Same Sex Marriage Just Won't Fly — Two-panel cartoon of airplanes with wings labeled MAN and WOMAN versus two MAN wings stacked on one side.

Same Sex Marriage Just Won't Fly

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Published October 15, 2026

Pat Cross's July 2022 political cartoon tried to argue against same-sex marriage by drawing a plane with wings labeled 'man' and 'woman' next to a doomed plane with both wings on one side labeled 'man.' After @mattxiv shared a captioned version titled 'Same-sex Marriage Just Won't Fly' on July 27, 2022, Twitter users spent the next week producing polycule planes, biplane jokes, and flight simulator videos proving the gay plane could actually take off.

backfire memes lgbtq memes political satire memes exploitable templates object labeling

Overview

Cross's argument hinges on an aerodynamics analogy where wings must balance opposite sides of a fuselage, so a plane with two left wings cannot stay airborne1. Twitter edits that followed the viral screenshot largely ignored that premise, using the two-plane layout as an exploitable3. Common variations relabeled wings for polycules, drew biplanes to represent bisexuality, or pointed at real aircraft with unusual wing configurations that fly fine.

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A second category of jokes attacked the physics directly. Users produced flight simulator footage of the 'man/man' plane in the air, dug up photos of asymmetric aircraft, and cited the 1983 incident in which an Israeli Air Force F-15 landed safely after losing most of a wing in a mid-air collision5. The pile-on turned Cross's cartoon into one of the stronger self-own moments of mid-2022 political Twitter.

Origin & Background

Platform
Pat Cross blog (artwork) / Twitter (viral spread)
Creator
Pat Cross
Date
2022

Pat Cross, a Catholic political cartoonist whose work runs in the National Catholic Register, National Review and First Things, published the drawing on his blog on July 18, 20221. The National Catholic Register ran it two days later with the caption 'Same-sex Marriage Just Won't Fly'2.

Twitter user @mattxiv screenshotted the Register version on July 27, 2022, and posted it without added commentary4. The tweet gained over 34,000 retweets and 492,000 likes within two days3.

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How It Spread

Parodies started appearing on Twitter on July 28, 2022, with users turning the second plane into an exploitable template. @datagurl77 added extra wings in a polycule configuration6, while @BadRaccShow fitted the planes to the four-panel Loss layout7. Both posts stayed small, with roughly 20 likes each3.

Biplane jokes gained more traction. @damnyouwillis attached a photo of a biplane to argue bisexuality 'makes marriage fly,' earning over 60 retweets and 280 likes8. @LiaOfTheBay captioned a photo of an F-15 'F-15 confirmed gay,' nodding to the fighter jet's famous one-wing landing9.

The biggest response came later that day when the Twitter account @PlaneyBoys posted a flight simulator video showing Cross's two-left-wings plane take off and fly successfully, earning over 17,000 retweets and 88,000 likes in under 24 hours10. After that burst, parody engagement tapered off within the first week of August 2022.

Timeline

2022-07-18

Pat Cross publishes the original cartoon on his blog, with the two planes labeled 'man/woman' and 'man/man.'

2022-07-20

National Catholic Register runs the cartoon with the caption 'Same-sex Marriage Just Won't Fly.'

2022-07-27

Twitter user @mattxiv posts a screenshot of the Register version, which gains over 34,000 retweets and 492,000 likes.

2022-07-28

Twitter parodies arrive: polycule planes, biplane jokes, F-15 one-wing jokes, and @PlaneyBoys's flight simulator video of the 'gay plane' flying.

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