TikTok has fallen headfirst into a surprisingly emotional obsession with the tripod fish, a deep-sea species whose strange life cycle reads like pure cosmic suffering.

Videos joking and crying about the creature’s hardships have gone viral, turning its long, motionless existence on the ocean floor into an internet grief cycle. While the melodrama is exaggerated, the fascination is real.

There’s just something so tragic about a fish that has to stand on its feet all day.

The heart-rending tale of the tripod fish

In recent weeks, TikTok has been joking and/or weeping over the fate of the Bathypterois grallator, or the tripod fish. It got its name for its adult stage of life, during which it grows three long bones from its underside that it uses to balance on the ocean floor as it waits motionless day after day, hoping that a bit of food will drift by.

That’s only the beginning of the hardships this creature must endure. At the moment it hatches, it very likely already has a parasite problem. If it can survive that, it spends its first months of life attempting to beat the long odds that a predator won’t have it for lunch.

@fireball.tool.yt #tripodfish ♬ original sound – Fireball Tool

If it manages to reach adulthood, it sinks to the bottom of the ocean, where the water is coldest and the pressure the most intense. As it does, the tripod fish grows the three long “legs” that gave it its name. Once at the bottom, it spends most of its remaining years standing still in one spot.

Imagine being born a fish only to have to spend most of your life standing on your feet like an underpaid cashier who never gets to clock out. These little guys can still swim, but doing so is risky, burning precious calories collected from the bare scraps of food that are so scarce in the deep sea.

It’s no wonder TikTokers are getting emotional.

“Oh, my little soldier boy”

Over the past week, TikTokers have flooded the platform with videos either joking or crying about the tripod fish. Many of these posts are set to sad songs like “Dream Sweet in Sea Major” by Miracle Musical and “Soldier Boy” by The Shirelles. And, of course, Sarah McLachlan.

@cozysweatshirtguy Tripod fish have the saddest life of any animal out there. 5-10 years of standing motionless on the bottom of the sea until they have to move to capture food which can take days or even weeks. They have 3 long bones which hold them up on the bottom of the sea floor. #creepy #creepyvibes #deepsea #fyp #CapCut ♬ original sound – ɅstrooUniverse

@ccatlasybba I love the tripod fish, it's one of my fav animals, my sweet baby ☹️#CapCut #fyp #abcxyz #tripodfish #fish ♬ original sound – ✧༺🔪♡{ brainrot }♡🔪༻✧

Popular sketch TikToker @youngbalerion gained 7.8 million views with a video acting out a vengeful god sentencing a horrified sinner to a life reincarnated as a tripod fish.

Meanwhile, @mamammema gathered five million views with a tearful post on the topic.

“I’m really upset when people say that God is a woman,” she said, “because if God was a woman, that f*cking tripod fish wouldn’t exist.”

@mamammema I want to keep one as a pet to try and give it a good life for once in its horrible history or maybe I’m just having a mental breakdown #tripodfish ♬ original sound – LENiNGELS

Others, however, moved to debunk the idea that the tripod fish suffers its whole life. In reality, deep-sea fish are adapted to their environment and would probably cry over the idea of having to breathe air and run around all day just to eat.

Dry those tears, children. The fish is fine.

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The post The tripod fish is TikTok’s latest tragic-little-guy fixation because it’s entire existence sounds like a punishment appeared first on The Daily Dot.

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