Two recent documentaries examine how online phenomena have infiltrated mainstream political culture, focusing on the rise of the Pepe the Frog meme and its appropriation by far-right groups. Feels Good Man traces Pepe's journey from a harmless comic character to a symbol of hate, while TFW No GF gives a platform to the trolls who helped popularize it.
Feels Good Man, directed by Arthur Jones, follows Pepe's creator Matt Furie, who first drew the frog for his 2005 comic Boy's Club. The character was initially a laid-back slacker, but after being uploaded to Myspace, it spread to forums like 4chan, where it evolved into a sad, alienated avatar for disgruntled dropouts. As Pepe gained mainstream popularity, 4chan users deliberately turned it into a racist and anti-Semitic symbol to repel 'normies'.
By 2015, Pepe had become a mascot for the alt-right and was even tweeted by Donald Trump in October that year. The Anti-Defamation League designated it a hate symbol in September 2016, prompting Furie to launch the #SavePepe campaign, which ultimately failed to reclaim the frog's image.
TFW No GF, directed by Alex Lee Moyer, focuses on the lonely men behind such memes, offering them a platform with little critical pushback. The film was partially funded by Cody Wilson, described by the Southern Poverty Law Center as an antigovernment extremist. Wilson launched Hatreon, a crowdfunding site for white nationalists banned from other platforms.
Both documentaries highlight the blurring of virtual and real-world politics, showing how online trolling can have tangible consequences, including influencing elections.
