Joe Rogan talks misinformation surrounding the Ukraine war

Benny A. King

Joe Rogan frequently features guests with interesting backgrounds. The legendary podcast host recently hosted retired United States Marine Dakota Meyer. The two talked at length about the current situation in Ukraine.

And Rogan appears to have a more nuanced take on situation than previously thought. Previously Rogan only touched on the Ukraine invasion as a side note in his war with CNN. First he called them out for blasting ads on top of War coverage – something the company that was ‘promoted’ wasn’t thrilled with.

In addition to this controversial podcaster posted a spoofed CNN report claiming that Steven Seagal was assisting Russian forces during their invasion of Ukraine. The meme was a play on the number of famous professional athletes that have joined the Ukraine army in order to stave of Russian forces in takeover of Ukraine. This in turn led to Rogan removing the post and clarifying his stance on the conflict:

“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.”

But during the recent podcast – Rogan shared a somewhat different take. The 59 year old podcast host started the exchange:

“… we’re in the middle of the Ukraine, Russia conflict. It just started a few days ago. And everyone is kind of shocked and terrified by this prospect of a hot war going on, you know, inside the former Soviet Union with Russia invading Ukraine, and we’re watching it play out on television. And it’s it’s a very terrifying time for a lot of people.”

Rogan’s guest offered an interesting perspective on the conflict by replying:

“Is it though? Like, I mean, let’s, let’s, again, I hate I hate Russia. So let’s get that off the table. But what would we do? If China came in, and China was teaming up with Mexico, and they were gonna put, and they were operating out of Mexico?”

Retired marine condemned Putin – while at the same time shading Ukraine government for corruption:

“I don’t know what to believe. Because, first of all, Putin’s evil, like, nobody’s arguing that, but But you know, Ukraine. I mean, their government’s not known for being honest – they’re one of the most corrupt governments there are. And it’s like, you know, I, I just don’t, it just doesn’t like we’re hypocritical.”

Rogan attempted to clarify his guest’s remarks: “You’re not saying that Russia is good. And Ukraine is evil. You’re saying it’s messy.”

Retired United States Marine Dakota Meyer followed that up by questioning several news stories that have come out of the region:

“I don’t know what to believe, you know, you, you hear these, these stories that inspire you to think that oh, you know, you know, these people on this island on that island. Next thing like that, you know, they gave their life and there’s this and it’s like, well, now they’re alive, supposedly, who knows? What’s what’s really happening? You see that, that tank that, you know, just veered off and ran over that car? And it’s like, didn’t you hear that? That was a Ukrainian tank. You know what I mean?”

What Meyer is referring to is the story about Ukrainian military on Snake Island sending the Russian an expletive ridden message instead of surrendering. It was initially reported that the 13 soldiers perished. It has since been released that Russian forces had captured the soldiers and were keeping them alive.  Ukrainian Navy said it had at first believed that the soldiers were dead because Russian bombardment destroyed the island’s infrastructure.

Rogan is quick to fact check his guest, too. Especially on the tank bit.

“I think that was that was a Russian tank. Right? I haven’t heard any of this. But yeah, I see what you’re saying. There’s so much misinformation, misinformation. Yeah, the island was a big one that they told Russia go f–k themselves and that they killed everybody on the island. But it turns out no, they actually been captured.”

You can watch the entire exchange below: