Katie Notopoulos is a senior editor at Buzzfeed News and co-host of the Internet Explorer podcast. She is on Twitter.

In one of New York City's Supreme Court buildings, there’s an intricate wood inlay design in the ceiling that looks like a bunch of swastikas. The courthouse was built before the rise of Germany’s Nazi party, and the ceiling pattern is almost certainly a meaningless design choice. But the fact that this hall of justice is decorated with a symbol of the Worst Thing Ever is just, well, awkward.

Awkwardness is also the fate of young Ethan, whose bar mitzvah was meme-themed. He had T-shirts made with Pepe the Frog’s face on them, and now no one can responsibly wear them:

I don't think I'll be able to get over learning about this pic.twitter.com/7tMuMIx1Z4 — Charles Dingus (@fungumchum) September 30, 2016

No, if the Anti-Defamation League says that Pepe the Frog is a symbol of anti-Semitism and racism, there's really no bouncing back from that. It's no use arguing that Pepe is also just a funny frog. Once a symbol is officially lumped in with neo-Nazis and racists — whether it appears on the ceiling pattern of a courthouse, or is a white hood, square black mustache or cartoon frog — it’s over. You can dutifully explain to friends that there was a time when that symbol didn’t mean anything bad, but let's be honest, even though there’s no use in tearing down an old ceiling, you'd never in good conscience inlay it with swastikas today. It’s over.

As far as meme cycles go, the journey of Pepe the Frog has been perhaps the weirdest. Usually memes get rejected by the people who started them once they get too mainstream – typically this happens when they appear on Ellen Degeneres (“Damn, Daniel”), get co-opted by advertisers (Brands Saying Bae), or when moms start to post them on Facebook (Grumpy Cat).

Those who are hip to internet culture know that a brand adoption of a meme is the ultimate death knell. Now we know — because of Pepe — it turns out the one thing more toxic to a meme's cool factor than brands is adoption by anti-Semites and racists.

And it's very sad because before Pepe was labeled a hate symbol, it used to be a really, really good meme. There was a whole absurdist play-acting bit that played out online in which various Pepe drawings were presented as “rare” and valuable, with memelords ironically insisting there was a market for these memes that adhered to the rules of real world capitalism. (I swear it's funnier than it sounds.)

Like Ethan, whose bar mitzvah swag is now paradoxically branded with anti-Semitic frogs, I too have been burned by Pepe. Last year, I wrote about the Pepe meme for BuzzFeed. Now that Pepe’s reputation is solidified as a neo-Nazi symbol, I’m conflicted about this old post. Will people read it and think I’m a Nazi, or that BuzzFeed endorses the current meaning? Do I need to add a disclaimer? What’s the editorial protocol here?

Truthfully, the Anti-Defamation League's recent lambasting of Pepe may have created a bit of a Streisand effect — when publicity around a bad thing makes the phenomenon larger, or more visible, than if it had been left alone. Most fans of the meme frog have probably never encountered the Pepe-as-Hitler meme. Katy Perry has tweeted a Pepe, for example, and as far as I know, Katy Perry is not a neo-Nazi. The harmless version of Pepe was hugely popular; the numbers and scope of those alt-righters using Pepe in sinister contexts is much smaller. But now Pepe is forever tied to the worst elements of the internet, and there’s no hope in getting him back.

Feels bad, man.



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