"Isn't that a Daisy?" - FroggyPot

The Introduction

This is a new show - an interview styled program. I will be showcasing the good people on Minds - the creators and the bright lights. This will NOT be a podcast, but a well written BLOG to promote the brightest channels on Minds. A positive reflection to showcase and promote the goodness of people and an open endorsement of the creators, authors, and artists on Minds.

This is the fourth of twelve interview styled episodes called "Isn't that a Daisy?" This phrase originated from the film "Tombstone" and is quoted from the character Doc Holliday that was played by Val Kilmer. The term 'daisy' was often used towards anyone that provoked challenge towards him. Whether he was playing cards or battling in a gun fight it was a common term used during the 1870's and used several times in the movie.

A daisy is a plain, but pretty flower. The phrase itself meant 'marvelous' or the 'cream of the crop'. These interviews will showcase the 'cream of the crop' and the most marvelous channels on Minds. 

Special Guest: FroggyPot

The world of Minds holds many daisies. Beautiful creators, artists, and writers. This month I am showcasing a very talented and humble writer. You may know him on Minds as @froggypot. He is a writer of several genres, so let me introduce you to this Daisy. You should subscribe to his channel.

Some of my guests prefer to maintain a high level of anonymity and I respect their wishes. I ask questions that some choose to answer and others opt out. I fully understand why people prefer anonymity especially now a days. Even on Minds no one is safe from the cancel culture, so whatever I can do to ensure one's anonymity - I will do it.

@FroggyPot has requested a high level of privacy, so I have allowed him to fill-in-the-blanks and answer the questions he felt comfortable answering. We did this as a precaution, but he went the extra mile. He wrote his answers, provided all the graphics, links, and formatted the blog. I just put it together for publishing. 

I managed to severely injure my back recently and I have not been able to sit for long periods of time. FroggyPot made my job much simpler for me by formatting the entire blog with all its' contents. This just exemplifies my respect for this man and his channel.

As you can see, I have been showcasing his art for a few weeks. Just check out my profile pic - the Reverend Holliday 'froggy'. I would like to see him gain more subscriptions for his channel, so if you are a fan of the froggy, original art, and are looking for a generous and kind friend, then subscribe to @froggypot.

The Interview

One of the first questions I asked Mr. Froggypot was 'who is Pepe'? Believe it or not I was clueless about a lot of different trends and Pepe was one of them. Thanks to him, now I know the history of Pepe and so will you! Very interesting inquiry. 

These are the questions (modified) and answers from @froggypot:

1) What is Pepe, who was the original creator, and what does Pepe symbolize? Why did you embrace this symbol and create a franchise of free templates to honor Pepe?

“I’m happy this was the first question you asked, because the answer is very important. I do not draw images of Pepe the Frog. Every character I produce is a variation of a variation of a multitude of characters that was originally inspired by Pepe, but not every poorly drawn cartoon frog with tubular lips is Pepe. This is important because Pepe’s original creator is a highly sensitive and insecure individual who has weaponized copyright law to target right-wingers. 

Here's a brief history for those who don’t know. I’ll try to be nice. The following is an example of the original Pepe the Frog by the original creator:

In 2005, an… obscure… artist named Matt Furie created a comic book called “Boys Club”. It’s about four degenerate animal friends who use drugs, play video games, eat pizza, and fart and vomit on each other. Pepe the Frog was one of these characters. People on the internet do what they do and, long story short, Pepe the Frog became a widely spread internet meme, which became specifically popular in right wing circles.

After 10 years of meme evolution the character was more popular than ever, but more importantly he became a meme that has the distinct advantage of not having a rigid definition of what he symbolizes. The NPC meme is always robotic. The Chad meme is always stoic. The Wojack meme is almost always critical or emotionally identifiable.  However, the frog can be anything and express anything and, in doing so, the meme maker isn’t betraying anything in the meme character’s concept. Any and all betrayal already took place when the first meme deviated from Furie’s original, aimless, degenerate concept. 

The common thread is that the frog usually symbolizes an individual who is somehow dealing with the world we live in. Very often, expressing the idea that leftism is what is undesirable about that world. Sometimes he’s fighting it, sometimes he’s coping with it, sometimes he’s being destroyed by it, but it’s quite frequently the 'frogs vs the left'. 

