Joe Rogan's Controversial Taylor Swift Opinion

Joe Rogan has said something extremely controversial—and it's that he agrees it was Kanye West who made Taylor Swift famous.

Years after the feud between West, who has since legally changed his name to "Ye," and Swift began, Rogan has taken to an episode of his podcast to agree with the controversial statement the rapper made in his 2016 song "Famous." In the track, he says: "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex. Why? I made that b**** famous."

The rapper was referring to when he ambushed Swift's acceptance speech for Video of the Year at the 2009 MTV VMAs to declare that Beyoncé should have won instead. While he later apologized, years later he released "Famous" and claimed to have obtained Swift's approval over the controversial lyric. In a statement, Swift denied that she permitted him to use it and denounced the lyric as "misogynistic."

Swift fans were infuriated, and West's then-wife, Kim Kardashian, defended him by releasing a phone conversation in which the rapper and the "Blank Space" singer appeared to have discussed the song before it was released. However, in March 2020 a 25-minute unedited version of the video emerged, proving that Swift had not been informed by West about the "made that b**** famous" line.

Now in 2023 Rogan and guest, comedian Shane Gillis, have weighed in on the discourse by agreeing with West. Newsweek reached out to Swift, Rogan and Gillis representatives for comment via email Tuesday.

In the podcast episode, Rogan said Swift "wasn't that big back then," to which Gillis agreed by referencing the song and saying Kanye: "made that b*** famous." The pair then both said the rapper "ruled" before Rogan said the rapper "says a lot of wild s***."

A clip of this exchange was shared to X, formerly Twitter, by user @ye4us who captioned it: "Joe Rogan and Shane Gillis agree that Kanye West made Taylor Swift famous 💀💀💀 Swifties everywhere are in shambles."

But people took to the comments to disagree with the sentiment, with many saying Swift was already famous in her own right before West stormed the VMA stage.

"Wasn't she accepting an award that even beat Beyoncé?" one person asked.

"She won the award, all Kanye did was let his ego get in the way...now look at him!!" said another.

"She already had many hits. Man I really used to like him but now he's bonkers," a third person wrote.

A fourth added: "That makes zero sense."

Other commenters said that they believed it was West interrupting Swift at the award show that introduced her to a new audience.

"He made her famous outside of country fans for sure," said one, with another adding: "I mean they're right in a way cause it definitely put her on the map with guys like them but any of us that spent any time around children had already known about her for years lol."

In June 2016, Kardashian spoke to GQ about the "Famous" incident, saying Swift allegedly permitted the use of the "b***" lyric. Kardashian insisted that Swift "totally gave the OK. Rick Rubin was there. So many respected people in the music business heard that [conversation] and knew."

She continued: "I mean, he's called me a bitch in his songs. That's just, like, what they say. I never once think, [gasping] 'What a derogatory word! How dare he?' Not in a million years. I don't know why she just, you know, flipped all of a sudden."

Then in March 2020, Kardashian tried to explain what transpired between the parties when the subject rose to the fore again.

"To be clear, the only issue I ever had around the situation was that Taylor lied through her publicist who stated that 'Kanye never called to ask for permission...,' she wrote on X. "They clearly spoke so I let you all see that. Nobody ever denied the word 'b****' was used without her permission."

However, Swift's publicist, Tree Pain, disagreed with the reality star. In March 2020, she shared a statement to X in response to Kardashian's tweet. "Kanye did not call for approval, but to ask Taylor to release his single 'Famous' on her Twitter account," she wrote before adding: "She declined and cautioned him about releasing a song with such a strong misogynistic message. Taylor was never made aware of the actual lyric, 'I made that b*** famous.'"

When Swift was named Time's 2023 Person of the Year, she spoke with the magazine about various aspects of her life and career. Among the subjects she touched upon was West's 2016 track. The pop superstar also discussed the feud with West and Kardashian and how the backlash she faced at the time felt like "a career death." Further opening up about the experience, she added: "Make no mistake—my career was taken away from me."

"You have a fully manufactured frame job, in an illegally recorded phone call, which Kim Kardashian edited and then put out to say to everyone that I was a liar," Swift said. "That took me down psychologically to a place I've never been before.

"I moved to a foreign country. I didn't leave a rental house for a year. I was afraid to get on phone calls. I pushed away most people in my life because I didn't trust anyone anymore. I went down really, really hard."

Swift went on to release her revenge-themed album Reputation, which was initially met with skepticism on its 2017 release. "I thought that moment of backlash was going to define me negatively for the rest of my life," she said.

Now it seems the star has had the last laugh as she's had a record-breaking year. Her Eras Tour has officially made over $1 billion—breaking the Guinness World Record for the highest-grossing tour of all time.

In just its first weekend of release, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour became the highest-grossing domestic concert film ever. It made $92 million in its opening weekend and since its October 13 release, the movie has made more than $200 million globally.

Update 12/19/23, 11:22 a.m. ET: This article was updated to include further comments from Kardashian as well as a previous statement from Swift's publicist.