WATCH: Joe Rogan Apologizes and Explains ‘Context’ for Multiple Uses of ‘N-Word’ on His Podcast

Tommy ChristopherFeb 5th, 2022, 3:12 pm
 

Embattled podcast host Joe Rogan took to social media to respond to a viral clip featuring past instances in which Rogan said the uncensored n-word on tape.

Rogan is locked in mortal combat with critics who object to the Covid misinformation that is featured on his podcast The Joe Rogan Experience, which has led to a campaign to get him removed from the Spotify streaming platform..

Rock stars like Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Graham Nash, their fellow bandmates David Crosby and Stephen Stills, and India Arie have removed their music from Spotify in protest of Rogan’s presence there.

Spotify responded to the outrage by implementing a “content advisory to any podcast episode that includes a discussion about Covid-19.”

And earlier this week, the popular resistance Twitter account Patriot Takes posted a supercut

On Saturday, Rogan responded with a nearly 6-minute Instagram video apologizing, and explaining his thinking about the context of those remarks when he made them.

“There’s been a lot of shit from the old episodes of the podcast that I wish I hadn’t said, or had said differently. This is my take on the worst of it,” Rogan wrote.

In the video, Rogan explains “There’s a video that’s out. It’s a compilation of me saying the N-word. It’s a video that’s made of clips taken out of context of me, of 12 years of conversations on my podcast, and it’s all smushed together, and it looks fucking horrible even to me.”

Now I know that to most people, there is no context where a white person is ever allowed to say that word. Never mind publicly on a podcast. And I agree with that now. I haven’t said it in years, but for a long time when I would bring that word up, like if you’d come up in conversation and stand instead of saying the N-word, I would just say the word I thought as long as it was in context, people would understand what I was doing. Like that context was part of the clip.

Rogan ticked through some specific examples, including this one:

I was also talking about how there’s not another word like it in the entire English language because it’s a word where only one group of people is allowed to use it. They can use in so many different ways, like if a white person, says that word, it’s racist and toxic. But a Black person can use it, and it can be a punch line, it could be a term of endearment. It could be lyrics to a rap song. It could be a positive affirmation. It’s a very unusual word, but it’s not my word to use. I’m well aware of that now, but for years I used it in that manner.

Rogan also tried to explain another incident in which he compared a Black neighborhood to the Planet of the Apes:

I was telling a story in the podcast about how me and my friend Tommy and his girlfriend, we got really high. We’re in Philadelphia and we went to go see Planet of the Apes, and we didn’t know where we were going. We just got dropped off by a cab and we got dropped off in this all-Black neighborhood. And I was trying to make the story entertaining and I said we got out. And it was like we were in Africa, so like we were in Planet of the Apes.

I did not, nor would I ever say that Black people are apes, but it sure fucking sounded like that. And I immediately afterwards said, That’s a racist thing to say. The Planet of the Apes wasn’t even in Africa. I was just saying, there’s a lot of Black people there.

That is pretty much how the segment went:

It’s unclear what Rogan thinks the defense to that story is?

Rogan wrapped up by expressing “My sincere and humble apologies. I wish there was more that I could say, but all of this is just me talking from the bottom, my heart. It makes me sick watching that video. But hopefully at least some of you will accept this and understand where I’m coming from.”

Watch above via Joe Rogan.

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