In 2015, because someone somewhere dared to make a Trump Pepe, and someone else somewhere else dared to make a Nazi Pepe, the connection was forged. The left had the ammunition it needed to take a shot and suddenly Pepe the Frog was officially declared a “hate symbol” as defined by the American Defamation League in the United States. Think about that… 10 years of memes as a popular figure in the meme world, then Trump shows up and suddenly it’s a “hate symbol”. 

This meant that Pepe could now be used as a weapon to discredit any right-wing figure who ever had a Pepe posted in their comments. Examples, other than Trump, are figures such as Jordan Peterson, Alex Jones, and Nick Fuentes. No matter what you feel about these individuals, the point is that memes with cartoon characters are more than just pictures on a computer. They are weapons in the struggle for control. 

The problem is that the magic that gives the frog its power is the fact that people identify with it. So once again, we have a situation where the left is labeling everyone who disagrees with them as Nazis. And, of course, why label anyone a Nazi? To justify in harming them, of course. 

This is nothing new, but in Pepe’s case it’s self-perpetuating. Meme makers make memes when they feel rejected by society and society rejects meme makers because of their memes. It could be that dynamic will only lead to an increase of popularity for the frog. As a result, Matt Furie is on a quest to “reclaim” the character and take credit for its success. To this day, he continues to draw frogs in the same style, producing his same degenerate, blasphemous little cartoons with no wholesome appeal. That’s not the frog I produce. I don’t even think it’s the frog people want unless they’re leftist. 

The frog I embraced is from a cast of characters that evolved from the original Pepe. It’s a family of characters with different names and personalities. (Apu, Apugurl, Peepo, Marv, Groyper, Smidge, etc.). I embraced them for the same reasons that most people do. 

First, they carry all symbolism that the original Pepe does. People still identify with them as participants in a worldview struggle that is increasingly affecting their daily lives. Second, they’re cute and often wholesome, or as we say, they’re “cozy”. This matters because wholesome virtue is a great weapon used against the left. Leftism is rooted in secular humanism, and views moral purity as oppressive and binding.

After years of looking at these little characters, I decided to use my skills to help in the production of them, not to honor Pepe, but to honor the defiance of the left and to fight their Godless worldview with the mighty power of memes.

2) What are your current and future plans with your drawings? Is this your only pursuit or are their other symbols/trends you are promoting/following?

“Froggy in the Pot is a channel that was originally intended to be a resource for meme makers to have access to meme templates without being artists themselves. The idea was that I draw frog characters and make them available for people to make memes with. Honestly, too that end, my channel has not been successful. I can count on one hand the number of meme makers who regularly use my templates. What I’m learning is that people don’t really want the means to produce content. They just want the content. 

That’s not to say there hasn’t been some success. Across platforms I’ve grown 1500+ followers in 6 months. I just don’t believe people follow for my functionality. I think they follow because they enjoy the characters I create and the worldview I project. It’s hard to say, this is my first time attempting to do anything significant in the social media world. 

The future is what I’m wracking my brain trying to figure out. Froggy in the Pot will always be a “frog world” media channel. It’s part of a larger community of meme artists that are really starting to come out of the woodwork and show their stuff. I want to see their content (and mine, I suppose) spread and become more accessible. I want mainstream social media spaces to continue to ban frog posters, so they migrate to the free-speech platforms. From there I want to see these artists continue to thrive and create newer and better work. I would like to jump out of the meme sphere and move on to animation. Matt Furie already has. He’s ahead of us on that score. Something we need to work on.”

3) Why did you choose Minds as an alternative on Social Media? Tell us about your other social media accounts (& a link to your Gab account). Why do you prefer using Gab?

So, Froggy in the Pot got started with a Telegram channel called, “Pepe’s Library”. The moderator started making a habit out of posting froggy templates and inviting the viewers to make memes. He would then post the memes. Truth be told, I don’t think I’m a great meme maker. What I was better at was making the templates. I started passing template after template to this poor moderator, until finally, I just decided that I would start my own channel and stop pestering the guy. 

