Bert is Evil
Bert is Evil was the title of a multi- mirrored website by Dino Ignacio that dealt with Bert, a character from the children's show Sesame Street .
The website that the 1998 Webby Award won for the craziest site showed mounted photos of the doll with notorious people in the history like Adolf Hitler or Jerry Springer or pictures of Bert, who with major disasters such as the crash of the Hindenburg is present when humorous “proof” of Bert's guilt, who is not just an innocent figure on children's television. The Evil Bert motif was adopted by many comedians who created their own pictures of Bert that brought him into connection with current or historical horror.
In 2001, an unedited photo was published on Reuters showing a demonstration in Bangladesh pro Osama bin Laden . One of the protesters carried a large poster with a photo collage of bin Laden's pictures. There was also a small picture in the collage that showed Bert behind bin Laden's left shoulder. The Reuters picture caused confusion among Western viewers and a lot of jokes were made about it. The original picture of bin Laden and Bert had previously been created by comedian J-roen with an image editing program and published on the web. The creator of the demo poster had copied it and not removed Bert from the picture.
After the demonstration picture was published, Ignacio took the Bert is Evil area offline and stated that he did not want to continue to undermine children's positive views of the character Bert in Sesame Street. He wrote: "I am doing this because I feel that this matter has gotten too close to reality". Despite Ignacio's request that all copies of Bert is Evil be taken offline as well, some are still online.
A detailed listing of the use of the demonstration image in South Asia and in Western media is online. This also speaks against the assumption that the use of Bert on the poster is any form of encrypted communication. It is more likely that the protester did not know the character Bert and therefore simply left him in the picture.
Individual evidence
Web links
- Bert is Evil - Mirror of "Bert is Evil"
- Bert is Evil - German translation of "Bert is Evil"
- Osama's puppet article in Telepolis magazine