One of Joe Rogan’s Latest Guests Really Rubbed Some Fans the Wrong Way
In a world of celebrities and politicians leading the news headlines, it’s not often that newspaper writers get some media attention of their own.
Bari Weiss, Op-Ed writer for The New York Times does just that. Once a writer for The Wall Street Journal as well as Tablet, an online magazine for Jewish politics and culture, Weiss ruffles more than a few feathers with her controversial writing, and the opinions she expresses in interviews.
What does Bari Weiss write about?
Looking through Weiss’ long list of headlines, a pattern emerges. She takes on topics that range from Jewish culture and Israel, to the #MeToo movement, to politics around the world.
Despite being left-leaning, her writing seems to attract ire from the left and the right as she often makes statements that seem overly critical of the left, and over-forgiving of the right.
It’s often hard to tell if she is expressing firmly-held beliefs or just vying for attention over controversial statements. This has led her to being compared to right-wing pundit Ann Coulter.
In her pieces, she has defended free speech, questioned the #MeToo movement, and overall takes an extremely hard-line stance when it comes to her opinions on Israel.
Her support of free speech is so extreme, in fact, that she seems to share more in common with the far right because of her hatred of political correctness and any attempts to keep spaces free of hate speech. She also has a firm stance on cultural appropriation that is mostly unheard of on the left.
In one of her most controversial pieces, “Three Cheers for Cultural Appropriation,” she goes so far as to say “cultural partitioning” is beloved by Neo-Nazis.
In addition to her articles, she also recently released her first book, How to Fight Anti-Semitism. Yehudah Mirsky, reviewer for The Guardian described it positively: “This passionate, vividly written, regularly insightful book is her pained, fighting elegy.”
What do other writers think about Bari Weiss?
When it comes to Weiss, opinions are mixed, at best. Vanity Fair writer Evgenia Peretz wrote a piece on her entitled “Mad About Bari Weiss: The New York Times Provocateur the Left Loves to Hate.”
In it, she made mention of the controversy surrounding Weiss, and how she has been called everything from “fascist” to “the Jewish, female version of Kanye West” but largely comes out on Weiss’ side, a fan even.
Nathan J. Robinson wrote a piece for Current Affairs called “Why We All Hate Bari Weiss So Much” in response to Peretz’s conclusions, that is decidedly against Weiss. He goes over in detail just how problematic he believes her views of Israel and Palestine are, among her other problematic views.
As part of the piece, he states: “Weiss is irritating because she portrays herself, and those like her, as martyrs who are ‘purged’ for their opinions, when instead they all receive book deals and profiles in liberal newspapers and magazine.”
What did Joe Rogan fans think of Bari Weiss’ recent interview?
Joe Rogan’s podcast is known for having guests from all over the political spectrum, but even so, fans were not pleased with Weiss’ interview. One fan commented: “This is about to be the most disliked Joe Rogan episode since… The last time she was on.”
Another fan wrote: “What a Disingenuous Hack, she’s the worst journalism has to offer.” Another joked: “She’s not Bari Weiss,” a play on “very wise.”
Joking aside, many had astute observations on her hypocrisy when it comes to her nationalistic view on Israel, but how she is anti-nationalism when it comes to everywhere else in the world.
Other topics of discussion ranged from her views on circumcision to the current Democratic candidates. Weiss is a fan of Yang, while Rogan is in support of Sanders.
