About

Spec Ops Guy refers to a tall protester in full riot gear seen at multiple George Floyd protests in early June 2020. Several videos of the protestor went viral on both TikTok and Twitter, including a video of the protester throwing tear gas back at police officers, a video of him towering over a line of police officers and one addressing another protester. The Spec Ops Guy has also accumulated nicknames like Tank and Riot. The videos caused Twitter and TikTokers to create fan videos of him and say they are simping him.

Origin

On June 1st, 2020, TikToker @callmejojo1 posted the fist video of the protestor addressing a line of police officers with the caption "The Streets Spec Ops have been deployed" (shown below). The video gained over 580,000 likes in five days.

Spread

On June 2nd, 2020, TikToker @o000000000o0 added another video of the protestor with the caption "heard u guys like the tall spec ops guy, well here’s him throwing tear gas back at the white house" (shown below). The video received over 421,800 likes in three days.

On June 4th, Twitter user @AmyEskind posted a video of the protestor talking to another protestor filming him and added the caption, "We’ve seen video of “spec ops guy” throwing the cops’ tear gas back at them. Here’s what he’s all about. #DCProtests" (shown below). The video accumulated over 392,200 views, 31,000 likes and 10,500 retweets in a day.

On June 4th, Twitter users began posting about the protester using the #specopsguy hashtag. Twitter user @Call1Ellie tweeted^[2] about simping the Spec Ops Guy and garnered over 550 likes and 90 retweets in a day (shown below, left). That same day, Twitter user @GhastlyAlan tweeted^[3] an epic handshake meme regarding the protester and accumulated over 860 likes and 140 retweets in a day (shown below, right).

Twitter user @LoreniEEEEEEEEE reposted a fan cam of Spec Ops guy and received over 680 likes (shown below). Multiple fan cam videos of the protester were uploaded to TikTok. The Daily Dot published an article on the protester.^[1]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References