Joe Rogan Compares UK to ‘Soviet Russia’ Amid Riots; Elon Musk Shares Clip

US commentator Joe Rogan has criticized the UK government’s response to the riots sweeping the country, likening it to “Soviet Russia” in a clip shared by tech billionaire Elon Musk.

Musk, who’s faced criticism for a barrage of attacks on the government’s handling of violent disorder in the UK, reposted the clip where Rogan makes unverified claims about policing in England.

Speaking on his podcast, “The Joe Rogan Experience,” Rogan condemned what he described as “terrible government overreach,” falsely asserting that 4,000 people in England have been arrested for “thought crimes.”

Around 500 arrests have been made during the unrest linked to the far-right, which erupted following the killing of three young girls in Southport. Social media posts had falsely implicated a Muslim immigrant as the suspect. The arrests have been a mix of those related to social media activity and others involving violent disorder, assault, punching police officers, and burglary.

Rogan stated: “You’re seeing it in England now, with terrible government overreach. People talk about Soviet Russia, like how bad Russia is in terms of cracking down on thought police and cracking down on bad tweets and things like that.”

“There’s something like 4,000 people in England who have been arrested for thought crimes where they’ve said things online that people find to be a hateful thing or a problematic thing. And I think it’s only 200 in Russia.”

“The fact that they’re comfortable with finding people who have said something that they disagree with and putting them in a f****** cage in England in 2024 is really wild.”

While Rogan’s claims lack a clear timeframe and basis, a debunked tweet from last year had gone viral saying 3,300 arrests had been made in the UK for social media posts, compared to just 411 in Russia. These figures, from 2017, were misrepresented. The UK numbers referred to arrests under the broader category of online malicious communications, not specifically social media posts. The Russian numbers related to criminal proceedings rather than arrests.

Arrests in the UK and Russia occur for different reasons, with Russian internet users facing stricter social media restrictions. Rogan’s clip, shared overnight, has already garnered 1.5 million views.

The UK’s Online Safety Act, which became law last year but has not yet fully come into effect, will eventually require platforms to take “robust action” against illegal content, including incitement of violence.

However, individuals can already be arrested under Section 127 of the Communications Act, which makes it illegal to send grossly offensive, indecent, obscene, or menacing communications over public networks. This also covers the spread of misleading communications.

In recent days, Elon Musk, the owner of the social platform X, has faced heavy criticism for his posts about the Southport stabbings disorder.

Justice Secretary Heidi Alexander labeled Musk “deeply irresponsible” for suggesting that “civil war is inevitable” in the UK, calling it “unconscionable.”

On Thursday, Musk reposted a fake headline about the UK’s response to riots, impersonating a story from the Telegraph.

The headline read, “Keir Starmer considering building ‘emergency detainment camps’ on the Falkland Islands,” with the subheading stating the camps would be used to detain prisoners from the riots.

Though Musk deleted the post shortly after, it had already been viewed more than a million times in the first 15 minutes.