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This week, Grammy-winning singer India.Arie, who has pulled her catalog from Spotify, shared a compilation video via Instagram that shows Rogan uttering a racial slur on numerous past episodes of his show. She also posted a message saying Rogan was problematic because of "his language around race."
The podcast host, who in 2020 inked a deal reportedly worth more than $100 million to distribute his show exclusively on Spotify, took to Instagram overnight to address the videos and apologize. "I certainly wasn't trying to be racist," Rogan said, "and I certainly would never want to offend someone for entertainment with something as stupid as racism."
The apology came shortly after a fan-made website found that roughly 70 episodes of the podcast were no longer available on Spotify. The website, JREMissing, uses Spotify's API to compare available episodes to a database of all episodes recorded.
Spotify has previously excluded episodes of the podcast for violating its content policies. CNET can't confirm a link between the currently circulating videos and the disappearance of the episodes. Neither Spotify nor Rogan responded to requests for comment.
The new controversy and apparent removals come amid broader concern about Rogan's podcast serving as a platform for COVID misinformation. Rocker Neil Young and folk icon Joni Mitchell pulled their music from Spotify after an open letter signed by more than 250 medical professionals, researchers and professors pointed to the podcast as evidence the streaming service was assisting in the promotion of misinformation.
CEO Daniel Ek has defended the inclusion of Rogan on the company's roster and told a company town hall that the podcast was vital to Spotify's success.
"If we want even a shot at achieving our bold ambitions, it will mean having content on Spotify that many of us may not be proud to be associated with," Ek said during the town hall. "Not anything goes, but there will be opinions, ideas and beliefs that we disagree with strongly and even makes us angry or sad."
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Cancel this.
Skynyrd was right, Neil needs to sh*t the hell up.
I used to like Neil better than dylan but they can both whine somewhere else .Nugent a way better guitarist anyways.
In a recent interview with Kristi Leigh, Nugent weighed in on the matter in his own characteristic style. “ I hope he’s healthy and happy, but I think his brain is so burnt, he doesn’t know what happy is anymore. If he is ‘rockin’ in the free world,’ then he wants to censor somebody who’s bringing information from world-renowned virologists and epidemiologists and calling that misinformation, but he’s gonna quote Joe Biden as the decree of… Are you kidding me? “ When you do that much mind-destroying chemicals upon yourself, your brain is burnt and you struggle to find logic, truth and common sense. Neil Young has no common sense. He’s out of his mind. And all you can do is pray for him and ignore his stupidity. That’s what I do, ” Nugent said.