Joe Rogan Clashes With Podcast Guest Over US School System

Newsweek

08-05-2025

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Joe Rogan clashed with chef José Andrés on a recent episode of The Joe Rogan Experience over the school system in the United States.
Newsweek reached out to Andrés' representative via email for comment.
The Context
Rogan, 57, hosts one of the most popular podcasts in the world. The Joe Rogan Experience was launched in 2009 and has over 2,300 episodes. The former Fear Factor host interviews a range of guests, including comedians, politicians, actors, authors, and more. In recent years, it has frequently topped the Spotify charts.
Andrés is a Spanish chef and Emmy Award-winning television personality. He's the author of several New York Times best-selling books, including The World Central Kitchen Cookbook and Vegetables Unleashed. In 2012 and 2018, he was named to TIME magazine's "100 Most Influential People" lists.
What To Know
On Friday's episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, Rogan and Andrés disagreed while discussing the U.S. education system.
"The thing is, school was designed to make good factory workers. That's what school was designed for. The American school system, at least, was designed by the Rockefellers, and what they're essentially doing is preparing people to be cogs in a wheel," Rogan said.
"They're preparing people to just show up, and do what you're told, and live this life of quiet desperation and sit there and absorb whatever they tell you to because you're going to have to go and work and do something you don't want to do all day long and show up and do it again until your body stops working and you die."
In response, Andrés said, "I don't know if I will 100 percent agree with that statement in the sense of it was created by design."
Joe Rogan attends UFC 249 in Jacksonville, Florida, on May 9, 2020.
Joe Rogan attends UFC 249 in Jacksonville, Florida, on May 9, 2020.
Douglas P. DeFelice/Getty Images
"Well the school system in America certainly was created by design," Rogan continued.
"The idea of sitting people down, especially young kids, for eight hours a day is a ridiculous idea."
"But the schools and education go way beyond America and go back in time," Andrés replied. "There is always an interest for writing and teaching and sharing knowledge, and obviously the very few lucky ones centuries and centuries ago, were the ones that were able to acquire that knowledge."
Rogan responded, "Yes, but I think starting people off at 5 years old and sitting them in classes all day, that is relatively new in human history. This is what I'm talking about. Sitting people in classrooms all day as children. This is relatively new in human history. This is not something people did hundreds and hundreds of years ago, when you think about all of the great scholars of the past. Yes, they certainly learned in school. They didn't do it the way they're doing it today."
Andrés noted that while he's "not an expert in that front," his daughters attended Montessori school, which he said was "great" for their development.
Montessori education is a hands-on approach to schooling that emphasizes self-directed learning and encourages students learning at their own pace.
"I thought it was giving my daughters just a great framework—to understand how to be themselves, how to grow, how to organize themselves, giving them the freedom to become the young women they are becoming," Andrés said. "I thought it was amazing because I saw little human beings that they were far away smarter, I think, than when I was at their same age."
Andrés said that rather than being guided "like cows or like horses," it "was the contrary."
"It was opening their world—not only 360 but almost three dimensionally. Giving them options for them to be their own owners of their destiny."
"So yeah, I'm not an expert on education," the restaurateur said. "I see your point, but still I'm not going to lie to you, Joe."
What Happens Next
New episodes of The Joe Rogan Experience are released weekly on platforms like Spotify, YouTube and Apple Podcasts.