Douglas Murray versus the Revisionists

By Olivia Pierson

Written April 12th 
First published on the Good Oil, April 15th, 2025

Joe Rogan’s podcast, hosting a scorching three-hour debate between Douglas Murray and Dave Smith, has set X on fire with fierce arguments. The clash has split opinion again, with X-users adamantly divided over who emerged victorious. Murray, known for his first-rate intellect, drew criticism for appealing to authority, having lambasted revisionist, amateur historians who inflate their own importance while disavowing any expertise. He had Darryl Cooper and Ian Carroll in mind, though their names eluded him. Both have been hosted by Rogan.

Right from the start, Murray zoomed in on what he called a “tilt” toward overt anti-Israel (and anti-Ukraine) sentiment among too many of Rogan’s guests, pointing a finger also at Smith, who happens to be a libertarian comedian with a podcast. His opening challenge was unmistakably important:
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I feel that you’ve opened the door to quite a lot of people who now have a big platform, who have been throwing out counter-historical stuff of a very dangerous kind.

Darryl Cooper, a self-proclaimed historian and podcaster, gained notoriety on Tucker Carlson’s show by absurdly labelling Sir Winston Churchill “the chief villain of the Second World War” and a “psychopath.”

Ian Carroll, meanwhile, mirrors Candace Owens, with his penchant for antisemitic conspiracies and ceaseless attacks on Israel. His X bio declares he’s “not an expert at anything except sarcasm.” Quite.

Murray’s critique was blistering. He argued that these people, who downplay Hitler’s monstrousness while questioning Churchill’s heroism, lack the scholarly weight to properly shape discourse on history or geopolitics with truth. Their obsessions with antisemitism, Holocaust denial, and absolving Hitler of blame, he said, echo the Left’s reckless dabbling in dark, dangerous things, like downplaying the atrocities of communism, Mao Zedong and Lenin. The Right, now riding a wave of renewed mojo, risks falling into its own trap of embracing “dark and ugly stuff” - revisionism that distorts the truth of history. 

For the next 20 minutes, Rogan and Smith pushed back hard, defending Cooper’s views and questioning whether he genuinely minimised Hitler’s evil. They argued that his perspective deserved a hearing (yawn), challenging Murray’s characterisation of him. 

Smith conceded there was a “danger” in what Murray described.  He tied it to a broader collapse of trust, a salient point, underscoring the lies that have decimated public faith since 2019, particularly over the deceit of the COVID era.  Smith opined:
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The people with real power should do a better job of not lying through their fuckin’ teeth about everything.

​Murray silenced the room by turning the tables:
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Perhaps you have power, maybe you have power, both of you. We live in an era when podcasters have a lot of power. If you go on a podcast with Jake Shields and he goes on another podcast and says he doesn’t think six million Jews were killed in the Holocaust, what do you think is happening there? That’s an exercise of power.

Rogan cleared his throat.

Murray’s on-the-nose mic-drop exposed the actual stakes and it was a brilliantly made point - podcasters aren’t just comedic infotainers; at this scale they wield enormous influence that can legitimise terrible ideas, which become mainstream in the culture - and they currently have an absolute proclivity for doing so.

At one point in this early part of the debate Smith quoted an anecdote from someone saying “take one red pill not the whole bottle,” which really went to what Murray was trying to get across, but wasn’t being absorbed.  Referencing the fact that so many people had already had their minds blown from all the Covid deceit, Murray asked the excellent question:
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Do you help those minds that have been blown by blowing them out some more with a whole lot of other conspiracy stuff, i.e., maybe Churchill wasn’t a great guy… maybe Hitler wasn’t such a bad guy… maybe the Holocaust [didn’t happen]… etc? That is exactly what these guys are doing!

​Rogan and Smith emphatically made noises in unison that nobody was saying such things. 

This was all in only the first 25 minutes of a three hour debate and I commend Murray for having the nuts and clarity to challenge them both, from the very outset, to be careful of what they’re "watering" on the very fertile ground of their enormous platforms (especially Rogan), given that atavistic Jew-hate is on steroids again after Oct 7th 2023.  

The social media fallout reveals a deep splintering off in conservatism and classical liberalism, which is fast becoming known as the “woke right.” Some champion Murray for defending historical rigour, others, rallying behind Smith, accuse Murray of elitism, dismissing his critique as “gatekeeping” or an attempt at “censorship.” This is plain nonsense. Censorship requires state authority and punishment; Murray was appealing to something far more individually volitional, that of personal wisdom regarding the hugely disillusioned audiences they’re now talking to in this age of information.  Veracity matters.

Rogan’s platform, with its millions of listeners, is culture shaping. Amplifying voices that are cozy with antisemitism, or the rewriting of history is not a neutral position - it’s a choice, with consequences to said culture, which sooner or later impacts politics. Murray understands this well, hence his opening challenge. 

In what can only be described as a rather petulant outburst, Dave Smith rushed to X post-debate, griping that Douglas Murray sidestepped real discussion, opting instead to act like a “pompous ass” rather than engage ideas. That’s utter codswallop. Within the debate’s first 25 minutes, well before even touching on the Israel-Gaza conflict or broader geopolitical histories, Murray laid out an arsenal of critical ideas, ready and able to do battle with the hooplehead revisionists within his own political camp. Thank God that conservatives are good at this, though I’m not too sure about those “bi-sexual libertarians.”