No, That Wasn’t Amy Schumer At That Truck Stop, And The Rest Of It Was Probably Fake, Too

Amy Schumer is not a professional truck driver, but thanks to a viral post on social media the comedian has had to address both a very vulgar shirt and some very bizarre mentions of vehicular manslaughter. The latest meme to circle the interwebs looks to be an edited image of Schumer as a truck driver with an extremely odd backstory, all in an effort to sell some obscure merchandise.

The whole ordeal revolves around a truck stop called Celinas. Though the initial image in question went viral on Facebook, Celina’s apparently has a Twitter account where identical posts also live. In the image, a woman stands next to a Monster-branded minifridge and looks VERY much like Amy Schumer with a tattoo on her face that the truck stop claims has a tragic backstory. The post says that the woman, apparently named Amelia, won “trucker of the month” and came in to claim her prize while wearing a “truckin -n- f*ckin” novelty tee.

There are a lot of things that seem off about this, initially, starting with the assertion that the minifridge carries a $500 value. Or maybe the “stop pooping in our parking lot” sign in the background. But the thing that tipped many off to it potentially being fake was a follow-up comment on Facebook about the teardrop tattoo on the woman, which is claimed to be there in memory of a pedestrian that was hit and killed by the truck driver when she fell asleep at the wheel.

That had many, including Snopes, calling shenanigans on the image. And a New York Post story described Schumer herself as “stunned” by the doppelgänger appearing at a Celina, Tennessee truck stop. Schumer did post about the truck stop on Twitter, but didn’t address whether she thought the image was fake or not.

The Post apparently interviewed the “manager” behind the account, who assured them it was all very real and that the teardrop tattoo story was legit as well.

In an interview with The Post, Danny Brine — who claimed to be a truck stop shift manager — said that Amelia’s “teardrop tattoo story is real” and claimed that the rest area is indeed a real place.

However, The Post was unable to verify claims by Brine, who said he doubles as a social media assistant there.

That’s been difficult to verify because, well, it’s almost certainly fake. It seems to be part of a very weird but very active community of people on Facebook that intentionally fake bizarre meme-like images with celebrities involved. Earlier in the year, the same “truck stop” went somewhat viral among hockey fans when a photo of Arizona Coyotes forward Phil Kessel was photoshopped to replace a puck with a can of chewing tobacco as another “trucker of the month.”

It’s important to note the “truck stop” apparently responded to the Post story on Twitter, calling it a “hit piece” with a very winking mention of “fake news” that seems to confirm that this is, indeed, a fairly elaborate bit the “manager” is carrying out over multiple social media platforms for one reason or another.

If you squint hard enough at it all, you can see the fringes of Weird Twitter at play here, complete with bizarre promotions and crude references to ratchet up the absurdity. It’s not all kayfabe, though: They’ve had a bit of fun with this on Twitter and actually acknowledged some of the non-edited images, so it’s safe to say that all of this is probably just a harmless bit of fun. But it’s certainly making things awkward for those they decide to pick as their big winners and duping some less skeptical people of some very weird contests happening down south.