Media claimed '270 doctors' demanded Spotify take action over Joe Rogan podcasts. Turns out, most aren't medical doctors.



The media last week widely circulated an open letter to Spotify allegedly co-signed by “270 doctors” that demanded the company take action against podcast host Joe Rogan.

But it turns out the majority of those signatories cannot legally practice medicine on their own.

What does the letter say?

The letter demanded that Spotify "implement a misinformation policy."

The letter voiced anger over a recent episode of the "Joe Rogan Experience" with Dr. Robert Malone, a virologist and immunologist who has been censored by social media companies for disseminating a perspective about the COVID-19 vaccine that contradicts the government's narrative.

The letter claimed Rogan has a "concerning history of broadcasting misinformation" about the COVID-19 pandemic.

"Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, Joe Rogan has repeatedly spread misleading and false claims on his podcast, provoking distrust in science and medicine," the letter stated. "This is not only a scientific or medical concern; it is a sociological issue of devastating proportions and Spotify is responsible for allowing this activity to thrive on its platform."

The media predictably circulated the letter like wildfire.

  • The Guardian: "‘Menace to public health’: 270 doctors criticize Spotify over Joe Rogan’s podcast"
  • Forbes: "Doctors, Scientists Petition Spotify To Stop ‘Joe Rogan Experience’ Covid-19 Misinformation"
  • Rolling Stone: "‘A Menace to Public Health’: Doctors Demand Spotify Puts an End to Covid Lies on ‘Joe Rogan Experience’"
  • New York Post: "'Joe Rogan is a ‘menace to public health,’ 270 doctors and experts tell Spotify

But what is the problem?

A quick inspection of the letter's signatories reveals that the majority are not legally permitted to practice medicine unsupervised, while a significant number are not even direct medical providers.

The range of credentials among the signatories includes: 82 medical doctors (MD), five doctors of osteopathic medicine (DO), more than one dozen nurse practitioners, nearly 100 Ph.D.s and Ph.D. candidates (most of whom are professors), registered nurses, veterinarians, a dentist, a psychologist (which is different from a psychiatrist, which requires an MD), physicians' assistants, a biochemist, master's students, research associates, pharmacists, a "COVID-19 laboratory supervisor," medical students, public health advisers, teachers, engineers, social workers, and even a podcast host.

In other words, the list is composed of an eclectic group of people — some of whom are qualified medical experts having earned the terminal degree in their field — that hardly inspires confidence in the newsworthy value of their letter, let alone in the weight of their collective opinion.

After all, what generally qualifies a person to contribute any substantive perspective to a given field of research is by earning the highest degree necessary in that field and by having direct experience in the field. For medicine in the United States, this is most often the MD or DO, considering one of these degrees is required to obtain a license to practice medicine without supervision.

This is what makes the letter — and the censorship of Dr. Malone — even more astounding.

Whether or not someone agrees with Dr. Malone, by academic and professional standards, he has earned the right to have a "seat at the table." He is a medical doctor and possesses decades of experience in virology and immunology.

Rather than seeking to silence voices that contradict the narrative, all views should be weighed equally and then only discounted if they are examined fairly with a methodology appropriate to the field (this is why, for example, academic journals typically employ a blind peer-review process). After all, scholars and experts who are members of professional societies routinely gather in meetings to share new ideas. Some are accepted, others are rejected, but all are allotted the opportunity to be heard if they are within the bounds of the field.

One thus wonders: Should people not qualified to examine the views of a bona fine expert be allowed to make judgements about the expert's opinions? That is what has happened with Dr. Malone and others like him.

(H/T: The Dossier)

Glenn Beck: Joe Rogan & Dr. Malone just scratched the surface of the Great Reset



The Left is furious about podcaster Joe Rogan's recent interview with Dr. Robert Malone, a U.S.-based virologist and immunologist who claims to be the "inventor of mRNA vaccines and RNA as a drug."

YouTube removed Rogan's interview with Dr. Malone for allegedly violating the platform's "community guidelines." The full episode of "The Joe Rogan Experience" can still be found on Spotify. Additionally, Malone's Twitter account was suspended for "repeated violations of our COVID-19 misinformation policy."

On "The Glenn Beck Program," Glenn suggested this all goes way beyond the debate around COVID-19 vaccines. He explained why he believes Rogan and Dr. Malone are just scratching the surface of the Great Reset, and the elites pushing for it can't let the truth go mainstream.

