Amid celebrations for Hello Kitty's 50th anniversary, which officially occurs November 1st, fans of the popular cartoon character created by Yuko Shimizu are shocked to learn that she is not as feline as she appears.

During an appearance on the Today Show on July 18th, the director of retail business development at Sanrio, Jill Cook, makes a shocking confession.

Is Hello Kitty a cat?

So Hello Kitty is not a cat.

She's actually a little girl, born and raised in the suburbs of London.

Naturally, the revelation, while not entirely known, has made some fans a bit confused.

After all, Hello Kitty appears to be a cat with a little red bow and for some reason, no mouth.

One fan reacts to the Today clip on TikTok saying, "So she has whiskers, ears, and is named Kitty, but is actually a human? What?"

While it may be news for some, this isn't the first time Hello Kitty's species has stirred controversy.

In fact, the character made headlines back in 2014, around its 40th anniversary, for the exact same reason.

During that time, anthropologist Christine R. Yano, who authored Pink Globalization,

Hello Kitty's trek across the Pacific was corrected very firmly by Sanrio on the distinction between cat and little girl amid prepping for a Hello Kitty exhibit at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art.

Yano telling the Los Angeles Times, she's a cartoon character.

She's a little girl.

She is a friend, but she is not a cat.

She's never depicted on all fours.

She walks and sits like a two-legged creature.

She does have a pet cat of her own, however, and it's called Charmy Kitty.

Meanwhile, other fans were just as surprised to hear where Hello Kitty lives.

Hello Kitty, whose first ever appearance was on a Japanese coin purse in 1974, was very intentionally made British, raised in the suburbs of London.

Hello Kitty emerged in the 1970s, when the Japanese and Japanese women were into Britain.

They loved the idea of Britain.

It represented the quintessential idealized childhood, almost like a white picket fence.

So the biography was created exactly for the tastes of that time.

But while fans continue to learn this very shocking fact about Hello Kitty, one aspect that won't surprise anyone is that she was created to be universally adored.

Her core message is friendship, kindness, and inclusivity.