Masculinity and Markets: Joe Rogan’s interview with Robert Malone
Diana Daly
Masculinity and Markets: Joe Rogan’s interview with Robert Malone
Learning Objectives
- Describe how the Joe Rogan podcast uses Immersive Strategies to guide the listener’s thinking.
Introduction
Transcript of this podcast episode
We analyzed the nearly 3-hour interview by Joe Rogan of Dr. Robert Malone, which took place on December 30th, 2021 and was aired on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast the following day. The Joe Rogan Experience was the top podcast on the platform Spotify when this episode aired, capitalizing on Rogan’s popularity as a mixed martial arts champion and host of the show Fear Factor. The Joe Rogan Experience, also available on YouTube, delivers interviews presented as intending to inform in Spotify, the same online space where audiences stream entertainment including music and discussion of culture and sports.
In the conversation between Rogan and Malone, what sound like their sincere beliefs in misinformation intermingle with both men’s public plays for attention, reputation, and profit. The interview’s claims of conspiracies behind COVID-19 care and harm caused by vaccines reached millions of listeners. Reactions included an open letter signed by over 1,000 physicians and scientists calling on Spotify to “immediately establish a clear and public policy to moderate misinformation on its platform.” The episode has remained available, with Rogan and Spotify defending the episode by conflating free speech with the right to be amplified (discussed here by new media scholar Danah Boyd), and Rogan claiming to have gained subscribers from the controversy. The episode is no longer available on YouTube, but it is still available on Spotify.
Key Questions
- What types of strategies does the Joe Rogan podcast use?
- How does he use these strategies to engage with listeners?
Immersive Strategies and Tactics
Section 1.1: Truth From Sport
Immersive strategies found to drive the disinformation in this content relate to masculine gender performativity and the new media ideal of authenticity. The show’s mix of discussion topics (sports, politics, entertainment) plays as Rogan’s authentic stream of consciousness. Upon analysis, Rogan’s podcast series is a theater in which masculinity is articulated through rituals, discourse, and character tropes. One important theme found related to masculine performance was truth from sport, a rejection of consensus-based scientific processes coded as feminine, in favor the masculine ideal of truth achieved through sport-like public display. Truth from sport here follows from the false equivalence the two speakers use to compare Malone’s point of few with the broad scientific consensus he argues against. As an example, Malone cites scientists refusing his invitation to debate Malone live on air as evidence that Malone has truer arguments, and that all of those scientists are part of a conspiracy in the suppression of this truth. This drive to award trust through competition mirrors both capitalist free markets and the sport competitions for which Rogan’s audiences know him as fighter, commentator, and host.
Section 1.2: Non-Peer, Non-Review
A related theme is the non-peer non-review that serves as endorsement of information in podcast interviews, with masculine familial hierarchy a key factor in the value of Rogan’s endorsement of Malone and in the intersection of the men’s performances. Early in the episode, for example, Malone describes his credentials in the biomedical field alongside masculine-coded skills like carpentry, which receive Rogan’s attention and approval. As the episode goes on, Malone is elevated by Rogan’s flattery to the role of a fatherly, level-headed scientist in contrast with Rogan’s more readily inflamed ingenue. Malone’s discrediting by peers in the scientific world that is relatively unfamiliar to Rogan’s audiences is eclipsed by these more familiar character tropes. In all, the beloved podcast host’s submission to Malone’s narrative in this episode enables Malone to believably cast himself alone as mastering science. The “mind blown” sound Rogan makes as the episode nears the end is a culminating aural endorsement of his belief in the conspiracy Malone lays out in the episode.
Section 1.3: Heroes Within Conspiracy
A third immersive strategy relating to masculinity found in these performances is a fantasy of both men—and the believing audience by proxy—as heroes within conspiracy. The men bond in the episode as protectors of truth and especially of children, in a conspiracy of government and medical institutions pushing COVID-19 vaccines and treatments solely for profit. Language around this fantasy escalates to dog whistles, from Malone’s stated quest early in the episode to “stop the jabs in children” to demonizing language near the end of “overlords” responsible for mass vaccination campaigns.
Conclusion
The truth about COVID-19 and claims in this podcast episode
Vaccines to protect against COVID-19 significantly reduce the risk of death and severe illness. The podcast Science Vs made an episode debunking Rogan’s interview with Malone, citing strategies including cherry-picking, anecdotes, and sowing distrust in science through conspiracy. Malone’s claims in this episode have also been debunked by the New York Times and other news organization. The World Health Organization is a reliable source of the most up-to-date information about COVID-19 including myth-busting public information.
