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The Shot heard around the world
A 4-year-old boy crawled into the enclosure of Harambe, the Western lowland gorilla Harambe at the Cincinnati Zoo. Harambe then grasped the child and began dragging him around the enclosure before a Cincinnati Zoo employee was forced to shoot and kill Harambe to ensure the child's safety. -
The First Documentation
The footage was uploaded to Youtube and accumulated 12.5 million views and over 20,000 comments. LINK: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zfuz7cTDNeI -
Making a Change
A petition was created on Change.org titled "Justice for Harambe" to pin the parents of the child responsible for Harambe's death. Petition gained over 500,000 signatures. This jumpstarted the Hashtags #JusticeForHarambe and #RIPHarambe on Twitter and Facebook. -
Twitter Tributes
Twitter users began photoshopping Harambe. At first, they were tributes of Harambe up with other celebrities who died in 2016. (see photo) These memes began to innovate and branch off into the many different types of jokes that Harambe was able to cover. -
Harambes Death Raises Greater Questions
Shortly after Harambe's death, the New York Times released a highly disputed article that sparks the question, "Do Gorilla even belong in the zoo?"
LINK: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/07/science/gorilla-shot-harambe-zoo.html -
Songs for Harambe
Memes transformed into parodies of popular songs where the words were changed to praise Harambe.This began to trend and even made the "twitter moments" page which showcases popular/trending material on the cite.
https://twitter.com/i/moments/746079071625486336 -
Dicks out for Harambe
One of the most iconic moments of Harambe's meme life was possibly the most vulgar. Twitter user @sexualjumanji posted a selfie holding a fake gun at the camera with the caption “We comin with them dicks out to avenge harambe!!!” This tweet became instantly viral and was picked up by all. The phrase "Dicks out for Harambe" was well known across every popular social media site. (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Vine) -
Dicks out for Harambe (continued)
One of the most popular vines from this trend is comedian Brandon Wardell'a vine with Danny Trejio. (seen below) https://vine.co/v/5apgA7BFm6K/embed/simple -
Cincinnati Zoo Director Twitter Hack
A hacker that uses the Twitter name @prom took control of Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden director Thane Maynard’s Twitter account, @prom vandalized his feed with Harambe hashtags and jokes. (see photo) -
Presidential Election
Harambe was able to rally over 11,000 supporters who voted for him via write-in as their vote for the President of the United States. As a result of these statements, a wave of President Harambe memes quickly covered social media sites. -
Harambe Cheeto
A Cheeto that supposidly resembeled Harambe (see photo) was put on Ebay with a starting bid at $11.99. In under 24 hours, the bidding shot off and the Cheeto was sold for $99,900 the next day on February 7th.
LINK: https://www.ebay.com/itm/Gorilla-Hot-Cheetos-RARE-One-of-a-Kind-Cheetos-Harambe-Gorilla-/172504352676?_ul=AR -
Photo Sources
1) http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2016/05/30/15/34C572A300000578-0-image-m-2_1464617445423.jpg
2) https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/photo/58623495.cms
3) https://metrouk2.files.wordpress.com/2016/05/harambe1.jpg?quality=80&strip=all
4) http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/001/152/047/bf8.png
5) http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/001/152/056/e18.png -
Photo Sources (continued)
6) http://i0.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/facebook/001/146/072/e61.jpg
7) https://vine.co/static/images/vine_glyph_2x.png
8) https://i.redd.it/rwovaf0rqngx.png
9) http://dailysnark.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/11/54fbb80740dbbabb08404794b8945f42-copy.jpg
10) http://assets.nydailynews.com/polopoly_fs/1.2965617.1486413587!/img/httpImage/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/article_750/lvcheetos7n.jpg
