Joe Rogan has vowed to quit his controversial podcast if he has to ‘walk on eggshells’ in the future.
The 54-year-old – who recently apologized for his use of the N-word in resurfaced videos – has been at the centre of the row with his podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience, accused of giving a platform to false statements about Covid and the vaccine.
This led to several musicians speaking out in protest against Spotify, with Neil Young among those removing their entire catalogue of music from the platform.
During the most recent instalment of the series, he was joined by guest Josh Barnett, with the MMA fighter explaining that he feared he would judged for ‘every little thing’ he said during their chat.
Addressing his fears, the host said: ‘There’s more people pouring over it but it’s the same thing. I do it the same way.
‘If I become something different because it grew bigger, I will quit.
‘If it gets to a point that I can’t do it anymore, where I have to do it in some sort of weird way where I walk on eggshells and mind my p’s and q’s, f**k that!’
It has been claimed that Rogan’s deal with Spotify is worth around $200million (£146m), meaning he will be walking away from a huge amount of money.
There has been intense scrutiny of the host and the streaming service after his podcast was accused of spreading misinformation around Covid and the vaccine.
A string of musicians, including Young and India Arie withdrew their work from the platform in protest, with Prince Harry and Meghan Markle issuing a statement ‘expressing concern’ to Spotify about the ‘all too real consequences’ of spreading misinformation about the global pandemic.
In a lengthy video, Rogan responded to the criticism by saying: ‘I’m not trying to promote misinformation, I’m not trying to be controversial. I’ve never tried to do anything with this podcast other than just talk to people and have interesting conversations.
‘My pledge to you is that I will do my best to try to balance out these more controversial viewpoints with other people’s perspectives, so that we can maybe find a better point of view.
‘I don’t want to just show the contrary opinion to what the narrative is. I want to show all kinds of opinions so that we can all figure what’s going on…’
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