Joe Rogan has admitted that he was completely wrong about the COVID-19
vaccine.
Not really, no, only in some aspects, though.
So in this particular instance he had guest Josh's Epson to discuss the ongoing
discussions about myocarditis and its prevalence in either COVID vaccinations or
just getting COVID naturally within the environment, throughout the country.
So as this discussion unfolded, Joe did not really believe,
what's the name, what Zepce had to say, but eventually they figured it out.
Let's listen to this first part.
>> Where there's an adverse risk associated with the vaccine,
it's like 2-4 fold increase in the instances of myocarditis.
>> Yes.
>> [INAUDIBLE] hospitalization.
>> But you know that there's an increased risk of myocarditis among that age cohort
from getting COVID as well.
Which exceeds the risk of myocarditis from the vaccine.
I don't think that's true.
I don't think it's true.
>> It is.
>> No, no, no, I don't think it's true that there's an increased risk of
myocarditis from people catching COVID that are young versus increased risk of
myocarditis from the vaccine.
>> No, there is.
There's [INAUDIBLE].
>> Well, let's look that up, cuz I don't think that's true.
>> He did not think that was true.
He wants to look it up live on the show, kudos.
So they looked it up live.
Let's watch.
>> Myocarditis is more common after COVID-19 infection than vaccination.
Was this with Children?
Yeah, we're talking about young people.
>> This is with men and boys aged under 30, this is what it says here.
>> With Children is the issue.
>> Well, no, we were talking about 15 year old's.
>> Well, we're talking about young Children.
>> [INAUDIBLE] 12 to 17.
>> 12 to 17, more likely developed myocarditis with three months of catching
COVID at a rate of 450 cases per million infection.
This compares to 67 cases of myocarditis per million at the same time
following their second dose of Pfizer.
>> Yes, you're about eight times likelier to get myocarditis from getting COVID than
from getting the vaccine.
>> That's interesting.
>> Now, that being said.
>> That is not what I've read before.
But also it's like even when we're reading these things,
it's like what are we getting this from?
Is this from the various reports?
But even from the various reports, when they report this stuff,
it's like the amount of people that report, it's the under reporting.
>> So they worked through it a bit.
There was a couple of, as you discover some more information from Joe there,
maybe you have to do a couple of mental hurdles of, well,
I thought I saw something different then, over who was this from?
Well, are we specifically sure we're talking about young enough Children?
All those went through.
Before we get to how Rogan responded on twitter,
I first wanna get you all immediate responses just from that incident there.
Ben, please go ahead.
>> Sure, happy to.
I was chomping at the bit really.
I was just trying to be polite by waiting.
>> [LAUGH] >> What a pivot?
Kudos, like you said, to Joe for correcting himself on the record, but
didn't stick with the full correction, immediately went to, yeah, but
where are we getting this information?
Yeah, Malcolm, he didn't say that when you were spreading your misinformation, Joe.
Where are we getting your information?
He goes, is this from the various or
the self reporting website that is known to just be broadly inaccurate numbers and
people can put up there whatever they want.
It's not like we don't have any bad actors that are spreading disinformation
intentionally.
It's from a scientific, very respected, I think it's the British Journal of Medicine
or something to that ilk, that is where that story came from.
So then joe had to correct it on twitter, but come on man.
>> [LAUGH] He was working a few angles.
Did you see anything that stuck out there for
you Adrian, before we get to his thoughts?
>> It's funny because I think Joe Rogan had said the thought that he felt like
a dummy or something to that extent.
And the thing is, it didn't come off to me that way because I never considered
Joe Rogan to be any kind of authority when it comes to medicine.
And the fact that joe Rogan may feel foolish in some regard or
may have felt like, my God, I just got caught off base.
It's like, why do you think you have an MD or PhD behind your name?
Because last I checked it wasn't there.
So why do you even expect to have this knowledge?
And the fact that he might purport or carry himself out as having it,
is very disconcerting.
But even more so that there are other people out there who would actually
rely on this man's judgment.
>> I feel like things like that, it's a bit of, especially right now, especially
currently in this country, I'm sure other countries, but when the debate goes on,
it's hard because of our pride to say, okay, maybe I've had this wrong.
And that's not something that's particular to people that are against the vaccine
versus Ford, versus Democrats, versus conservatives, any of that type of stuff.
It's just a matter of people having the ability to say, whoa,
now what are you saying really?
