Good morning folks, hope your day has been well. I hope you’re ready to embrace one of the biggest clusterfucks of this year, because boy is it a doozy. Welcome to the Cinnamon Toast Crunch shrimp saga, otherwise known as Shrimpgate. I’m going to explain every single bit of this wild story, so buckle in.
How did one man go from finding shrimp in his breakfast to being cancelled online? Where does Boy Meets World come into it? What else did he find in the bag of cereal that has everyone’s stomachs turning? Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered.
First, let’s start at the very beginning. The time was 4:32am, March 23 in sunny Los Angeles…
Chapter 1: Man Finds Shrimp In Cereal
Jensen Karp, an LA comedian, finds shrimp tails in his box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch.
That’s it, that’s the first step. Seems manageable, right?
Back when someone found a Nutri-Grain that looked like ET, the story ended with just that. It was a much simpler time, and there wasn’t any scandal, drama, memes or fuckery.
Alas, observe the shrimp tails. It’s wild, but this is only the first step. Also it must be noted that despite Karp’s status as a comedian, he claims that this entire story is not a joke.
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374051365417230336?s=20
And while we’re on the first stage, here’s the first response from the (probably) panicked Cinnamon Toast Crunch media team.
We’re sorry to see what you found! We would like to report this to our quality team and replace the box. Can you please send us a DM to collect more details? Thanks!
— Cinnamon Toast Crunch (@CTCSquares) March 22, 2021
Notice the line “replace the box”, as it is the very beginning of a back-and-forth tweet war that I like to call, a song of shrimp and sugar.
Chapter 2: A Song Of Shrimp And Sugar
Mr Karp comments that he definitely doesn’t want another fkn box as a replacement, just answers as to why there’s shrimp (???) in his cereal (?????).
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374069746946109440?s=20
Seth Rogen of all people chimes in.
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374072681595691012?s=20
The Cinnamon Toast Crunch (CTC) team says that they’ll look into the matter closely and get to the bottom of it.
We understand your concern. We promise you that our team will look into this and get to the bottom of it – but in the meantime, we want to do everything we can to make this right. We’ll need further details to research.
— Cinnamon Toast Crunch (@CTCSquares) March 22, 2021
Karp makes a joke about the whole situation, saying he has sent in a DM.
Cue forced laughter.
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374080604988305412?s=20
CTC then made the wild claim that the original image from Karp isn’t shrimp tails, but an accumulation of sugar. What?
Truly the CTC team could have said nothing, but alas.
The company assured Karp that there was no possibility of cross-contamination with shrimp.
After further investigation with our team that closely examined the image, it appears to be an accumulation of the cinnamon sugar that sometimes can occur when ingredients aren’t thoroughly blended. We assure you that there’s no possibility of cross contamination with shrimp.
— Cinnamon Toast Crunch (@CTCSquares) March 22, 2021
Karp claims the company is trying to gaslight him.
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374108037376483331?s=20
Now, friends, keep the word gaslight in mind. Really just let that word sink in, as we progress through to the next chapter of this tale.
Chapter 3: Karp Makes A Discovery, Much Like Half Of Us In The HSC English ‘Discovery’ Module
Aight, here we go. Things start to pick up the pace.
Karp is pissed that CTC tried to “gaslight” him.
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374109078826328066?s=20
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374113295922200578?s=20
He then agrees to send his box to the lab, but keeps one of the tails just in case he loses all of the evidence.
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374130107711819778?s=20
Karp inspects the cereal more before he sends it in, and look at what ungodly things he finds.
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374133946552754176?s=20
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374132475375493122?s=20
And now onto the next bag…
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374187045279518720?s=20
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374364960210309128?s=20
Chapter 4: In The Case Of All Things Online, Memes
Naturally, the internet was simply obsessed with this wild tail (get it, tail) and made one trillion memes joking about it all.
— bobbyhundreds (@bobbyhundreds) March 23, 2021
Ummmm @CTCSquares – why is there a DVD copy of 2015’s ‘Mortdecai’ in my cereal? (This is not a bit) pic.twitter.com/CkTFUPOjrS
— Lights, Camera, Barstool (@LightsCameraPod) March 23, 2021
Cinnamon Toast Crunch tempura shrimp. Custom spice blend, jalapeños, served with a coconut lime dipping sauce.
Part of a balanced breakfast. pic.twitter.com/YuzS35r6z6
— Chef Andy Lunique (@AndyLunique) March 24, 2021
Chapter 5: Topanga??
Danielle Fishel, who plays Topanga Lawrence in Boy Meets World (and Girl Meets World, if you know you know) just happens to be the wife of Jensen Karp, which just adds an extra bit of fuckery to this story.
A man named Karp married to a woman named Fishel found shrimp tails in a box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch. The cereal was purchased from the Costco on Topanga Canyon Blvd, and his wife played Topanga in Boy Meets World. Meanwhile, Karp used to be a guest on Pistol Shrimp Podcast.
— Batmanda (@HarveyBar22) March 24, 2021
— Amy (@lolennui) March 24, 2021
https://twitter.com/JensenKarp/status/1374535352136863744?s=20
THE DUDE THAT FOUND THE CINNAMON TOAST SHRIMP IS MARRIED TO TOPANGA?????????
— Tony X (@soIoucity) March 24, 2021
Purely unexpected material.
Now, while Karp waits for test results for the black findings at the bottom of his cereal and the shrimp tails, some nasty allegations have come forth as of March 25.
Chapter 6: In The Case Of All Things Online, Cancellation
Much like Bean Dad, it seems there may be more to Shrimpgate man than meets the eye.
One of Karp’s exes, Melissa Stetten, has come forward claiming that he was a “manipulative gaslighting narcissistic ex-boyfriend”, who has put a lot of girls in therapy due to “his terror.”
The word gaslighting returns to bite Karp.
Getting lots of texts from girls still in therapy over his terror. At least we have this fun little club!
— Melissa Stetten (@MelissaStetten) March 24, 2021
He told A LOT of people I was a compulsive liar because he didn’t want them to believe all the shit I said about him
— Melissa Stetten (@MelissaStetten) March 24, 2021
After Stetten’s tweet, other people came forward to back up her claims of Karp’s abuse.
Hahaha my quickly deleted subtweet yesterday said “oh no I can’t follow the latest viral saga cause I was blocked in 2014 b/c I was not gracious enough after a surprise threesome! But not before I was told to ‘be careful or I would never work in this town again’” https://t.co/QYVpsRdP3j
— Stephanie Mickus (@smickable) March 24, 2021
https://twitter.com/roryuphold/status/1374770444016885761?s=20
I ended up in the hospital. Took me a year to recover mentally and I still struggle.
— roryuphold (@roryuphold) March 24, 2021
All I’m insinuating is that you do not need to give him your time or brain space.
— Brandon Bird (@Brandon_Bird) March 24, 2021
Next thing you know shrimp man will claim that he found the podcast idea and name he stole from us in a bag of Cheerios
— John Cullen (@cullenthecomic) March 24, 2021
Chapter 7: We Wait
Currently, Karp has not addressed the claims of abuse or negative treatment made against him online.
There is still no confirmation as to whether or not the contents of the bag were due to tampering, and the alleged tests that are currently being made on the black substances in the bag have not yet yielded any results.
We’ll update this yarn as we learn more.
