Happy Merchant
| Happy Merchant | |
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Caricature illustration of a Jewish man with beard and yarmulke
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| First appearance | Artwork by A. Wyatt Mann. |
The Happy Merchant (also called "Jew-bwa-ha-ha.gif") is a common name for an image that depicts a stereotyped Jewish man with exaggerated features. The Happy Merchant is common on imageboards such as 4chan when it is frequently used in an anti-Semitic context.
Contents
History
The image was first created by a cartoonist called A. Wyatt Mann (a pseudonym that sounds like "A white man"). In 2015, Mann was revealed by BuzzFeed to actually be Nick Bougas. The image was part of a controversial cartoon that also included a stereotypical drawing of a black man and said: "A world without Jews and Blacks would be like a world without Rats and Cockroaches." The cartoon was first released in print, but appeared online in February 2001.[1]
The image of the Jew in the cartoon was cropped out and began to spread on various internet communities, where users began to make variations of it.[1]
Description
The image is intended as a derogatory depiction of Jewish people, and employs many stereotypes. These include:
- A large, hook-shaped nose.
- A yarmulke (Jewish head garment).
- A malevolent smile and hands that are being rubbed together, to indicate scheming behavior.
- Balding black hair and a long beard.[2]
Use
The image is common on internet communities such as 4chan, other "chan" websites, and on other message boards, such as some white nationalist websites.[3] In 2017, Al Jazeera tweeted an image that included the Happy Merchant on its official English-language Twitter account. The tweet was promoting a story about climate change, and insinuated that Jews were behind climate change. Al Jazeera later deleted the tweet.[4]
A study published by Savvas Zannettou et al. on online anti-Semitism recorded the prevalence of the Happy Merchant and its variations on 4chan's /pol/ board and Gab. The study found that usage of the Happy Merchant on /pol/ remained largely consistent (with a peak during the US airstrike on Syria in April 2017), while usage of the meme on Gab increased after the Charlottesville rally in August 2017.[5] It was also determined that /pol/ influences the spread of Happy Merchant to other, more mainstream web platforms, such as Twitter and Reddit.[6]
The same study also found that the Happy Merchant has been incorporated into other common memes on the site, including Pepe the Frog.[7]
References
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