Last week, we witnessed the latest episode of “Woke-scolds Attack” as Bernie Sanders committed the unimaginable crime of sharing a mild endorsement from comedian and podcast host Joe Rogan. Speaking with New York Times staff editor Bari Weiss, Joe Rogan stated that he was likely to vote for Bernie Sanders in the California Democratic Primary. Given that the Joe Rogan Experience is downloaded by hundreds of millions of listeners a month, it would be mind-bogglingly foolish for Bernie Sanders’ campaign not to try and take political advantage.
Setting aside the arguably flawed logic in Joe Rogan’s argument - consistency of ideology is hardly an important variable if the ideology in question is demonstrably immoral - as a phenomenally famous podcast host, with an audience which spans the political spectrum, such an endorsement would be a feather in the cap of the Sanders campaign. However, in the eyes of the increasingly-radical woke Left, Joe Rogan is nothing more than an “incredibly influential bigot,” and falls into the faceless basket of deplorable homophobes, racists, and transphobes the radical Left openly despise.
Rather ironically, because of the Left’s overused “guilt by association” arguments which are often promulgated by Sanders himself, the Senator from Vermont is being forced to lie in the bed of relentless intersectionality that he and many of his supporters have made. Even more absurdly, the farcical “slippery slope” argument permits people to compare Joe Rogan to Richard Spencer or David Duke...despite the fact that Joe Rogan is vocally Left-wing on many issues.
However, we must acknowledge and address the deeper issue of the radical Left’s inconsistent and politically-convenient outrage wielded to take down their enemies, while they continue to allow demonstrable bigots to thrive in their midst.
It’s patently absurd to argue that Joe Rogan is some sort of hateful bigot solely because his opinions on certain topics are unacceptable in the eyes of the woke Left. However, let us assume (for the sake of argument) that Bernie Sanders was indeed wrong to share an endorsement from someone accused of such bigotry. With this in mind, surely this would mean that others with a demonstrated history of bigotry would also be banished from Bernie’s ranks?
Enter Linda Sarsour, who works as a campaign surrogate for Bernie Sanders, who has an illustrious career of anti-Semitism which includes the support of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan, suggestions of “a conflict of interest between feminism and Zionism,” references to the age-old trope of Jewish dual-loyalty, and claims that Israel is “built on the idea that Jews are supreme to everyone else.” Interestingly, for Linda Sarsour, the woke-scolds’ silence is deafening.
What about another vocal anti-Semite Ilhan Omar, who endorsed Bernie Sanders in October of 2019? She has also accused American Jews of possessing dual loyalty, stated that Israel had “hypnotized the world” to hide their “evil doings,” and claimed that support for Israel is “all about the Benjamins,” all while shilling for the deeply anti-Semitic Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement. Again, silence.
The free pass given to politically-advantageous bigots such as Linda Sarsour and Ilhan Omar prove that the outrage triggered by Joe Rogan’s endorsement is utterly disingenuous. The brutal fact is that the radical Left don’t care about hate or bigotry. They only care about using accusations of hate or bigotry against their political enemies. They are nothing more than cowardly bullies who use the threat of deplatforming to force people to either openly mimic their views or cower in silence.
Yet again, combating anti-Semitism doesn’t play a part in the radical Left’s faux-crusade against bigotry. I wonder why?