You can pull it off if you've got integrity. John Stewart surely has plenty of integrity in my eyes. Joe's definitely also going for integrity, but maybe he's also liable to be pulled into the views of his guests. He certainly keeps an open mind, but if you surround yourself with a certain kind of people at some point you'll develop a bias no matter how open you're trying to be.
What's scarier are the persons who for the law are considered entertainment, but conduct themselves on Fox as if they're real journalists, and lie and deceive with impunity. If Joe Rogan could disrupt the right media with that, the same way John and maybe Stephen did on the left side, the world would be a better place for sure.
I actually think Rogan's approach is exactly the opposite of Stewart and Colbert (S&C). S&C would critique news organizations for failing to provide counterpoints. They would also earnestly advocate for their own views without feeling the need to provide counterpoints. Their justification was that they were entertainment - they believed what they were saying and didn't feel like they needed to properly inform on every element.
Rogan feels like he wants it both ways. He wants to pick the people for his show and get credit when he picks well, but if people dislike one of his picks he would suddenly like to be seen as 'mixing it up' or a "cage fight commentator." He won't really own a view (or the idea of wanting to expose people to particular thinkers), but he would rather bring people on in a way where he's seen as minimally responsible for the uncomfortable content he produces.
I'm a fan of Joe Rogan, but the "doesn't have a conflict of interest" argument doesn't seem correct to me. The point of Joe's podcast is that his biases and motivations are transparent, not that they don't exist. Joe is interested, like many people, in contrarians. It's a heuristic that leads him to interesting conversations, and those kinds of interesting conversations are why the podcast is so popular. Oftentimes people who seem one-dimensional in media coverage are shown to be much more than meets the eye when placed in a long-form non-confrontational setting. There is no guarantee of factualness or good faith in any conversation on the podcast, and in many cases he will bring in verifiably crazy people just to see what they're really like -- these are some of the most popular episodes, by the way.
That is an argument with some merit, but I don’t believe it applies here. Rogan brings on many polarizing guests, they happen to be mostly conservative. It’s not like he’s bringing on only moderates from all branches of politics
It's clear that the author really likes Rogan but finds it politically unacceptable to do so.
Joe is a solid interviewer because he's all about letting the interviee speak -- this can also be a flaw if you get the "wrong" guest, but on net Joe chooses a wide and at least interesting array of people to interview.
Discounting the comedy and MMA episodes (which albeit, there are a lot of) Joe has one of the most diverse sets of guests of any podcasts I listen to and doesn't try to dominate or editorialize too much (cough Kara Swisher -- who I love, but definitely can overpower her interviee on occasion)
Joe Rogan is a both-sides-ist. He shows people who speak the truth, and people who speak lies, and then claims to be impartial because he showed both sides.
Imagine this in any other field. It is not exactly reasonable to separately bring both a Nazi and a non-Nazi and claim to be impartial. In that scenario, most likely the normal person would sound relatively ambivalent, while the Nazi would be extremely agitated and emphatic that urgent action must be taken.
A fundamental of the human condition is we don't know who is lying and who is telling the truth. You can get a pretty good hit rate assuming everyone is lying, but the misses with that strategy are catastrophic because the rare truthful and productive people are dynamos.
What people really want is someone who, as best they can, is a bit humble and a bit curious. A note which Rogan hits a lot better than most. It is irrelevant whether he is right or wrong, that isn't what people are looking for. They can't assess that and frankly most people don't prioritise the truth that highly. If they want to be told what is right and wrong they can go watch cable and get told by the likes of government officials, or the clergy. Neither are popular. People want to know what opinions are floating around.
From that perspective, Joe Rogan does no wrong. He is fulfilling a role that people are desperate for. It is easy to overestimate the confident and noisy moralisers who worry about normal people hearing things that are not true - they aren't actually popular. That class of people are the sort who staff censorship bureaus.
Realistically even if Rogan were to push back, at the end of the day you'd just be watching a show through Joe Rogan's beliefs: he'd push back where he didn't agree and he'd let slide anything he agreed with.
Instead we have a show from the beliefs of each guest, and even if some guests are wrong (I'm sure every guest is wrong in some way), you do end up with a diversity of beliefs.
"His success was made possible, at least in part, by legacy media’s blind spots."
Blind spots generally persist because someone isn't held to account for reality. In this case, perhaps the editors are not being held to account. But how can that be fixed without just perpetuating the media meta-argument?
I guess the answer is variety: if you don't like the editorial decisions here, go somewhere else. That is a necessary solution with a free press, but ideally would not be the first line of defense.
The answer in this case is that Joe Rogan is simply taking on all of the roles: editor, interviewer, commentator, and sometimes the subject. But I have to imagine the separate roles were created for a reason... is it a net win?
Should we then respect Joe Rogan’s right to host and give platform to controversial (or even reprehensible) guests if he chooses to do so? Does that reflect poorly on his moral character or not necessarily?
Also, is there value for society in surfacing reprehensible ideas?
It's not strange many interesting people want to visit Joe Rogan podcast.
First, he is willing to give a voice to many who won't be able to tell their stories on mass media.
Who other will let speak people like James Damore? What major broadcaster is willing to interview Jordan Peterson without protraiting him as a villain?
He respects his guest, when in disagrement. His interview to Jack Dorsey (not much of his liking, I presume), was criticised for not being aggresive enough.
The interviewed is not afraid of a headline out of context.
Given the current political climate, I'm not suprised a MMA guy is capable of doing what most journalists don't.
What concerns me about Joe Rogan, and what this article helped solidify, is not necessarily his views, but the power he has as one person.
