• ObjectivityIncarnate@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      7
      ·
      6 days ago

      Google says Steam has 132 million monthly active users. Even if you count Pepe (which is absurd, the vast majority of use of it has nothing to do with anything hateful), that’s still far under 1% of users.

    • enkers@sh.itjust.works
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      167
      arrow-down
      9
      ·
      edit-2
      8 days ago

      Pepe is a beloved internet meme, not a symbol of hate. Rightoid asshats need to leave pepe and doge the fuck alone. >:(

        • Grumpy@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          86
          arrow-down
          9
          ·
          8 days ago

          Wtf pepe is considered alt-right because alt-right uses them sometimes??? I hear they also use English! Maybe English needs to get banned!

          • ObjectivityIncarnate@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            4 days ago

            Yeah, I’m very much in the camp of “fuck you, you don’t get to have it” when it comes to extremist groups trying to co-opt other symbols.

            It’s extremely doable–the LGBT population has largely succeeded at doing exactly that with “queer”, for example–these days, basically nobody utters that word as a pejorative. Fuck you, it’s ours now. See what I mean?

            There are way more of us than them, we could literally do this for everything these dipshits try to ‘claim’.

          • Jiggle_Physics@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            53
            arrow-down
            11
            ·
            8 days ago

            They didn’t just use it sometimes, they were using it as an intentional dog whistle, that is the difference. Part of dog whistling is choosing something that, otherwise, has had no real relationship to the thing it is being used as a dog whistle for.

            • reksas@sopuli.xyz
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              39
              arrow-down
              6
              ·
              8 days ago

              so they can choose anything and we just have to stop using it because its their dogwhistle now?

              • Jiggle_Physics@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                30
                arrow-down
                6
                ·
                8 days ago

                No, but you have to understand that it now comes with the context of being a WP dog whistle. The symbolism of the Nazis weren’t anything to their ideology before hand. They had widespread use for thousands of years. Now they, especially the primary one, is all but verboten in the west, and people who use things, like the swastika, as religious symbols, even know to tread with caution using it in the west. White hoods, and robes, have been used in cultural/religious regalia forever. However, you don’t use them in the US unless you consider being mistaken for a klan memeber.

                Can we reclaim pepe? Probably, it was minor compared to the aforementioned things, and the creator has done a lot to kibosh the commercial use of it from right wing people. However, it was that, and that context doesn’t just disappear because you don’t like it.

                • ObjectivityIncarnate@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  1
                  ·
                  4 days ago

                  Can we reclaim pepe?

                  We never lost it, imo. The vast majority of Pepe use is by people communicating nothing resembling a message of hate in any way.

                • 9488fcea02a9@sh.itjust.works
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  15
                  arrow-down
                  4
                  ·
                  8 days ago

                  There’s a whole documentary about reclaiming pepe called “feels good man”

                  The more we discourage people from using pepe because WP and shitheads, the more they win.

                  • Jiggle_Physics@lemmy.world
                    link
                    fedilink
                    English
                    arrow-up
                    6
                    ·
                    8 days ago

                    I agree, a number of the places I hang out online, and friends, use it. None of them are like that. However, when researching bigotry in culture, it will inevitably come up, and it’s significance as an indicator is complicated. So, best to read the details of the data, and what they have to say about it, beyond and chart, and headline, and keep in mind that there is real reason to attach the frog to the alt-right, but it is used in many other ways.

              • thedirtyknapkin@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                9
                arrow-down
                14
                ·
                edit-2
                8 days ago

                to me it’s kind of kind the nazi bar thing. if you’re at a bar with 2 Nazis, and you’re not a nazi, you’re still hanging out at a nazi bar.

                they fucking adore this frog. no other group has embraced it as strongly or consistently. I’m quite happy to let an old ass meme die because i find it distasteful now that it’s the favorite meme of nazis.

                • Voyajer@lemmy.world
                  link
                  fedilink
                  English
                  arrow-up
                  4
                  ·
                  6 days ago

                  Except in this instance the bar is the meme and you can’t stop the Nazis from using it no matter what you do. Even if you move on to some other meme they can just as easily follow you, now no one knows what’s acceptable or not and for how long.

        • petrol_sniff_king@lemmy.blahaj.zone
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          8
          ·
          7 days ago

          They did, but I don’t think they still have them.

          Pepe is now (or again) a beloved element of Twitch chat, and the OK symbol… I dunno, that was eight years ago. I just don’t hear anybody talking about it, unless it’s to half remember that it’s bad now or something.

          • wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            6
            arrow-down
            2
            ·
            7 days ago

            The whole OK symbol thing was literally a false flag by 4chan to clown on the news media’s fervor at the time to label things as racist dog whistles, specifically the whole Pepe shit that was going on.

