India Arie Threatens to Pull Music from Spotify to Protest 'Racist' Joe Rogan
Washed-up singer complains hugely popular podcaster earns more money
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Singer India Arie is threatening to pull her music from Spotify unless the platform agrees to ban "racist" podcaster Joe Rogan.
Despite failing to break the top 100 in the past ten years, Arie believes her short-lived success twenty years ago carries enough weight to back Spotify into a corner.
Rogan has emerged as one of the most influential figures in the media in recent years.
His podcast is now so popular that it surpasses the viewership statistics of the likes of MSNBC, Fox News, and CNN's biggest shows.
The Joe Rogan Experience reportedly reaches an average of 11 million people per episode.
In comparison, Rogan's mainstream media counterparts did not even come close to pulling numbers similar to his average listenership.
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In fact, Rogan's show dwarfs all three of the top-ten largest left-wing primetime TV rivals combined.
Joe Rogan has completely disrupted the legacy media. pic.twitter.com/rBLCYweag0
— Pomp 🌪 (@APompliano) January 3, 2022
However, aside from Rogan's alleged "racist" remarks and "misinformation," India Arie claims that it's unfair that she earns less from Spotify that the hugely popular podcaster.
"I have decided to pull my music and podcast from Spotify,” the singer shared in an Instagram post on Tuesday.
"Neil Young opened a door that I MUST walk through.
"I believe in freedom of speech," she alleged.
"However, I find Joe Rogan problematic for reasons OTHER than his Covid interviews…”
Arie went on to explain how she was offended by the way Rogan spoke about race during the episode he hosted with guest Dr. Jordan Peterson.
She also alluded to being indignant at the pay structure for musical artists versus podcast creators.
"What I am talking about is RESPECT,” the “Magic” singer continued.
"Who gets it and who doesn’t.
"Paying musicians a fraction of a penny and [Rogan] $100M?
"This shows the type of company they are and the company that they keep.
"I’m tired.”
Rogan brought up race in an episode of his podcast last week.
The JRE host said it was strange to call someone black or white based on skin tone, especially with a “spectrum of shades of people.”
“Unless you’re talking to someone who is like 100% African, from the darkest place, where they’re not wearing any clothes all day, and they’ve developed all that melanin to protect themselves from the sun, you know, even the term ‘Black’ is weird,” Rogan said on the podcast.
Spotify vowed to publish “long-standing platform rules” in response to the criticism and is planning to “add a content advisory to any podcast episode that includes a discussion about COVID-19.”
However, they did not indicate that Rogan was in jeopardy of losing his show.
Rogan also shared a lengthy response to the matter over the weekend, saying he is committed to presenting both sides of any argument in an attempt to learn about controversial topics rather than just catering to one side or the other.
The podcast host defended his show saying, “Do I get things wrong?
"Absolutely. I get things wrong, but I try to correct them.
"Whenever I get something wrong.
"I try to correct it because I’m interested in telling the truth.
"I’m interested in finding out what the truth is.
"And I’m interested in having interesting conversations with people that have differing opinions.
"I’m not interested in only talking to people that have one perspective.”
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Most musicians who committed to removing their music so far, including Young, Mitchell, and Bruce Springsteen guitarist Nils Lofgren, have all been upset about COVID issues specifically and Rogan’s willingness to host those of differing opinions.
Arie was the first artist to cite other podcast episodes as “problematic.”
She likely won’t be the last.
Now that Rogan is being openly criticized, more artists are becoming emboldened to speak out against the popular podcaster for promoting opinions that vary from the mainstream.
An apology has never stopped the mob before.
