Visual Communication Quarterly (2025)
Authors: Yibing Sun, Varsha Pendyala, Ruixue Lian, Haohang Xin, Puja Patel, Erik P Bucy, Dhavan Shah
Abstract: This project investigates the diffusion of hateful visual symbology in news coverage from 2015 to 2023, focusing on Pepe the Frog, a meme often linked with alt-right ideologies. Using a multimodal large language model, Large Language and Visual Assistant (LLaVA), along with structural topic modeling and qualitative visual analysis, we analyzed 4,707 articles and 6,384 images featuring Pepe across time. Our mixed-methods analysis finds that Pepe appeared more frequently as time progressed, and often without proper contextualization about the symbol’s hateful connotations. Once politicized, Pepe’s representation increasingly aligned with alt-right ideologies and candidates, particularly Donald Trump and the symbology of the MAGA movement, and spiked with the introduction of the Pepe cryptocurrency in 2023. Conceptual, methodological, and civic implications of these findings are discussed.