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Behind Nick Fuentes, the host of America First, follows a new group of far-right conservatives. They call themselves the Groypers. And theyve launched a war against the Republican party.

Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA, and Donald Trump Jr. do not seem like likely targets for a rising right-wing faction. But much to their surprise recently, the Groyper army chose events hosted by Kirk and Trump to descend upon.

Groypers attended a Turning Point USA conference at Ohio State University to heckle speakers with loaded questions. Turning Point is a conservative nonprofit that mobilizes Republican students on college campuses.

Trump, meanwhile, was booed off the stage at a free speech event at the University of California Los Angeles. The Groypers are claiming these two events, along with seven others, as victories against the mainstream Republican party, which they now consider to be fake conservatism.

A Groyper is a member of Fuentes movement of his brand of alt-right white nationalism. The alt-right is a loose collection of conservatives that harbor white nationalists. Fuentes is currently one of its most public faces.

As their chosen mascot, Groypers took hold of an exploitable illustration of Pepe the Frog. While iterations of Pepe are commonly used within the far-right, this version is of Pepe resting a conspicuous face against his two hands.

The meme appears in different forms on Groypers Twitter pages to show their allegiance.

pic.twitter.com/waW5rgrJ40

Fuentes Twitter bio declares himself as the Groyper leader. His image header illustrates Pepe soldiers holding up a flag that states Groyper War, Total Victory!

The header also has the names of the events, primarily on college campuses, and dates of when the Groypers heckled conservative events, all claiming victory.

The Groypers galvanize around the idea that the current Republican party is fake conservatism. Basically, they try to push each conservative position farther to the right by supporting a white, male, heterosexual America. They embrace white nationalism in support of policies that, although they have foundations in conservatism, even some Republicans find too far.

The group is extreme on immigration restrictionism, often calling for a total shutdown of immigrants into America, and pushes anti-LGTBQ propaganda to continue to fight a culture wore they believe the right gave in on.

Support of Israel is one major difference between the Groypers and what they call the traditional Conservative Inc. While the Republican party remains firm in supporting its Israeli ally, the Groypers extreme nationalism and anti-Semitism pushes them outside the bounds of normal right-wing discourse.

America is NOT a propositional nation. We have NO ALLEGIANCE to Israel, Fuentes posted on his Telegram according to Vox. We are CHRISTIANS and we dont promote degeneracy. Demographic replacement is REAL and it will be CATASTROPHIC.

Fuentes is also known for casting doubt on the number of Jews that died in the Holocaust, using crude analogies relating to cookies and baking.

He described the above cookie comparison as his hilarious and epic Holocaust joke on his Telegram channel.

The Groypers are loyal to Fuentes and share this anti-Semitic perspective. For example, one Groyper page posted a tweet with a photo of a blimp that says jews rape kids.

your uber driver has arrived, @ayyyetone tweeted with the photo.

Fuentes, an extremely online pundit, thinks he can shape youth conservatism because hes better at catering to the internet culture that many Gen Z or Zoomer college students are inclined to consume.

I think the generational style is so important, Fuentes posted on Telegram. Idk if its post modern or post ironic but the style and tone is very native to Zoomers which is i think why ppl like Shapiro or Kirk imagine theyre check mating me with some of these controversies but in reality its just turning young ppl onto my content.

Fuentes and the Groypers primarily target the bulk of the Republican party.

In the past, they have heckled speakers like right-wing talk show host Ben Shapiro, as well as Trump Jr. and Kirk.

Their goal is to expose high-profile Republicans by asking loaded questions, often about Israel and homosexuality, to prove their distance from the extreme or true right.

There were a number of trolls who sabotaged the Q&A portion of tonights @tpusa event, Turning Points Benny Johnson tweeted following an event at Ohio State University. Many of the questions were abhorrent and were not asked in good faith.

Fuentes responded to Johnson by calling out Turning Points moderate stance. Turning Point has been scrutinized in the past for its own racist biases.

