Joe Rogan Comes Off As Sensible in Matthew McConaughey Podcast Episode
Matthew McConaughey is currently on a press tour for his newly released book, Poems & Prayers. The book came out on September 16th, and he’s been making the usual appearances to promote it including The Today Show and The Joe Rogan Experience. On The Today Show, McConaughey had a charming interaction with Cardi B, who correctly called McConaughey a “fine white man.”
On the much longer Rogan episode, the conversation got into the subject of McConaughey’s book, which is “an inspiring, faith-filled and often hilarious collection of personal poetry and prayers about navigating the rodeo of life and chasing down the original dream, belief.”
Don't Miss
The nearly three-hour-long conversation spanned everything from the cognitive impairment caused by A.I., LSD usage, the power of intention and religion in schools. The last one felt like it could quickly be an iffy subject, and I admitted I tensed up when this specific segment of the conversation began. In an era when everyone is constantly drifting into extremes, I wasn’t prepared to hear my favorite True Detective say something a little, you know, extreme. His new book is called Poem & Prayers, after all.
“The Ten Commandments in the schools. What do you think about that?” McConaughey asked Rogan, about an hour into the conversation.
“I don’t like it,” Rogan responded.
“Why?” McConaughey asked.
“Well, I think the Ten Commandments are very interesting. I think mandating it in classrooms, in public schools, the problem with that is like what about the Muslims? What about the Buddhists? What about the Hindus? What about all the other religions that exist?” Rogan explained.
“Okay I’m curious since this is a Christian society, the Ten Commandments, but we have 10 minutes where everyone can bow to Allah, whatever your religion is, if you care to partake or not there’s no exclusion about what can be a spiritual time of worship in these 10 minutes,” McConaughey continued. “But in our classroom in America, we’re going to have the Ten Commandments.”
Matthew!!! Let me introduce you to Engel v. Vitale, the 1962 Supreme Court ruling that established that it was unconstitutional for public schools to require prayer. A landmark decision, if you will.
To my never-ending surprise, Rogan referenced other cases against including religion in public school, before again saying he’s against it. “If you have publicly funded schools, keep religion out of them. That’s what I think because otherwise you have too many possible religions. Like you’re gonna be religiously bigoted if you teach only one.”
The conversation continued from there, and you can listen above if you like. But, it is one of the rare instances, at least by my count, where I’m 100 percent in agreement with Joe Rogan. And for me to be siding with the podcast host against McConaughey, the star of several of my favorite rom-coms? Now that’s a real bummer.
But you know what they say: Never listen to an actor you like talk for three hours straight.
