Big Floppa

2019image macroclassic

Big Floppa is an ironic meme built around photos of Gregory, a Russian pet caracal owned by Instagram user prozhony. Starting in late 2019 on ironic Instagram meme pages and going wide in mid-2020, the surreal captions and edits of the tuft-eared cat turned Gregory into one of the defining animal memes of the pandemic era.

catsironic memescelebrity animal memesabsurdist humor memesinstagram memes

Overview

Big Floppa, often shortened to Floppa, is an ironic image macro series built on photographs of a pet caracal named Gregory (Гоша in Russian)1. The cat belongs to Moscow couple Andrey and Elena Bondarev, who post Gregory alongside their two housecats, Zhora and Matvey, on the Instagram account prozhony1. The nickname comes from the caracal's oversized, tufted ears, which flop as the animal moves2.

The format is loose by design. Captioned photos, cursed edits, low-poly 3D renders, and demotivational posters of Gregory all count as Floppa content, usually with absurd or non-sequitur text3. In Russian-speaking meme circles the caracal is known instead as Bolshoy Shlyopa (Большой Шлёпа), which became its own parallel meme ecosystem1 (translated from Russian).

How It Spread

Floppa stayed inside ironic Instagram until spring 2020. On March 24th, tfosing posted an edit splicing clips of Gregory and a serval being petted, captioned HOW THE F--K IS IT SO SOFT, which was reuploaded the next day by Instagram user hambubrger and pulled over 38,100 views3. On April 6th, 2020, iFunny account ShitpostSanctuary reposted the edit, marking one of the first jumps off Instagram3.

The meme broke out on Twitter and Reddit in mid to late April 2020. On April 16th, Twitter user @pawpawchan48 posted the Big Floppa Flop fo no hoe demotivational, and on April 24th Redditor LlamaKnight11 posted a Gregory photo titled The big floppa to r/aww, which cleared 150 upvotes3. Traffic accelerated in May, and on June 4th, 2020, the dedicated subreddit r/bigfloppa was created as a hub for fan art and edits3.

Big Floppa kept going through 2020 and 2021, feuding good-naturedly with fellow cat meme Bingus3. Russian users built the Шлёпер format, editing beverages next to Floppa so the caracal appears to pronounce their names with an -er suffix1. On February 12th, 2021, Twitter user @KittsterM posted a low-poly Blender model of Floppa, and a week later @alob_e cropped it into a standalone image that pulled 52,700 likes in four days and was reuploaded to r/blursedimages for over 17,000 upvotes3. The Bondarevs, aware of the viral run, opened the Big Floppa Store to sell merchandise built around Gregory1 (translated from Russian).

How to Use This Meme

Most Floppa posts pair a photo of Gregory with either surreal captions, an unrelated pop-culture reference, or edited props such as clothing and drinks. Common conventions include the low-poly 3D Floppa cutout, the Шлёпер beverage format popular on RuNet, and simple two-line demotivational captions that lean into the caracal's blank stare13.

Frequently Asked Questions

Big Floppa

2019image macroclassic

Big Floppa is an ironic meme built around photos of Gregory, a Russian pet caracal owned by Instagram user prozhony. Starting in late 2019 on ironic Instagram meme pages and going wide in mid-2020, the surreal captions and edits of the tuft-eared cat turned Gregory into one of the defining animal memes of the pandemic era.

cats ironic memes celebrity animal memes absurdist humor memes instagram memes

Overview

Big Floppa, often shortened to Floppa, is an ironic image macro series built on photographs of a pet caracal named Gregory (Гоша in Russian)1. The cat belongs to Moscow couple Andrey and Elena Bondarev, who post Gregory alongside their two housecats, Zhora and Matvey, on the Instagram account prozhony1. The nickname comes from the caracal's oversized, tufted ears, which flop as the animal moves2.

The format is loose by design. Captioned photos, cursed edits, low-poly 3D renders, and demotivational posters of Gregory all count as Floppa content, usually with absurd or non-sequitur text3. In Russian-speaking meme circles the caracal is known instead as Bolshoy Shlyopa (Большой Шлёпа), which became its own parallel meme ecosystem1 (translated from Russian).

How It Spread

Floppa stayed inside ironic Instagram until spring 2020. On March 24th, tfosing posted an edit splicing clips of Gregory and a serval being petted, captioned HOW THE F--K IS IT SO SOFT, which was reuploaded the next day by Instagram user hambubrger and pulled over 38,100 views3. On April 6th, 2020, iFunny account ShitpostSanctuary reposted the edit, marking one of the first jumps off Instagram3.

The meme broke out on Twitter and Reddit in mid to late April 2020. On April 16th, Twitter user @pawpawchan48 posted the Big Floppa Flop fo no hoe demotivational, and on April 24th Redditor LlamaKnight11 posted a Gregory photo titled The big floppa to r/aww, which cleared 150 upvotes3. Traffic accelerated in May, and on June 4th, 2020, the dedicated subreddit r/bigfloppa was created as a hub for fan art and edits3.

Big Floppa kept going through 2020 and 2021, feuding good-naturedly with fellow cat meme Bingus3. Russian users built the Шлёпер format, editing beverages next to Floppa so the caracal appears to pronounce their names with an -er suffix1. On February 12th, 2021, Twitter user @KittsterM posted a low-poly Blender model of Floppa, and a week later @alob_e cropped it into a standalone image that pulled 52,700 likes in four days and was reuploaded to r/blursedimages for over 17,000 upvotes3. The Bondarevs, aware of the viral run, opened the Big Floppa Store to sell merchandise built around Gregory1 (translated from Russian).

How to Use This Meme

Most Floppa posts pair a photo of Gregory with either surreal captions, an unrelated pop-culture reference, or edited props such as clothing and drinks. Common conventions include the low-poly 3D Floppa cutout, the Шлёпер beverage format popular on RuNet, and simple two-line demotivational captions that lean into the caracal's blank stare13.

Frequently Asked Questions