Turning Point is now making a concerted effort to slander all critics of their bullshit fake conservatism as extremist trolls,' @NickJFuentes tweeted. We are America First and you are being exposed for the sellout frauds you are.

Fuentes has been promoting the Groypers next event on Dec. 20. White nationalists Patrick Casey and Jacob Lloyd will join Fuentes in West Palm Beach for the Groyper Leadership Summit. The Groypers will also be mobilizing against Republicans again, as the event is set to overlap with another Turning Point conference.

The GLS will feature speeches by myself, Patrick Casey, and Jacob Lloydwe invite all Groypers to join us for a celebration of our Total Victory over Charlie Kirk in the Groyper Wars! Fuentes posted on his Telegram board.

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What are Groypers? - The Daily Dot

Believe it or not, the first emoji was created in 1999 by a Japanese artist, Shigetaka Kurita, who wanted to create a simple, quick, and attractive way of conveying information. At that time, Kurita was working as a developer for i-mode, an internet platform owned by Japans main mobile carrier, DOCOMO. Fast-forward almost 20 years and these small, yellow, emotive characters now represent a lot more than at first sight.

Emoji has been referred to as a lingua franca a bridging language that allows us to bypass spoken language barriers and cultural differences. But emoji arent just as level ground for communicating, or as an innocent outlet to sext, theyve become an accessible symbol of activism and politics over this past decade.

Emoji has become a summary of our society and has increasingly intertwined with our conversations, even when were talking about politics, Lilian Stolk, an emoji expert told TNW. Not only do we use emoji for politics, but the process of adding new emoji is also a political game. Big tech companies use emoji to show that they represent diversity such as Apple with itsdisabilities emoji and Google with its gender neutral emoji.

A few months back, when people first started talking about US President s potential impeachment on Twitter, the peach emoji which was once a harmless sexting reference became the latest protest symbol against , and more specifically, his potential impeachment get it?

This emoji seemingly became a homonym having the same spelling or pronunciation but different meanings after Lizzo, an American singer-songwriter, tweeted a message which gained almost 120,000 likes. Lizzos IMpeachMENT tweet was likely in celebration of House Speaker Nancy Pelosis decision to launch an impeachment inquiry against Trump.

Emoji are used in their literal sense to spread political messaging, especially in countries were censorship restricts free speech. For example, in China, #MeToo is censored, so people who want to share their stories of sexual harassment and assault instead use the cooked rice and rabbit emoji because rice bunny in China is pronounced similarly to me too.

Throughout the recent general election campaign in the UK, the red rose emoji was used as a symbol for the Labour party.

But just as emoji is used to spread positive political messaging, its also used to represent the opposite. For example, several emoji including the frog (in reference to Pepe The Frog), the milk glass, and the ok sign are used to symbolize white power.

The most political thing about emoji that surprised me is that Apple is not displaying the Taiwanese flag on phones in China, and recently they also blocked it on devices in Hong Kong and Macau. This shows that Apple wants to keep the Chinese market a friend, Stolk added.

With the more controversial political opinions, I think its safer to use an emoji, or a meme, instead of making a message more concrete with words, Stolk added. If you bring your political opinion with a layer of irony, you can hide behind the irony. If you post a pepe meme or use the frog emoji people can deny a real connection to extreme right-wing ideas, because its just funny. But at the same time, it still connects to these ideas.

Although it may seem like Emoji just magically appear on our phones once a year, this isnt exactly how deployment works. The Unicode Consortium, the official body that manage emoji, accept or reject emotive characters submitted by users, designers, and activists.

Over the past couple of years, the Unicode Consortium has faced some backlash over its decisions. Earlier this year, they approved the release of a blood drop emoji in what was widely considered to be a first step in ending period shame and sparking conversations about menstruation.

This is all thanks to a girls-focused development charity, Plan International UK and Plan Australia who in 2017, launched a campaign to create a period emoji in an attempt to reduce the taboo surrounding period and menstrual health.

