Joe Rogan Blasted For Joking That LA Should Shoot Homeless People

Spotify podcaster Joe Rogan came under fire for cracking a joke that “you should just go and shoot homeless people” because of Los Angeles’ lax laws on violent crime.

During the Monday episode of “The Joe Rogan Experience,” the host and his guest, Netflix comedian Tom Segura, discussed how homeless encampments in public spaces are protected in areas of California.

Rogan, 54, recalled passing a homeless homestead on an LA freeway that blocked off the sidewalk and one of the lanes of the highway. 

Sickening. Joe Rogan, who’s worth millions, pontificates on the plight of homeless people, then decides the best solution may be just to “shoot the homeless people”. pic.twitter.com/mgBGmarzgP

— Mike Sington (@MikeSington) July 19, 2022

“When you see stuff like that on the streets, at least in Los Angeles or maybe in California, that’s protected property. Like by law. That’s that person’s property by law,” Segura pointed out. 

“Oh, a homeless person’s property is protected?” Rogan questioned. Segura mentioned that it was illegal to move or take the homeless’s belongings.  

“You’d get arrested. Hilarious. But they wouldn’t arrest you if you shot somebody. Maybe you should just go shoot the homeless people,” Rogan retorted.” And if nobody claims it. I mean nobody does anything about violent crime in LA anymore. It’s a f–king joke, they’re just letting people out.”

Rogan’s comments were condemned as “repulsive” and “infuriating” by “We the Unhoused” podcaster Theo Henderson. 

“It’s infuriating because it’s not only out of touch, but the reality is that unhoused people are targeted by housed people,” Henderson commented. “To advocate trying to shoot at unhoused people or just giving these dog whistles to people that do not see unhoused people as human beings — I can’t believe you’d advocate for it.”

During the same show, Rogan claimed that the US is an “authoritarian state” while discussing CIA whistleblower Edward Snowden’s exile. 

“Isn’t it ironic that Edward Snowden exposes the United States, exposes this like, this deep underlying surveillance system that is essentially monitoring everybody violating our constitutional rights,” Rogan stated. “He gets kicked out of the country and goes to Russia, and Russia takes him in. He’s happy over there. Fine in Russia.”

“The way they treated him, the way they treat Julian Assange, you could absolutely make the argument that this is an authoritarian state – and he leaves here to a far worse one, and there, he’s protected,” he concluded.

Marie Finn