Watch the Fox7 story, posted Tuesday, October 30th.
The following letter was sent to and posted on Tuesday, October 30th:
Dear Mayor Adler,
I want apologize to you directly for IndyAustin’s error in using the Pepe the Frog image on an ad opposing your election. I do understand how this can be interpreted and ask you to accept that this was not at all intended to malign you or any group of people. We do not condone hate speech in any form.
You may have read that we found the clip on the internet that seemed to fit our “shell game” ad opposing your Soccer Stadium proposal, and did not realize the offense that would be taken to that image. The Anti-Defamation League also states that not all uses of “Pepe the Frog” are racist, but we do understand your concern, especially at this moment, which is why we pulled the ad.
We rightfully oppose your re-election, but there is nothing in the hearts and minds of the people of IndyAustin that promotes, condones, or believes in bigotry in any form. We hate it as much as you do.
Again, please accept our apologies.
Sincerely,
Linda Curtis
IndyAustin.org
This fair-minded KXAN Report was just after we issued our apology.
The following was posted on Monday, October 29th:
It was just brought to our attention this morning that an image in our recent 1-minute video “Steve Adler’s Shell Game”, Pepe the Frog, was expropriated by the Alt-Right.
Unfortunately, Pepe, originated in a comic by Matt Furie called “Boys Club,” had no say in the matter and this was our error.
Here is additional information from Wikipedia about Pepe and its listing by the Anti-Defamation League and Pepe’s creator:
The Anti-Defamation League added certain incarnations of Pepe the Frog to their database of hate symbols in 2016, adding that not all Pepe memes are racist.[9] Since then, Pepe’s creator has publicly expressed his dismay at Pepe being used as a hate symbol.
We at IndyAustin have no use for hate speech.
We honestly thought it was a cartoon of a pea smoking a cigar — taken from an video online — not ours.
We have changed the video without this image.
Watch Mayor Steve Adler’s city hall hide $100s of millions in property tax exemptions for a rushed soccer “sucker” stadium.
Again, our apologies!
Our main number is 512.535.0989 or email us at contact@indyaustin.org.
Independently yours, Austin!
I don’t believe you. The fact that anti-semites use this image widely and Mayor Adler’s Jewish heritage are too much of a coincidence. Ignorance is never an excuse, especially inasmuch as it’s a hallmark of bigotry, and you have lost the support of Austinites who are sick of hateful people. You have made it clear y’all don’t represent Austin.
Mr. McDougall, we are allowing this to be printed on our blog because we agree with your right to freedom of speech. We only represent ourselves and do not pretend to “represent Austin.” We respect your beliefs, though we obviously differ.
This is such a strange non-apology. Digging in your heels in an apology is just bizarre. It shows an acute lack of awareness that is disturbing to say the least. Hopefully Austin will be rid of these bigots from now on.
Folks can read our apology here and even watch us on TV and decide for themselves.
Are you seriously claiming that none of your organization’s leaders had ever heard of Pepe the Frog before? If this claim were true, it would reveal a level of ignorance and media illiteracy that disqualifies Indy Austin from being taken seriously in any political conversation.
It’s obvious that you all are struggling to get your story straight even now. Your Facebook post says, “It was just brought to our attention this morning that an image in our recent 1-minute video “Steve Adler’s Shell Game”, Pepe the Frog, was expropriated by the Alt-Right.” This suggests that you knew the video included the image of a frog cartoon, but you were somehow unaware of its alt-right and white supremacist associations (though this ignorance could have been remedied within seconds through a quick visit to Wikipedia, a Google search, or asking s). But this post offers a second, inconsistent excuse: “We honestly thought it was a cartoon of a pea smoking a cigar.” Which of these would you have us believe is the truth? More importantly, why would you circulate a video at all if you didn’t understand its contents and weren’t prepared to take responsibility for them?
It’s not too late to salvage some shreds of credibility by posting a real apology and making significant changes to your actions in the future. (For starters, maybe it’s time to have someone with at least elementary-school-level news media literacy vet your posts before you make them public.) Own up: you circulated a hate symbol, and you got caught. Maybe you circulated this symbol knowingly because you’re a hateful, bigoted organization (as your member’s misgendering of Danielle Skidmore suggests); maybe you circulated it unknowingly, in which case you are too ignorant to be a constructive force in political life; or maybe you circulated it without caring what it means one way or the other, because you are trolls who don’t seriously care about anything and only seek to generate attention. It really doesn’t matter. What does matter is that you act like adults now. Rather than asking Mayor Adler and everyone else in this city to take your word for it that you oppose bigotry, show us some consistent and meaningful action to *prove* that you oppose it.
You are speaking with the same judgemental, shaming kind of rejection of independent, non-aligned voters and our concerns that got Skidmore a D- from our organization on our candidate scorecard. Skidmore tried to corner us in the press this week, just as — we SUSPECT (because we weren’t there and no one recorded this) that she did a working class black man who was trying to engage a voter on signing a legal and legitimate petition to vote on the Soccer (Sucker) stadium deal. Should we now call you or Ms. Skidmore a racist? No, we won’t go there. But how ’bout you take your own bull and take a look in the mirror. You are vicious and if you represent Skidmore, all we can say is beware voters in District 9, vote for Linda O’Neal or Kathie Tovo.
You can’t honestly say you’re so disconnected from the current moment that the Pepe meme is actually news to you. Either y’all can’t be trusted because you’re out of touch, or can’t be trusted because you’re signaling anti-Semitic white nationalists. Doesn’t matter which.
This is the sickness our country is in — those, like this writer, who are compassionless, full of judgement and without forgiveness and any willingness to understand. That is, unless they’re just political operatives for the forces destroying a city and it’s options.
Using Pepe the Frog only proves that you don’t follow the Alt-Right agenda. I could have easily made the same mistake. I choose to NOT FOLLOW either the extreme right OR the extreme left.