About

Aww So Cute But Who Is In the Cage is an exploitable text message / DM exchange meme in which one person sends another a drawing of two stick figures in love standing between a person in a cage and a house, the sender on the right asking, "Who is in the cage?" and the sender on the left responding with a name. One of the earliest versions of the meme has the left sender respond, "Netanyahu," referring to Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel. The meme was popularized on sites including Instagram and X / Twitter in early January 2026, inspiring many edits that replace the punchline and attribute each DM bubble to a character.

Origin

On January 4th, 2026, Instagram^[1] user grahamcrackers posted a screenshot of what appears to be a text or DM conversation between two people. The sender on the left starts by sending a drawing of two stick figures with a heart between them. A person in a cage is on the left, and a house is on the right. The right sender writes, "What's that," the sender on the left responds, "You & Me." The person on the right writes, "Aww so cute but who is in the cage?" The person on the left responds, "Netanyahu." The post gained over 123,000 likes in five days.

This is the earliest known, viral version of the image, however, it may not be the original, with several commenters claiming there is a previous version of the meme.

Spread

The Aww So Cute But Who Is In the Cage meme spread over the following days, inspiring edits in early January 2026.

On January 5th, 2026, the original version of the meme was reposted by X^[2] user @Jolly_Blaziken, writing, "Need this," garnering over 344,000 likes and 3,200 reposts in four days.

That day, Instagram^[3] user edgesandsledges posted an edit referencing cricket player Gautam Gambhir that gained over 76,000 likes in the same span of time.

On January 6th, 2026, X^[4] user @wensadms posted a version referencing the show Wednesday that gained over 5,200 likes in three days.

On January 7th, X^[5] user @CEOofchiscara posted a version of the meme referencing the series Hazbin Hotel, garnering over 9,200 likes in two days. Later that day, X^[6] user @rinnegaara posted a Naruto version that gained over 4,700 likes in two days.

On January 8th, 2026, X^[7] user @nutellka_04 posted a version of the meme referencing the Hololive ship "autofister," which also edits the stick figure drawing, garnering over 3,200 likes in a day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References