Gaturro vs Pijurro: A Brief Memetic History

Disclaimer [This post was originally published on this blog last year and I accidentally deleted it. Given the relevance of its topic, I'm re-uploading it in an expanded and revised version]

In a previous article "Scaloneta: Una breve historia memética" I tried to provide a working definition for the term meme, one that allows us to analyze the cultural construct in its context. For this new article, we'll continue using the standard definition of meme as written by Limor Shifman. A meme is:

"(a) a group of digital items sharing common characteristics of content, form, and/or stance, which (b) were each created with awareness of each other, and (c) were circulated, imitated, or transformed via the internet".

Pijurro is a meme that emerged as a deformation of Gaturro, the comic strip character created by Nik, an Argentine cartoonist. Gaturro belongs to the tradition of humorous characters aimed at young audiences that began with Quino's Mafalda, was continued by Sendra with Yo, Matías, and taken to the extreme by Nik. Gaturro is a character inspired by Garfield but with heavy doses of lowbrow humor and common sense.

Gaturro's undeniable popularity in the offline world was contrasted by his creator's unpopularity online and, particularly, on the social platform Twitter. Pijurro is a memetic manifestation of that tension. Or rather, Pijurro was born in the context of that tension.

It's common to come across expressions of rejection not so much toward the character but toward the author himself, due to his constant acts of plagiarism across different social platforms. While we won't debate here about the concept of original/copy and so on, it's enough to point out that Nik is a figure disliked by both internet users and fellow cartoonists.

In the 2010s, the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires began installing commemorative statues of various Argentine animated characters. Mafalda, Hijitus, until it was Gaturro's turn. Over time, the statue was vandalized in countless ways. While some saw this as a symbol of rejection toward the author, others found in the defaced statue an object that could be appreciated on purely aesthetic grounds -- that is, for its intrinsic value as an object. Others simply found it funny.

At some point (and I'm not entirely clear on this, so feel free to write in the comments and I can correct it) someone drew a dick on the Gaturro statue, giving rise to the Pijurro meme (pija [Argentine slang for dick] + Gaturro), or perhaps it was the other way around -- someone on the internet drew the cat with a dick on its forehead and then someone brought it into reality. It hardly matters because in this case the order of factors doesn't change the outcome. The moment Pijurro and the statue become one, it no longer matters which came first.

Thus, the Pijurro meme is born, satisfying the conditions required by our criteria to be considered as such. We can see that Pijurro is not just a meme but a whole set: from illustrations of the character to photos with the statue. All are created with awareness of the existence of other versions of the meme, and they circulate primarily through the internet. 

The most fascinating part of all happened in recent weeks when Nik launched a new crusade to replace the statue. Nik chose to do so from a narrative stance in which he presents himself as a victim. He argues that his creation is a victim of Kirchnerist trolls (Nik is one of the pillars of anti-Kirchnerist humor) who invented a campaign against him in order to "silence" him.

The topic blew up on social media, as Nik managed to get a new statue placed in the same spot. The subject invaded every social network and, as we can see from Google Trends -- Google's trend analysis tool -- Pijurro became a popular topic in internet searches in Argentina. 

Pijurro is a meme that contributes to a kind of "internet folklore." When two people laugh at a Pijurro meme, they affirm that they share a common code. That common code can be the shared belief that Nik is a plagiarist or simply being drawn to the humor of the meme. Any interpretation of the meme's meaning ends up being irrelevant because what matters in meme culture is knowing whether the other person shares the code, and nothing more. Pijurro functions as a password to detect whether our counterpart is "competent" in the language of the internet.

The most striking thing is that in this new crusade, Nik mentions Pijurro. Then something different happens. Now we have concrete evidence that Nik knows about Pijurro. Thus, in my understanding, we enter a new phase of the meme: the feedback loop.

Now Pijurro exists as an idea in Nik's mind, completing the full circle: Pijurro, an ironic derivation of Gaturro, now infects the mind of Nik himself and may potentially affect the direction in which Nik continues to develop his character. At least now we know that in the brain of Gaturro's creator, Pijurro also exists simultaneously. And I think that's beautiful. As some users said, "Pijurro is canon." 

And then the cycle begins again. Pijurro manifests in the act of vandalizing the Gaturro statue, which catches the attention of the creator, who launches a campaign to install a new statue -- and destroying the new Gaturro statue becomes a meme. That is, turning Gaturro back into Pijurro. And it seems this cycle could continue endlessly. 

What this feedback loop reveals is the tension between the creation of Gaturro and the original meaning of the work versus the memetic reinterpretation by a group of people online: Pijurro, the cat with a dick for a head.

As a matter of fact, and setting aside all the differences (absolutely all of them), there are already cases of characters that were created with one purpose and became internet icons. Like "Pepe the Frog." In a documentary I've recommended several times, "Feels Good Man," we can see the entire journey of Matt's creation, how it's affected by the fact that it became an internet icon used for political purposes, and ultimately became a meme. 

While I believe we're still very far from something like that happening, it's still beautiful to watch in real time how a dispute over meaning unfolds around a comic strip character.

Update: July 2023

Nik's latest attempt to install a clean statue with "anti-vandalism technology" in the same spot where its predecessor stood triggered a new wave of vandalism that destroyed the statue completely. Countless memes depict each stage of the figure's destruction, including videos of its removal by the GCBA, and one user even went to the site to leave a tombstone. 

Gaturro is trapped in a positive feedback loop that may have no turning back. Or maybe it does. The case reminds me of the event known as "The Triggering of Shia Labeouf," in which the well-known actor attempted to create an anti-Trump "performance" and was systematically trolled by users of the 4chan forum. I recommend watching it to understand how the struggle over meaning works once a work is appropriated by the public.

As an author, Nik faces two possibilities. The first is to stop feeding the meme and refrain from replacing the statue (or perhaps he could install a holographic representation of Gaturro, which would be immune to graffiti). The other possibility is to surrender to the meme and embrace the destruction of Gaturro as part of the work's natural evolution, stripping away the sense of dispute it currently represents. If Nik gives his blessing to the vandalism, perhaps it would lose its purpose.

In any case, the worst thing he can do is to keep maintaining his current stance, in which he tries to control the meaning of the work while installing the statue and expecting neutrality from a public that has incorporated him into the national memetic stew as one of its most significant figures.