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Anti-Defamation League Declares Pepe the Frog a Hate Symbol (time.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the offensive-language dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TIME: The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has declared a popular internet meme depicting a cartoon frog to be a hate symbol. Pepe the Frog's beginnings were unoffensive: he is the creation of comic book creator Matt Furie, who featured the frog as a character in the series Boy's Club beginning in 2005. The character subsequently became a beloved meme, often called the "sad frog meme" and shared with a speech bubble reading "Feels good man" or "Feels bad man." But recently, as the Daily Beast reported in May, the character has been co-opted by a faction of Internet denizens who decided to reclaim it from the mainstream, and began sharing it in anti-Semitic contexts. "Images of the frog, variously portrayed with a Hitler-like mustache, wearing a yarmulke or a Klan hood, have proliferated in recent weeks in hateful messages aimed at Jewish and other users on Twitter," the ADL wrote in a statement. "Once again, racists and haters have taken a popular Internet meme and twisted it for their own purposes of spreading bigotry and harassing users," wrote ADL CEO Jonathan A. Greenblatt.

8 of 398 comments (clear)

  1. Who said what? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Who the fuck is the ADL? Why the fuck do I give a shit?

    -- Internet

    1. Re:Who said what? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Internet hate has been growing for a long time now.

      At basically the same rate non-techies have started adopting the internet in their every day lives I suspect.
      The internet was a nice place before all the normals started using it.

    2. Re:Who said what? by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Insightful

      As opposed to getting in line and do what the outraged, loudmouthed minority says?

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    3. Re:Who said what? by Maritz · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I'm no ADL fan, but this is from their website:

      "However, because so many Pepe the Frog memes are not bigoted in nature, it is important to examine use of the meme only in context. The mere fact of posting a Pepe meme does not mean that someone is racist or white supremacist. However, if the meme itself is racist or anti-Semitic in nature, or if it appears in a context containing bigoted or offensive language or symbols, then it may have been used for hateful purposes."

      Kinda makes you look stupid going off on that rant, to be honest.

      --
      I do not want your cheap brainburning drugs. They are useless for work. And I am a working man today.
    4. Re:Who said what? by Mashiki · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Keep in mind that this is exactly what the left keep pushing with their "hate crime" laws, and wanting to implement kangaroo courts for them. We have them in Canada, they're abused. Up until Ezra Levant and Mark Styen won they had a 100% conviction rate. The head of the CHRC was also found to have been deliberately planting evidence against his political enemies then running them against the system to ruin them.

      You guys in the US have gotten your first taste of it, it's called a Title IX tribunal.

      --
      Om, nomnomnom...
  2. Time got trolled by sinij · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The only logical explanation is that Time got trolled. I certainly don't recall reading anything about Hitler or Third Reich using frog symbols.

  3. Star of David used by Neo Nazis... by hsthompson69 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...and then we can declare that a hate symbol too?

    What about the rainbow flag? If sharia enforcing islamists start using rainbow colors, can we declare that a hate symbol?

    What about the word "HATE"? Can we declare that a hate symbol, and ban it?

    WTF, guys, seriously?

  4. Lemme get this straight by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Some internet trolls take a meme and dress it up to be anti-semitic. For some odd reason this (out of the thousand others that work just the same way) gets the attention of the ADL and they declare the meme, not the dress-up, but the meme, to be anti-semitic.

    Seriously, if I was the troll, I'd feel on top of the world. This must be the apex of trolldom. Ultimate validation.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.