About

Clown Pepe, also known as Honk Honk or Honkler, its original name pepoclown, is a depiction of Pepe the Frog wearing a rainbow wig and red clown nose, which is often accompanied by jokes with corny or cringeworthy punchlines and the emojis 🤡🌎 meant to represent the phrase "Clown World." In February 2019, racist and anti-Semitic variations of the character named "Honkler" began appearing on 4chan's /pol/ imageboard. Additionally, the character is associated with the term "honk pill," which is often described as an absurdist alternative to black pill nihilism allowing a person to appreciate the humor in an absurd universe, interpreting existence as a cosmic joke.

Origin

The origin of "pepoclown", its original name,comes from a Discord server for a 3v3 League of Legends community, The Shadow Isles .While the reason for creating this is unknown, the user is not. The creator of "pepoclown" goes by the online alias as "Brizi".

The base of "pepoclown" is an emote^[2] in The Shadow Isles "gwoos" which was edited to have the appearance of a clown.

Spread

On January 21st, 2019, Redditor Skrub-eon submitted a screenshot of a 4chan post of the character with the message "What emotion does this image evoke from you?," to which another user replied "Honk Honk circus music alcoholism" to /r/4chan^[3] (shown below).

On December 19th, the clown Pepe image was submitted to a thread on 4chan's /v/ board.^[5]

On January 30th, 2019, the Clown Pepe image was submitted to 4chan's /s4s/^[4] board along with the message "Honk Honk" (shown below).

Honkler / Clown World

On February 11th, 2019, a post featuring the image along with the message "Why Honk Honk is the next OK sign" was posted on /pol/, which called for "taking back the rainbow" (shown below). Meanwhile, a post about "Operation Honk" was created, featuring a screenshot of Clown Pepe illustrations under the Google Image search "Honkler."^[6]

That day, a thread was submitted to /pol/ about the Honkler entry on Know Your Meme, which accused moderators of killing the entry.^[1]

On April 4th, the left-wing news site Right Wing Watch^[7] published an article titled "White Nationalists Adopt Clowns as Their Next Racist Symbol (Yes, Seriously)," which reported that there were "an abundance" of racist Clown Pepe memes performing acts like "lynching black people" and "operating gas chambers." Additionally, the article noted that the term "clown world" had become associated with the character, often represented by the emojis "🤡🌎."

ZimoNitrome's "HONK HONK" Video

On February 26th, 2019, YouTuber ZimoZitrome posted a video featuring Clown Pepe performing various antics like walking down 4chan threads, turning angry Wojaks into happy clowns and being shot into space (video has since been deleted, shown below is a re-upload from a different channel). Over the next two months, the video accumulated upwards of 740,000 views and 3,300 comments.

Lil Lunchbox

On April 5th, 2019, Lil Lunchbox uploaded a video about the Clown Pepe meme, saying she would be taking the meme back from those making it "a symbol for racism" (shown below). Over the next 72 hours, the video accumulated more than 65,000 views, 970 reacts and 490 shares.

Two days later, the @HonkHonkler Twitter feed reposted the video with the message "LMFAO What did I just find on Facebook? 🤡🌎🤡🌎" (shown below). Within 24 hours, the video accumulated upwards of 98,000 views, 2,000 likes and 750 retweets.

On April 8th, the HONK Facebook page posted an edit of Clown Pepe with a shaved head, along with the message "Lil lunchbox here I made this for you, now fuck off and leave honkler alone" (shown below).

That day, actor James Woods tweeted^[3] a picture of the Christchurch shooting suspect photoshopped with Clown Pepe makeup in front of Lil Lunchbox with the caption "War! #ClownLady" (shown below, left). Shortly after, journalist Jon Levine posted a tweet^[4] noting that the photoshopped image was based on the shooting suspect. Also on April 8th, Woods posted several tweets praising Lil Lunchbox (shown below, right).

The following day, Paul Joseph Watson uploaded a video titled "PANIC Over Clown World Meme 🤡🌎," which celebrated "Operation Honkler" as succesful in light of the Right Wing Watch article (shown below).

Facebook Removal Rumor

On June 8th, 2019, Twitter user @GarbHum^[8] posted a screenshot of a Facebook notifcation that a post using the word "Honk" had been removed for not following the site's "Community Standards" (shown below).

On June 10th, 2019, the news site ZeroHedge^[10] published an article titled "Facebook Has Banned The Word 'Honk' For Violating Their Community Standards," which cited the @GarbHum tweet. That same day, YouTuber Mr. Obvious uploaded a video titled "Facebook Bans the Word HONK, We Are Living in Clown World!" (shown below).

On June 11th, Redditor lighted_is_lit submitted a post asking "What's the deal with the word 'honk'?" to /r/OutOfTheLoop,^[9] which linked to the Zero Hedge article about the Facebook removal.

/r/Honkler Ban

On July 1st, 2019, the /r/honkler^[11] subreddit was banned for violating the platform's "content policy against violent content" (shown below). Shortly after, Reddit RibosomalTransferRNA submitted a post titled "/r/honkler has been banned" to the /r/AgainstHateSubreddits community,^[13] where it garnered more than 2,100 points (92% upvoted) and 230 comments within 48 hours. The following day, The Daily Dot^[12] published an article titled "Alt-right subreddit that used clowns to promote white nationalism has been banned."

Canadian Freedom Convoy

The Canadian Freedom Convoy is an event in which several large semitrucks strategically staged an occupation of the city of Ottawa, the Canadian capital. After a few days, it was decided that the trucks merely sitting in certain areas wasn't being effective enough, so the trucks themselves starting honking their large horns sporadically throughout the day. This made HONK into a reference to the freedom convoy, with people posting HONK online in spaces about the convoy.

Search Interest

External References