In February 2022, a black and white cat who had been diagnosed with feline immunodeficiency virus, or FIV, passed away. Pets dying, while devastating for the owners who love them, is not an uncommon occurrence – their lives are tragically much shorter than human ones, after all. What makes this example unique is the storm that followed.
The cat, whose name was Pot Roast, had garnered a sizable TikTok following, and fans on the app eagerly awaited regular updates on their favourite internet famous cat. When Pot Roast passed away, her mother, known online as Pot Roast’s Mom, was bombarded with messages from strangers unimpressed with how she handled her cat’s health concerns.
Pot Roast regularly visited the vet for checkups and routine testing, owing to health issues she had as a kitten, but this wasn’t enough to convince some fans that she was being taken care of. They told Pot Roast’s Mom that Pot Roast’s death was preventable, while others said she should simply euthanize her. Pot Roast’s Mom told NBC News at the time, “People have been telling me how to take care of Pot Roast since the beginning, you know? I think when she got sick, people really took that as an opportunity to be like, ‘Oh, I was right, she’s going to die.’”
This feeling of entitlement over strangers’ lives certainly isn’t new, but that entitlement hasn’t always extended to their animals. It’s an increasingly bizarre terrain that pet owners are now having to navigate.
Pot Roast was not the first internet famous cat to be taken too soon. In 2019, fans were dealt the triple whammy of internet pet deaths: in January, Boo the dog died of what his owners said was a broken heart following the death of his friend Buddy in 2017; in May, perhaps the most famous internet cat, Grumpy Cat, died at the age of seven, and in December, Lil Bub, known for her adorable smile, died at the age of eight.
All three of these pets presided over empires: Boo the dog collaborated on a collection of plush toys with GUND, Grumpy Cat starred in a movie and was voiced by Aubrey Plaza, and Lil Bub was the subject of a VICE documentary, co-author of several books, the star of a mobile video game funded by fans, and was also turned into a plush toy.
The question of how owners of internet famous pets navigate maintaining their pet’s fanbase and overseeing their legacy after their pet has passed on is an interesting one. Grumpy Cat’s owners (or someone acting on their behalf) post sparingly, primarily on big days like Christmas, New Years, and Stan Lee’s 100th birthday. Jonathan Graziano, owner of Noodle the Pug of ‘Bones/No Bones’ fame, took some time away from TikTok following Noodle’s death in December 2022, but has recently returned with a vengeance since he begun fostering two pug puppies named Rigatoni and Macaroni (in keeping with the pasta theme started by Noodle). Updates from Marnie the dog, who passed away in 2020, are few and far between, but her owner occasionally posts photos with celebrities that Marnie met during her life. Recent Instagram posts feature Betty White, Bob Saget and Gilbert Gottfried and Jennifer Coolidge. Boo’s owners appear to have opted out of the social media grind almost entirely, only posting once in 2022 and three times in 2021.
These pets presided over empires … Lil Bub was the subject of a VICE documentary, co-author of several books, the star of a mobile video game funded by fans, and was also turned into a plush toy.
Mike Bridavsky, audio engineer and owner of Lil Bub, has taken a different approach – one that involves radical honesty and a desire to do good with the platform his furry friend left behind. Last month, Bridavsky shared a refreshingly honest message with Bub’s 2.7 million Facebook fans about the ongoing difficulties of grieving someone and the associated struggle to continue to post when grief feels overwhelming.
“Even though it’s been over three years since BUB departed, I’m still struggling with the loss, and the process has gone through many different phases. Most recently, I’ve found that it’s been hard for me to look at photos and as a result, sharing them online has felt overwhelming and daunting, which is why I haven’t been posting much. This has been one of the most difficult phases so far because looking at BUB should bring me great joy, not despair and anxiety.”
In an interview with Junkee, Bridavsky displays the same degree of candour. Bridavsky stresses Bub’s role as the brains of the operation, explaining that he never made a conscious decision to make Bub famous. “She found me because I was the type of person who could help her do what she wanted to do,” he says, adding that he continues to make decisions with Bub in mind. “I feel like she’s not really gone, she’s definitely watching, she’s keeping tabs on me and helping when she can.”
While they always existed, parasocial relationships with his pet became more noticeable for Bridavsky following Bub’s passing. Grieving with an audience of fans made the experience that much more surreal. “I’ve never experienced anything like it,” he say, “because literally millions of people are grieving with you, and there’s a fraction of those people that actually, truly believe that they cared about her more than you did.”
While Bridavsky isn’t posting as much as he once did, he is conscious of the fact that because of the work he now does with Lil Bub’s Big Fund, he needs to keep Bub’s audience engaged in order to be able to do good. The fund advocates for pets with special needs – Bub herself had feline dwarfism, as did Grumpy Cat – and raises money for grants and partnerships with shelters so they can develop special needs foster initiatives.
Bridavsky is currently working on a concert series called “Small and Mighty” in collaboration with his recording studio and a number of not-for-profits. He also has plans for an animal welfare convention. So while his beloved pet is gone, his mission remains the same: using the platform he has to affect positive change for pets like Bub.
“I have to do it for the love of my cats.”
Catherine Bouris is a freelance writer and editor specialising in internet culture and communities.