Pepe the Frog: the internet\u2019s most infamous meme explained Pepe the Frog is one of the most well-known and widespread memes around, and over the decade and a half he\u2019s existed, it\u2019s also one of the most interesting stories the internet has to offer. [jwplayer QIWQDyD7] Created back in the long-long ago of 2005 by cartoonist Matt Furie, Pepe first appeared in a comic called and wasn\u2019t much more than a recurring character there for the first bit of his life. It took a few years, but in 2008 memes featuring the amphibian started getting popular on MySpace and 4chan, with just a few variations in these early days like \u201csad\u201d \u201csmug\u201d \u201cangry\u201d and various types of \u201cfeels\u201d. It was certainly a much simpler time. In the first half of the 2010s, Pepe only continued to grow in popularity and fame. Twitch, Twitter, Reddit, no matter where you went online it seemed like the frog was everywhere, but the good times couldn\u2019t last. Controversy, that hasn\u2019t gone away even today, was just on the horizon. Pepe was originally created by Furie as having no political affiliation whatsoever but in the run-up to the 2016 United States Presidential election, he became a symbol for certain online groups and was labeled a \u201cHate Symbol\u201d by various U.S. organizations, including the American Defamation League (ADL). He\u2019s still around today though, and that\u2019s because the Pepe meme itself isn\u2019t bigoted at all, but the context of use is an important consideration. \u201cBecause so many Pepe the Frog memes are not bigoted in nature, it is important to examine the use of the meme only in context,\u201d the ADL website says. \u201cThe mere fact of posting a Pepe meme does not mean that someone is racist.\u201d Just don\u2019t test your luck throwing out frogs in Overwatch League chat, as the competition completely banned the meme back in 2018 (and even fines players caught using it to this day). Different types of Pepe emotes Really, you could write a book on all of the different variations that appear as emotes on Twitch alone, and that\u2019s not even touching the countless \u201crare\u201d Pepes that have been minted over the years either. To keep things simple, we\u2019ll just focus here on some of the most common specimens you might encounter while browsing Twitch. Feelsbadman This is basically Pepe 101, a common reversal of the famous \u201cfeels good man.\u201d Feelsbadman can be found all over Twitch when a streamer encounters something sad. Maybe the game you\u2019re looking forward to still doesn\u2019t have any updates? That\u2019s a feelsbadman (looking at you, Overwatch 2). PepeLaugh If the name wasn\u2019t enough to fill you in, this Pepe is barely able to contain his laughter. You\u2019ll find it anytime something humorous happens on stream, or when chat knows something the streamer doesn\u2019t. MonkaS When things get tense, and the anxiety starts building, there\u2019s no better emote to pull out then MonkaS. If you\u2019ve ever wondered how it got its name, it\u2019s actually really simple. On March 16th, 2016, Twitch user Monkasen uploaded the emote to the Better Twitch TV browser extension. Monka \u2013 for the user, and S \u2013 for scared. PepeJam When your tune comes on, or the Fallout music hits just right, you know it\u2019s time for PepeJAM. Pretty straightforward here, with headphones over his ears, and animated versions have him bouncing up and down. Poggers At first glance you can probably guess the inspiration behind the \u2018Poggers\u2019 emote. That would be the longstanding \u2018Pogchamp\u2019 emote, that Twitch recently changed to feature a different streamer every 24 hours. It usually faces left, instead of right like the original emote, but animated versions can also be found flipping back and forth. Honorable mention: Peepo (Apu Apujasta) Peepo emotes seem to just keep getting more and more popular on Twitch since they started popping up in 2017 (and we can see why, as the little guy is undeniably cute). But a common misconception is that these are just poorly drawn Pepes. They\u2019re not! Peepo is instead a descendant, derived from the poorly drawn Pepe named Apu Apustaja (\u201cHelp Helper\u201d in English) that first appeared on Finnish message boards before he made his way to Twitch. He can be used in just as many situations too, so expect to see plenty of him. The humble internet frog Pepe has been on a wild ride over the last 15+ years, but he and his offspring like Peepo don\u2019t seem to be going away anytime soon. Even though the edgy Pepes will undoubtedly continue, it will be very interesting to see how the meme evolves by the time he reaches 30.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Pepe the Frog: the internet\u2019s most infamous meme explained Pepe the Frog is one of the most well-known and widespread memes around, and over the decade and a half he\u2019s existed, it\u2019s also one of the most interesting stories the internet has to offer. [jwplayer QIWQDyD7] Created back in the long-long ago of 2005 by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57100"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57100\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}