Joe Rogan and Working Class Appeal
However, not everyone was happy with this, and some even were very upset over the Sanders campaign sharing the video. The reason why is that Joe Rogan does have a history of saying some inappropriate things, hosting right-winger personalities, and entertaining pseudoscience and conspiracy theories. Most of the people upset were mostly concerned about the former. The most talked about issue being some transphobic statements Rogan made about transgender women’s MMA fighter, Fallon Fox. In several different instances he had discussed his opinion on why he believes it is unfair for a transgender woman to compete against cisgender women in MMA. He also often gets into pretty bigoted sounding language such as calling Fallon Fox a man. There were also some other instances dug up where Rogan said something racist or the like. The other most damning accusations were that Rogan has had several right wing figures such as Milo Yiannopolous, Alex Jones, Ben Shapiro, and Jordan Peterson on the show.
This of course led to a major backlash from certain internet personalities and not only did they attack Joe Rogan, but they also attacked Bernie Sanders for elevating a bigoted personality like Rogan. Rogan was described as a transphobe, fascist, and several other names. I even saw many people make the claim that Rogan’s rise to fame had come off his bigotry being appealing to white male audiences. This led to some people demanding that Bernie Sanders retract accepting his endorsement and to take down the video. It also led to people suggesting this is proof that Bernie Sanders doesn’t actually care about the issues of marginalized people, and the common trope that he is just a dirty class reductionist. Well, this isn’t quite the truth, nor is Joe Rogan the villain they want him to be. Let me explain why.
Joe Rogan’s rise to fame came from acting on some sitcoms such as News Radio and others, but his really big breaks were with the UFC and Fear Factor. This would eventually lead to his real home as a celebrity personality, podcasting. As a podcaster Rogan would excel making his podcast, the Joe Rogan Experience one of the most popular podcasts in the world with millions upon millions of regular listeners. He started out interviewing many MMA fighters, comedians, and other friends of his, my personal favorites being his early episodes with Bas Rutten(You should listen to his bar fight story). However, this would eventually branch out including actors, musicians, political commentators, and more. What made the show work though was the Rogan was not just your regular talk show host. He was someone you could relate. He came off as someone you knew from the gym or your football team back in high school. He’s intelligent, but not too intelligent in a snobbish way. He talks about drugs, aliens, conspiracy theories, and several other topics which would be common conversations among your bros. Joe Rogan is a bro. The listeners feel like he is one of their bros. Maybe most importantly, Rogan’s willingness to speak his mind as he sees it, sometimes with little filter provides a sense of realness missing from most entertainment.
This incredible appeal is something I find rather undeniable. I have huge criticisms of his views on transgender people, race, conspiracy theories and more. I also think he’s a bit gullible with some of the more right-wing people he has on the show. All that being said, I still like him. I have always liked him. This is exactly why the Bernie Sanders campaign made the decision to accept his endorsement and post the video of it online. I think this brings us to another important thing about Rogan. His imperfections are another redeeming quality in his character. Most of us know we are little bits of fuck ups here and there and so is Rogan. He’s not polished, he’s not always PC, and he occasionally says something stupid. This is another area we can all relate.
Now, what does this mean for the Bernie Sanders campaign? Personally, I think this entire ordeal has and will continue to turn out as an overwhelming success. Joe Rogan’s platform is so large it is undoubtedly reaching people Bernie may never have reached otherwise. Secondly, the loudest critics of the campaign sharing the endorsement video are mostly likely a vocal minority. They don’t express the views of the general public, and they definitely don’t express the views of Bernie’s primary demographic, the working class. This has been mostly confirmed in recent polls showing Bernie climbing to first in at least one national poll and leading in both Iowa and New Hampshire polls. The Rogan bump seems to have paid off.
Lastly, I do want to address a few issues with some of Joe Rogan’s views, especially his views on transgender rights and the like. It is undeniable that Rogan has some negative views towards transgender people, but it might be a bit more complicated than it appears. I don’t find Rogan to be explicitly bigoted as much as I do mistaken and guilty of getting carried away. His main criticisms of transgender people was the Fallon Fox issue with transwomen competing in women’s sports and puberty blockers in children. While I’m not going to argue either way on these I do think it is fair to point out these are probably fairly mainstream opinions currently in America. However, Rogan does seem to be capable of evolving his views as he did in a different podcast episode where he was discussing how in old movies certain things were acceptable then, but now, they are considered to be bigoted. Rogan’s example was Ace Ventura: Pet Detective which has a transgender woman as the film’s main antagonist and the climax having all the men in the police force being grossed out and puking when they notice she has a penis. Rogan was very quick to point out how this was definitely transphobic and not appropriate. So, Rogan does have some ability to improve his opinions.
Furthermore, most people are actually very similar to Rogan when it comes to their worldviews. They are a collection of good, mediocre, bad, and even batshit crazy ideas. Unfortunately, to be human is to be a walking contradiction when it comes to ideology. We all have our blind spots, and many of the woke lords that police everyone else’s views are equally, if not more guilty of this than the rest of us. Looking at Joe Rogan I would consider him to be firmly a left liberal. He overall supports policies which fit the mainstream left liberal and even probably more so than average for the American population. It makes perfect sense that he would vote for Bernie Sanders. Rogan has endorsed ideas such as single payer healthcare, unions, marijuana legalization and much more. Yes, that does come with his problematic views, but if we are realistic if you had a microphone next to you as often as he does you would probably say some problematic things yourself.
Ultimately, I believe the lesson of all of this is if we are going to build a popular left-wing political movement, we will need to have a diverse coalition that even includes diversity of opinion behind a progressive platform such as the one Bernie Sanders is promoting. As it stands now it seems to be working as you have people from every race, gender, religion, and everything else backing him, with the exception of the upper classes. Most importantly, Bernie’s class politics reach across the aisle to working class voters that may not always vote Democrat in ways no other candidate could. That is after all the goal for socialists, to win the working class. Universal values of class solidarity will always trump everything else.