To make the process of adding emoji to our phones more democratic Stolk created, Emoji Voter, a web-based app where people can vote for which emoji should appear on our keyboards.

Similarly to Tinder, Emoji Voter works by swiping through various emoji proposals which have been officially received by the Unicode Consortium. By swiping an emoji left, youre rejecting the design and its meaning, but by swiping right, you agree that this emoji should be included in the next round of updates.

Once the results are in, theyre sent straight to Unicode who then decide if theyll appear on our phones one day.

A handful of people from The Unicode Consortium decide which emoji we can communicate with. Imagine if just a few people would decide what words we can use? Its very weird that we as users dont have a voice in this. This is what I want to change with Emoji Voter, Stolk said.

The emoji proposals include harmless, fun examples like a rock to depict Earths foundation. But also include more inclusive and political emotive characters like a beaver thats a playful subcultural symbol among the LGBTQ+ society and afro hair which would help diversify cultural representation and its currently the only hair-type missing from the emoji catalog.

As gatekeepers of the language that we all use online, Unicode and their voting members are not consistent in their choices. They state that a new emoji should not be too specific and have the potential to become popular, Stolk explained. Then why is there a red-haired emoji and no afro emoji, while there are many more people with an afro worldwide? Why was a period emoji too specific, but there will soon be 70 symbols for people with disabilities? If we continue in this way, within eight years well be scrolling through 5000 emoji. Do we want that? We should think about this better.

According to Stolk, the most voted emoji will be the hugging and lip biting emoji. Both are a form of non-verbal communication, and thats how we use emoji most often, Stolk said.

Although the voting process is far from perfect, its reassuring to see that diversity and inclusivity are increasingly becoming part of the debate. While an emoji may not spark real change in society, it does encourage a conversation and acts as an accessible form of communication between various cultures and languages it could be argued that emoji speak louder than words.

Read next: Unblock your favorite streaming sites & watch them anywhere for $40

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From sexting to politics: How emoji evolved this decade - The Next Web

Gas mask: check. Eye mask: check. Helmet: check. A press ID and reflective vest that spells out PRESS across the chest: check.

As I packed my black-and-white polka-dot designer backpackthe only backpack I ownearlier this month to prepare myself for the December 8 rally that marked the six-month anniversary of the Hong Kong protests, a feeling of uneasiness and doubt weighed heavy inside my chest. Since when did such protective gear become a must-have when I head out to cover a demonstration? And since when did writing about arts and culture involve putting myself on the front lines, where tear gas and rubber bullets face off against bricks and Molotov cocktails?

I might not have been able to imagine it six months ago, but this is now a somewhat regular day on assignment for me.

It didnt have to be this way. As a journalist who covers art and culture, I have the option to look away. Footage depicting the violent clashes between the police and black-clad protesters may have been making international headlines over the past six months, but for Hong Kongs art world, things seemed to be business as usual. I could have chosen to attend an art opening with a stylish clutch under my arm, sipping champagne while keeping my antenna up for news and gossip. The fall art auctions took place on schedule amid the shooting of tear gas, and I could have chosen to stay in the comfort of the auction room, taking in the frenetic bidding over the work of Yoshitomo Nara and Sanyu.

Riot police outside the Hong Kong Museum of Art after tear gas was fired nearby. Photo: Vivienne Chow.

But as Hong Kong descends into an unthinkable state, what seems to be the normality of the art world has suddenly become a detached reality might as well exist in a parallel universe. Protesters and unarmed civilians have been hit with more than 16,000 rounds of tear gas, nearly 14,000 rounds of so-called non-lethal weapons from rubber bullets to sponge grenades, and two live rounds. One student protester fell to death during a clash in a residential area, and more than 6,000 arrests have been made over the past six months, including of a child as young as 11. How can one still keep her head buried in the sand, thinking that the city is operating normally?

At the height of some of the most violent clashes, like the siege of university campuses in mid-November, Hong Kong was, quite literally, a war zone. None of this is normal. Had I chosen to stay in the art bubble and not witness at least some of what might be the worst events of terror my hometown has ever seen, I would have regretted it for the rest of my lifeas a human being, a Hongkonger, and as a journalist.

