Islamic Hostage Barbie Hoax

The Islamic Hostage Barbie Hoax as Instapundit has dubbed it (i.e. that hoax photo of a captured U.S. soldier) is now all over the blogosphere. It seems quite clear that it was an action figure in the photo, not an American soldier. But it's not clear to me where this photo originally came from. Where is this mysterious Islamic website that the picture was posted on? If we knew that it would be a lot easier to tell if it was meant as a joke, or as a serious (though absurd) threat.

Anyway, as I've been browsing the web I've already come across a lot of photo parodies of the hoax. Here are a few that I've found so far:

From The Templar Pundit, Hostage Barbie:
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From EtherHouse, Team America:
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From Power Line, Elmo Captured:
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And from Ludicrosity, Rumsfeld Decides:
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Hate Crimes/Terror Military Photos

Posted on Tue Feb 01, 2005


Comments

Team America isn't a parody of the hostage hoax, it's a movie that parodied America's belligerant foreign policy in general.
Posted by Big Gary C  on  Wed Feb 02, 2005  at  09:35 AM
Oh, I get it-- looks like they switched one of the heads in the poster.
Never mind ...
Posted by Big Gary C  on  Wed Feb 02, 2005  at  09:37 AM
That makes some sense- using dolls for propaganda. Cripes, isn't Bush a ventriloquist Dummy? Sen. Charlie McCarthy, Knucklehead Cheney, Handchop, or Kukla, Fran, and Ali. All puppets, strings attached.
Posted by Hairy Houdini  on  Wed Feb 02, 2005  at  11:46 AM
I like the Elmo captued by insurgents. That's funny.
Posted by Dany  on  Wed Feb 02, 2005  at  01:40 PM
This reminds me somewhat of the old 'Bin Laden Bert' poster; how long before they send Buffy Sainte-Marie over there to cheer Elmo up, or teach him about the letter 'R' (and the colour blue, and how to construct blasting tape out of chalk, sand, and pencil lead)?
Posted by Ashley Pomeroy  on  Wed Feb 02, 2005  at  03:18 PM
But the "Bin Laden Bert" picture was real, no?
Posted by Citizen Premier  on  Wed Feb 02, 2005  at  04:52 PM
Yes it was. As were the Zarqawi/Big Bird pic, the Castro/Big Bird DVD, and the Pinochet/Pinnochio rap video.
Posted by Hairy Houdini  on  Wed Feb 02, 2005  at  05:22 PM
That's cute. But the Bin Laden/Bert picture WAS real.

There's a website that's been around for years and years that presents evidence that Bert is pure evil. You can read his cannibal cookbook, explore his connections with alien abductions, read about his attempted rape of Prairie Dawn, and see all kinds of pictures of him hanging out with history's most despicable people.

One picture created for the website shows Bin Laden and Bert together. Well, after 9/11, certain middle eastern persons decided to celebrate by taking to the streets with posters of their hero. A local print shop (in Egypt I believe, or maybe Pakistan) cashed in by quickly pulling some pics of Bin Laden off the internet and printing them out on posterboard. The printer didn't realize that Bert was in one of the pics with Bin Laden, and that poster ended up being carried through the streets by jubilant al qaeda supporters.

So the picture is real in the sense that people really were carrying it through the streets, oblivious to the origin and meaning of the yellow puppet chatting with their holy warrior hero guy. The picture you might see of a Middle Eastern man holding up a poster with Bert and Bin Laden on it is real; it really happened.

Whether the meeting ever actually took place between Bin Laden and Bert is a matter of speculation, though.
Posted by Barghest  on  Thu Feb 03, 2005  at  01:22 AM
Heck, I know it was real; I was one of the first people to write about it, way back in October 2001:
http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=1176621
Posted by Ashley Pomeroy  on  Thu Feb 03, 2005  at  06:16 AM
I remember my hubby and I found bertisevil.com just before Sept 11th. One of the things I rmeember about that time period is looking for comic relief and going to that site afterwards, and getting his "I'm taking it down because" note instead. Damn you Bin Laden. 😉
Posted by Winona  on  Thu Feb 03, 2005  at  07:26 AM
Evil Bert/Osama is real. I've even got the picture included in one of my 'hoax photo tests':

http://www.museumofhoaxes.com/tests/hoaxphototest2.html

(it's an example of a real photo)
Posted by The Curator  in  San Diego  on  Thu Feb 03, 2005  at  08:07 AM
Hey- that Pinochet/Pinnochio was the real deal. It had great tunes on there, like: "The Blue Fairy Be My Ho, so let's put her in jail", and "Gepetto Won't Give Up His Homeys, so let's put hin in jail", and, my favorite, "Stromboli Got Back (in Jail)". Word.
Posted by Hairy Houdini  on  Thu Feb 03, 2005  at  08:08 AM
I'm just glad I got the story mostly right, and from memory, too. Not bad for an old guy with a headache. (28 is old, right?)
Posted by Barghest  on  Thu Feb 03, 2005  at  07:40 PM
The pic of Hostage Barbie makes her look like she rolling her eyes. She's all like, "I can't take this anymore," but she can't walk away, can't she? haha
Posted by Rahnee  on  Tue Oct 20, 2009  at  07:36 AM
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