Texas college mug with accidental vulgar message goes viral

Someone at the University of North Texas made a big—and kinda hilarious—mistake.

It started off innocently enough: a coffee mug was emblazoned with the school logo. The mug sported the university’s initials “UNT.” Typical way to flaunt school spirit.

But the placement of the university's initials -- "UNT" right next to the letter C created by the mug's handle -- turned the logo into an unfortunate slur.

A photo of the mug was posted to Imgur with the caption “not sure the University of North Texas thought that through.”

The mug was available on sale for $10 on the Barnes & Noble website. While the retailer has retracted the original image and flipped it so the c-word is no longer visible, Bored Panda noticed the controversial merch and took a photo of the first cup before the image disappeared.

And the photo lit up social media.

By the way, if you feel like you've heard about this before, you're right -- some are pointing out this has come up in past years too.

Alex Samuels is a University of Texas-Austin student and Paste BN College correspondent.

This story originally appeared on the Paste BN College blog, a news source produced for college students by student journalists. The blog closed in September of 2017.