A female pygmy hippopotamus named “Moo Deng,” which means “springy pork,” lies on the ground at Khao Kheow Open Zoo. (Photo by Chaiwat Subprasom/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)
SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images
An unexpected celebrity has emerged from TikTok’s algorithmic slot machine: Moo Deng, a two-month-old pygmy hippo, has garnered millions of views on TikTok and her sweet images have inspired a dedicated online fan base.
Moo Deng, whose name means “springy pork,” lives at the Khao Kheow Open Zoo in Thailand and has become something of an internet phenomenon.
Images of Moo Deng being splashed with water and appearing to squeal while being lifted into the air by a zookeeper quickly went viral, attracting likes, shares and comments from enthusiastic social media users.
The zoo’s social media accounts have been boosted by the hippo’s rise to fame; he has 50,000 followers on X (Twitter) and over 400,000 on Facebook.
Although Moo Deng is not the first cute animal to enjoy admiration on the Internet, the pygmy hippo has become amazingly famous and has a large number of Fan artMemes and merchandise – the zoo claims that visitor numbers on the weekend doubled since Moo Deng went viral.
Even cosmetics chain Sephora has jumped on the Moo Deng bandwagon, releasing an ad advising customers to “apply blush like a baby hippo.”
How did the pygmy hippo Moo Deng go viral?
Moo Deng owes her fame to a TikTok account with currently over 2.5 million followers, which regularly posts videos of hippos and other animals at the Khao Kheow Open Zoo.
Moo Deng is considered an unusually playful hippo, but the secret of her popularity is simple: she is really cute and looks more like a Pokémon than a real living being.
Moo Deng’s small, shiny body adorned with baby rolls and her large, expressive face make her a perfect subject for artists who want to draw an adorable animal.
There may be another factor behind Moo Deng’s rise to fame: her content is intended to be a kind of “timeline cleaner”, eliminating much of the toxic substances from social media timelines.
Working with Moo Deng often results in an algorithm reboot and eliminates some of the chronic backlash, outrage and controversy that characterize the current online landscape.
There is a lot of darkness in the world right now and retreating with cute animal pictures offers a calming balm, a much-needed dopamine rush.
However, internet fame also has its downsides: Singer Chappell Roan has spoken out against the entitlement of obsessive fans who constantly cross boundaries and intrude into her private life, inspiring other celebrities to do the same.
Unfortunately, Moo Deng has also experienced the dangers of an obsessive fan base: some visitors reportedly reacted violently, even throwing food at the baby hippo to get its attention. One video shows a visitor pouring water over the sleeping Moo Deng, sparking a fierce reaction on social media.
Narongwit Chodchoi, director of the Khao Kheow Open Zoo, urged visitors to behave and assured concerned fans that the zoo had installed surveillance cameras around Moo Deng’s enclosure.
Pygmy hippos are an endangered species (fewer than 3,000 remain in the wild) and conservationists hope Moo Deng’s viral moment will inspire the public to learn more about pygmy hippos.
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