On May 26th, 2016, an online news source called The Daily Beast published an article written by Olivia Nuzzi titled “How Pepe the Frog Became a Nazi Trump Supporter and Alt-Right Symbol," which called attention the trend of white nationalists spreading Semitic an other racist versions of the "Pepe" meme. The article also highlighted the support of current President elect Donald Trump by the Alt-right (a white supremacist political party) through the meme, which often included Pepe either dressed as Trump or wearing a Trump button. 

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On September 9th, 2016, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was quoted at a fundraising event saying that half Donald Trump’s supporters were in a “basket of deplorables,"(see figure 2 on the left), and in response on September 10th, Donald Trump Jr. posted a photoshopped movie poster on Instagram of the film The Expendables, which features various conservatives and an image of Pepe the Frog with the title “The Deplorables" (see figure 1, slide 4). A day later, NBC news published an article identifying Pepe the frog as "white nationalist symbol", which resulted in multiple other news sources reporting the same, including CNN, which noted that former KKK leader David Duke had also tweeted the meme (see figure 3 for video, figure 1 slide 5 for tweet). This information was confirmed when the the Anti Defamation League, or the ADL, added Pepe to its database of hate symbols, stating that although Pepe "did not originally have racist or anti-Semitic connotations" its status as a meme and its popularity in online communities like "4chan, 8chan, and Reddit, which have many users who delight in creating racist memes and imagery"has lead to its now mainstream status as a hate symbol (ADL). 

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In response to the extremely negative reputation that this meme has gained, the original artist of Pepe the Frog, Matt Furie, has publicly denied his association with the "weird racist version"of Pepe and has joined forces with the Anti Defamation League to attempt legal action, releasing the statement below:

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“As the creator of Pepe, I condemn the illegal and repulsive appropriations of the character by racist and fringe groups. The true nature of Pepe, as featured in my comic book, ‘Boys Club,’ celebrates peace, togetherness and fun. I aim to reclaim the rascally frog from the forces of hate and ask that you join me in making millions of new, joyful Pepe memes that share the light hearted spirit of the original chilled-out champion.” -- Matt Furie (ADL)

 

This meme's status as a hate symbol is the perfect example of the negative outcome due to third party recomposition that DeVoss and Ridolfo explained in their article "Composing for Recomposing: Rhetorical Velocity and Delivery." In addition, Furie's attempt to reclaim the meme by teaming up with the Anti Defamation League through can be seen as an attempt at recomposition of the situation, although there is no way to reverse the spread of the negative information. Like with Dawkins virus metaphor in regards to meme theory, the "infection" of the racist Pepe meme has already spread, making its way past small internet communities and into mainstream American culture.

 

We can see a similar situation in Jim Ridolfo and Martine Courant Rife's article "Rhetorical Velocity and Copyright: A Case Study on Strategies of Rhetorical Delivery," in which a protest image of a Michigan State University student was unknowingly taken and remixed, or recomposed, by the University as a promotional image. Although Furie knew about the meme (the original remix and its common variations), he did not anticipate the recomposition of his image as an anti-semitic symbol, and now wishes to take legal action, citing his copyright of the original Pepe design. However, like Maggie's example in Ridolfo and Rife's article, due to the murky nature of copyright laws and how they would apply to a widely used and edited meme may make it impossible for any real repercussions to occur.  This is in part because it calls to question creative license and intellectual property. In the case of a meme that is constantly reproduced and remixed, a strong argument could be made that the individual designs are unique, unrelated to Pepe (especially if they were posted without "Pepe" in their titles) and property of the creators, therefore not subject to copyright.  

 

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