About

The Steven Spielberg Triceratops Photo Controversy refers to the online controversy, and subsequent memes, which erupted after a photograph of Jurassic Park movie director Steven Spielberg, sitting next to the animatronic of a triceratops, was passed as the picture of a hunting trophy.

History

On July 6th, 2014, as a joke made in reference to the recent Axelle Despiegelaere and Kendall Jones scandals, in which both celebrities received backlash after photos surfaced showing them posing with wild animals they had killed during African safaris, Facebook user Jay Branscomb posted^[1] a photo taken during the making of the movie Jurassic Park, in which Steven Spielberg is sitting in front of a real-size mechanical triceratops prop, and commented:

Disgraceful photo of recreational hunter happily posing next to a Triceratops he just slaughtered. Please share so the world can name and shame this despicable man

This post (see below) has since then been deleted from Facebook.

The post was shared over 30,000 times within 4 days, including by many people hilariously oblivious to the joke, and voicing their outrage (see examples below). This story has since been covered on many websites and has been mentioned on plenty of social media outlets, which were quick to point out that Jurassic Park is a fictional story, and that triceratops have been extinct for millions of years.

Spread

This funny event prompted many internauts to post photoshopped pictures of Steven Spielberg posing in front of various fictional creatures, and other unlikely victims. Such a picture, where the triceratops is replaced by a unicorn, created by Tom Adelsbach and posted on Facebook on July 15th, 2014^[3], was liked over 10,000 times and shared over 5,000 times in 10 years.

Relevant Examples

External References