Evil Nestle — Collage of satanic symbols including a pentagram, 666, inverted cross, and the Nestlé logo under the text 'What's with all these satanic symbols'

Evil Nestle

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Published October 31, 2026

Evil Nestle refers to a July 2019 Reddit meme campaign that painted food giant Nestlé as a cartoon villain over water privatization claims and former CEO Peter Brabeck-Letmathe's 2005 documentary comment calling the belief that water is a human right an 'extreme' view1. The jokes concentrated on r/dankmemes, where Redditor TriggerOnTheTrey's July 11th post listing Nestlé's accused scandals gained over 10,000 points and set off copycat posts across the subreddit3.

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Overview

Posts in the Evil Nestle format typically catalog the company's accused abuses in list form, mixing confirmed scandals like aggressive water pumping during the California drought with the Brabeck-Letmathe soundbite that fueled the backlash1. Snopes rated the 'water is not a human right' claim as 'Mixture', noting the ex-CEO never used those exact words but did describe the belief as 'extreme' in the 2005 Austrian documentary We Feed the World1.

A common visual approach uses the Lisa Simpson's Presentation template, with Nestlé's grievances piled onto a classroom slide. Other posts cast the company as Lucifer, a Satanic ritual target, or a Captain Planet villain, playing off the gap between a bland corporate logo and the laundry list of accusations attached to it2. Memebase called the Reddit trend a 'meme war' being waged against the company and its ethics2.

Origin & Background

Platform
Reddit (r/dankmemes)
Date
2019

Peter Brabeck-Letmathe served as Nestlé's CEO from 1997 to 2008 and appeared in the 2005 Austrian documentary We Feed the World defending the privatization of water supplies1. In the interview, he described the NGO position that water is a human right as 'extreme' and argued that giving water a market price would prompt governments to help people without access instead of relying on charity1. Clips of the quote circulated online for more than a decade before gaining new momentum in meme form.

Reddit user TriggerOnTheTrey posted the earliest known Evil Nestle meme on July 11th, 2019, using a Lisa Simpson's Presentation image on r/dankmemes to walk through the company's various accused misdeeds3. The 2005 documentary clip was the backlash catalyst, while the meme format itself only emerged with that July 11, 2019 post.

How It Spread

Within days of TriggerOnTheTrey's post, r/dankmemes saw dozens of imitators. Redditor kayneshaw's 'lucifer intensifies' post reached over 31,000 points, and user @sajjad_wasti joked that the anti-Nestlé posts would soon overtake the trending Storm Area 51 memes, hitting 24,000 points3. The volume grew enough that r/OutOfTheLoop fielded a question asking what the Evil Nestle jokes were about3.

Memebase, part of the Cheezburger network, compiled the campaign later that month under the headline 'Redditors Are Waging a Meme War Against Evil Nestle and Their Ethics'2. Snopes revisited its earlier fact-check on the CEO's remarks during the spike, clarifying what Brabeck-Letmathe had actually said versus what the shared screenshots claimed1.

Timeline

2005

Peter Brabeck-Letmathe is filmed for the Austrian documentary We Feed the World calling the position that water is a human right 'extreme'[1].

2019-07-11

Redditor TriggerOnTheTrey posts a Lisa Simpson's Presentation meme listing Nestlé's accused scandals on r/dankmemes, gaining over 10,000 points[3].

2019-07

Redditor kayneshaw's 'lucifer intensifies' Nestlé post reaches over 31,000 points on r/dankmemes[3].

2019-07

User @sajjad_wasti jokes that anti-Nestlé memes will overtake the Storm Area 51 trend, hitting 24,000 points[3].

2019-07

Memebase compiles the Reddit campaign under a 'meme war against evil Nestle' headline[2].

How to Use This Meme

Common conventions load a Lisa Simpson's Presentation slide with Nestlé's accused abuses (water pumping during droughts, baby formula marketing scandals, child labor allegations), ending on the Brabeck-Letmathe water quote as the punchline3. Other posts often cast the company as Lucifer or a Satanic ritual target, playing off the clash between a wholesome food brand and the stacked grievances2.

Frequently Asked Questions