The podcaster and self-identified free thinker has addressed the criticisms of his use of a racial slur by asking more important questions than whether he uses the N-word as regularly as he does on his podcast.
By Ruairidh Macdonald
Photo by Austin Distel on Unsplash
It has been a difficult transition in the last few days for Joe Rogan, the Ultimate Fighting Champion commentator turned stand-up comedian turned podcaster. After being at the centre of a series of controversies regarding him blatantly spreading misinformation about coronavirus and the vaccines designed to combat it, Joe Rogan decided that it was best to double down this week after Spotify decided it best to remove more than seventy episodes of Joe Rogan’s podcast backlog, ranging from 2009 to 2018, from its platform for “racial insensitive language”, including the use of the N-word by Rogan at least 24 times on his podcast.
Rogan decided to finally respond to the backlash the clips have caused, addressing the legions of white men that listen to his every word on the only reasonable place imaginable, Instagram Live, so that we could get the unfiltered stream of consciousness of a man that thinks he is God’s gift to the rest of us. “I think everyone is blowing this way out of proportion, I only said the word twenty-four times, that’s not much as I say it at home, I don’t understand why everyone is getting so mad at me” he said, very confidently. “If you think about it, why can’t I say that word? I am an ethnic minority concerning how red my skin is, don’t see how that doesn’t qualify me to say it. On top of that, I have so many black people working for me that are completely ok with me saying it around and to them, so who is really in the wrong? I’m just asking questions”.
The initial response to this statement from Mr. Rogan was confusion and questions if he was sampling the substance he will seemingly never be quiet about, DMT, with intoxication being the only reasonable explanation for this career-ending outburst online but knowing his loyal fan base, they will take his word as gospel and defend him to their last breath, meaning that we will most likely not being seeing the last of Joe Rogan and his informative and balanced podcast.
