Infowars Being Sued By “Pepe the Frog” Creator
And they are gonna lose. Here’s why.
Cartoonist Matt Furie is continuing to reclaim his artistry as he has officially filed a lawsuit against Infowars and its podcast show host Alex Jones for selling merchandise inspired by his creation, “Pepe the Frog”, the illustrated character that is synonymous with right-wing trolls.
The Associated Press says, that Jones described the lawsuit as a “publicity stunt.” Although he stressed that Infowars didn’t produce the poster, Jones said he views it as an expression of political speech protected by the First Amendment through the controversial talk show host has later said that he thinks the cartoon looks “dumb”, his website is selling “Pepe” posters for $29.95.
Furie’s “chill frog-dude” debuted in a 2006 comic book called “Boy’s Club” and is understandably annoyed that his “Pepe” character would be used as a symbol of racism and bigotry.
Associated Press has also reported that Lurie just settled a case that is a bit similar.
Our Take
Alex Jokes is actually incorrect from a legal standpoint. While he is free to use licensed characters as part of a free speech effort say for a march, the second the copywritten character was being resold for personal gain, that’s where Alex Jones broke the law and will probably have to pay a hefty fee as a result.
"There are also other characters that come and go (also owned by the Warner Bros. Discovery conglomerate media company)."
Huh. Is that just referring to other characters from the show itself, or is this implying that the new season is going to have cameos from other WBD IPs