thousands of active-duty soldiers have been deployed to help border police prepare for the arrival of a "caravan" of migrants. (Photo by Guillermo Arias / AFP)GUILLERMO ARIAS/AFP/Getty Images GUILLERMO ARIAS AFP/Getty Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border epa07174393 Members of the Central American migrant caravan remain at a shelter in the city of Tijuana in Baja California, Mexico, 18 November 2018. The 5,000 member migrant caravan that entered Mexico on 19 October that stopped this week in the city of Tijuana, bordering the US, are expected to meet in this city on the next day to make a decision about their future, according to local authorities. EPA/JOEBETH TERRIQUEZ JOEBETH TERRIQUEZ EPA Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Migrants pray at a temporary shelter in Tijuana AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border Migrants shower outside a temporary migrant shelter next to the Us-Mexico border fence Getty Images Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border US Border Patrol agents, left, speak with two Central American migrants as they sit atop the border structure AP Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A Central American migrant looks on through the US-Mexico border fence AFP/Getty Images Migrant caravan reaches Tijuana on US border A migrant stands next to the border fence REUTERS

A process that began with words and ended with bodies.

Footage also emerged this week from the US-Mexico border of US border agents firing tear gas at beleaguered asylum seekers. This too was not the first stage in a process.

In response to images of toddlers in nappies fleeing smoking canisters, newly-elected Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez tweeted of her shame: "Asking to be considered a refugee isn’t a crime… It wasn’t for Jewish families fleeing Germany… And it isn’t for those fleeing violence in Central America." The tweet was quickly picked up on by Senator Lindsey Graham who suggested Ocasio-Cortez visit the Holocaust museum in Washington to "better understand the differences".

There are many instances in which Holocaust comparisons are inappropriate, but using the Holocaust to minimise the moral repugnance of a government’s policy is an act far more offensive to the memory of its victims.

What Graham’s comments display is a mirror image of Peterson’s: while one seeks to contemporise the past as a way of making its horrors seem logical and therefore justified, the other cultivates a historical blind spot which places us outside of history, and so frees us to ignore its lessons and repeat its mistakes. Both are apologia that work at once retrospectively and pre-emptively.

Peterson appears to excuse the Nazis by drawing comparisons to our own current economic concerns, while Graham excuses Trump (and his own complicity) by treating each of his choices as the response to an objective condition, and not the response to a previous choice in a campaign of his own making (one of dehumanisation) that makes firing tear gas at toddlers appear to be a logical step.

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But, of course, what both fail – or, more likely, refuse – to do is examine the premise on which such logical steps are taken. For Peterson, Hitler’s "othering" of the Jews and the other people he "went after" was more than a useful political tool; it was a response to some visceral, microbial disgust that operates beneath the level of reasoned thought and so, ironically, can also be forgiven. Once you accept this premise, that a group of people can be considered ‘less than’, what happens next is inevitable.