👉 Boston.com article

👉 Wiki

On the morning of January 31, 2007, the Boston Police Department and the Boston Fire Department mistakenly identified battery-powered LED placards depicting the Mooninites, characters from the Adult Swim animated television series Aqua Teen Hunger Force, as improvised explosive devices (IEDs), leading to a massive panic.

  • mo_ztt ✅@lemmy.worldEnglish
    34·
    1 year ago

    The best part:

    As members of the media attempted to ask them how they felt about causing a panic, the pair refused to answer any questions not related to “haircuts of the ’70s.”

    And as I remember, someone asked them more or less, what type of haircuts do you think you guys will be getting in prison? And whoever was going to answer the question genuinely hesitated and looked worried.

    Jajajaja

  • pitninja@lemmy.pit.ninjaEnglish
    28·
    1 year ago

    If the Boston marathon bombing had happened within a year prior to this I might understand, but come on…

    • SulaymanF@lemmy.worldEnglish
      18·
      1 year ago

      The Iraq war was still in full swing and cities were getting Homeland Security bulletins about possible revenge attacks.

      • norbert@kbin.social
        20·
        1 year ago

        That was a very dark time for the country, we’ve definitely not recovered from it and it allowed a lot of Christian nationalism and budding-fascism to metastasize into the danger it is today.

    • Kerred@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      1 year ago

      I remember when Adult Swim aired the entire movie for free… At 1/32 the size in a corner of the screen

      • achance4cheese@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        I remember how excited I was at the beginning, until they shrunk it down. I tried making sense of what was happening by standing real close to the Tv. But like most ATHF content, it was as nonsense without sound as it was with. The Neal Peart solo was pretty cool though!

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldEnglish
    8·
    1 year ago

    I remember that. I never watched that show so I had no idea what the reference was, but if I had seen it in person, I would have just thought it was viral marketing. What’s so scary about it?

    • Biff@lemmy.worldEnglish
      8·
      1 year ago

      I did see it and knew what it referenced. There was nothing scary at all about it, it was clearly an LED sign. I couldn’t believe how massive an over reaction there was to it by the police. Terrorists tend not to put bright LEDs on their weapons as an advertisement.

      • SCB@lemmy.worldEnglish
        3·
        1 year ago

        People were still pretty 9/11 crazy in those days and I remember thinking the reaction was way more entertaining than even the marketing.

        As a huge ATHF fan (I have a Master Shake tattoo on my ass), it just really spoke to me. Felt like an alignment in the cosmos.

      • pelrun@kbin.social
        1·
        1 year ago

        Boston PD were(are) out of their minds. They also blew up an ordinary traffic counting device deployed by the city.

  • cryomancer20x6@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
    64·
    1 year ago

    I remember this happening in Atlanta. After maybe 2 weeks, no one cared. The whole of Atlanta received this marketing and was just like “Oh, well that’s weird.” I absolutely do not recall or believe the idea that a city (no matter where) was “turned upside down” - because they weren’t. It took almost no time of investigation to determine this was just marketing from Adult Swim. Cool your jets, man.