In my opinion he has taken some problematic view points, but others would agree with him more, and many would say he just plays devil's advocate and likes to talk hypotheticals and dig into interesting topics. I don't think any of this really matters.
The issue is that the views come from one guy, get amplified in some man-cave banter with a few guys paid by him, and then broadcast to an audience "larger than Belgium". This isn't normal. Media companies have layers of editors, they have at least some diversity, a woman will hopefully look at a story or script before it goes out, sometimes even a lawyer might tell them to tone it down a bit. Even celebrities with big followings on social media are likely to have more input on many of their postings than Rogan does on his broadcasts.
A bit of a filter is a good thing for everyone, whether it's trusted friends who can and do tell you when you're wrong, an editor at work, a legal team, whatever. It's also honest. I think Joe Rogan could use a filter.
Rogan is intellectually curious and he's not afraid to have conversations with people who have unpopular opinions, even opinions with which he disagrees. His interviewing style is a great example of "Seek first to understand, then to be understood." I have heard several times when someone explains something to Joe and he replies "I think that's all bullshit" and then proceeds to explain why he thinks that person's view/opinion is wrong. People (and the mainstream media, for that matter) are far too sensitive these days to hearing anyone say anything that disagrees with their worldview. It's easier, albeit intellectually lazy, to say "That's misinformation: BAN IT!" than to have an intelligent discussion, understand what someone else is saying, counter them with logic and more information, and end in a state where everyone is more informed on all sides of an issue.
But that won't translate into ratings so don't hold your breath waiting for it.
I used to listen to Rogan quite a bit until I realised what his format was, if he has reasonable guests on he'll find something to challenge them over (great), if he has 'controversial' guests on he'll let them mostly talk unchallenged. I used to think that was because he was easily redirected by bullshit artists, but after the anti-vaccine/ivermectin reporting I think it's more likely he just agrees with them and wants them to have a bigger platform
Again I'm not arguing he should be censored or that any differences in opinion should be excised from the public domain. But giving people equal platforms lends them equal credibility to laypeople and the general public, which is why I think a good faith effort to interview controversial subjects would include a lot of disclaimers/warnings/replies from experts which Rogan makes no attempt to do
That's not even remotely similar to Joe Rogan though? He has a podcast where he invites a wide variety of guests, and mostly lets them tell their stories without interruption or argument. Sometimes those guests say things people don't like, sometimes Joe himself says things people don't like (eg, alternative medicine for covid), but his controversies are because he's open-minded to a every perspective rather than intentionally shocking.
If people consider you the most trustworthy news source, you have a responsibility to live up to that trust, which saying "I'm only an entertainer" is abdicating, he was saying "I'm only an entertainer, why are you trying to hold me to the standards of news media?" Well, because millions consider you a trustworthy news source, that's why.
> There's this idea of court jester's as being the only people who could safely say certain things. I'm no historian so I can't speak to that historical accuracy, but that's how I view Jon Stewart.
I believe that's exactly how Rogan's audience views him too.
I am not a fan of Rogan. But this seems pretty similar. The difference is just that you disagree with Rogan's fans and agree with Stewarts, ok...
The difference is just that you personally think Stewart is generally more trustworthy than Rogan? If so (and I generally agree), why didn't Stewart accept that responsibility instead of trying to abdicate it with "I'm only an entertainer, you can't hold me to the standards of news media". Don't both Stewart and Rogan have the responsibility to in fact be held to the standards of news media, when millions consider them trustworthy as news media? I think both of them are irresponsible and acting in an untrustworthy manner if they say "I'm only an entertainer, I shouldn't be held to the standards of a news source", while being considered a trustworthy news source by many. How do we know if someone is trustworthy as a news source? By evaluating them as a news source, not letting them get out of it with "I'm just an entertainer, you can't hold me to that standard".
I like to think of there being different domains of trust. Trust to present accurate information to their best knowledge, trust to thoroughly vet information, trust to not construe facts to construct a false reality (ie a narrative), trust to tell it like it is, trust to not present a biased self interested story that omits important things purposefully, trust to be an expert on the subject matter, and so on.
Obviously any thinking individual will know Joe Rogan is worse at some of these aspects than mainstream media but they also recognize that mainstream media will willfully consistently violate other domains where Joe Rogan won't.
I trust Joe Rogan will tell me some stupid stuff about conspiracies and extra dimensionality trips, but I also trust that he won't tell me this stuff just to sell me on sponsors or his party's agenda, unlike the mainstream news.
What an odd take. Are you saying that professional journalism literally doesn't exist? That Joe Rogan is the same thing as James Risen? Admittedly plenty of people call themselves professional journalists that are frauds like all the folks at FOX or OAN who have been caught dead to rights lying to pander to their audiences. Or Rogan's guests like RFK and Alex Jones who only come on his show to promote their personal interests push their own utterly deceitful agendas.
But there are a great many serious people who take pride in speaking the truth and exposing reality that people don't want to hear. It's beyond cynical to think that every single one of them is fake.
His interviews are not adversarial and he is not judgemental towards his guests. He isn't there to put his guests on the spot. He isn't there to get a juicy soundbite taken out of context. He allows his guests to speak for as long as they want. And his guests appear to enjoy themselves.
These things are all true even if the guest or their ideas are extremely controversial. Maybe Joe Rogan is just smart in a way that's different to the way that you are smart.
What's scarier are the persons who for the law are considered entertainment, but conduct themselves on Fox as if they're real journalists, and lie and deceive with impunity. If Joe Rogan could disrupt the right media with that, the same way John and maybe Stephen did on the left side, the world would be a better place for sure.
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