Joe Rogan trolled after sharing fake news about Steven Seagal joining Russian forces
Joe Rogan is being mocked mercilessly online after sharing a spoof news report claiming a Hollywood star had joined the Russian military.
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Embattled podcaster Joe Rogan is being mocked mercilessly online after posting a spoof CNN report that claimed Steven Seagal was assisting the Russians in their ongoing invasion of Ukraine.
The post surfaced amid high-stakes talks between the nations, in which Ukraine demanded that the invading nation withdraw troops from their country.
The screenshot, which the host of The Joe Rogan Experience shared to Facebook and Instagram on Monday, depicted the 69-year-old action movie star toting a machine gun while rocking sunglasses and combat fatigues.
The description read, “Intelligence agencies around the world have spotted American actor Steven Seagal among Russian special forces positioned around the outskirts of Gostomel airfield near Kyiv captured by Russian airborne troops.”
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Rogan, 54, captioned the faux report, “If I had to guess the plot of this f**ked up movie we’re living through I would say we are about 14 hours from the arrival of the aliens.”
Social media commenters were quick to rip into the post, which some pointed out was actually from Seagal’s 2016 thriller Sniper.
“This is obviously Photoshopped though,” scoffed one detractor on Instagram. “I may be a beluga whale but I do make memes for a living so I like to think I can detect a meme with my sonar.”
“I had to Google to make sure this wasn’t real. Lol this world is bonkers,” said another.
One critic wrote, “For anyone who thinks this is real: it’s quite cold — about -2°C — in most of Ukraine. This photo was clearly shot on a warm day.”
“@joerogan I’d laugh, but my friends are dying,” they added.
“Joe Rogan sharing misinformation while taking 70 episodes of his own show down,” snarked another, in reference to Spotify’s alleged culling of JRE episodes last month after the former comedian allegedly disseminated Covid disinformation.
Others took the opportunity to make cracks about Seagal’s oft-lampooned action movies. “He’s on deadly ground,” joked one in reference to the aikido master’s critically panned 1994 environmental thriller, On Deadly Ground.
“I hope miss July jumps out of a cake when he reaches his destination,” quipped another in an apparent shout out to former Playboy Playmate Erika Eleniak’s frosting-covered cameo in Under Siege.
Rogan deleted his post a short time afterwards, and replaced it with a screenshot of a (real) Washington Post article from five years ago which highlighted Russian President Vladimir Putin’s “bromance” with Seagal.
Rogan explained why he’d fallen for the post in the caption, writing: “I deleted my earlier post about Steven Seagal being in Ukraine because it was parody, which isn’t surprising, but honestly it wouldn’t be surprising if it was true either.
“He was banned from Ukraine in 2017 because he was labeled as a national security threat. I, like all of you hope the tragic situation is resolved there quickly.”
This isn’t the first time the conspiracy theorist has been accused of disseminating fake news. Spotify’s juggernaut podcaster found himself in hot water in recent months after doing a podcast with Dr. Robert Malone, a vaccine scientist who reportedly spread misinformation regarding the Covid jab, and compared the US’ current health climate to Nazi Germany.
The episode was subsequently pulled from YouTube while a coalition of 270 medical experts penned an open letter imploring Spotify to create a fact-checking policy that would “mitigate the spread of misinformation.”
Meanwhile, high-profile musicians from Joni Mitchell to Neil Young threatened to remove their music from the Swedish audio streaming giant unless it jettisoned Rogan.
This article originally appeared in the NY Post and was reproduced with permission.
Originally published as Joe Rogan trolled after sharing fake news about Steven Seagal joining Russian forces
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