Every time you masturbate... God kills a kitten

The image

"Every time you masturbate… God kills a kitten" is the caption of an image created by a member of the website Fark.com in 2002.^[1] The image features a kitten (subsequently referred to as "Cliché Kitty") being chased by two Domos, and has the tagline "Please, think of the kittens".

According to a New York Times Magazine article on Domo-kun, "Any major exhibition on the history of clowning around on the Internet would have to include [this image]".^[2] An article from ICv2 stated, "This phony PSA is quite out of character with Domo's image in Japan."^[3]

The phrase originally appeared as the headline "Fact: Every Time You Masturbate, God Kills a Kitten. How Many More Have to Die?" with a kitten photo on the cover of The Gonzo, a satirical publication produced by students at Georgetown University, in 1996.^[4]

Cultural references

In 2003, actor Dudley Sutton found inspiration from the Internet, "where apparently people say that every time you masturbate God kills a kitten".^[5]

The XXXchurch used the retouched kitten image in an e-mail campaign.^[6] Jay Porter was quoted as stating that "'God kills a kitten every time you masturbate' is not an advisable message to direct at children", after the Michigan church used the slogan during an anti-pornography campaign in 2005.^[7] The phrase also inspired the name of a sex club called Killing Kittens.^[8]

The phrase is sometimes varied. For example, in 2003, Daily Show correspondent Samantha Bee maintained a screensaver that showed kittens chased by vengeful ninjas, and the cut line, "Every time you masturbate, a ninja chops the head off a kitten."^[9]

See also

Internet portal

• Domo
• Lolcat
• Viral email

References

1. ^ Fark Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ): Farkisms, Fark.com
2. ^ Hello, Kitschy, The New York Times Magazine, July 22, 2007
3. ^ "Nickelodeon Gets Anime-Mated." ICv2. May 4, 2006. Retrieved on February 5, 2009.
4. ^ "The Gonzo #10". http://www.shlomiraz.com/Site/The_Gonzo/Pages/Issue_10.html#0. ^{[dead link]}
5. ^ "Edinburgh Festival 2003: Thomas Quinn — Pest at the fest", Daily Mirror page 22, August 4, 2003
6. ^ Mitzi Szereto (2005). The World's Best Sex Writing 2005. Thunder's Mouth Press. ISBN 1560257725. http://books.google.com/books?id=fHFuD3C8IIAC&pg=PA168&dq=masturbate+kitten&as_brr=0&ei=8zvmRsjGNZa2pwLoyrm5Aw&sig=yfTUW1vPupP4ZrzxxSHj9fSYWgc. 
7. ^ Mich. Church Slammed for 'Porn Weekend', Fox News, April 1, 2005
8. ^ John Cameron Mitchell: Let's talk dirty The Independent on Sunday, section ABC, page 6, November 26, 2006
9. ^ Bee dazzled: "It was very crazy and unexpected" to be whisked from Toronto to New York to make news that amuses, The Daily Show’s Canadian component tells Simon Houpt", The Globe and Mail, page R3, November 24, 2003