Milk Face Cat

About

Milk Face Cat or Cursed Milk Cat refers to an image of a black kitten with thick, milky food covering its face and an upset look, a bowl full of the food under him as if he fell face-first into it. The earliest known upload of the image was posted to Imgur in May 2020. It spread across social media over the following year, becoming the subject of image macros and a reaction image, often used to represent someone as mentally or physically exhausted or in agony.

Origin

On May 15th, 2020, Imgur^[1] user 420Ghostgirl posted an "Animal meme dump," the first image showing a black kitten with its face covered in what appears to be milk mixed with some sort of food (shown below). The kitten has an upset look on its face as the milk is seen dripping off its chin. The post gained over 1,900 upvotes and 131,000 views in just under two years. It is unknown if this is the original post. The next day the image was uploaded to the /r/hmmm^[2] subreddit, gaining over 25,200 upvotes in a comparable span of time.

Spread

The image spread across social media over the following months, often used as a reaction image to represent agony or tiredness. For example, on May 22nd, 2020, Imgur^[3] user WHEREISMYTROPHY posted a now-deleted tweet where the user writes "everyday has felt like this" along with the image (shown below). The Imgur post gained over 46,000 views in just under two years.

On January 5th, 2021, TikToker @luvorboy posted a video where he dons makeup meant to resemble the cat, gaining over 15.1 million views in a year (shown below). On July 11th, a duet to one of the TikToker's videos was posted to /r/Cringetopia^[5] implying he looks like the cat, gaining over 34,400 upvotes in six months.

On December 18th, 2021, Tumblr^[4] user f posted a text string where the image is used as an out of context response to someone's message, gaining over 24,500 notes in a month (shown below).

Various Examples

Template

Search Interest

External References