Am I scared? Im terrified. Covering art and culture has rarely involved encountering squads of armed riot police or hearing shots of tear gas fired at crowds in the heart of Central, the citys core business district where international galleries like Gagosian, Lehmann Maupin, Simon Lee, and Pearl Lam are located. Nor does it typically involve getting jostled by crowds of protesters running across Salisbury Garden in Tsim Sha Tsui, where tear gas canisters were fired outside the newly reopened Hong Kong Museum of Art.

Sure, I had the experience of covering the Umbrella Movement on the frontline occasionally as a culture news reporter in 2014. I have also recently taken a safety workshop for journalists given by a former member of the Australian military. But this kind of reporting was never something I could get used to. And as news continues to surface about journalists becoming targets of riot police, many getting shot with rubber bullets or sponge grenades,and one even losing an eye, I have had to decide in a split second on the ground: should I stay or should I go? Should I continue to take pictures or filming?

The installation Beyond by Hong Kong artist Rosanna Li Wei-han on show at Hong Kong Museum of Art. Photo: Vivienne Chow.

As an art journalist, it may seem unnecessary for me to put myself in danger like many of my colleagues who have been on the frontline on a day-to-day basis, and for whom I have the utmost respect. But these traumatic experiences have opened my eyes to humanity in a new and deeper way, which has inevitably informed the way I cover my own beat and helped me to reflect on the true meaning of art.

The words of Abby Chen, the head of contemporary art at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, constantly ring in my ears. During our conversation back in July, Chen told me that she believed the greatest art will be produced in Hong Kong in the wake of this uprising. This is about being human, and the kind of resistance and resilience that we are seeing Hong Kong artists are at the forefront in terms of thinking about their global identity in this rapidly shifting world, she said. Artists are part of this light.

Protesters mini Stonehenge rockblock in Hong Kong. Photo: Vivienne Chow.

Five months later, Chen has been proven right. Her understanding of art, and more importantly, her understanding of humanity, has led me to realize that the most meaningful and relevant creative expressions are living on the streets, rather than inside perfect white cubes insulated from the real world.

Often made anonymously by groups of Hong Kong people who are determined to fight an impossible fight, these creative expressionsgraffiti, songs, protest signs, memes, Stonehenge-looking roadblocks, and even performative protestsrepresent the demands, dreams, hopes, and fears of the people of this former British colony as they struggle to retain its freedoms and systems under the rule of the Peoples Republic of China before the 50 years unchanged promise expires in 2047.

Graffiti that reads Hongkongers, revenge. Photo: Vivienne Chow.

The protests sparked by the now-withdrawn extradition bill have morphed into a much larger scale pro-democracy movement, and the symbolism has expanded, too. These creative outputs have not only transformed public spaces into a living gallery of visual culture, but have also played an important role in keeping the movement vital and engaging. It is no coincidence that a record number of artists ran for public office during the most recent Hong Kong electionsand won.

When I walk pass a Lennon Wall and look at the post-its, graffiti, and posters spelling out protest slogans such as Liberate Hong Kong, Revolution of Our Times or Five Demands, Not One Less,I often ask myself: Is it art? But what is art, anyway? A banana duck-taped on the wall sold for $120,000? Or an object of desire made with impeccable craftsmanship?

Art, to me, is an honest statement, and what I see in the streets and in images circulating in cyberspace are expressions that require both artistic skillbe it drawing, design, or street calligraphyand sincerity. They are the product of hybrid cultural influences inherited from Chinese tradition, Japanese pop culture, the Western world, as well as Hong Kongs cinema heritage, Canto-pop, street humor, and cynicism.

Christmas card from Hong Kong protesters.

