India Arie once again clarifies position on Joe Rogan and Spotify, says ‘It is about her ‘integrity’ and ‘dignity’—nothing else

controversy

Feb 9

By Rebecca Johnson // Controversy // EEW Magazine Online

“My conversation is not about Joe Rogan, it is not about Spotify, it is about my integrity and my dignity,” said India Arie in a new video uploaded to her official Instagram page.

On Tuesday, the Grammy-winning singer, who originally touched off a firestorm of controversy after uploading a video compilation of Spotify’s $100 million-man, Joe Rogan, using the N-word repeatedly and referring to a Black neighborhood as “planet of the apes,” said it is not her intent to “cancel” or “censor” anyone.

India.Arie is not interested in canceling Joe Rogan (EEW)

While some have assumed that Arie, 46, believes Rogan, 54, is racist and wants him removed from the digital streaming service, she said this is not true.

“Censorship is being at the threat of loss of life or freedom for your words. No one’s being censored here,” explained Arie referencing writer, professor, and social commentator, Roxane Gay, author of The New York Times best-selling essay collection “Bad Feminist.”

Arie continued, “This is about curation—curation, meaning choosing what you want in a space, choosing the space you want around you. Spotify is making a choice about the space they choose to curate. I and other creators are making choices about the space we want to curate, the life we want to curate by choosing spaces we want to be in or not.”

And when it comes to Spotify, it’s a not for her.

Despite pulling her music and verbalizing her disapproval of the white, male, comedian’s racially-charged language, she said it is not her intent to in any way attack the host of “The Joe Rogan Experience.”

“I’m not trying to attack anyone. What I’m doing is standing up for myself,” Arie said, noting that “trolls” have, on the other hand, viciously attacked her online for being vocal.

During an appearance on "Good Morning America" Monday, “The Truth” songstress made it clear that she is not asking Spotify to choose between her or Rogan, nor is she calling him a racist. She simply does not wish to be connected to a platform that invests huge amounts of cash in a racially insensitive shock jock while its musicians and less controversial podcasters barely scrape by.

"I am in no position to tell Spotify not to have Joe Rogan. I don’t believe in cancel culture," Arie said on GMA. "I didn’t even call Joe Rogan a racist. What I said was, ‘I don’t like it, take me off.’ But mostly this is a conversation about me standing up for my dignity. Because how far can somebody go before it’s like ‘OK, I’m tired now?’"

Rogan took to Instagram Friday night to share a video in which he expressed his "deepest, sincerest" apologies for his flippant and hurtful use of the N-word.

“I think he did well with his apology,” said Arie in Tuesday’s Instagram video. “I also found some of it disingenuous because everyone on the planet knows that that word is loaded and that, that’s why most people say ‘the N-word’ when referring to the word.”

Arie further pointed out that Rogan must “deal” with his choice to use the N-word and all the negative consequences that accompany that choice. “But he’s not being canceled, censored, and I have not called him racist,” she said.