Pepe the Frog meme listed as hate symbol by ADL

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The Anti-Defamation League has added ‘Pepe the Frog’ to its online database of hate symbols, the organization confirmed today.

The organisation released the following statement;

Also referred to as the “sad frog meme,” Pepe the Frog did not originally have anti-Semitic connotations. But as the meme proliferated in online venues such as 4chan, 8chan and Reddit, a subset of memes came into existence promoting anti-Jewish, bigoted and offensive ideas. And those have spread virally on Twitter, Facebook and elsewhere.

ADL’s Task Force on Harassment and Journalism, convened earlier this year, is currently working on a report documenting the source and extent of harassment against journalists on social media.  Those preliminary findings are slated for release in mid-October.

ADL founded the Hate on Display database in 2000 as part of its effort to track hate groups and help law enforcement, educators and other members of the public to identify those symbols that serve as potential calling cards of extremists and anti-Semites.

The ADL clarified that the majority of Pepe memes are not racist, and that innocent versions will not be subject to the hate symbol ruling.

Featured Image: The Verge 

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