Joe rogan

Thursday

Lou Perez

It’s not Joe Rogan who needs to apologize

We are spending too much time talking about Joe Rogan, and Joe Rogan is spending too much time apologizing. “Whenever you're in a situation where you have to say, ‘I'm not racist,’ you fucked up,” Rogan apologized on February 5. “And I clearly have fucked up.” Rogan was addressing a montage that is circulating on social media, showing him saying the N-word on multiple episodes of his podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience. When Joe describes the montage as “the most regretful and shameful thing that I've ever had to talk about publicly,” I believe him. And I don’t think Joe made a mistake apologizing. That was Joe expressing his authentic self.

joe rogan

Tuesday

Damian Reilly

The real reason culture warriors want to take down Joe Rogan

From our UK edition

Joe Rogan is wildly popular with men because his podcast most closely approximates the way the majority of us speak, think and interact with one another. By turns funny, clever, stupid, thoughtful and irreverent, there is nothing else like it in the media. This means it needs to be cancelled. If you’re trying to organise a cultural revolution and bring down the patriarchy, the existence of The Joe Rogan Experience – a bastion of relatively guiltless masculinity that draws an audience of tens of millions of men three times a week – is unhelpful in the extreme.

Friday

Emily Hill

The indomitable popularity of Joe Rogan

From our UK edition

‘Nobody has stronger opinions about Joe Rogan than people who have never listened to Joe Rogan,’ is Edward Snowden’s view but I am the exception that proves the rule because the more I listen to him the more I profess my love for him. At points in the past year, the Joe Rogan podcast has been all that’s prevented me hurling myself out of the window with Elizabeth Day’s latest book. If you feel isolated and lonely in the post-lockdown world you might find yourself – among the legions of truck drivers stuck in cabs and Amazon workers waiting for robots to replace them – falling for him too.

Thursday

Grayson Quay

When the fringe becomes the majority

I’ve noticed a pattern over the past few years. We saw it when Joker made over a billion dollars at the box office, despite numerous reviews and think pieces assuring us that everyone who enjoyed it was a dangerous alt-right incel. We saw it most clearly in 2016 and again in 2020 when the tens of millions of Americans who voted for Donald Trump were uniformly smeared as white supremacists. To suggest any other motive was unacceptable. Racists! All of them! We saw it twice in the past week. The first of those instances is related to the ongoing Freedom Convoy protest in Canada. More on that later.

Wednesday

Bill Zeiser

Joe Rogan and the risk of being unreasonable

In the mid-2000s, I was an avid fan of mixed martial arts. My friends and I would pool our money to order the pay-per-view events of the Ultimate Fighting Championship, the combat sport’s largest promoter. One of the fixtures of UFC broadcasts was — and remains — the color commentary of Joe Rogan. Most people of that era would have been more likely to recognize Rogan as the host of Fear Factor, a hokey NBC gameshow in which contestants attempted to withstand such challenges as being covered in live insects or dropped into deep water while trapped in a car. But my buddies and I were more impressed with his UFC broadcast work. He was knowledgeable about the sport and infectiously enthusiastic, to the degree that we wondered whether he was coked out of his mind.

Tuesday

Stephen L. Miller

The hippies have become the cops

You either die a rebel or live long enough to see yourself turn into a snowflake. The generation of free love and free expression have gradually transformed into the baton-wielders. I’m referring to Neil Young’s demand that Spotify either pull his entire catalog or do away with Joe Rogan’s podcast. Spotify reportedly paid $100 million to acquire Rogan’s podcast in 2020. You'd imagine their contract includes legal bulwarks against such demands. Young is reportedly upset with Covid “misinformation” (the media’s new favorite vague term) and is no longer willing to abide by a streaming service that plays host to Rogan. It took Spotify about three seconds to make their decision: Neil Young is no longer on their platform.

neil young
Ross Clark

Why should we listen to celebrities over Joe Rogan?

From our UK edition

I’m boycotting Spotify. I am doing this for the same reason as I don’t have a Netflix subscription: I refuse to subsidise the efforts by Harry and Meghan to monetise their royal fame. If either company terminates its relationship with the couple I will consider using its services, but for the moment I will stick to YouTube. But no, it wouldn’t be a problem for me that Spotify hosts the Joe Rogan podcast – something which I admit I have never listened to, but which seems to have upset Harry and Meghan, as well as Neil Young and Joni Mitchell. The day we banish people from spouting unpopular opinions, even nutty ideas, is the day that we submit to being ruled by a tyranny of officially-sanctioned experts.

