Joe Rogan confronted by Douglas Murray, on his own podcast, for platforming conspiracy theorists

Joe Rogan’s latest guest, conservative British journalist Douglas Murray, has criticised him to his face for platforming conspiracy theorists.

Podcaster Joe Rogan has been called out quite brutally on his own show, with a guest hammering him, along with prominent voices in the “right-wing” media ecosphere, for platforming conspiracy theorists and privileging “fringe” views.

Mr Rogan’s guests on the latest episode of his podcast, The Joe Rogan Experience, were the conservative British journalist Douglas Murray and American comedian Dave Smith.

It was Mr Murray who offered a sustained critique of Mr Rogan.

Joe Rogan speaking to Douglas Murray. Picture: The Joe Rogan Experience

And Mr Murray in a moment of relatable exasperation. Picture: The Joe Rogan Experience

“Can I ask you something? Since the war in Ukraine began, and the war in Israel began, you’ve had quite a lot of people who are very against both, in different ways. Do you think you’ve had enough people on who are supportive of either war?” he asked the host.

The context here is that Mr Murray has been an advocate for both Ukraine, in its defence against Vladimir Putin’s invasion, and for Israel in its response to the atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7, 2023.

When he characterised Mr Rogan’s guests as being “against” the war in Ukraine he was referring to those who think the West, and the United States in particular, should not be sending the country aid.

“I don’t know that word, ‘enough’, if that’s a good word,” Mr Rogan told him.

“Let’s say enough people who are on the side of Israel, rather than wild critics of Israel,” Mr Murray clarified.

“Well I’ve had a few,” said Mr Rogan.

“Do you think you’ve tilted one way? The guests you’ve had?” asked Mr Murray.

“The guests? Yeah, probably, more tilted towards the idea that perhaps the way they’ve done it is barbaric,” the host responded.

“But why do you think that is? Your selection of guests?” Mr Murray pressed.

“I don’t think about it that way. I just think, ‘I’d like to talk to this person,’” said Mr Rogan.

“But if you’re going to interview historians of the conflict, or historians in general, why would you get someone like Ian Carroll?” Mr Murray asked.

Mr Carroll, who was platformed by Mr Rogan recently, is not a historian. He’s more of a conspiracy theorist. He has previously, for example, claimed Israel was responsible for 9/11, and expressed other views blaming Jewish people for various societal ills.

Ian Carroll during his appearance on Joe Rogan's podcast. Picture: The Joe Rogan Experience

“Ian Carroll, I didn’t bring him on for that purpose,” said Mr Rogan.

“I brought him on because I wanted to find out, how does one get involved in the entire conspiracy theory business? Because his whole thing is just conspiracies.”

“But do you have any – I mean, there’s been a tilt in the conversation, both conversations, in the last couple of years. And it’s largely to do with people who have appointed themselves as experts, who are not experts,” said Mr Murray.

To fill in the gap, Mr Murray appeared to be starting that sentence by asking Mr Rogan whether he feels any responsibility for whom he chooses to promote.

He then brought up “that other dude, who thinks he’s an expert on Churchill”. The guy in question here is Darryl Cooper, who quite infamously argued on Tucker Carlson’s podcast and elsewhere that British prime minister Winston Churchill was “the chief villain of World War II”. As opposed to, say, Adolf Hitler.

Darryl Cooper speaking to Joe Rogan. Picture: The Joe Rogan Experience

Mr Rogan asked whether Mr Murray had consumed any of Mr Cooper’s content.

“It’s pretty hard to listen to someone who says, ‘I don’t know what I’m talking about, but now I’m going to talk,’” Mr Murray shot back.

“Yeah, but that’s not exactly what Darryl was saying,” said Mr Smith.

“Darryl’s point of view – however you feel about this – what Darryl was saying is he doesn’t like to do debates. He likes to do long format stuff where he can really explain it.”

“But if you throw a lot of s*** out there, there’s some point at which ‘I’m just raising questions’ is not a valid thing. You’re not raising questions. You’re not asking questions. You’re telling people something,” said Mr Murray.

“I think a lot of people are doing that. I think Dave’s doing that. Dave is a comedian, but he’s now mainly talking about Israel.”

Mr Smith argued back on this point, characterising Mr Cooper’s description of Mr Churchill as a villain as a “hyperbolic, provocative statement”.

“But what’s the point of that?” asked Mr Murray.

“OK, but Pat Buchanan wrote an entire book on this. Is he not allowed, is he not an expert?” said Mr Smith.

Mr Buchanan, a right-wing American politician and political commentator who ran for president twice in the 1990s, wrote a book in 2009 blaming British “blunders”, and chiefly those he ascribed to Mr Churchill, for World War II.

Mr Buchanan during one of his presidential runs, in 1996.

“He’s certainly not an expert,” said Mr Murray.

“He can be interviewed. I watched Pat Buchanan debate. I watched him debate against Churchill historians, and he was absolutely levelled. Because he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

“He didn’t know what he was talking about. He had a contrary view, and it was interesting and stimulating to hear. But if you only get the contrary view, which is, ‘Isn’t it fun if we all pretend Churchill was the bad guy of the 20th century,’ at some point you’re going to lead people down a path where they think that’s the view.

“And that’s horses**t. Of the most profound kind.”

“You’re taking him out of context, when you talk about Darryl, who’s done what, 30-plus hours of podcasting?” Mr Rogan said of Mr Cooper.

“So what? Thirty-plus hours of podcasting. You do that in a week,” said Mr Murray. Not exactly moved to sympathy, there.

“I think it’s weird to mainstream very fringe views, constantly, and not give another side. I think that’s weird,” Mr Murray argued.

“Well, I mean, OK, I think there’s a little bit of a contradiction here. You’re saying here that these are fringe views, but you’re also saying these are enormously powerful,” said Mr Smith.

“No. No no no. There’s no contradiction. Let me clear it up for you, if you think there is,” Mr Murray said, interrupting.

“I think there are very fringe views that have become mainstreamed on the right-”

“But then aren’t they not fringe, by definition?” asked Mr Smith.

“Sure, you can play an epistemological game with me. You do understand the concept, don’t you?” said Mr Murray.

I probably shouldn’t transcribe the whole conversation. The entire back-and-forth on this subject, the platforming of people Mr Murray said “don’t know what they’re talking about”, lasted for maybe 40 minutes. You can watch it all here.

For what it’s worth the commenters, on YouTube, mostly sided with Mr Rogan and Mr Smith.

“Murray’s performance was a spectacular example of why the expert class is so utterly unspectacular,” said one guy.

“Three hours of Douglas Murray exercising an appeal to authority fallacy,” said another.

“Murray’s elite pompousness and unassailable righteousness are off the scale,” said one more.

To be fair there were also a fair few comments praising the podcast for offering up a debate that was deeply “engaging”.