Was talking about this earlier today.
Sure you do. You take him seriously. He takes himself seriously. If he didn't, he wouldn't be doing this, and if you didn't, you wouldn't keep tuning in.
"Taking it seriously" isn't solely confined to listening/reading with a furrowed brow and a frown, thinking so hard on every syllable that your colon might burst from the effort. That's not all that "taking it seriously" is or can be.
"Taking it seriously" is just a phrase that means you care enough to pay attention to something in the hopes it'll be worth the time you spend on it. Because if you didn't care even that much, you'd just pull a sock out of the hamper, fill it, and take another nap until you had to go to work/school whatever.
So yeah, he cares. He cares a lot. He couldn't do what he does if he didn't. And you care enough to keep listening every week and admit you're still a listener even though this guy keeps letting disgusting motherfuckers get free run of his megaphone for hours at a time.
That's taking it seriously.
Anyway, Joe Rogan is like a pair of pull-ups for intellectual bedwetters. That's basically his appeal. He's a dimbulb who is just smart enough to provide an aspirational figure for other assholes who want to feel smart without having to make a commitment to actually learning shit.
That sorta thing appeals to training-wheels cynics who care more about cheating their way to unearned intellectual "superiority" than they do actually knowing whatever the fuck it is they're talking about.