Internet Culture

Pepper Spraying Cop: UC Davis officer reprimanded with meme

There’s nothing funny about the pepper-spraying incident at UC Davis, except perhaps the meme it spurred. 

Photo of Fernando Alfonso III

Fernando Alfonso III

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While the fallout from the University of California Davis pepper-spraying incident continues, Canvas and Tumblr users have been turning one of the officers responsible into a meme.

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On Friday, Davis Police Lt. John Pike and another officer pepper-sprayed a group of UC Davis students protesting in the quad. The incident outraged the campus and Internet community and has since lead to Pike, Chief Annette Spicuzza, and the other unnamed officer being placed on administrative leave, reported the Christian Science Monitor.

Late Sunday, night the Tumblr blog Pepper Spraying Cop was created to feature altered images that are equally absurd: Pike pepper-spraying helpless animals, someone exercising, and the grave of Anne Frank. By far the most well-done image incorporated Pablo Picasso’s “Guernica.”

On the imageboard Canvas, users were relentless in their use of the cop in almost every image they could think of. Here are some of the images that grabbed our attention:

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The Daily Dot