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Joe Rogan is one of the top if not the top podcaster in the world today. He commands a huge audience. In the same way that being on Johnny Carson back in the day could make a career, so too is a spot on Rogan considered a golden ticket, especially in the comedy world.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n He also likes to talk about us. Like many people, he thinks we\u2019re the nicest people in the world but our beliefs are super dumb and weird. Like with many religions he tends to garble his facts. I was particularly amused when, when interviewing\u00a0 Ben Shapiro, he appeared to be oblivious to the fact that Jews do not worship Jesus, but more often than not his missteps have a kernel of truth around a warped interpretation. He had an interview where Whitney Cummings seemed completely oblivious to the difference between the FLDS and LDS, and was wondering why Salt Lake City wasn\u2019t getting raided to rescue all the girls. In a recent episode with Mel Gibson Rogan said that Pope Benedict XVI was moving a priest around who abused deaf kids, when <\/span>that\u2019s not what happened<\/span><\/a> (although Pope Benedict XVI may have been involved in an appeal regarding ecclesiastical penalties long after the priest in question had left active ministry).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Anyway, in a recent episode <\/span>he had an evangelical apologist <\/span><\/a>on who took occasional potshots at us, some to greater effects than others (e.g. he brought up that we believe we can become Gods as if it would be scandalous, but Rogan just thought it was cool). This caused a bit of chatter in different places about how Rogan talks about us so much that he should at have one of us on, so it got me thinking about the different possibilities. Given that it\u2019s Times and Seasons, I\u2019m not including content producers who are predominantly pugilistic towards the Church. No offense to any others I may have missed. I\u2019m sort of aware of this space, but not as much as I could be.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n President Nelson or another general authority<\/b><\/p>\n Some suggested the prophet himself. I think this would be a disaster. Rogan\u2019s podcasts are famously extremely long (often 3+ hours) and President Nelson is quite old. Plus (and this goes for basically all the general authorities), debating about sensational, hot topics for a long period of time is not a muscle that Church leaders have had to develop. They obviously have a lot of other, more important things to do.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Some of them are adept at the shorter-form interviews they\u2019ve been involved in and could probably do okay\u2013I thought President Holland did a good job with that BBC interview a while ago, and I assume Elder Kearon would do okay given his professional communications experience. Once again, a sensational debate requires its own skillset, and is quite distinct from actually making a good, logical argument. Christopher Hithchens, for example, was quite fun to watch even though his arguments, when distilled down to some kind of logic flowchart, made no sense (all the good things religion does doesn\u2019t matter because non-religious people could possibly also do those things, check-mate! Also, \u201cno man knows my name\u201d is by far the best book on Mormon history).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Also, media hot takes on the Church tend to be quite convoluted, and again may have a grain of truth but are presenting it in the worst possible light, or sometimes there are outright sensationalist fabrications. One calls to mind MSNBC anchor Lawrence O\u2019Donnell\u2019s on-air claim that Joseph Smith started Mormonism because his wife caught his cheating with the maid and he claimed that God told him to do it, essentially conflating aspects of Nauvoo-era polygamy with the origin story that is demonstrably false. He later apologized, sort of, but the damage had been done (and don\u2019t even get me started about the \u201cUnder the Banner of Heaven\u201d series with Brigham Young and Emma conspiring to kill Joseph\u2013what the what?)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n While there are major, well-documented difficult issues that I assume Church leaders are reasonably aware of, there are also a thousand little, less-well documented claims (e.g. Joseph Smith worshipped Jupiter) and these have a tendency to get strung together into weird narratives where it\u2019s hard to even know where to start, and if you don\u2019t have a Johnny-on-the-spot answer then it just looks like you\u2019re a simpleton Mormon who doesn\u2019t know your own history. So if anybody does a longform interview defending the Church they would need to have a rather broad base of knowledge about the weird niche as well as big issues, and I don\u2019t think Elder Kearon would have a quick answer about our secret pagan Jupiter worship (I mean, he\u2019s a convert, maybe they haven\u2019t told him yet\u2026)<\/span><\/p>\n Don Bradley<\/b>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Independent researcher Don Bradley has that breadth of knowledge, plus he\u2019s a nice guy who is one of the most open-minded researchers about talking to and being chill with people from all sorts of backgrounds, whether fundamentalists, anti-Mormons, or polygamy deniers. I think a Don Bradley\/Elder Kearon tag team might be the dream team here.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Ward Radio guys<\/b><\/p>\n Ward Radio<\/span><\/a> has one of the largest audiences in the orthodox Mormon YouTube space. They also have that combination of experience with issues as well as the on-screen presence that would fit with a Rogan episode. In a way they’re actually the Joe Rogans of Mormonism; you feel like you\u2019re sitting around a table having a beer with your buddies, and I\u2019d put them in the top tier of who I would have on.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n My one complaint is that they occasionally have <\/span>a demography expert on <\/span><\/a>that has the YouTube charisma of a block of wood.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Jacob Hansen<\/b><\/p>\n Like the Ward Radio guys, he also has that <\/span>combination of knowledge and on-screen presence<\/span><\/a>, plus he has experience doing long-form debates. I\u2019d trust Jacob Hansen representing my faith.<\/span><\/p>\n Stephen Jones<\/b><\/p>\n I was only recently made aware of <\/span>his channel<\/span><\/a>, but it looks like he has a fairly significant subs base, plus he has the comedian background that could work on a Rogan podcast.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Jasmin Rappleye<\/b><\/p>\n