‘Sloth selfie’ wins the internet

At first glance, skeptics out there might say this “sloth selfie,” or “slofie” has been photo-shopped. It looks too good not to have been. A smiling sloth in a tree in the Central or South American rainforest seeming to pose and wave to the camera.

If it’s legit, Dr. Alec Couros is right: It “single-handedly justifies the existence of selfie-sticks.” The much-maligned sticks have been banned in places across the globe.

Putting credibility aside, as virtually all the commenters on tourist Nicolas Huskar’s post on imgur did, one skeptic asks, “Is it really a sloth selfie if the sloth isn’t taking the picture?”

Well, sloths are notoriously lazy, stupid and considered a failure in evolutionary terms. Why would the sloth take its own selfie?

Defenders would say they’re not lazy and stupid, just slow. A pro-sloth commenter on Reddit offers: “I’m imagining that the sloth was taking a selfie and this guy photobombed him while holding onto a piece of bamboo.”

Woa, this is a slippery slope.

So far there has been no detectable debunking of the photo, which Huskar posted on Monday and went on to win the heart of the internet, with almost 2 million views as of Wednesday morning.

One thing’s certain, it’s a cool and funny photo — even if it was done with a selfie stick.

This story was originally published July 6, 2016 at 10:59 AM with the headline "‘Sloth selfie’ wins the internet."