These creative outputs embody a unique Hong Kong cultural identity, but can also resonate with a global audience. They borrow icons and memes from other cultures and reinvent a new identity for them, such as Pepe the Frog, which was reimagined as an irreverent symbol of Hong Kongs resistance and resilience rather than the symbol of hate co-opted by the alt-right in the United States. And more importantly, these visual expressions are the vessels of the pain and trauma Hong Kong people have experienced over the past six monthspeople whose voices have been muted by a government that fails to respond to their demands. Some have resorted to violence out of desperation, but many have also turned to art and creativity as their weapon of choice. Their creations might not be perfect, but they are genuine. They are peoples art.

Protesters in fiberglass masks of Pepe the Frog and LIHKG Pig at the December 8 protest. Photo: Vivienne Chow.

What will be interesting to see next is how artists distill all this to express themselves with their own artistic language. Some have already begun, but there will be more to come in the next decade or so. And as the movement is still ongoing, so is the pain and traumabut I have absolute faith in the future of Hong Kong art. That, now more than ever, is what makes this city one of the most interesting places to write about art.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning art critic Jerry Saltz began writing when he was over the age of 40. Being in such a rapidly changing Hong Kong at age 41, I feel that my career has only just begun. I am looking at the world around me, and at art, with fresh eyes.

More:
Ive Been Reporting From the Front Lines of the Hong Kong Protests. Heres What It Taught Me About the Power of Art - artnet News

A new far-right group stepped out in the United States this fall and its driving pro-Trump right-wingers crazy. The groypers are potential successors to the alt-right, but their aim is not to bolster Trumpism so much as to replace it with an even more radical and openly anti-Semitic form of white nationalism.

Turning Point USA, a popular student group headed by Charlie Kirk that supports U.S. President Donald Trump, came under attack this fall as Kirks Culture War college tour was treated to a series of high-profile disruptions by the groypers.

Led by 21-year-old YouTuber Nicholas Fuentes, an associate of infamous white nationalist (and self-described racial identitarian) Richard Spencer, the groypers made national headlines this month for heckling Donald Trump Jr. at an event at UCLA. That resulted in Trump Jr. and former Fox News personality Kimberly Guilfoyle leaving the stage after attempting to shout down the crowd.

Weeks before the event, the Zionist Organization of America called on Twitter to ban Fuentes for using the analogy of Cookie Monster baking batches of cookies to attempt to deny the horrific murder of 6 million innocent Jews during the Holocaust during a podcast he hosts.

Fuentes group, apparently named for a cartoon frog similar to alt-right symbol Pepe the Frog, has harassed pro-Trump speakers from popular conservative commentator and Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief Ben Shapiro to Texas Congressman Dan Crenshaw to David Rubin, a host for the conservative pay television network BlazeTV.

At the events they disrupt, the groypers ask speakers leading questions about Israel, gay rights and immigration to force them to defend universal rights thereby revealing them as fake conservatives.

Kirk, like Crenshaw and other speakers targeted by the groypers, are staunch defenders of Trump and often push the same kind of rhetoric as the president. Crenshaw and Kirk both regularly attack the so-called deep state and the impeachment hoax, but denounce the overt racism of the groypers.

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Voxs Jane Coaston, one of the preeminent journalists covering the American right today, notes that thegroyper army is simply the alt-right of 2016 and 2017, warmed over, reenergized and using new terminology aimed at disassociating itself from the optics problem of the deadly August 2017 Charlottesville Unite the Right Rally which, not coincidentally, Fuentes attended.

The alt-right a far-right, white nationalist movement in the United States that grabbed attention early in Trumps presidency has lost steam in recent years as many of its leaders have been largely discredited and exiled from the American right wing. From Spencer to Milo Yiannopoulos to Gavin McInnes of the men-only, misogynist organization Proud Boys, the movements most vocal proponents are now rarely given media platforms.

The size and scope of the groyper army is not well documented, nor is its online reach. However, it has disrupted events from Tennessee to Los Angeles and appears to be gaining steam ahead of the 2020 presidential election campaign.

