White Man Has Been Here

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About

White Man Has Been Here is an exploitable image macro where two Native American hunters have found traces of white people in the snow. In memes, one hunter says to the other, "White man has been here," prompting the other to ask, "How can you tell?" with the third speech bubble and what's found in the snow replaced with a pop culture reference stereotypical of white people. The original image is a painting that was made in 2000 while the template was made in late 2017.

Origin

In 2000, American painter Robert Griffing created a painting titled, Friend or Foe,^[1] wherein, two Native American hunters are examining footprints made in the snow (shown below, left). The painting became an image macro in memes 17 years later when an unknown creator gave the hunters speech bubbles, writing in them, "White man has been here. / How can you tell? / Yellow snow. Wrote Name." Although the cartoon's creator is unknown, the earliest repost was made on October 8th, 2017, by the Facebook^[2] page Blackfoot Productions. It earned nine reactions in five years.

Despite the aforementioned Facebook post being the earliest known repost, a post made on December 28th, 2017, to the website santabanta.com^[3] showcases the most untouched version of the image, including the entire black border that surrounds it (shown below, right).

Spread

On January 5th, 2018, the Facebook^[4] page Veteran Humor posted the cartoon and earned roughly 2,100 reactions and 3,000 shares in four years.

The cartoon wasn't exploited by meme creators until 2019. On April 15th, 2019, Instagram^[5] page salty.memesters replaced the third speech bubble with the word, "Froklifts," being a misspelled version of "Forklifts." Over the course of three years, the meme received roughly 2,500 likes (shown below, left). On May 1st, 2019, Redditor eryial posted a similar meme to /r/comedyheaven,^[6] earning roughly 2,000 upvotes in three years (shown below, right).

The template was used more often throughout 2021 and 2022. For instance, on May 9th, 2021, Redditor velvetbettle posted a version to /r/dankmemes^[7] that replaced the third speech bubble with, "Vapes," earning roughly 55,000 upvotes in one year (shown below, left). On April 29th, 2022, Twitter^[8] user tribematic referenced YouTube video essays as a sign of white people, earning roughly 126,400 likes in three days (shown below, right).