Flowers Are Blooming In Antarctica

About

Flowers Are Blooming In Antarctica is a catchphrase used in memes to imply "climate doomer" sentiments. The phrase stems from a slightly false claim that flowers are blooming in Antarctica, which was spread on Twitter / X and Instagram in late 2023, alongside a photograph of purple flowers set in front of an iceberg. Although the posts using the photograph cited a real study by climate Professor Nicoletta Cannone, the claim was proven false by many fact-checking sites like Snopes because the photo was instead from Greenland where flowers are common in the summer. Cannone's study cited plant growth like Antarctic grass instead. Regardless, the phrase spread in memes on Reddit, TikTok and elsewhere going into early 2024, becoming a symbol of global warming activism.

Origin

On September 21st, 2023, the X^[1] account @DailyLoud posted a photo of flowers blooming in front of an iceberg with a caption that claimed, "Flowers are now starting to bloom in Antarctica and experts say this is not good news." The post cited Nicoletta Cannone, a professor of ecology at the University of Insubria. Over four months, the post gained roughly 13.3 million views and 62,000 likes (shown below).

Soon after the post's virality, a Community Note ^[2] was added to the post that fact-checked its claim. The note cited a Gizmodo^[3] article from 2022, which cited Professor Nicoletta Cannone's study on flowering plants in Antarctica. However, the photo used in @DailyLoud's post was misleading as it was taken in Greenland, not Antarctica, where colorful flowers are common in the summer months.^[4] Other outlets, like USA Today,^[5] also fact-checked @DailyLoud's post.

Gizmodo^[3] included a photo of Antarctic hair grass growing on rocks at Couverville Island, Antarctica in its article (shown below), which is the plant growth that Professor Nicoletta Cannone was studying.

Spread

After the virality of @DailyLoud's post, the claim spread online, which was notably evident on Instagram.^[6] Also, on September 29th, 2023, X^[7] user @kirawontmiss screenshotted and reposted a since-deleted Instagram post from @pubity, captioned, "flowers in Antarctica?? yeah we are cooked," receiving over 4.1 million views and 71,000 likes in four months (shown below, left).

On December 7th, X^[8] user @_cyyndaquil posted a photo of a girl who seemed to be his daughter, claiming that she told him, "Antarctica is growing flowers," gaining roughly 57,000 likes in a month (shown below, right).

Users on TikTok also started to spread the claim in September 2023, such as TikToker^[9] @omaragamyy on September 22nd, 2023, whose skit about the claim gained over 5.8 million plays and 504,800 likes in four months (shown below, left).

Memetic content about the claim spread on the platform soon after, in which people used the phrase to symbolize climate change fears. For instance, on November 11th, TikToker^[10] @b0rderlineslvt posted a video with text reading, "when people ask me why I want to start a family so young, but the flowers are blooming in Antarctica," receiving over 4.3 million plays and 601,200 likes in two months (shown below, right).

Image-based memes about the phrase also spread on Reddit. For instance, on October 5th, 2023, Redditor Kayo4life shared a Sunset Wojak meme to /r/memes ^[11] that used the phrase, gaining over 48,300 upvotes in three months (shown below).

In January 2024, viral memes about the phrase continued to surface on /r/memes.^[12]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References