News

Dino Sore

Published June 10, 2015

Author Joyce Carol Oates retweeted a photo of Steven Spielberg with a message critical of him for “killing” a triceratops.

One surefire way to upset the online public is to post photographs of big game hunters and their trophy kills, especially when those kills involve animals that are endangered (or perceived as such). Typically, this outrage involves animals such as a giraffes or elephants and hunters whose identities are unfamiliar to the general public.

According to author Joyce Carol Oates' tweets, however, she is apparently upset with director Steven Spielberg for killing an animal that has been extinct for millions of years, a triceratops:

Of course, Oates could be joking. She often retweets material from famous comedians (Steve Martin, Conan O'Brien and John Oliver have all graced her feed recently), and we assume the Pulitzer Prize-nominated author is aware of the fact that dinosaurs are extinct.

Oates could also be referring to the lack of conservation laws preventing non-existent animals from appearing on film, but that doesn't seem likely.

We don't know what Oates was thinking when she posted her tweet. What we do know is that Steven Spielberg has never actually killed a triceratops:

Dan Evon is a former writer for Snopes.