The groypers also ask questions using a variety of anti-Israel, anti-Semitic conspiracy theories to elicit reactions from the speakers they target. These questions include asking about Israeli domestic surveillance equipment at the White House and the dancing Israelis conspiracy theory, which claims that Israel was behind the 9/11 attacks as evidenced by five Israeli nationals dancing in celebration as the Twin Towers burned.

Another common question asked by group members is about the USS Liberty, a U.S. spy ship that Israel sank in the aftermath of the Six-Day War in 1967 after it misidentified it as an Egyptian vessel, killing 34 American sailors. The incident has become an anti-Semitic dog whistle used by the groypers to ask how support for Israel puts America First and to raise doubt over the U.S.-Israel alliance. When a groyper posed this question to Kirk when he was onstage with Trump Jr. and Guilfoyle at UCLA, Kirk denounced the conspiracy theory which alleges Israel deliberately targeted the U.S. vessel and ended up launching into a vehement defense of Israel.

VoxsCoaston quotes the neo-Nazi Daily Stormer websiteas urging the groypers: When you get pulled out [by security], yell GOOGLE THE USS LIBERTY or GOOGLE DANCING ISRAELIS or AMERICA FIRST NOT ISRAEL FIRST or just NICK FUENTES.

While still very much on the fringe of the American right, Fuentes has found some mainstream support in well-known conservative pundit Michelle Malkin.

Malkin spent a decade churning out New York Times best-sellers, had a nationally syndicated newspaper column and is a regular on cable news. Shewas fired from the Young America's Foundation last week for supporting the groyper leader.

Her former employer is a conservative youth group whose events were also targeted by the groypers.

After YAF issued a statement upon her termination, saying that There is no room in mainstream conservatism or at YAF for Holocaust deniers, white nationalists, street brawlers, or racists, Malkin who has praised Fuentes as a New Right leader doubled down on Twitter in response to YAF. The Keepers of the Gate have spoken. #AmericaFirst is not mainstream. My defense of unjustly prosecuted Proud Boys, patriotic young nationalists/groypers & demographic truth-tellers must not be tolerated. SPLC is cheering, she wrote, referring to the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Malkins tweet echoes the groypers sentiment that they and not the mainstream are the true voice of Trumps America First agenda.

In mid-November, the groyper army targeted TPUSA events featuringrising GOP star Crenshaw at Arizona State and the University of Texas at Austin. The latter event saw groypers being escorted out of the auditorium after Crenshaw declared that he sections off any anger about anti-whiteness and was shouted down by an audience member who said: We are mad because Israel, its prime minister, said 9/11 was good for Israel.

Crenshaw has since slammed the groypers, repeatedly calling them the alt-right 2.0.

After conservative Daily Wire writer Matt Walsh tussled with a groyper at LA'S California State University in early November, Crenshaw came to his defense. The groyper had asked Walsh how he justified working for a non-Christian meaning Shapiro, the Daily Wires editor-in-chief. Wait, youre telling me that my Jewish boss doesnt believe that Jesus is the son of God? Walsh asked sarcastically. My god, Im scandalized by this! I had no idea.

In response to the incident, Crenshaw tweeted: Matt is correct. They use slogans like America first to get conservatives to sympathize with them. But after personally dealing with them, its pretty obvious they are vehement racists, anti-semites & ethnic-nationalists. Conservatives need to know the difference. Malkin then blocked Crenshaw on Twitter.

Walsh had responded to Malkin in a tweet, writing, Hi @michellemalkin. Fuentes called me a race traitor and f*ggot because I work for Jews. He also said that black people who complained about segregation needed to grow up. How do you feel about these statements? And in what way are they America First?

Many of the conservative speakers the groypers have targeted are Jewish including Shapiro, Rubin and Jonah Goldberg, a former editor for the National Review. Fuentes had previously personally targeted Rubin on his YouTube channel: You want to talk to Jewy Jewstein? Fuentes said. Im David Rubin and this is the gay Jewish show. Today weve got a Jew.

At a speech at Stanford University last week, Shapiro ripped into Fuentes, calling him a garbage human being and obviously white supremacist garbage.

