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Sharon Stone sounded off on Joe Rogan over the way he’s approaching the COVID-19 misinformation controversy surrounding his show.
Rogan’s exclusive deal with Spotify has been in the crosshairs of various critics in the last week after Neil Young announced that he was pulling his library of music from the platform unless it addressed the misinformation about the pandemic and vaccines being promoted by Rogan as well as guests on his show. Joni Mitchell, Nils Lofgren, Graham Nash and India Arie followed Young soon after while calls for more artists to do the same mount.
Stone, who has worked as an activist for several years in the field of infectious diseases such as HIV and AIDS, was approached by TMZ in Beverly Hills. In her impromptu interview, she pulled no punches in her criticism of Rogan’s apology and his commitment to present a more balanced collection of opinions on his immensely popular show.
JOE ROGAN BREAKS SILENCE AFTER NEIL YOUNG'S SPOTIFY CONTROVERSY
Sharon Stone sounded off on Joe Rogan over his recent Spotify controversy. (Britta Pedersen/picture alliance via Getty Images - Ronald Martinez/Getty Images)
"I’m an infectious disease worker who has won the Nobel Peace summit Award for my work in infectious disease, Harvard Awards, Einstein Awards, you know these kinds of things," she said. "And, you know I worked with Dr. [Anthony] Fauci for decades and I just want to say — COVID is not an opinion-based situation and Mr. Rogan thinking that his opinion or a disclaimer for the lives that he personally has affected and caused losses of, it’s not an opinion."
The star went a step further, calling Rogan’s comments "idiocy" and shaming him for pretending his opinions are the same as researched medical facts.
Stone, 63, speaking during the 17th Zurich Film Festival in September. (Photo by Andreas Rentz/Getty Images for ZFF)
"Mr. Rogan is risking peoples’ lives with his idiocy and his professing that his thoughts about COVID are opinions, they aren’t opinions, COVID and infectious diseases are science and they are fact-based situations," she declared. "So, the pretense that these are opinions is dangerous and his behavior is dangerous and so to is the pretense that these are opinions and that he should put a disclaimer… He should put a disclaimer that he’s and a--hole."
She noted that she believes many people have been impacted negatively or even died espousing the same beliefs they’ve heard on "The Joe Rogan Experience" that fly in the face of scientific research about vaccines and infectious disease prevention.
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Spotify announced that it will begin to put a disclaimer at the beginning of Joe Rogan’s show when he discusses COVID. (Photo by: Vivian Zink/Syfy/NBCU Photo Bank/NBCUniversal via Getty Images)
"People can say whatever they want to say. All I can say is that what I’m saying comes from my experience working in overcrowded laboratories with people risking their lives to save other people’s lives," Stone concluded. "My opinions come from standing in hospitals with children dying of AIDS while I explain to parents how heartbroken I am that they’re going to lose their infant or their child or their teenager or their sister or their brother or their mother or their father. I’ve stood by the bedsides of dying people for the last 25 years. I don’t know how many of these people’s opinions come with fact-based experience."
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Rogan is one of the streaming service's biggest stars, with a contract that could earn him more than $100 million. He released a video on Monday in which he addressed the recent criticism and defended the credentials of some of the more controversial guests he’s had on in recent months, specifically those who spoke about the COVID-19 pandemic and vaccines. Meanwhile, Spotify announced that it will place disclaimers on content that may have unverified information about COVID-19.
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