John Oliver shades Philly on ‘Last Week Tonight’ for hitchBOT destruction

John Oliver once again has a bone to pick with Philadelphia, this time about the ill-fated hitchBOT, the hitchhiking robot that infamously met its untimely demise here in Philly back in 2015.

Oliver brought up Philadelphia’s robot-related debacle as part of this most recent episode of HBO’s Last Week Tonight, which focused on how robotic automation is effecting the American jobs market. As the host points out, some Americans are concerned for the future employment due to jobs automation, and understandable have a “deep-seated urge…to see robots come to harm.”

With that, Oliver launched into a brief segment on hitchBOT, calling its Aug. 2015 destruction in Philly an example of people “attacking any robot foolish enough to trust us.” In a CBS interview aired on Last Week Tonight, hitchBOT’s creators noted that their robot’s death “could have happened anywhere,” and that it didn’t have anything to do with Philadelphia specifically.

“You’re wrong about that. It has absolutely everything to do with Philadelphia,” Oliver said. “Sending a hitchhiking robot to Philadelphia is not unlike sending a beautiful bell symbolizing freedom into Philadelphia. There is no way it’s going to remain in one piece.”

Oliver added that there is also a “non-zero” chance that someone in Philly won’t try to have sex with the Liberty Bell, and that that person is probably the Flyers’ mascot, Gritty. He also noted that we have a “chronic police horse-punching problem,” because in January last year, two sports fans were arrested for punching police horses at Eagles games.

HitchBOT first came to Philly in late July 2015. The robot started its cross-country hitchhiking journey in Boston several weeks earlier as part of a social experiment examining how people might treat a non-mobile hitchhiker. By Aug. 1, images began to surface showing the robot decapitated and non-functional, laying on a Philadelphia city street. From there, national coverage of the incident followed, particularly with the note that the robot was destroyed in the so-called “City of Brotherly Love.”

While hitchBOT’s killer was never brought to justice, some previously pointed the finger at Philly pranksters Ed Bassmaster and Jesse Wellens for its demise. The pair were among the last people seen publicly with the robot around the time of its destruction, and Bassmaster was later spotted giving interviews and appearing in faked surveillance footage of the assault as Always Teste, one of his many characters.

At the time, Bassmaster was launching The Ed Bassmaster Show, a prank-oriented show, on CMT, leading some critics to view hitchBOT’s destruction as a planned publicity stunt to promote the program. The pair, however, later said their involvement was a hoax.

“Even though it did end badly for hitchBOT, we’ve learned a lot about human empathy an trust,” hitchBOT researcher Harris Smith said following the robot’s demise. “Everything we’ve learned will be borne out in the resulting research and used in future planning for hitchBOT’s adventures.”

Since then, however, hitchBOT’s lifeless body has found a permanent home at the Canada Science and Technology Museum. It’s creators have since moved on to BOTisattva, a meditating robot.

Oliver has gone after Philadelphia in the past over issues ranging from civil forfeiture laws to charter schools. The 2016 charter school segment, in fact, got the attention of Pennsylvania Sen. Anthony Hardy Williams, who wrote Oliver an open letter saying he went “too far” with his coverage of the issue.

Mayor Jim Kenney also weighed in, though he mostly ribbed Oliver about mocking Eagles fans and cheesesteaks because the HBO host is an “English soccer fan who eats fish from newsprint.”

After ribbing Philadelphia once again on Sunday, Oliver turned his attention back to automation, and recommended some ways for future workers to remain relevant in an increasingly robotic jobs market, which came in the form of shying kids away from outlandish employment dreams.

“You can do a series of non-routine tasks that require social intelligence, complex critical thinking, and creative problem-solving, OK?” Oliver said. “Can you repeat that back to me?”