Why was Joe Rogan banned from The Comedy Store?
Joe Rogan was banned from The Comedy Store between 2007 and 2013. The UFC color commentator used to pursue a career as a stand-up comedian along with his other gigs.
Rogan got into a spat with yet another big name in the world of comedy at the time, Ned Arnel Mencia, also known as Carlos Mencia. Mencia made a name for himself as a comedian in the late 90s and the early 2000s. His genre involved topics like culture, race, social class, and more.
Great…. Now if I get COVID people are say I stole it from Joe Rogan.
However, Rogan was not a fan of Mencia's work and often labeled it as banal. He believed Mencia was a joke thief and accused him of plagiarism in a blog post.
Rogan mentioned that comedy is one of the most artistic things that someone can do. He also pointed out that many comedians were influenced by other comics during the early days of their careers.
However, he believes that while a comedian might be influenced by ideas, they should not copy someone else's work and present it as their own. Rogan's main point behind this view is that it takes a lot of hard work and creative thinking for a comedian to come up with new and interesting ideas and present them in an attractive way to their audiences.
Rogan appeared on The Point with Ana Kasparian in 2014 and said:
"I believe anybody tries to take any of your ideas, and pawn them off as their own is a piece of s***. They should be outed as being a piece of s***. Now, with Mencia the real problem is he was profiting off of this and destroying other comedians' careers."
Watch Joe Rogan talk about Carlos Mencia in The Point with Ana Kasparian:
Joe Rogan and Carlos Mencia clashed in 2007
In February 2007, Joe Rogan had just finished one of his performances at the Hollywood Comedy Store. He introduced the next performer, Kirk Fox, who used to work for Mencia.
The JRE podcast host often used the term 'Menstealia' to refer to Carlos Mencia. He did the same while introducing Fox and Mencia, present in the room, and a confrontation ensued. The duo got involved in an on-stage verbal spat.
Watch Joe Rogan discuss his confrontation with Carlos Mencia on his podcast:
Mencia was a more popular name than Rogan in the world of comedy at that point in time. It was evident that further conflict might happen between the duo and Rogan was banned from The Comedy Store for that reason.