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This is a quote from Jordan Peterson. I've provided two examples, one in which he qualifies the major viewership as being "young" males, in the other it's a generalised statement about all men. I've heard him make this claim many times, but obviously can't go dig up all the instances.

"Most of the people who watch Youtube happen to be young men"
Link to quote in video

"Youtube is a male domain primarily ..."
Link to quote in video

I've found the following information.

8.YouTube’s male-to-female ratio is about 1:1

Many sources speculate that majority of YouTube users are male, however, studies conducted by Google and Nielsen actually found that the gender demographic is evenly split, with female viewership in the slight majority. While YouTube's total user base might be closer to 50/50, studies have found that men make up the majority of viewers in 90% of YouTube’s content categories. The most male-dominated categories are in gaming, sports, and virtual worlds. Female dominated categories are make-up and cosmetics, skin and nail care, and weight loss.
Mediakix, claiming to be a marketing agency on their site (written March 24, 2017)

An article from from two years earlier gives this information:

While it attracts an even split of women and men, YouTube is still fairly male dominated. Men spend 44 percent more time on the site per month, and of 51 categories of YouTube content measured by OpenSlate, men make up the majority of viewers in 90 percent of them.
The demographics of YouTube, in 5 charts (written April 24, 2015)

Not sure how much things change since 2015 or 2017. A reminder that both quotes made by Peterson were made this year. Those charts from the second source do show that there are some major differences in video subject matter that males and females tend to watch. Also, I don't understand the second source when it says there's an even split of males to females, yet males spend 44% more time on the site per month. Wouldn't spending more time on the site mean you're watching more Youtube videos?

The most recent quote, from HARDtalk, which was said just two months ago in August is the one which claims "most viewers happen to be young men." As a general statement is it reasonable to doubt that more males watch Youtube than females? Also, how about when we add qualifier "young" to males?

Also, I'd like to point that he's mentioned in the past that most watchers of his own channel are male, but I find it nearly impossible for him to have derived the general conclusion from having extrapolated his own channel's data to the whole world. So I wonder where he's got this information.

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  • The problem with this question is that "most" just means >50% but is generally understood to mean some larger percentage, and "primarily" is similarly vague but usually suggests more than a simple majority. Peterson is deliberately vague and imprecise to avoid being debunked, while still misleading his audience.
    – dont_shog_me_bro
    Jan 17, 2019 at 13:30
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    @dont_shog_me_bro "Peterson is deliberately vague and imprecise to avoid being debunked, while still misleading his audience." Do you have any evidence that that was his motivation for phrasing the sentences the way he did? I find it much more likely that they were off-the-cuff statements about his own experience in combination with sources (for example possibly the Omnicore source cited in the accepted answer) that he came across. Regardless of whether he is right or wrong, saying that his statements were an intentional act to avoid future debunking seems pretty conspiratorial...
    – James
    Jan 26, 2019 at 17:38
  • @James only his well established pattern of behaviour, e.g. how he refuses to be pinned down on what "promoting monogamy" and "redistribution of sex" mean.
    – dont_shog_me_bro
    Jan 27, 2019 at 12:19
  • @dont_shog_me_bro Many people accuse him of being vague, and I think it's a fair accusation. However in many other instances he explains statistics and details exactly. "Enforced monogamy", what you called "promoting monogamy" he explains exactly what he means. He spends about 13 minutes discussing it with Joe Rogan; believe me, Rogan definitely pins him down. Because of the wording of "enforced" people have jumped at the chance to misrepresent his point a la Cathy Newman. Though if you want to make the statement that he's generally vague, I'm not going to dispute that in general terms.
    – Zebrafish
    Jan 27, 2019 at 13:01
  • @dont_shog_me_bro Of possible interest regarding "enforced monogamy" I was able to find: jordanbpeterson.com/media/…
    – James
    Jan 27, 2019 at 17:45

1 Answer 1

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According to Omnicore, a digital marketing agency:

62% of YouTube users are Males.

They do not provide a methodology, so these numbers may be inaccurate, but they are probably in the ballpark.

It depends on the genre and content of the videos:

Males are primarily watching soccer or strategy games.

Females are primarily watching beauty videos.

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  • I made a significant edit to this answer.
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Oct 2, 2018 at 4:35
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    It is worth to note that there is very large difference in the gender declared on youtube accounts and the actual viewer. As an example, my living room's TV is connected to my Youtube account, but who uses it mostly is my SO and my kids - all female.
    – T. Sar
    Oct 2, 2018 at 11:31
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    Oddthinking, why would you make an edit like that? You took out the vast majority of what I posted and condensed it down to data that is far less useful with little context.
    – Foobucket
    Oct 2, 2018 at 17:15
  • @Foobucket: I tried to explain in the edit comment, but there wasn't much room there.
    – Oddthinking ♦
    Oct 3, 2018 at 0:42
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    However, the thought that computer games are intrinsically a male thing has been debunked by "Adam ruins everything": youtube.com/watch?v=i08CVkBxvBM
    – Make42
    Apr 13, 2021 at 8:03

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