VIDEO: Moth Drinking Bird’s Tears Is An Absolute Mood

Are you people ready for the purest representation of what the internet friendly kids these days would call “an absolute mood”? How could you be? I wasn’t ready! This was a terrible way to start my day! But the internet hath spoken and given unto me this gift: also known as this video of a moth stealing and drinking the tears from a sleeping bird.

Alright Neil Gaiman’s writing reality now, I guess. This horrifying video has a very reasonable scientific explanation, as expressed in ScienceMag.org which originally posted the damn horrifying thing.

They tell us the video was originally taken in November, 2017, by ecologist Leandro Moraes of the National Institute of Amazonian Research, and he spotted this absolutely insane sight in Manaus Brazil. The bird is a black-chinned antbird, and the moth drinking its tears is the erebid moth. Apparently, this is a common practice between the two species, as the moth gets sodium and proteins from the tears of this bird, using its lengthened proboscis (nose thing) to suck the tears out, and apparently insects do this all the damn time.

Butterflies drink crocodile tears (so next time someone says crocodile tears, they don’t mean they can’t feel pity for you, they mean that your tear extractions are an incredible source of sodium and protein), and bees like turtle tears (which sounds absolutely adorable).

Still, if I ever woke up to find an insect sucking the tears from my face, you could smash cut to me in one of those HP Lovecraft asylums in the 1800’s, screaming forever at the unholy terrors I’ve just witnessed.

Unsurprisingly, the people of the internet have had a reaction closer to that one rather than the sort of bemused one of the ScienceMag.org staff.

WHAT?! https://t.co/CwgQDk1jQf

— Shelly Konink (@KoninkShelly) September 24, 2018

nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope nope
https://t.co/SN10iosjl0

— Madeline Cashion ???? (@madforsharks) September 22, 2018

[Isn't that a Smiths song?] Watch a moth drink tears from a bird’s eye https://t.co/qtBsvxr7nQ pic.twitter.com/kA9OGe5hCL

— Steve Baragona (@stevebaragona) September 24, 2018

Not to be outdone, Haaretz then linked to video of a butterfly and a bee drinking the tears of one of the most dangerous animals in costa rica. Well.. here you go!