The Russian government just tweeted an image of a white supremacist frog

[babylonsister]

http://www.vox.com/world/2017/1/9/14212496/russia-embassy-pepe


The Russian government just tweeted an image of a white supremacist frog
Updated by Zack Beauchamp@[e-mail] Jan 9, 2017, 11:40am EST


The Russian Embassy in the United Kingdom loves to troll the West on Twitter. On Monday morning, it outdid itself — tweeting an image of a cartoon frog linked to Donald Trump’s white nationalist fans:

image at link/don't know how to share this...

Even absent the image, the tweet would be pretty trolly. It’s a response to British pundits who are calling on UK Prime Minister Theresa May to disrupt President-elect Donald Trump’s attempts to cozy up to Putin’s Russia. The Russian Embassy is making fun of these UK pundits for seeming not to trust America, Britain’s closest ally — which is rather amusing, given how often the Russian government blasts the United States.

But it’s the appended image of the frog that elevates the Russian tweet from “a bit trolly” to “holy shit, this is actually happening.”

The frog is named Pepe, and it was originally a character in a web comic called Boy’s Club. But more recently, the frog has been appropriated by the “alt-right” — a racist, sexist, and anti-Semitic online subculture full of Trump devotees. It became so closely associated with the alt-right movement that the Anti-Defamation League, America’s premier anti-Semitism watchdog, declared Pepe a hate symbol akin to the swastika.

It’s possible that Russia’s UK embassy didn’t know this, and just reached for a popular meme to append to its tweet. But the odds are against it: Pepe is quite famous, with his white supremacist links exhaustively reported after Donald Trump Jr. posted a meme featuring Pepe this summer. It’s more likely that the exceptionally web-savvy embassy added Pepe to the tweet intentionally to ramp up the troll quotient.

Russian state media agencies such as RT and Sputnik have tailored their content to appeal to the alt-right, which the Kremlin sees as willing to parrot its line on foreign policy issues.

more...

http://www.vox.com/world/2017/1/9/14212496/russia-embassy-pepe

[Raster]

1. "Its possible that Russias UK embassy didnt know this..."

..Yes, and it's possible I am directly related to the Queen of England. Possible, but highly improbable.

[etherealtruth]

3. Yeah ... it's more likely that i AM the Queen posting under this pseudonym

[Hortensis]

2. Yes, likely part of a very sophisticated dispersion scheme

that will push spread of not only this message but many others.

[progree]

4. Images of Pepe the Frog

https://www.google.com/search?sourceid=chrome-psyapi2&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8&q=pepe%20the%20frog%20images&oq=pepe%20the%20frog%20images&aqs=chrome..69i57j0.4757j0j7