I started on Telegram. I was already perma-banned on Twitter - twice. I despise Facebook, Instagram, Tumblr and Tiktok. Parler is sus. Gettr and Truth Social weren’t around yet (also sus) and so my list of platforms was thin from the start. I decided to launch the channel on Telegram, Minds, and Gab, all because they are workable platforms which claim to emphasize free speech. I launched them all at about the same time and simply followed the interactions. 

Telegram is still my largest following, but Gab has the most interactions. People on Gab were much more likely to comment or message me, they’re also much more likely to make requests. Froggy profile pictures are much more common on Gab. There’s a larger “froggy community” over there.

Minds has always had the slowest growth rate for me. But just in the last month or so it’s been picking up a lot. I think perhaps Minds requires a lot more proactive interaction with other Minds users, which isn’t a bad thing, just a time-consuming thing. I’m excited to see how it progresses.

4) Will you be launching a Merchandise store? Why or why not?

“I’m exploring that very idea right now. Not just as a practical idea – i.e. does anyone even want froggy merch? Is it even financially viable?  But also, as a legal idea.

As I stated before Matt Furie is an insecure manlet who is trying to bank on the popularity of a character that would otherwise be unpopular if not for thousands of meme makers over decades of time. He also has the assistance of some lefty law firm that wants to fight those nasty right-wingers. So, they’ve been slapping a lawsuit on anyone who tries to profit off the cartoon frog. So, I’ll be honest... I would love to take Matt Furie to task over this, because there’s a much more important principle here. Are my drawings the property of Matt Furie just because they kind of resemble a frog he drew 15 years ago? 

I have several ideas for putting the frog in merch form, but I want to make sure I have a solid legal defense against the manlet before I do.”

5) Tell me about your faith. How does your faith direct your path and plans for the future?

“Absolutely! I am loyal believer and follower of Jesus Christ. To put it in contemporary terms, I am a non-denominational Christian. I believe absolutely that Jesus is Lord and Savior. I believe in the Bible as the divine Word of God put on earth to guide us through life. 

My faith has radically changed everything in my life. I called myself a Christian long before I started living like one. Once I decided to start living like one everything changed. That’s when I stopped doing theatre, because before I had dedicated my life to theatre. Then I dedicated my life to God. Theatre dedicates itself to humanity. I no longer worship humanity, or want to encourage others to do so. So, I could no longer justify dedicating my life to theatre. 

Today I’m still finding my way in the world having abandoned the only career path I ever wanted. Moving forward, everything I do I will do for the Lord. Even drawing cute cartoons. I have a specific character dedicated to Christian expression. That would be Basil, the Based Christian Lion. I’ve also been very outspoken about denouncing Kek, and pointing all worship to the Lord.”

6) If you could launch some type of ministry, what would it look like and what would be its purpose?

“Right now, the Christian church is being infiltrated by leftist ideology. They’re calling themselves “Progressive Christians”. They are people who claim to worship Jesus, but emphasize that worship through “acceptance” of sin. Sin, by definition, is not Godly. Behold we have been sent out as sheep amongst the wolves. 

Christian churches and their leaders have lost their backbone and they’re afraid to stand up to this. They’re afraid of calling out sin for what it is and so churches all over are being torn apart by this. I won’t elaborate, but there was a time when this wasn’t tolerated within the Christian church. I want to return to some form of that. 

What I know for sure, at least right now, is I want a ministry that teaches Christians the truth about this cancer within the church. After that, I want to also teach Christians to have courage in the face of retelling that truth. 

I’m not sure what that looks like yet in reality, but I have a sneaky suspicion that the skills I’m building with Froggy in the Pot are somehow preparing me for that Ministry.”

Thank You, FroggyPot!

Thank you @FroggyPot for taking the time from your very hectic schedule to appear on my humble show. I pray for your continued blessings and successes in everything you hope to achieve. If you honor God, He will honor you. May the Spirit of God guide you and the Son comfort you. God bless you, my fren. 

For my readers: Thank you for taking the time to learn more about this great channel - his purpose and his mission. Subscribe to @froggypot. You're a daisy if you do.