At first glance, your eyes are probably drawn toward the sneakers worn by Australian prime minister Scott Morrison in the family portrait released by his office this week.
It’s not so much their super-white appearance, but the fact that the leader of the antipodean nation appears to have two left feet. Yes, it’s a Photoshop fail.
It turned out that the photo edit was an attempt to put a pair of newer, cleaner sneakers on Morrison’s feet as the real pair were apparently too scuffed and dirty for a family portrait. Decide for yourself …
The prime minister hadn’t asked for the picture to be Photoshopped, and didn’t know anything about it until someone told him, a government spokesperson said.
“The photo was doctored by the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet without the knowledge of, or authorization by, the PM or the PM’s office,” the spokesperson confirmed.
Of course, this being the age of social media, there was no way Morrison was going to get away with this particular photographic calamity, and it wasn’t long before the blunder started trending on Twitter with the hashtag shoegate.
#auspol story of 2019: our latest PM (ScoMo) had nice white shoes photoshopped onto his feet for his official https://t.co/eXNtcX7xTa site?! Yup. Regular bloke. Our tax dollars hard at work. #shoegate pic.twitter.com/kA0gG0yy9L
— Luke (@lukerhn) January 8, 2019
PM Scott Morrison denies photoshopping his images. #auspol #shoegate pic.twitter.com/qwj3AxWktD
— P.McGee (@pepeMcGee) January 9, 2019
Yo did I do this right?#Shoegate pic.twitter.com/cW2axIecQQ
— Greig White (@schnozzman) January 8, 2019
The Aussie leader was quick to demonstrate that he could see the funny side, tweeting a close-up picture of the sneakers that he wore, their grubbiness confirming why his team had decided to embark on what turned out to be a rather hopeless edit.
“Message to my Department,” Morrison wrote. “I didn’t ask for the shoeshine, but if you must Photoshop, please focus on the hair (lack thereof), not the feet!”
Message to my Department (PM&C): I didn’t ask for the shoeshine, but if you must Photoshop, please focus on the hair (lack thereof), not the feet!
Here they are in all their glory – my footwear of choice whenever I can get out of a suit. pic.twitter.com/hKKUstnArq— Scott Morrison (@ScottMorrisonMP) January 8, 2019
It’s not the first time Morrison’s office has slipped up when trying to communicate with the masses. In September 2018, his team deleted a video from his social media accounts after realizing that the hip-hop song accompanying it contained explicit lyrics.
