Jordan Peterson's argument relies on some commonly held assumptions that I think don't hold up under scrutiny - for instance, the demonization of hedonism. But since it's a commonly held assumption, it seems credible to many people.

And I think his argument is also compelling because I think pride is a confusing emotion for many people, which makes it fertile ground for presenting any narrative that seems remotely plausible.

But why is pride a confusing emotion?

I think it has to do with the fact that we commonly imply some relationship between pride and personal agency - for instance, when we say we are proud that we got a new job, or won our soccer game.

Although most people claim to believe in "free will", many people also realize that anything you've accomplished can be diminished when you realize all the privilege and luck that lead us to our successes - which can make it hard to understand what part of our accomplishments we actually "deserve" to feel proud of.

But I think there is a simple answer, once you realize what pride really is.

All of our emotions ultimately have some value for survival. And the reason why we feel pride and shame is because they serve as our gauge on whether we are accepted or rejected by our community.

In other words, pride is simply the feeling of optimism that we have been accepted by our community.

And when viewed through that lens, it becomes obvious that the reason why we tend to feel proud of our accomplishments is because our communities tend to value competence, and are therefore more likely to accept and celebrate us if we have accomplished something.

And through this same lens, we can also see why people often feel proud of their various community memberships. People often feel proud of their country, their race, or their heritage for this reason, because it grants them membership to a community.

And it's along those same lines that "pride" is actually the perfect word to use with respect to the LGBTQ community - a diverse mix of people who long have been rejected by much of society, and is celebrating their acceptance into both a comunity of their own, as well as broader society.

So how did pride become one of the seven deadly sins?

I think the reason is because people often times work hard to inflate their sense of pride, in ways that might inflate their sense of community acceptance, and in ways that actually are not good for themselves or their community.

The most common example would be someone who brags all the time about their accomplishments, which their community may not even care about.

People also often treat pride as a zero sum game, whereby they try to find ways to shame other people in order to bolster their own pride.

And people's search for pride can lead to a fixation on heritage or race or country, which can lead to dangerous tribal dynamics.

So here's the thing. Pride feels good. And it is good, as long as our need for it causes us to behave in beneficial and pro-social ways. But it can also be a pretty problematic thing, if it causes us to behave in ways that damage our relationships and cause harm to others.