Cuz I told you thought something different, as you said,
kudos that he at least admitted that as he was going.
Now, as he tweeted about it, this is where it went.
Afterwards he tweeted with the clip that happened and said,
if anyone was going to make me look dumb on the podcast,
I'm glad it was Josh's Zeps, because I love him and he's awesome.
However, this is why I was confused, and he linked back to the article
from September where he originally saw that information.
He continued on with a few other tweets here.
That video was cringey, but it's what happens when you stumble on a long form
podcast when you didn't know a subject was going to come up and you just wing it.
And lastly, obviously I have no idea what what is right, but
the article I posted was what I was referring to.
I'm sure I'll stumble again in the future, but
I honestly do my best to get these things correct.
Okay, now hear me out.
>> Can I say more?
No, you go first and I will hear you out.
>> Yeah, here me out, Ben and Adrian.
This is how it's supposed to work.
I'm happy this happened this way and I'm not willing to call Joe Rogan a dummy and
an idiot.
And, [SOUND] I told you.
Again, and I said this way early on with the pandemic in 20,.
I was like, as we discover things and as things get learned,
cuz that's how science works.
As they go through experiments as they test.
This is a new virus we hadn't seen before and maybe some elements that we knew
about, but this was something new as it hit the entire world.
And when people come up with their conclusions, I had conclusions,
I was wrong about it first too, hey just weren't as drastic.
And other people do as well.
And if someone then tells me, I told you JR.
I'm like okay, I must leave you alone and
maybe I'm gonna find someone else that I can talk to.
That's a bit of a human nature thing and because of how aggressive people are and
maybe it starts with people that are against the vaccine or
sometimes conservatives.
The automatic knee jerk reaction back from people like us is, dummy, I told you,
are you gonna do it yet?
Take the vaccine.
That doesn't really lead us to people going that direction.
So I'm not big on the dancing on it.
And I understand the feeling for because there's a lot of emotion back and forth.
People are dying.
Family members and friends are dying.
So I get the anger, but I'm not sure if we can end it or
at least get closer to what we can by kind of going after each other like this.
>> Yeah, I think you make a really good point.
But I think also that, yeah, you are right, we can't just knee jerk react and
write people off, especially when they're willing to correct themselves.
And I don't think Joe is dumb.
Obviously, he's a very smart person.
He has amassed a huge audience, not from being a ridiculous person, but for being
open minded to all kinds of conversations and he deserves credit for that for sure.
I just think that you have to correct harder when you're spreading
misinformation that might hurt people, that could affect lives.
You can't just say here's the article, we really don't know.
But why don't you air on the side of science when you're not positive,
why not air on that side?
I don't get it.
>> Yep, and that's exactly how I feel.
I think when you have that many listeners, followers, people who look up to you,
that you need to stay in your lane.
You need to stay in your knowledge base and anything outside of that realm,
you should be hedging.
You should be saying, I speculate, I suspect, I think,
I've heard that these are the facts, but my thoughts are this.
You need to let people know because there are people out there who do not
necessarily have that full intellectual capacity to be able to decipher between
what is fact and what is your opinion.
And as a result of that, when you have people's lives on the line,
that is on you.
When you are not parsing out your language and
you are speaking as though you are an authority in that area.
Leave the science, leave the medicine, to those who study it and
who are experts of it, and who are peer reviewed and
supported by the vast majority of the medical community.
>> I understand [CROSSTALK].
>> And also.
>> Yeah, go ahead.
>> And also, Joe is just selective about when he's open minded and when he isn't,
which is a little bit of an issue.
I've known joe personally for a long time.
We're both comics and
there have been times where he's been very closed minded to me.
I I ran for President of the United States and he refused to have me on.
We got into a verbal altercation, basically,
at the improv talking about that exact thing.
When he has on people that are actively, I was trying to offer a different way
of thinking, a different option to the American people and instead Joe is like,
let's have on every hate filled broadcaster.
Let's have on Milo Yiannopoulos spreading hateful messages, have Alex Jones on, but
not one of your colleagues who's offering a different option for
the country during a very critical time.
And he got angry that I even brought up the suggestion.
So it's very strange when he, and
then went on to his podcast that kind of mock me yet.
So, maybe a little bit of my reacting.
There was a little bit of just frustration at how he's willing to go and
mock people who he has not spent a minute to research or understand.
