Joe Rogan responded to the controversy around his recent comments about the COVID-19 vaccine during the April 29 episode of the Joe Rogan Experience podcast, #1642. Rogan sparked outrage and a response from the Biden administration after saying he doesn’t think young, healthy people should get the coronavirus vaccine.
Rogan said on the podcast, “These are not planned statements. Let’s be real clear. When I say something stupid, I’m not thinking about what I’m going to say before I say it. I’m just saying it. I don’t have an off-air, an on-air voice, I have me. I got through the f****** net and I’m swimming in open waters. And that’s how I live.”
During the conversation with fellow comedian Andrew Santino on the Spotify-distributed JRE podcast, Rogan said, “The thing about this whole thing, people being upset at me, I didn’t say, I’m not an anti-vax person. In fact, I said I believe they’re safe, and I encourage many people to take them. My parents were vaccinated. I just said I don’t think if you’re a young healthy person that you need it. Their argument was you need it for other people.” Santino interjected, “So you don’t transmit it,” and Rogan said, “That makes more sense. But that’s a different argument. That’s a different conversation.”
Rogan, on the April 24 episode of his podcast, featuring libertarian comedian Dave Smith, said, “If you’re like 21 years old, and you say to me, should I get vaccinated? I’ll go no. Are you healthy? Are you a healthy person? Like, look, don’t do anything stupid, but you should take care of yourself. … If you’re a healthy person, and you’re exercising all the time, and you’re young, and you’re eating well, like, I don’t think you need to worry about this.”
The comments sparked outrage on social media and responses from medical experts, including Dr. Anthony Fauci. On NBC’s Today show, Fauci responded to Rogan, “Well, that’s incorrect. And the reason why is that you’re talking about yourself in a vacuum then. You’re worried about yourself getting infected and the likelihood that you’re not gonna get any symptoms. But you can get infected and will get infected if you put yourself at risk. And even if you don’t have any symptoms, you’re propagating the outbreak because it is likely that you — even if you have no symptoms — that you may inadvertently and innocently then infect someone else who might infect someone who really could have a problem with a severe outcome.”
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Rogan Said the Problem Is People Listen to His 3-Hour Podcast & Find the ‘Stupid S***’ He Says to Create ‘Clickbaity’ Headlines
Rogan said during the April 29 JRE episode with Santino, “If you say you disagree with me, I probably disagree with me too. I disagree with me all the time. If someone said, ‘Yeah, young healthy 21-year-old people who eat well and exercise are not at high risk for coronavirus, but you should think about other people,’ I would say, ‘Well that’s a different argument, but yes. That makes sense.’ But I’d say, ‘Aren’t those people vaccinated and shouldn’t we vaccinate the vulnerable people?’ And then we’d have a different conversation.”
Rogan added, “The problem is today, everything is all headlines, and highlights and it’s all clickbait. Which is fine. That’s the business. Listen, I have a deep respect for real journalism. I love Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi and people who stick their neck out and do real journalism. But there’s a lot of people out there that have to make a f***** living. And what’s the best way to make a living? Here’s one way, take a jackass like me, go over their podcast. Go over this three-hour drunken, ridiculous podcast.” Rogan said he didn’t drink during his controversial conversation with Smith, but “that’s unusual.”
He added, “Usually we’re drinking or we’re high. And I say stupid s***. I get it. And if you mine that and you make money off of that. More power to you. I don’t care. I’m happy for you. Just don’t lie. Get a little clickbaity, we’re good.”
Rogan Revealed He Was Planning to Get the Johnson & Johnson Vaccine Before It Was Pulled From Distribution
During the April 29 episode of his podcast, Rogan expressed surprise that the White House had responded to his statements. Santino said, “that’s so funny, Fauci hit you up.” Rogan replied, “Well he didn’t hit me up necessarily. He disagreed with me.”
Santino said he got “vaxxed up.” Rogan then asked Santino why he got the shot after already having COVID-19. Santino joked, “I’m a sheeple, dude. I’m part of the sheep, I wanted it. ” He added, “Because my antibodies were gone. The last time I got tested for antibodies was three months after and they said they were there but they weren’t super strong.”
Rogan interjected, “So you were scared.” Santino responded with a laugh, “Yeah.” Santino said he received the first shot of the Moderna vaccine and will be getting a second shot. “Corona for me was weird already, so I was like ‘I don’t know, I’ll just do that thing so I don’t have it again.'” Rogan said, “It’s not being a sheep. There’s some legitimate science behind it.”
Rogan added, “I was going to get the vaccine. I was scheduled to get the Johnson & Johnson vaccine. The UFC had allocated a certain amount of vaccines for all their employees. And so Dana said, ‘Do you want to come in and get the vaccine?’ And I said, ‘Sure, what day?'” Rogan said White told him they’d set one aside for when he came to commentate on the fights at UFC 261 in Jacksonville, Florida, on April 24.
But Rogan said the UFC doctor told him with the way the CDC allocated the vaccines, “We really have to do you at the clinic. So can you come to the hospital?” Rogan said he didn’t have time to come on Monday, two days after the event, and then the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was pulled from distribution.
“I’m not a doctor, I’m a f****** moron. And I’m a cagefighting commentator who is a dirty standup comedian. I just told you, I’m drunk most of the time. And I do testosterone and I smoke a lot of weed,” Rogan said. “I’m not a respected source of information, even for me. If I say things, I’m always going, ‘Check on that Jamie, I don’t know if that’s true,'” Rogan said, in a reference to his producer, Jamie Vernon. He added, “I do that all the time. But I at least try to be honest about what I’m saying.”
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Joe Rogan Opens Up About Vaccine Controversy: ‘I Say Stupid S***’