Episode 993: Ben Shapiro
Why This Episode Is Problematic
In episode #993 (August 2, 2017), Joe Rogan hosted Daily Wire editor-in-chief Ben Shapiro for a wide-ranging conversation that platformed several false and harmful claims, particularly about transgender people and climate change. Rogan largely accepted Shapiro’s framing rather than pushing back on demonstrably wrong assertions.
TL;DR: Shapiro pushed the false claim that transgender identity is a mental illness and minimized human-caused climate change. Rogan, lacking expertise in either area, accepted these claims and at times amplified them.
Guest Background
Ben Shapiro is a conservative political commentator, attorney, and editor emeritus of The Daily Wire. He is not a medical professional, scientist, or expert on gender medicine or climate science. His claims on these topics are political opinions presented with the rhetorical confidence of expertise he does not possess.
Key Problematic Claims
Claim 1: Transgender people are “mentally ill”
Shapiro repeatedly framed transgender identity as a mental illness, suggesting that affirming a person’s gender identity is “pretending” and harmful.
What the evidence says:
- American Psychiatric Association: Being transgender is not itself a mental illness. The DSM-5 removed “gender identity disorder” in 2013, replacing it with “gender dysphoria” — which refers specifically to the distress some trans people experience, not their identity itself. APA Statement
- World Health Organization (2019): Removed transgender identity from its list of mental disorders in ICD-11, reclassifying gender incongruence under sexual health. WHO ICD-11
- American Medical Association: Has formally opposed restrictions on gender-affirming care and recognizes it as medically necessary. AMA Statement
Claim 2: Misgendering and the “biology” argument
Shapiro asserted he would refuse to refer to trans people by their correct pronouns because, in his view, “chromosomes determine sex” and gender identity is irrelevant.
What the evidence says:
- Endocrine Society Clinical Practice Guidelines: Gender identity has a biological basis distinct from chromosomes — brain structure, prenatal hormone exposure, and other factors all contribute. Endocrine Society
- Major medical associations including the AAP, AMA, APA, and Endocrine Society all recognize gender identity as distinct from chromosomal/anatomical sex and support gender-affirming care.
Claim 3: Minimizing human-caused climate change
Shapiro acknowledged warming but questioned what percentage is human-caused and characterized climate policy responses as economically irrational.
What the evidence says:
- IPCC (2021): “It is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land.” Human activity is responsible for essentially all observed warming since pre-industrial times. IPCC AR6 Report
- NASA: Multiple independent lines of evidence confirm 97%+ scientific consensus that humans are the dominant cause of recent warming. NASA Climate
- Yale Climate Connections: Has documented Rogan’s pattern of platforming climate misinformation across multiple episodes. Yale Climate Connections
Joe Rogan’s Role
Rogan’s contribution to this episode was largely as an enabler rather than as a skeptical interviewer:
- Failed to push back on Shapiro’s framing of transgender identity as mental illness, despite this contradicting every major medical authority.
- Agreed with the “biology” framing without acknowledging the scientific consensus that gender identity is more complex than chromosomes alone.
- Did not challenge Shapiro’s hedging on climate science despite the overwhelming scientific consensus on human causation.
- Platformed Shapiro as a thoughtful expert on topics where Shapiro has no medical, scientific, or relevant academic credentials.
This episode reflects a pattern that would intensify over subsequent years: Rogan inviting ideological commentators to discuss medical and scientific topics as if they were authorities, without the fact-checking or expert pushback that responsible interviewing requires.
Real-World Harm
- Anti-trans rhetoric and suicide risk: A 2022 study in JAMA Network Open found that gender-affirming care is associated with substantially lower odds of depression and suicidality among trans youth. Framing trans identity as mental illness fuels stigma that worsens these outcomes. JAMA Network Open
- Policy impact: Misinformation that trans people are “mentally ill” has been cited in legislation restricting gender-affirming care across multiple U.S. states.
- Climate inaction: Climate-denial-adjacent rhetoric on widely-listened podcasts delays public support for emissions reductions during a critical decade for action.
- Audience reach: JRE was one of the most-listened podcasts in the world in 2017, with this episode reaching millions of mostly-young, mostly-male listeners.
Why It Matters
When the most popular podcast in the world platforms false medical and scientific claims unchallenged, those claims become normalized. This episode is an early example of the pattern that has come to define JRE: ideological certainty presented as common sense, with no expert counterweight in the room.