            The fucking thread that started it was (paraphrasing): “Hey guys, do you think the news media would be stupid enough to believe the OK hand sign is a white power dog whistle? [Image of WP poorly traced over the OK hand symbol]”

            Obviously, if you get your kicks out of pretending to be a fool, you shouldn’t be surprised when you find yourself in the presence of actual fools. That also very much applies to the type of edgelords on 4chan that thought it would be funny to “pretend to be” racists, or at least to have discovered a racist hate symbol. Eventually enough people will take it seriously that the original “joke” (if you can even call it that) will be lost.

            • petrol_sniff_king@lemmy.blahaj.zone
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              2
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              5 days ago

              I don’t know if it was really a false flag. Nazis did start using the OK symbol for a time, and I think that was the point. It was built to be smoke and mirrors.

              I do believe a lot of channers thought that it was just a joke. I mean, that ambiguity is what makes the dog whistle what it is.

              But yeah, it’s a pretty lame magic show when all your tricks are, like, doing a Charlottesville but saying you’re not.

              • ObjectivityIncarnate@lemmy.world
                link
                fedilink
                English
                arrow-up
                2
                ·
                4 days ago

                It was a joke, and still is. It’s just that there were enough extremist imbeciles out there who didn’t realize it was a joke, and took it seriously.

                That doesn’t change anything about its origin as a joke.

    • Darohan@lemmy.zip
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      20
      ·
      8 days ago

      Wait, is just using a Valknut considered a hate symbol? I was under the impression that it was a pretty common “I like Vikings/Odin/Paganism” type symbol… Same with Tyr tbh.

      • Virkkunen@fedia.io
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        29
        arrow-down
        25
        ·
        8 days ago

        The issue is that the Venn diagram of people interested in vikings/odinism and racists bigots is almost just a circle

        • tootoughtoremember@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          3
          ·
          edit-2
          6 days ago

          I enjoyed the Vikings tv series, particularly the early seasons with Ragnar. I especially liked when they wove in religion and mysticism into the episodes. A lot of people enjoyed the series at the time, it was objectively popular. Having an interest in something well represented in popular culture does not make you a de facto racist bigot.

          There’s a more likely argument to make, that within the population of white nationalist racist bigots, there’s an overrepresentation of interest/obsession with Vikings/Odinism.

        • Paranomaly@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          33
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          8 days ago

          This is hyperbole. A large amount of racists and bigots are into norse stuff? Maybe. Almost all people in the norse stuff are racists and bigots? High doubt, and shouldn’t be allowed to be coopted anyway. Loki is one of the few ancient figures with some gender fluid markings as it is.

          • ObjectivityIncarnate@lemmy.world
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            ·
            4 days ago

            A large amount of racists and bigots are into norse stuff? Maybe. Almost all people in the norse stuff are racists and bigots? High doubt

            In my experience, people are, on average, extremely susceptible to this very basic logical fallacy, and truly believe the two sentiments above are equivalent. In other words, believing that “most X are Y” implies “most Y are X”.

            It’s fucking everywhere, pervasive all over the political spectrum too, it’s universal. Radical feminists use the fact that most physical assailants are male to malign half of the human population. Racists use statistics about what percentage of violent crime is committed by a race, to draw conclusions about what percentage of that race commits violent crime. Hell, Reefer Madness, a propaganda piece with a well-deserved reputation of being completely full of shit, rests its premise on the exact same fallacy: “practically everyone dying from hard drug use is/was also a weed smoker, so we’ve concluded weed use leads to hard drug use”.

            I see it over, and over, and over again, online and in real life. It makes you want to grab someone by the shoulders and shake them while yelling “all oranges are fruits, does that mean all fruits are oranges?!”, lol.

            That’s enough venting for tonight, though, haha.

          • Default_Defect@midwest.social
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            11
            arrow-down
            9
            ·
            8 days ago

            You’re right, but 100% of the people I’ve encountered that were REALLY into Norse stuff specifically, rather than a general interest in history, were white supremacist.

            • Paranomaly@sh.itjust.works
              link
              fedilink
              English
              arrow-up
              4
              ·
              8 days ago

              This is fair. I am usually not in spaces where I’d see it much but have heard tell. Part of why I say it is to not have people feel shamed if they just generally like the culture/pop aesthetic involved without any baggage and to encourage people to do what they can to counter co-opt attempts

        • Darohan@lemmy.zip
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          27
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          8 days ago

          Not sure I believe that for a minute. There’s definitely a group there, nobody can deny that, but Norse mythology is incredibly popular among leftists too - I say this as somewhat of a Norse mythology leftist, whose favorite viking/odinist/pagan band preaches unity and kindness among all people and is fronted by a polyamorous bisexual - there’s a lot to love in the mythos and the factual history, and it appeals to a wide variety of people for a wide variety of reasons.

    • ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      12
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      7 days ago

      They even admit that pepe can be used in perfectly normal ways, yet they show it’s the number one most used one. That’s crazy to me lmao

      • gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        8 days ago

        He got reused in the mid 2010s as a very racist meme where people would make him sing some truly heinous shit, actually

        Defunctland (I think) did a video on Mac Tonight that mentions it in passing, if you’re curious open a private browsing window and look it up, you can likely find the memes still