Banned Books Week: Where's Waldo?

Brett Singer — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 14:00:00 GMT

When I saw the titles of books that had been banned I was pretty shocked to see "Where's Waldo?" on the list. I could not imagine how a book of pictures featuring a guy who appears to derive great enjoyment from hiding in crowded places would offend anyone.

Silly daddy! There's always something.

In this case, the problem is a Waldo wardrobe malfunction.

In the original 1987 edition of "Where's Waldo?", this following image appears:

As you can see, the woman has removed her bikini top, presumably to enable a more even tan. A small male person, perhaps a child, is dumping water on the woman's back, causing her to leap up in surprise and show her "girls" to a rather happy looking gentleman who appears to have some brown substance smeared on his chest (I'm color-blind, so apologies if that color isn't brown). If you look really really really closely, and are more than a little bit uptight, you might even say that there is a nipple showing.

The image was altered for a 1997 "special edition:"

As you can see, the painted jezebel has covered up. Now children everywhere are safe.

But I think the new image doesn't go far enough! As some folks point out over on snopes.com, the top left corner of this scene clearly shows two men in a compromising position – not only that, but one of the men is African-American! And in the bottom right corner, the elderly woman is obviously touching the man in his private area behind the screen he is holding up. Plus, there's some guy in medieval armor being buried in sand, and we all know what that means…

End of sarcasm.

The funny thing about this one is that the woman in question is actually showing some boobage. If not for the protests, I imagine very few people would have noticed the nefarious nipple. Not that it matters; I highly doubt any child has been scarred by the Where's Waldo? books. Bored, maybe. But not scarred.

Images: Waldo Wiki, Amazon

More from Banned Books Week here at Babble:

Banned Books Week: R.L. Stine's Goosebumps

Banned Books Week: Shel Silverstein

Banned Books Week: Kama Sutra for Kids

Banned Books Week: Little Women

Banned Books Week: In the Night Kitchen

Banned Books Week: Sarah Palin

Banned Books Week: "And Tango Makes Three"

Strollerderby : wheres waldo

Banned Books Week: Where's Waldo?

Banned Books Week: R.L. Stine's Goosebumps