Anything can become a hate symbol, but it seems that declaring something a hate symbol just empowers those who want to spread hate. So should the ADL be handing out these declarations as easily as they did with Pepe? How should people be taught about hate symbols? Is anything worth labeling a hate symbol today? Can a meme really be a hate symbol?
Friday, July 24, 2020
The problem with hate symbols
I chose to write about the Room for Debate article "Can a Meme be a Hate Symbol?" which discusses how a popular meme was designated the status of a hate symbol by the Anti-Defamation League. Pepe the Frog was the meme considered to be hateful by the ADL around 2017. Pepe became a hate symbol because it became a trend to use it in racist and offensive manners. However, I don't think that a meme can be tied to a certain belief if it is used in such a wide variety of ways like Pepe the Frog is used. The problem with giving something the status of a hate symbol is that it empowers people who want to spread hate. For a short time after the ADL declared the meme a hate symbol, it genuinely did become a hate symbol because of social consensus. The ADL gave these people exactly what they wanted. Another problem is that people are not required to understand what hate symbols represented but rather they are just expected to know they are bad. An example would be that many tourists are outraged when they travel to Asia and see a temple with a swastika. They understand that Nazis used a swastika but they fail to realize that the swastika is a symbol of peace that had been used for hundreds of years before the Nazis stole it. More recently, an online retailer stopped selling swastika necklaces because of public backlash.
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Declaring hate symbols can be a way of misconstruing an important figure making them look bad. A recent example came in 2017 when members of a social media site, 4chan, made it so the okay sign became a symbol of "white power." Suddenly many figures were labeled "white supremacists" for something as simple as holding the okay sign. Donald Trump (who uses the okay sign a lot when he gives his speeches) was labeled one primarily for using this hand gesture (whether he is or isn't one is not what I'm trying to debate I just gave an example). It is best to take claims of "hate symbols" with a grain of salt at first until more research is done.
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