fake Justin Bieber burrito

Screengrab via YouTube/Yes Theory

That photo of Justin Bieber eating a burrito was fake (updated)

It was all a prank.

 

Stacey Ritzen

Streaming

Posted on Oct 25, 2018   Updated on May 21, 2021, 3:14 am CDT

Update 6:50pm CT, Oct. 28: Justin Bieber was not photographed eating a burrito sideways. As it turns out, the photo was part of an elaborate prank. The man in the photo? A Justin Bieber lookalike named Brad Sousa. The team who runs the YouTube channel Yes Theory revealed the truth in a video published on Sunday. In the video, they detail the plan to fly out Sousa to Los Angeles and photograph him doing “unusual things in public,” such as eating a burrito sideways. Once the photo is taken, the team sends it out to news outlets. When it doesn’t get the results they want, they post it to different subreddits, including r/mildlyinfuriating, where the photo begins to pick up traction. And, well, you know what happens from there. The photo goes viral on Twitter.

“We wanted to prove a point: that staging a story, as goofy as it was, can be done much more easily than most people can imagine,” Yes Theory says in the video. Well played. Watch how they did it below:

Original story:

Justin Bieber has been going through a tumultuous period in his life. Newly married to model Hailey Baldwin, you’d think everything would be rainbows and sunshine, however that has not been the case. Between news of his on-again, off-again ex-girlfriend Selena Gomez experiencing a mental breakdown and a growing number of bizarre public appearances, fans have been expressing concern for the Baby singer.

Just this week, Bieber and Baldwin were seen having a public argument in the streets after brunch with her father, actor Stephen Baldwin. And then on Wednesday night, Bieber canceled an appearance at a charity event due to “a lot going on” in his personal life.

So taking all of that into consideration, it definitely does not seem like a good omen that Bieber was recently spotted sitting on a bench out in public eating a burrito … sideways? The photo was posted to Reddit’s r/mildlyinfuriating subreddit on Wednesday as people tried in vain to wraps their minds around such a savage move.

Justin Bieber eating a burrito sideways from mildlyinfuriating

Let they who haven’t gotten a badly constructed burrito in their lifetime—where all the rice is at one end and all of the fillings are in their own little pockets—cast the first stone. It’s annoying, for sure, but there has got to be a better way around it than this.

At any rate, whether or not Bieber is currently of sound mind was of little concern as the photo began to go viral, and people began making jokes at the pop star’s expense.

https://twitter.com/MarcSnetiker/status/1055500904529506304

Some are already insinuating that the photo might be the work of a Photoshop trickster, which may or may not be the case. Honestly, though, either way, would it be the weirdest thing Biebs has ever done? Who really knows what’s going on in that big blonde head of his.

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*First Published: Oct 25, 2018, 1:59 pm CDT