But in responsible you said a minute ago, Adrian,
it's true he's not a doctor, but he does commentate over grown men
fighting each other in an octagon that they're locked in.
Which basically in today's America is kind of the same.
>> Just about, I can understand that.
>> It's about the same, so you gotta give him a little leeway there.
>> [CROSSTALK] you're actually right.
>> And when it comes to that interaction you had with him, Ben,
that's what I'm talking about.
So there's not much of a bit of patience there from anyone else he comes after.
I'm sure maybe you're not the only person who's come after like that.
You don't have much energy left.
It's like, okay, I like what you're doing, now let's sit down and talk and
maybe we'll go back and forth and discuss how this really works.
Because what we're all trying to get to is an end to this.
And that is the thing that I think a lot of people from either argument don't
really want to acknowledge, that we're trying to get to the end of this.
Now, maybe some people just don't think there's such a thing and
that becomes a problem because you're extending the problem.
But when the energy and the anger is already negative,
you can't expect to get much positivity back.
And from the few people that do give it to you,
all you gonna do is probably ignore them anyway, because now we're just fighting.
That's how these things work.
One more thing speaking of how he's speaking to so many large audience.
There was a group of a couple 100 doctors and scientists, healthcare workers who put
out a letter for Spotify, whereas podcast is also broadcast to try to get them to do
something about the disinformation that he does put out there.
So let's go to this really fast from Common Dreams.
Doctors, health care workers and scientists from around the world,
warned streaming company Spotify, that it's most listened to a podcast,
The Joe Rogan Experience.
Is endangering millions of people by giving a platform to guests who
spread misinformation about COVID-19,
without the company making an effort to correct these false statements.
And they continued by saying, by allowing the propagation of false and
societally harmful asset assertations, Spotify is enabling it's hosted media to
damage public trust in scientific research.
And sow doubt in the credibility of data driven guidance offered by medical
professionals.
That's what these experts all said as they signed this.
We'll see if Spotify responded.
If they did, I didn't see that yet.
But there's looking to shore things up the way that you see on twitter or
I think maybe Facebook.
I don't really mess with Facebook.
Anything about COVID, there's suddenly this notification at the bottom
of the post saying, if you wanna read about it here, click here.
I'm not sure if that's gonna be something that really is capable of Spotify, but
maybe that's what they're looking for.
>> Yeah, but also that's the bigger issue too, is that it's okay for
Joe to apologize after the fact for misinformation his show is spreading.
But the big issue is in the vetting of their guests before they have them on.
If you're gonna be critical of having different perspectives on,
maybe also be critical of people you might intrinsically agree with, but
are not backed by any sort of science.
Joe definitely tends these days to be very much on the right side of things,
not as incorrect, as in the right side of our political spectrum.
And that's fine, you're entitled, of course, to your opinion.
But when that gets more alt righty, when it gets to place that's about spreading
disinformation, that's about just sowing chaos in the national conversation.
You can't just say, oops, I'm trying my best.
Because also, Joe, and I'm a man that enjoys in my private time,
drinking sometimes and some marijuana sometimes.
But when you're doing a podcast and you're talking about news issues,
I would never do that during a Young Turks appearance.
When you're doing a podcast that has 11 million listeners you're having on medical
experts or people that are pretending to be that and are the exact opposite,
maybe take it a little bit more seriously.
You do have a responsibility to the entire society, to the entire planet.
So perhaps, smoke after.
>> [LAUGH] >> [LAUGH] I'm not gonna tell people when
to smoke and when not to as I'm sure some people operate better that way, but
I will definitely encourage vetting individuals.
Because you do want to have people who have been, they're publishing studies,
have been subject to peer review as well as who are just reputable sources.
Because there are people out there with PHDs and MDs behind their name,
who are engaged in all sorts of shenanigans and
they should not necessarily be held out to the authorities.
But those are few and far between.
Especially when we're in a chaotic situation like a pandemic and
there are people dying.
And also we're not necessarily getting out of that pandemic and people will continue
to get sick or die because we all have to rely on each other to work together.
And so when we need that collective action,
it's better not to use your platform to uplift someone who's just
gonna provoke chaos and who is full of absolute nonsense.
>> And you're right.
I would like to apologize for telling people not to
smoke because I also kind of pigeonholed myself there unnecessarily.
So, strong point, Adrian.
>> [LAUGH] >> It's cool, it's cool,
I'm high now, so I got it.
>> [LAUGH]