Key Terms/Vocab
the narration of memorable experiences to justify a belief in lieu of scientific evidence
a common disinformation tactic of selecting only the data or facts that support the desired belief, and ignoring other data or facts that might contradict that belief.
the theory that established powers are executing a coordinated ruse or attack, and any evidence to the contrary can be interpreted as further support of the theory
words or terms that mean one thing yet also covertly signal meaning only to receptive audiences
false equivalence
equating two subjects or giving them equal treatment based on faulty reasoning
a conspiracy trope presenting believers as vilified protectors of vulnerable, socially valued entities such as children
the trend in popular misinformative media to reject peer-review processes, and to instead use the trust of a popular host or other non-scientist as a believer proxy in the evaluation of scientific claims
a masculinity-focused disinformation trope involving rejection of consensus-based scientific processes coded as feminine, in favor the masculine ideal of truth achieved through sport-like public display
Media Attributions
- Manhood_Stone_(5) © Stu_spivack is licensed under a CC BY-SA (Attribution ShareAlike) license
https://vimeo.com/683522649
One of the artifacts encountered in the virtual ethnography of communications around the dance community is an excerpt of an interview with Naomi Wolf on the Fox News show Next Revolution. Wolf uses conjecture to infer motives of the vaccine passport as "literally the end of human liberty in the West." Logical fallacies in Wolf's argument are in the video above, including each of the below:
Strategies Wolf also uses include in-the group appeal to "the West" as an imagined community, bounded by difference from "the East" including Asian nations, to infer that these nations do not afford human liberty.
The Slippery Slope
https://vimeo.com/683522649
One of the artifacts encountered in the virtual ethnography of communications around the dance community is an excerpt of an interview with Naomi Wolf on the Fox News show Next Revolution. Wolf uses conjecture to infer motives of the vaccine passport as "literally the end of human liberty in the West." Logical fallacies in Wolf's argument are in the video above, including each of the below:
Strategies Wolf also uses include in-the group appeal to "the West" as an imagined community, bounded by difference from "the East" including Asian nations, to infer that these nations do not afford human liberty.
The Slippery Slope
One of the artifacts I've encountered in the communications of the pilot group was a heavily circulated excerpt of an interview with Naomi Wolf.
It is an afternoon in January, 2022 on a Hawaiian island. A group of about 50 people have convened for a ceremonial dance celebration, on a hilltop clearing surrounded by towering pine trees. The group is a blend of residents of the island and nonresidents, including many Northern Californians who began migrating here together recently. Most of in the community appear to be white and middle class, their ages ranging from 20s to 60s, plus a handful of children. The children alternate between playing in the forest and zipping through the clearing, where the adults dance to the throb of two large speakers lugged up the hill earlier in the day.
The ceremony is not affiliated with any religion but is steeped in new age spirituality. Some dancers move to their own rhythms and some together, circling or embracing one another. Two hours into the ceremony, the dance ends, and the main event organizer intones gently in the microphone that it is time for the next part of the ceremony, when they form a circle on the floor of pine needles and a few white canvas tarps. Two men play several minutes of music with a middle eastern flavor, one on a stringed instrument in the style of a guitar and one on a sort of xylophone. Many who were dancing now close their eyes as in meditation, and some embrace in groups I hear called "cuddle piles". When the music ends, one musician takes the microphone and says, "Thank you doing the work and choosing family," after which he and Paul hold a long embrace. After this, Paul takes the microphone, followed by many others in turn. The most common theme is gratitude to this community for feeling at home there. One plays a song with the refrain, "Look how influential you are." Some cry as they talk about the relief they feel dancing so freely and being back where they feel they belong. At the end, Paul asks if anyone will offer seven sounds of Om to close the circle. One man in his 30s with shoulder length hair says he would like to, then asks, "Instead of Om, can we say Home?" Paul agrees, and the man leads the group in the chant, add some shouts to become phrases "I'M GLAD TO BE —HOME."
What stands out as I reflect on that scene is that many present were not at "home" in the traditional sense of the word, including the organizer. Paul and others in the group do not have permanent housing on the island, because housing is costly and difficult to find on this island.. The community that I witnessed at the park on that island is connected in a hybridity of offline events like that dance, online connections on platforms including Telegram, and perhaps most of all, aspiration.
https://vimeo.com/683522649
One of the artifacts encountered in the virtual ethnography of communications around the dance community is an excerpt of an interview with Naomi Wolf on the Fox News show Next Revolution. Wolf uses conjecture to infer motives of the vaccine passport as "literally the end of human liberty in the West." Logical fallacies in Wolf's argument are in the video above, including each of the below:
Fallacies and propaganda strategies in this meme
Below I discuss the faulty reasoning and misleading appeals that are evident in this 57-second excerpt of Naomi Wolf's talk, with the help of illustrations from Ali Almossawi's excellent An Illustrated Book of Bad Arguments. Note that the biggest one, which frames the entire piece, is presented last, so don't assume we missed it!
4.The Slippery Slope
Strategies Wolf also uses include in-the group appeal to "the West" as an imagined community, bounded by difference from "the East" including Asian nations, to infer that these nations do not afford human liberty.