Saturday

Toby Young

Why Neil Young’s Spotify boycott is a mistake

From our UK edition

When Neil Young issued his threat to Spotify – get rid of Joe Rogan’s podcast or remove my music from your platform – he was probably hoping a chorus of other musical artists would weigh in behind him. After all, Spotify paid a reported $100 million to Rogan for the exclusive rights to host his podcast and, given that each episode attracts 11 million listeners, it must be quite a money spinner for the music streaming service. I’m sure Young’s music does alright on Spotify, but from a purely commercial point of view it was a no-brainer. Thankfully, only Joni Mitchell seems to have joined Young’s boycott so far, and that’s the most significant thing about this episode, not Spotify’s decision to side with Rogan.

Saturday

John Mac Ghlionn

America is in a state of mass formation paralysis

Unless you happen to live under a rock, this week you became aware of Dr. Robert Malone. He’s a virologist and immunologist who has become a lightning rod of controversy — and for good reason. Alongside laying claim to the invention of mRNA vaccines, Dr. Malone has spoken about a hysteria that has swept the United States, something he refers to as mass formation psychosis. Although I agree with many points Dr. Malone has made, and I believe that many of the pieces written about him have been needlessly vicious, the idea of mass formation psychosis is plain wrong. Let me explain why. Psychosis, an abnormal condition of the mind, renders a person unable to differentiate between the real and the imaginary.

mass formation paralysis woke war words english

Sunday

Roger Kimball

The ivermectin skeptics

The first time I heard about ivermectin was from my doctor early on in the Era of COVID-hysteria. The United States still had a functioning president, we had yet to arm the Taliban or give them lists of Americans and Afghan 'allies' they might want to execute, and a vaccine against the worst scourge since the Black Death was, if the experts were to be believed, years, maybe decades away. Of course, the experts weren’t to be believed. Donald Trump’s Manhattan Project approach to getting a vaccine developed in record time bore fruit. Pfizer had the first vaccine ready to go before the 2020 election, but selflessly waited until just after the election to make the announcement.

joe rogan ivermectin

Friday

Stephen L. Miller

Retire the Commission on Presidential Debates

Two-hundred-and-thirty-three. That is the combined age of the three co-chairs of the Commission on Presidential Debates, an organization which has become embroiled in several eyebrow-raising incidents in the past three elections. (Candy Crowley anyone?)The debates haven’t revealed much this election season. Trump is being Trump and Biden is allowed to skate by without answering questions. In fact, the most consequential revelation has been how ill-equipped the Commission for Presidential Debates is for the moment, and for the future. The Commission finds itself as the focal point of the debates, thanks to their choices of moderators and their on-the-fly rule changes.

commission

Tuesday

Ben Sixsmith

What makes Joe Rogan so successful?

If you had watched the Joe Rogan Experience in the early 2010s, you would have had no idea that it would become the world’s largest, most influential podcast. Filmed in the living room of the Fear Factor host and Ultimate Fighting Championship commentator Joe Rogan, JRE featured Rogan and his hapless sidekick Brian Redban hunched over webcams in novelty t-shirts and beanies and talking to a strange assortment of comedians and conspiracy theorists. It was sponsored by Fleshlight, a company which produced masturbatory aids.Fast forward 10 years and JRE is moving to Spotify in a deal allegedly worth $100 million. It is watched and listened to millions of times a week. Guests have included Elon Musk, Mike Tyson, Bernie Sanders, Robert Downey Jr and Mel Gibson.

joe rogan

Thursday

Robert Jackman

The genius of Joe Rogan

From our UK edition

Last month, just before coronavirus conquered the airwaves entirely, millions of Americans gave up two hours to hear a professor of epidemiology discuss the emerging pandemic. Despite its huge reach, not to mention its quality, the interview wasn’t broadcast on any of the news networks. Rather it was the work of a former martial-arts pundit and hallucinogenic-drug enthusiast who also happens to be one of America’s most popular — and influential — podcasters. Although it racks up some 190 million downloads a month, The Joe Rogan Experience tends to fly somewhat under the cultural radar — particularly in Britain. Even worse, his brash style and predominantly male fan base means that Joe Rogan is sometimes unfairly labelled an arch-reactionary.

