The meme uses a still image of Kermit the Frog holding a cup of Lipton iced tea, captured from a 2014 promotional campaign13. The format follows a simple formula: a judgmental observation about someone's behavior, capped with "but that's none of my business" as Kermit takes a sip4. The setup typically calls out hypocrisy, bad decisions, or social faux pas, while the closing line creates an ironic distance between the poster and the shade they're throwing1.

The "tea" in the image carries a double meaning. Beyond the literal Lipton cup, "tea" is slang for gossip in online culture, rooted in drag community language and Southern tea party traditions3. Kermit sipping his tea became the perfect visual shorthand for someone who's observing drama without wanting to get directly involved4. Or, more accurately, someone who's absolutely getting involved but pretending they aren't.

The meme crossed over into mainstream culture in multiple ways. LeBron James wearing the Kermit hat to one of the biggest moments in NBA history gave it a celebrity endorsement that most memes never receive6. The resulting media coverage brought the format to audiences who had never scrolled through Instagram meme pages7.

Good Morning America's #TeaLizard blunder in June 2016 became its own news cycle, with coverage from Mashable, The Verge, Mediaite, and AOL921011. The incident highlighted the gap between how internet-native communities and traditional media understood meme culture. An ABC insider told Mediaite the whole thing was "just basic Internet stuff," a characterization that only deepened the comedy10.

The format also shaped how gossip and shade-throwing work online. Bustle noted that the meme "reveals more about the people who use it than about the people the users are commenting on," functioning as a socially acceptable way to voice judgments that might otherwise seem rude12. Urban Dictionary captured the dual nature, defining it both as a way to call someone out and as a method of signaling that you know something you're choosing not to discuss14.

The meme's first life was powered by Black Twitter and Instagram, where users turned Kermit into what Uproxx described as "a shaming, passive aggressive mouthpiece for meme creators who want to call out individuals living foul"1. The targets ranged widely: infidelity, financial hypocrisy, workplace double standards, and social media performativity all got the Kermit treatment1. The format worked because the punchline gave users cover. You could say something pointed, even mean, and the "but that's none of my business" tag functioned like a rhetorical shrug12.

Over time, the format expanded beyond Kermit himself. The catchphrase started appearing on social media paired with images of other characters and real people drinking various beverages12. As Bustle noted, the meme "leveled up" by detaching from the original image while keeping the core mechanic intact12.

Then came the revival. On June 19, 2016, LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers won the NBA Finals against the Golden State Warriors6. James wore a hat embroidered with the Kermit sipping tea image to his post-game press conference, sending a clear message to his doubters without saying a word6. He later posted on Instagram wearing the hat alongside a lengthy caption listing every criticism he'd faced throughout his career, closing with "THATS NONE OF MY BUSINESS"7. The NY Daily News called it "a significant send-up to the haters"7.

Within hours, the meme was reborn. Over a thousand similar Kermit hats appeared on eBay2. Mainstream outlets from USA Today to GQ scrambled to explain the reference8. GQ described James as "the king of petty," noting the Kermit hat alongside his Ultimate Warrior t-shirt made for a devastating one-two troll combo8.

The revival's most memorable subplot came on June 21, when Good Morning America's Twitter account attempted to engage with the trend. GMA asked if the Crying LeBron photo deserved a spot alongside "meme greats" like "#tealizard, #CryingJordan and #smockin"9. The internet was baffled. They had called Kermit the Frog, an amphibian, a lizard. And "Smockin'" wasn't a recognizable meme to most people either9.

Twitter users roasted GMA mercilessly. Perez Hilton jokingly renamed other famous memes in GMA's style, and Mashable ran the headline "Some maniac at Good Morning America called Kermit the Frog 'Tea Lizard'"9. A Mediaite investigation later revealed the GMA social media team had simply found someone else using the term "tea lizard" in a Weird Twitter parody post months earlier and ran with it10. The parody account behind the original "tea lizard" joke seemed quietly amused that their throwaway line had caused a national incident10. GMA eventually apologized to Kermit in a follow-up tweet11.

The #TeaLizard moment was itself a meme about memes. It demonstrated how disconnected institutional media could be from internet culture, even when trying to participate. As The Verge observed, "Meme culture, built atop referential humor, is old and broad enough to reference itself"2.

The meme's durability comes partly from the "tea" double meaning. The word's roots in gossip culture, adopted from drag community parlance where "T" meant "truth," made the act of sipping tea a natural metaphor for consuming drama3. This linguistic layer gave the meme more depth than a typical image macro, even if most users didn't know the etymology3.

By 2015, the meme had already inspired merchandise including t-shirts, mugs, and phone cases4. The irony of Kermit drinking from a Lipton cup while being used for maximum shade was not lost on anyone. The original Lipton campaign encouraged people to "be more tea," meaning more kind3. The internet took the image and made it mean the exact opposite.