Pizza Rat is an

internet meme An Internet meme, commonly known simply as a meme ( ), is an idea, behavior, style, or image that is spread via the Internet, often through social media platforms. What is considered a meme may vary across different communities on the Internet ...

based around a

viral video A viral video is a video that becomes popular through a viral process of Internet sharing, typically through video sharing websites such as YouTube as well as social media and email.Lu Jiang, Yajie Miao, Yi Yang, ZhenZhong Lan, Alexander Haupt ...

of a

brown rat The brown rat (''Rattus norvegicus''), also known as the common rat, street rat, sewer rat, wharf rat, Hanover rat, Norway rat, Norwegian rat and Parisian rat, is a widespread species of common rat. One of the largest muroids, it is a brown o ...

carrying a slice of

pizza Pizza (, ) is a dish of Italian origin consisting of a usually round, flat base of leavened wheat-based dough topped with tomatoes, cheese, and often various other ingredients (such as various types of sausage, anchovies, mushrooms, onions ...

down the steps of a

New York City Subway The New York City Subway is a rapid transit system owned by the government of New York City and leased to the New York City Transit Authority, an affiliate agency of the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA). Opened on October 2 ...

station in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

. The video was first uploaded to

Instagram Instagram is a photo and video sharing social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. The app allows users to upload media that can be edited with filters and organized by hashtags and geographical tagging. Posts can ...

on September 21, 2015, and a copy was uploaded to

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

later. Currently, the YouTube video has more than 12.16 million views.

Impact

Within hours of the video's posting, #PizzaRat was trending on

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

, and by September 23, the clip had been viewed over five million times. Articles were quickly written by

Gawker ''Gawker'' is an American blog founded by Nick Denton and Elizabeth Spiers and based in New York City focusing on celebrities and the media industry. According to SimilarWeb, the site had over 23 million visits per month as of 2015. Founded in ...

BuzzFeed BuzzFeed, Inc. is an American Internet media, news and entertainment company with a focus on digital media. Based in New York City, BuzzFeed was founded in 2006 by Jonah Peretti and John S. Johnson III to focus on tracking viral content. Ken ...

DNAinfo ''DNAinfo'' was an online newspaper that focused on neighborhood news in New York City and Chicago. It was closed down by CEO and owner Joe Ricketts in November 2017 after writers in its New York branch voted to unionize, a move to which Ricketts ...

, and

Gothamist Gothamist LLC is the operator, or in some cases franchisor, of eight city-centric websites that focused on news, events, food, culture, and other local coverage. It was founded in 2003 by Jake Dobkin and Jen Chung. In March 2017, Joe Ricketts, ...

. Pizza Rat costumes, as well as "sexy" Pizza Rat costumes, were created and worn for

Halloween Halloween or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve) is a celebration observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints' Day. It begins the observanc ...

that year. ''

Popular Science ''Popular Science'' (also known as ''PopSci'') is an American digital magazine carrying popular science content, which refers to articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. ''Popular Science'' has won over 58 awards, incl ...

'' identified the rat as a common

, and noted the rarity of humans to be able to get as close to them as Matt Little, the individual who originally posted the video to YouTube, did while filming the video. They attributed this to either the rat being too hungry to run, or more used to humans than other rats. ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'' created a timeline of the meme's progression, starting with its upload on September 21. The article argued that journalists and marketers attempting to gain clout from the meme, as well as the users themselves oversharing it, led to the meme's death within two days of its initial creation. The

Staten Island Yankees The Staten Island Yankees were a minor league baseball team located in the New York City borough of Staten Island from 1999 to 2020. Nicknamed the "Baby Bombers", the Yankees were the Class A Short Season affiliate of the New York Yankees and pla ...

rebranded as the Staten Island Pizza Rats for several games, wearing uniforms and offering merchandise depicting a stylized pizza rat.

Zardulu Zardulu the Mythmaker is a performance artist based in New York City. Her identity is unknown, but she rose to prominence after several of her performance pieces went viral as hoax videos in 2015 and 2016. These videos included "Selfie Rat", "Three ...

, a New York City-based performance artist, claimed credit for staging the original video as well as several other viral hoaxes in an interview with ''The Washington Post''. However, Little denies that the video was a hoax and states that they have no association with Zardulu.{{cite podcast , host=Goldman, Alex, title=Zardulu , date=25 February 2016 , url= https://gimletmedia.com/shows/reply-all/o2ho6j/56-zardulu , access-date=19 August 2022 , website=Reply All

References

Pizza in the United States East Village, Manhattan Fauna of the Northeastern United States Environmental issues in New York City Individual rodents 2015 YouTube videos 2015 in New York City Mice and rats in popular culture Pizza in New York City

Impact

See also

References