Ever wonder what happened to Joe Rogan? Rogan got his break as “Joe,” the eccentric maintenance fellow on NewsRadio. Then, he hosted Fear Factor. Then, he hosted The Man Show, when even Jimmy Kimmel and Adam Carolla would no longer host The Man Show. Now, according to Wikipedia, Rogan is a “color commentator for the Ultimate Fighting Championship.”
But that’s not all! Rogan is also an expert on why the word “faggot” is not offensive to gays. And if it is offensive to you, as a gay person, that means you are just “the gayest.” And Rogan means that in the “faggot” sense of the word.
Got it? No? Well let Joe Rogan break it down for you, gay people! In an interview with Peter from Brightest Young Things, Rogan explains—-at excruciating length—-why calling people (also, dogs) “faggot” has “nothing to do with your sexual orientation.” Trust him on this—-he has spoken to at least one gay person!
BYT: Your act is often about brutal honesty, and can include stuff that some folks might find offensive. But when I hear someone like you or Louis CK use offensive language or talk about people’s use of “bad words” it’s hilarious and seems like an expression of your personality. As opposed to when my idiot friend . . . yells out “Faggot” in a bar, when it’s just embarrassing and hurtful. Can you explain the difference between these instances so I can print it and he’ll cut that shit out?
JR: [Laughs] Well one of them is done for comedy and planned out. Sometimes faggot is the right word. There’s a trend in this country to avoid words: “We can’t say that one anymore it’s offensive.” Interesting thing happened when I filmed my last comedy special. They told me they were going to censor everything when it aired before 1am, but then after 1am they were going to leave everything in–you could say fuck, cunt, all the seven dirty words– except faggot. They were going to beep out faggot. I was so confused. I was talking to this gay guy about it and asked, “What is that? I’m not talking to a human being when I say faggot, I called a dog a faggot.” You know it’s the talking dog in the anti-pot commercials. The bit is about the guy realizing that the first thing his dog has to say is to tell him not to smoke weed. Like, you motherfucker you could talk this whole time? This is your message? So then he has a bunch of messages to his dog like “How about you stop chasing your tail faggot!” Just talking shit to his dog.
So this gay guy I was talking to was like “Well you can’t say it. I can say it because I’m gay. But you can’t. It’s our nigger.” He literally said that. I was like, “This is a new thing that the gay people have decided? That’s the gayest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.” You can’t do that. You can’t decide that a word is forbidden now collectively amongst your group of human beings, that the word is a slanderous evil nasty word about homosexuals. It’s not, the word doesn’t mean that. And sometimes it’s a good word to use in comedy. That’s what your friend has to realize when he’s at a bar just yelling out the word.
According to Rogan, “faggot,” which everyone everywhere has agreed is a slur against members of the LGBT community, is not “a slanderous evil nasty word about homosexuals.” The word actually refers to dogs, because Joe Rogan called a dog that once. Sure, Rogan employed the term in order to imply that the dog, by cultivating an obsession with its own butt, was acting like Rogan’s own offensive idea of what a gay person does. But whatever: It’s just a dog! If only us regular folks could figure out why calling a dog a word that refers to dogs makes for a funny joke, then we could all be color commentators for the Ultimate Fighting Championship.
BYT: Well that’s the thing his argument is similar to yours but not as nuanced. He has plenty of gay friends but he says “Well I’m not talking to them I’m talking to this straight guy who I think is an asshole…”
JR: Faggot never meant “gay” when I was a kid. You kind of knew that you could call a gay person faggot if you were ignorant, but nobody ever called someone a faggot if they were gay. Like if you all were going to go out and one guy’s like “you know what man I’m going to stay home I’m feeling kind of shitty,” you go, “You faggot.” That’s what it means. It’s about a guy wimping out, being a douchebag…it has nothing to do with your sexual orientation. It’s a great word! The whole thing about language is, it’s supposed to be broadcasting your intentions. These are my intentions and these words broadcast my feelings. If all of a sudden you have forbidden words that doesn’t make the intent any better. It’s just appeasing sensitive people.
The plot thickens. Rogan admits that it is, in fact, ignorant to “call a gay person faggot.” However, calling a presumably straight person “faggot” is a convenient way of communicating that that guy is “wimping out, being a douchebag,” as wimpiness and douchebaggery are qualities that Rogan apparently associates with gay men. To review: anti-gay slurs are only offensive when used against gay people. But that’s not an issue, because nobody would actually ever think to use an anti-gay slur against a real, live gay person.
BYT: I agree that it can be a funny word but when someone says “don’t say that around me because it hurts my feelings” I don’t really know what to say.
JR: Well then you say OK and you don’t say that around them. And then you don’t hang around them either. Because they are a sensitive cunt. There’s no time in life to hang around people who want to argue over the nuances of words we’ve used for hundreds of years. Just shut the fuck up man.You want to talk about the word faggot because it really offends you? Well you’re a douchebag. It’s really that simple. Anyone who gets annoyed by certain words or gets upset and outraged…though the word ‘nigger’ is different since it’s dehumanizing. There’s a a lot of hate and anger behind that word…I don’t think ‘faggot’ has the same connotation to the people who are saying it.
And Joe Rogan’s theory of “faggot” comes full-circle. If you are offended by the word “faggot,” you are a “douchebag.” And, if you can recall, being a “douchebag” makes you a “faggot.” By the transitive property, people who are offended by the word “faggot” are “faggots.” And since we’ve already established that the gay community is offended by the word “faggot”? Yep: You’ve just observed Joe Rogan proving to himself that gay people really are “faggots.”