Saturday

Lauren Chen

The carnivore confessions: I’ve never felt better than on my meat-only diet

Since late last summer, I’ve been experimenting with something pretty crazy. It’s not drugs. Nor is it a trendy celebrity religion. It’s meat. Like Jordan Peterson and other great apes, I’m on the carnivore diet. The carnivore diet is a lot simpler than keto, for example, which involves counting macronutrients. On carnivore, you merely refrain from eating anything that isn’t an animal product. Beef, lamb, chicken, pork and seafood are all in, but vegetables, fruit and grains are out. It’s reverse veganism, or the hunter-gatherer diet, but with more hunting and no gathering. Apart from those who work at a zoo, most people know of the carnivore diet because of Peterson and his daughter Mikhaila.

meat-only

Friday

Ben Sixsmith

Why aren’t leftists happy Joe Rogan endorsed Bernie?

As a twenty-something man who spends excessive amounts of time on the internet I have of course watched countless hours of The Joe Rogan Experience. Like any viewer, I know the martial artist-cum comedian-cum-actor-cum-commentator-cum-podcaster's irritating traits. He is morbidly obsessed with mind-altering drugs. He has a dilettante's weakness for pseudoscience. Worst of all, he — or, at least, his production company — censors people who make fun of his friends, despite his oft-expressed opposition to censorship. But whatever our complaints with the joke-cracking, pad-kicking, pot-smoking, elk-killing renaissance man we have to admire the range of his talents and the scale of his energy. And, besides, listen to anyone talking for hours and you will find a lot to dislike.

joe rogan

Saturday

Emily Ferguson

Pod almighty

This article is in The Spectator’s October 2019 US edition. Subscribe here. ‘Man the food-gatherer,’ wrote Marshall McLuhan, ‘reappears incongruously as information-gatherer.’ Once we foraged for information in the library. Now we graze among the podcasts. In the age of compulsive eating, podcasts are compulsive listening, an attempt to fill the silence. Nothing better to do? Click on a podcast, and let your attention drift. It takes no effort, it dissolves minutes into hours, and talking about the ‘great podcast’ you just listened to can sound just as smart as saying you’re reading War and Peace. After all, podcasts were originally made by nerds, for nerds.

podcasts

Saturday

Ben Sixsmith

The alternative media has censorship problems too

A common view is that the mainstream media loves censorship. Mainstream commentators smear people as bigots, mainstream social media platforms close their accounts and mainstream politicians applaud their efforts. Alternative tendencies like the 'Intellectual Dark Web' have emerged to oppose censorship. But is the alternative media free of its own censorious trends?One of the more memorable episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience involved the comedian cum commentator-cum-podcaster Mr Rogan sitting down with his friends, the comedian Bryan Callen and the UFC heavyweight Brendan Schaub. Schaub had just come off a loss by technical knockout and expected to discuss the bout in a collegial fashion.

alternative media

Thursday

Meghan Murphy

Why is Jessica Yaniv still on Twitter and not in jail?

Dramatic accusations of ‘doxxing’ online annoy me no end. It may seem like a petty complaint to rail on about, but as a devoted fan of communicating in coherent ways, I continually insist that words mean things and that we use said words as accurately as possible. Today’s postmodern youth claim that disagreement is violence, men who enjoy femininity are literal females, and the reading of words that challenge their preferred narrative causes PTSD. But our dictionaries have not yet been burned, and so many of us know better.

jessica yaniv

Thursday

Douglas Murray

California is the unexpected antidote to censorious liberalism

If I needed a safe space, I would nominate California. Against most odds this seedbed of censorious liberalism has thrown up the antibodies to the lurgy it created. Here within a short space of each other are a group of leftists and conservatives, religious and non-religious, all of whom are united in deploring the ‘You can’t say that’ culture which has torn across America and the West in recent years. The state may still have the shoutiest students. But it now also has the best first-responders. On Monday morning in Los Angeles I go to be interviewed by Dennis Prager, a devout, Republican talk-show host. From there I go to the studios of Joe Rogan, a libertarian comedian and martial arts expert.