2013-08-18
Explanation
In this comic, someone has built a cat translator so they can finally understand what their cat Scruffles is saying. When the cat says "Mow" (a meow), the couple looks at the translation screen expectantly, and one of them says "Awwww..." suggesting the translation seems cute. The other person remarks "He thinks he's people!" -- a common humorous phrase used when pets exhibit human-like behavior.
However, the actual translation displayed on the screen reveals something far more sinister: "Exterminate all non-orange cats. They are the lesser races." The cat is not having adorable human-like thoughts at all -- it is expressing genocidal, supremacist ideology, specifically believing that orange cats are the master race and all other cats should be eliminated. The owners are oblivious to the horrifying content of the translation, focusing instead on how cute it is that the cat seems to be "thinking."
The joke plays on the common pet-owner fantasy that our animals are having sweet, loving thoughts about us, when in reality animals might have much darker or more primal instincts. The votey panel doubles down with a yellow sticky note reading "KILL THEM ALL!" with the orange cat peeking in from below, confirming that the cat's violent supremacist thoughts are entirely sincere. The comic is also a darkly humorous nod to how humans project innocent motivations onto animals while ignoring that cats are, in fact, highly effective predators.