The Credentials and Veracity of Peter Friedrich:

1. What are Pieter Friedrich’s credentials?

2. The Veracity of Pieter Friedrich’s Articles

I was first introduced to the work of Pieter J. Friedrich by an acquaintance who viewed Pieter J. Friedrich as a hate-filled Anti-Hindu bigot. I noticed Pieter had classified himself as an analyst, an author and public speaker, and an activist depending upon the website describing him. This doesn’t seem to be for the purpose of confusion since he obviously can be all of these things and may choose to write down which aspects of his career is most relevant for each publication. However, I noticed on the google search of his website, he seems to have added “South Asian Affairs Analyst” and upon clicking his website, he writes as follows:

Did you notice the problem? At no point does Pieter J. Friedrich claim to hold any college credentials. One simply can’t claim to be an analyst of any kind unless they have a degree in journalism, communications, English, or some equivalent. He doesn’t even purport to have a history degree of any kind listed on his website either, but claims to specialize in past and current affairs of the Indian subcontinent. Well, I began to wonder, and decided to read his “Debunking Lies” page on his personal website and yet again, I noticed the same lack of information on what his credentials are. This is problematic, so I decided to look into his recent Twitter activity and found him asking supposed Kashmiris questions on Twitter with mostly anonymous Twitter responses. As you read this, please ask yourself if you consider journalism to be an important field: How is he vetting the information that he’s being given on Twitter?

In case he deletes the specific Twitter thread:

I’m genuinely bewildered how or why anyone could use this man as a source. I’ve found no evidence of him ever claiming that he has a journalistic degree of any kind or any related field, he claims to be an analyst but you need a Bachelors degree in journalism or some related field to claim such a reputation, and he doesn’t seem to have a vetting process for any information that he asks about from interviews judging from the evidence. He seems to be conducting interviews on Twitter on politically important subjects like Kashmir where anonymous Twitter posters can simply lie. Regardless of where you stand on the political issue, he’s clearly not doing any due diligence since he probably doesn’t have the training and therefore can’t be reliable for any side that he favors due to his current course of action. Overall, I’m confused how so many presumably accredited sources could be using a man who, from what I’ve searched, has never claimed to hold a degree of any kind and I wonder if this is the “White Privilege” that so many Left-leaning circles talk about since it seems this man has not been vetted and yet gets the equivalent respect that many ethnic minorities in the United States have to actually work hard to attain college degrees for. This cannot be construed as a personal attack, because credentials matter. We obviously need to distinguish people who are trained to gather and collect interviews, and who take vetting processes seriously, from people blithely making things up. Unless journalism has fallen so far that anyone can now claim expertise without the credentials and training, I don’t understand why this man should be viewed as credible. He’s claiming expertise in a field that he hasn’t shown the credentials for.

Take a look at the content that Pieter J. Friedrich shares on Twitter:

Pieter is re-tweeting a message of an anonymous Twitter follower who claims that the RSS is able to infiltrate Western society without leaving a trace. What, then, is the evidence that the RSS has done this when there is no evidence of it? It seems Pieter J. Friedrich and his cohorts can’t distinguish factual evidence from fantastical conspiracy theories.

Finally, the Google Search image of his personal website as proof of him claiming to be an analyst: