Viral Photo of a Starfish With a Big Butt: Fact Check

Story:

Starfish with a Big Butt..

Other Versions

Viral Photo of a Sea Star’s Butt.

Fact Check:

An unusual story in circulation on Twitter and other online platforms alleges to show a viral photo of a Starfish With a Big Butt. The photograph of the Pink Sea Starfish went viral because of its unusual rear appearance. Nonetheless, what you see is not uncommon in such starfishes and it is not a Butt as such.

Origin of Claim

Twitter user Akari @Babyshoujo shared the photograph on 30th June 2019 describing she ‘Saw a thicc a** starfish at the aquarium today‘ at Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach, California. Back then viewers followed with a number of memes and jokes about the photograph. Unusually, the Twitter post garnered hundreds of thousands of likes and retweets, making it viral.

Subsequently, Akari clarified in a comment she shared the post as a joke, “sexualizing starfish”. She also mentioned Patrick (Star), a fictional character in the American animated television series SpongeBob SquarePants. Patrick Star is shown as a lazy, overweight and silly Pink starfish.

Not a Starfish With Butt

Unlike the claims, what you see in the photograph is not a butt of the Pink Sea Starfish. To inquire about the photograph, USA TODAY website usatoday.com consulted Nate Jaros, the curator of fish and invertebrates at the Aquarium of the Pacific. Jaros said the creature in the photograph is a Vermilion Sea Star.

“Sea stars are actually invertebrates or animals without backbones and not fish despite people commonly referring to them as ‘starfish,'” he added.

Moreover, he explained the “butt” in the photograph is in fact the creatures’ arms while it is hanging on a vertical rock in a relaxed position. Since the sea star is hanging on vertically, the internal components of it come down due to gravity and appear as butt. For your information, website SadAndUseless.com shared some pictures of similar starfish with ‘butts’.

Hoax or Fact:

Hoax.