Some call themselves America First to hijack President Trumps slogans to give themselves a patina of credibility youre seeing them adopt the beliefs of some of these other movements in order to find cover for their own vile belief system, Shapiro said.

While Shapiro has been a vocal critic of this new movement and of the alt-right, he has also given credence to many of the arguments that bolster the far right in the United States. Shapiro recently argued in response to an Atlantic cover story on how to avoid another American Civil War that Democrats are using demographic change to force an ideological change in the United States a notion similar to the white genocide conspiracy popular with the far right.

One thing the groypers and the alt-right movement have in common is that both have made Shapiro their worst enemy. A study by the Anti-Defamation League found that Shapiro was the number one target of the alt-right in 2016 and it seems he will be for the groypers in 2020.

More:
Trump, Israel and anti-Semitism: How white nationalists are rattling the American right - Haaretz

Pepe the Frog is getting an image makeover this summer.

The cartoon frog with the bulging eyes and wide smile has, for years, been associated with America's alt-right a symbol of racism and hate as the country continues to grow more divided. In 2016, Pepe the Frog was officially listed as a hate symbol by the Anti-Defamation League, as the character gained prominence on sites like 4chan and became increasingly associated with anti-Semitism and bigotry.

Matt Furie, the artist behind Pepe the Frog, went so far as to "kill off" his creation in a 2017 comic strip, in an attempt to rebuke the far-right's transformation of the character. In a Time magazine essay, Furie wrote that "a once peaceful frog-dude from my comic book," was morphed by racists and anti-Semites into "an icon of hate." He concluded the essay arguing that "I, the creator, say that Pepe is love."

A pro-Trump protestor carries a Pepe the Frog sign during a protest at University of California-Berkeley in April 2017. Josh Edelson/Getty Images

In Hong Kong, however, protesters have another idea of what Pepe the Frog represents: for them, he is a pro-democracy freedom fighter siding with the masses as they take on mainland China a vastly different identity compared to what the character is viewed as by many across the Pacific.

A New York Times article published on Monday explored that question, with reporter Daniel Victor suggesting that many protesters "had no idea about the symbol's racist connotations elsewhere in the world. They just like him." He added that, at least online, when Hong Kongers do discuss the negative connotations surrounding the character, they largely shrug it off.

"Different countries have very different cultures," suggested 20-year-old Hong Konger Emily Yeung, in an interview with Victor. "Symbols and colors that mean something in one culture can mean something completely different in another culture, so I think if Americans are really offended by this, we should explain to them what it means to us."

As the Hong Kong protests picked up this summer, Pepe the Frog became a common symbol across the city his face emblazoned on stickers, walls, backpacks, and within the abyss of social media. He was directly on the front linewith protesters, sympathetic to their struggles and devoted to their cause. In a Reddit thread titled "Take Pepe back!" a user wrote "In Hong Kong Pepe is not at all associated with Trump... the original artist didn't want Pepe to be used like that. So let's try to make baby steps."

Hongkonger Paper Chu told the South China Morning Post that she "originally liked [Pepe] for his irreverence, which feels very in sync with the attitude of the Hong Kong people. But having him as part of the anti-extradition movement, as the face of it, feels appropriate."

That's a sentiment felt across the board, it seems: as one person wrote on LIHKG, an anonymous messaging board for protesters, "it has nothing to do with the far-right ideology in the state... it just looks funny and captures the hearts of so many youngsters. It is a symbol of youth participation in this movement," according to a Times translation of the forum.

Mari Law, a 33-year-old protester, told the New York Times that similar to the hundreds of thousands of them who continue to take to the streets demanding greater democracy and government accountability, the cartoon frog is just sad.

The protesters want change, and they want the Chinese government to take their demands seriously.

Pepe the Frog, the character who for years has been aligned with the far-right and anti-Semitism, may, in their minds, be just the "frog-dude" to keep that dream alive.

Read more:
Pepe the Frog, an alt-right symbol in the US, has emerged ...