The Infamous "Crying Peter Pan Bernie Bro" Is Actually A Hero College Kid

PHILADELPHIA — As Sen. Bernie Sanders urged his 1,900 Democratic delegates to back Hillary Clinton Monday night, the Internet quickly noticed — and poked fun at — some of his delegates’ emotional responses to the end of his insurgent campaign.

Even in this sea of sadness, Sean Kehren, a 22-year-old Sanders delegate from Minnesota, stood out. For one, he was wearing a Peter Pan-style hat (which represents a “Robin Hood tax” on Wall Street). His expression of pure anguish as Sanders spoke earned him the title of “breakout star” among all the crying Sanders delegates.

Kehren’s image was quickly churned into memes, many of them making fun of Sanders supporters for their die-hard “Bernie or bust” stance. Twitter referred to him alternately as “Crying Peter Pan” and “sad Robin Hood.”

Kehren, however, told Yahoo News that he is not a Bernie-or-buster. He said he was crying in part because he found it very noble that Sanders was encouraging his fans to back Clinton for the good of the nation after such a hard-fought and idealistic campaign.

“I was getting emotional over the fact that he was doing his best to unify the party and I think that’s such a noble cause,” Kehren said. “Bernie has led a revolution, he’s led a movement, and now that movement has to get behind the party.”

Kehren said he’s not a privileged “Bernie Bro” who hates Clinton, as some on social media have branded him. He said he was raised by a struggling single mom and will vote for Clinton in the election.

This is not Kehren’s first brush with Internet fame. “Two months ago, I pulled a woman out of a burning car,” he said. (He helped save the woman’s life by bravely removing her from the car.)

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Damn, what a power move from Crying Peter Pan Bernie Bro here. Everybody is laughing at you and memeing the fuck out of you for being this little crybaby pussy? Just casually drop it in with the next reporter that two months ago you jumped into a car that was on fire and pulled an old woman to safety literally seconds before it exploded into a fireball, and here’s the link if you need it, no big deal. Seriously, the story was no joke.

Kehren, a senior who will graduate from Gustavus Adolphus College in St. Peter later this month, pulled a 67-year-old woman from her car, which had crashed into a tree and caught fire Sunday morning on Interstate 35…

…Kehren was on his way to see his mother in Pine City when he saw a vehicle ahead of him drift into the ditch at 11:45 a.m.

Kehren slammed on his brakes and sprinted to the driver’s side door. He noticed Hupalo was bloody and “looked beat up.” Then he felt something warm on his legs.

“Flames were coming from the bottom of the car, and I said, ‘We need to get you out of here,’?” he recalled Tuesday. “I frantically tried to get her out but she slipped out of my hands.”

By then two others who had stopped, Elissa and Josh Schnell, helped drag Hupalo, who was clutching a pink iPad, to safety, Kehren said. Seconds later, Hupalo’s 2008 Dodge Nitro burst into flames, and everything else in her car went with it.[Star Trib]

Well played sir, well played indeed. Very impressive use of the humblebrag.

Lucky for us, both things can be true simultaneously. You can be the best meme of the conventions for weeping while wearing a Peter Pan hat on national television because you don’t get free college now. You can also be a hero with big old brass balls dragging on the ground.