'I’m not a scientist': Joe Rogan apologizes to Spotify over podcast backlash
Joe Rogan posted a short 10-minute video on Instagram on Sunday, January 30, addressing the controversy surrounding his Spotify podcast for spreading Covid misinformation and promised to “do my best in the future to balance things out.”
The criticism reached a peak when Neil Young said he would remove his music from Spotify application due to Covid misinformation on Rogan’s podcast. In his video uploaded to Instagram, Rogan apologized to Spotify for the backlash.
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Rogan mentioned the two podcast guests that the controversy focused on — Dr Peter McCullough and Dr Robert Malone. Both guests made multiple claims related to the Covid-19 pandemic on 'The Joe Rogan Experience,' which were wrong according to fact-checking organization, Science Feedback. Joe Rogan said in his video that the guest had opinions that differed from the mainstream narrative but they were highly credible sources. He added, “I wanted to hear what their opinion is.”
Watch the full video below:
He captioned his post, “My thoughts on the latest controversy with @spotify," with a later addition that read "Edit: I just realized “chuckie’s in love” is Ricky Lee Jones not Joni Mitchell. Doh!”
In his video, Rogan explained: “These podcasts are very strange because they’re just conversations. And oftentimes, I have no idea what I’m going to talk about until I sit down and talk to people. And that’s why some of my ideas are not that prepared or fleshed out because I’m literally having them in real time, but I do my best and they’re just conversations, and I think that’s also the appeal of the show. It’s one of the things that makes it interesting. So I want to thank Spotify for being so supportive during this time, and I’m very sorry that this is happening to them and that they’re taking so much from it.”
“I do not know if they’re right,” he continued, referring to his two guests, Dr Peter McCullough and Dr Robert Malone. “I don’t know because I’m not a doctor. I’m not a scientist. I’m just a person who sits down and talks to people and has conversations with them. Do I get things wrong? Absolutely. I get things wrong, but I try to correct them whenever I get something wrong. I try to correct it because I’m interested in telling the truth. I’m interested in finding out what the truth is, and I’m interested in having interesting conversations with people that have differing opinions. I’m not interested in only talking to people that have one perspective.”
Joe Rogan thanked Spotify for its support and said he was a huge fan of Neil Young, who along with Joni Mitchell asked the streaming platform to remove his music due to COVID-19 misinformation on Rogan’s podcast.