Ever since Joe Rogan signed his $100 million podcast deal with Spotify, critics have been trying to get him cancelled due to past episodes that share some problematic/anti woke views (depending on where you sit on the political spectrum sure, but let’s not get into that here) and so obviously they were going to have a field day after his latest episode where he invited controversial InfoWars founder and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones onto the show.
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Many people attempted to have Rogan cancelled because of this and some even claimed they were shutting down their Spotify accounts because of it, but Joe himself doesn’t seem too bothered after he shared the following Instagram post defending his actions. Here’s what he had to say:
I don’t know if anyone else is going to fact check everything that Jones said to verify if this is all actually true or not, but I suppose it’s somewhat of a positive move from Rogan to admit that he thought about this and try and pre-empt any criticism he foresaw that he might face because of it. Not sure if having Alex Jones on was the best idea, but I suppose it illustrates to his critics that he doesn’t give a rat’s ass what they think and also you have to give the guy credit for not shirking who he invites on his show and asking people from all walks of life. And at least allegedly fact checking everything they’re saying when it’s someone like Alex Jones so that his more dangerous and subversive views aren’t allowed to air without at least some kind of checks and balances in place.
Big move from Joe to be fair and I kinda respect it, as it seems do the top brass at Spotify as it seems they were also quick to defend their flagship podcaster after an internal email allegedly sent from Horacio Gutierrez – Spotify’s chief legal officer and head of global affairs – was intercepted by Buzzfeed, Here’s what it said:
If a team member has concerns about any piece of content on our platform, you should encourage them to report it to Trust & Safety because they are the experts on our team charged with reviewing content.
However, it’s important that they aren’t simply flagging a piece of content just because of something they’ve read online. It’s all too common that things are taken out of context.
We are not going to ban specific individuals from being guests on other people’s shows, as the episode/show complies with our content policies.
Spotify has always been a place for creative expressions.
It’s important to have diverse voices and points of view on our platform.
We are not going to ban specific individuals from being guests on other people’s shows, as the episode/show complies with our content policies.
In closing, we appreciate that not all of you will agree with every piece of content on our platform.
However, we do expect you to help your teams understand our role as a platform and the care we take in making decisions.
Nothing like telling it like it us hey? Doesn’t sound like they’re going to condemn their biggest earner any time soon does it?
Seems like this is probably going to be an issue every time Rogan does something even vaguely controversial on his show and it sounds like he’s going to be doing that every other week, so expect this to drag on for months/years before he finally pushes the envelope too much and gets cancelled. I think it’ll happen eventually but it could be a very long time.
For more of the same, check out Joe Rogan interviewing an Area 51 scientist who confirmed aliens were real. Nobody was getting angry about that one were they?