Watch the video clip below or find more from "The Glenn Beck Program" here:


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Twitter suspends Dr. Robert Malone, 'inventor' of mRNA vaccines and COVID-19 vaccine skeptic



Twitter on Wednesday suspended the account operated by Dr. Robert Malone, a U.S.-based virologist and immunologist who claims to be the inventor of mRNA technology and is an outspoken critic of the COVID-19 mRNA vaccines.

Malone is an internationally recognized vaccine researcher who has authored dozens of scientific papers and been cited thousands of times. He was the primary author of a 1989 paper that demonstrated how RNA could be delivered into cells and a co-author on a 1990 paper that showed how injecting pure RNA or DNA into mouse muscle cells can lead to the transcription of new proteins. His work has been described as "seminal" in the field of mRNA-vaccine development.

Although Malone supports vaccines as a medical doctor, he believes that the steps the United States government has taken to bring mRNA COVID-19 vaccines to market from Pfizer-BioNtech and Moderna "have been detrimental and contrary to globally accepted standards for developing and regulating safe and effective licensed products." He shares his views on social media.

In a post on Substack Wednesday, he wrote that his Twitter account had over half a million followers when it was permanently suspended.

"Over a half million followers gone in a blink of an eye. That means I must have been on the mark, so to speak. Over the target. It also means we lost a critical component in our fight to stop these vaccines being mandated for children and to stop the corruption in our governments, as well as the medical-industrial complex and pharmaceutical industries," Malone wrote.

He did not give a specific reason for his suspension, and Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But Malone has gathered a large following in conservative media for his opposition to government vaccine mandates and recommendations against having children under age 18 get vaccinated against COVID-19.

The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 shots received emergency use authorization in the United States for children aged 5 through 11 on Oct. 29, and for adolescents aged 12 to 15 in May.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that everyone age 5 years and older get a COVID-19 vaccine to help protect against severe illness and death caused by COVID-19, and public health officials have repeatedly insisted that the vaccines are safe and effective for children and adults.

Twitter has strict rules prohibiting users from spreading "false or misleading information" about COVID-19 or the vaccines developed by Pfizer, Moderna, and Johnson & Johnson. The platform prohibits users from making posts that claim the vaccines are dangerous or that adverse side effects have been covered up by governments or the medical industry.

Malone also has accounts on Gab and Gettr, two alternative social media platforms that are popular with users who believe Twitter censors conservative viewpoints. He posts links to his Substack articles on those accounts, some of which discuss COVID-19 and question the safety of the vaccines in adolescents and younger children, likely violating Twitter's rules.

In one recent video that went viral, Malone gave a statement making several claims about the mRNA COVID-19 shots being harmful to children. His claims were opposed by other health experts, who accused him of spreading misinformation about the vaccines.

AFP Fact Check reviewed Malone's video statement and cited medical experts who contested claims Malone made. For instance, Malone said that spike proteins in mRNA vaccines are "toxic" and can "cause permanent damage in children's critical organs."

Paul Offit, an infectious disease physician and director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia said that was false.

"There's no evidence, either in experimental animals or people," he told AFP.

"There is absolutely no evidence that the spike proteins generated in response to the Covid-19 vaccine are toxic," Deborah Greenhouse, a fellow at the American Academy of Pediatrics, added.

According to AFP, messenger ribonucleic acid, or mRNA, vaccines work by artificially replicating the coronavirus spike protein, which the body learns to recognize and develops an immune response to fight off later.

"The spike protein is a useful target for the vaccine because it is different than other proteins that humans can produce," Greenhouse explained. "So our immune system is able to recognize it as foreign and mount an immune response against it. There is also no evidence that the spike protein remains in the body longer than other typical proteins and no evidence that it causes significant damage."

While there is clear evidence that some younger men have developed heart inflammation as a side effect of the vaccine, the experts said such side effects are rare and temporary.

At the end of his video, Malone said "there's no benefit for your children or your family to be vaccinating your children against the small risks of the virus." Each of the doctors that spoke to AFP emphatically rejected this claim.

"The theoretical risk of Covid vaccines absolutely do not outweigh the benefit of the vaccine," Greenhouse said.

"Over 1,000 children have now died from Covid infection. Tens of thousands have been hospitalized. One of my patients was hospitalized this past week with significant illness from Covid disease," she said.

"The vaccine has been shown to be safe and effective for children five years of age and older," Greenhouse said, adding: "The risk benefit ratio based upon data available to this point clearly favors vaccinating children ages five-11."

Offit told AFP Malone's video was "dangerously, flagrantly incorrect." If Malone promoted the video on his Twitter account, or made similar claims there, he would almost certainly have violated Twitter's rules and triggered the suspension.