India Arie shares advice for “consciously racist” UFC commentator Joe Rogan

India Arie has given some advice to UFC commentator Joe Rogan.

The comedian has been in the headlines for a variety of controversies the past month. First getting into trouble for his comments on vaccines, he’s since come under fire for racism. A video that went viral featured Rogan using racial slurs, as well as making a joke where he compares an all-black neighborhood to the movie ‘Planet of the Apes’.

Both videos went viral partially thanks to musical artist India Arie.  The Grammy-award-winning Arie shared both videos on her Instagram account. Earlier this week, she went on to The Daily Show with Trevor Noah to discuss her thoughts on the situation.

India Arie opined that there are two different types of racism: conscious racism, and unconscious racism. She believes that the UFC commentator is guilty of the former.

“I think there are two things that we consider when we talk about racism. One is conscious racism, and the other is unconscious racism. And so I have learned in my life to make room and forgiveness for people who are unconsciously racist. Because our whole society is built on racist concepts. So if you’re born into it, if you’re not actively working to not be racist, then you have some of it in you…” – said India Arie on the Daily Show.

“And then there’s conscious racism when you know you’re doing it…and if a person keeps doing it, is that when we call them a racist? So if you know you’re doing it and you keep doing it, I would say that is a racist. And so for me, when I think about Joe Rogan, I think that he is being consciously racist.”

She continued and opined that Rogan needs to do more to truly show that he’s sorry. The musician shared that she’s received loads of hateful comments in the aftermath of her sharing the video of Rogan.

“And so I want to tell you: My DMs and my comments are wild right now of people just—all kinds of racial slurs and misogynistic ones, too. All kinds. And so that says to me that these people who want to defend Joe Rogan think that this is the right language to do it.”

“So Joe Rogan needs to do more than go, ‘Oh, yeah, I’m sorry.’ He needs to—if you really want to lead your listeners down a new path—then lead them to the point where they don’t feel that it’s the right language to come into my DMs and call me an N-word in defense of him. He needs to teach them that they shouldn’t feel that way. They’re not making him look good.” (h/t MMANews).

What do you think about India Arie’s comments about Joe Rogan?