Comedian George Carlin, that great court jester of empire, pierced the veil with these words. He was not joking, though it came wrapped in laughter. He was revealing the architecture of power in America, which is not democracy in the Athenian sense but plutocracy, oligarchy, and the orchestration of society by malevolent Godzillionaires who hold the levers of capital, media, and lobbying. Carlin’s genius was that he could condense the unspoken reality into a phrase so sharp it cut through the fog: that the average citizen is managed, pacified, manipulated, but never truly invited into the circles where decisions are really made.
Now contrast this with the comedian Joe Rogan, whose arc has been peculiar. He began as an outsider—comic, martial artist, psychonaut - someone who sat at the edges of culture, exploring taboo subjects, amplifying voices that the lamestream media ignored. In this way, he bore the spirit of initiation, cracking the seal for millions into discussions of psychedelics, UFOs, alternative histories, and human potential.
But then—success, influence, and the gravitational pull of that “big club.” The very dynamic Carlin warned of began to enfold Rogan. The curiosity began to wobble. Instead of being the gadfly pricking the system, his voice increasingly became captured by the same circuits of power he once subverted. Because as wealth accumulates, and celebrity solidifies, the outsider is no longer outside and what was once disruptive becomes contained within the big club itself. Carlin never joined that club. He stayed outside, hurling his Molotov cocktails of truth wrapped in laughter. By contrast, Rogan has been drawn towards it, and Transmuted from Stoned Ape theory advocate to oligarchic ball gargler in the process.
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