The Artist Who Created Pepe The Frog Is Suing Alex Jones And InfoWars For Copyright Infringement

Poor Matt Furie. He never could have anticipated that Pepe, a cartoon frog that began as a character in the comic Boy’s Club, would become the stamp of the alt-right, a symbol of supremacist hate that has its own page on the Anti-Defamation League’s website (“A subset of Pepe memes [came] into existence that centered on racist, anti-Semitic, or other bigoted themes”).

Furie recently put “peaceful frog-dude” Pepe out of his misery. Now he’s hoping to do the same with Pepe memes. The artist has filed a copyright lawsuit against the Alex Jones-owned InfoWars, the Pepe meme of websites. The complaint reads as follows:

“Beginning in 2015, various fringe groups connected with the alt-right attempted to co-opt Pepe by mixing images of Pepe with images of hate, including white supremacist language and symbols, Nazi symbols, and other offensive imagery. Furie has worked hard to counteract that negative image of Pepe, including collaborating with the Anti-Defamation League on the #SavePepe campaign to restore Pepe as a character representing peace, togetherness, and fun.”

Furie’s coming after InfoWars over a poster showing Jones, President Donald Trump, Milo Yiannopoulos, Ann Coulter, Matt Drudge, and Roger Stone hanging with Pepe. It costs $17.76, because of course it does.

The lawsuit — which you can read in full here — is asking for an injunction against InfoWars from infringing on Furie’s copyright and damages. Hopefully, InfoWars sells some extra “SuperBlue” toothpaste this month to cover the funds.

(Via The Hollywood Reporter)