Nick Viall’s Girlfriend Plagiarized His Birthday IG And I'm LOLing

Instagram birthday captions can be tricky, and it’s totally normal to get stuck on what to say. But as all of your teachers probably reminded you during syllabus week, plagiarism is never the answer. Unfortunately, Natalie Joy, Nick Viall’s girlfriend, did not get that message — and the result is seriously cringe. Joy plagiarized Viall’s birthday Instagram, taking the caption pretty much word for word from someone else, vlogger Claudia Sulewski, typo (“fariytale”) and all. (Elite Daily reached out to Joy’s rep for comment on the post and did not hear back in time for publication.)

To celebrate Viall’s birthday on IG on Sept. 28, Joy posted a carousel of photos of the two of them together. And her caption seemed sweet and poetic, the goal of most birthday IG captions. She wrote (or copied and pasted):

this man!!!! you are one of the best ones and anyone who’s met you knows it too. I am so lucky to not only share this life with you but to love you, and to be loved by you. you flipped my whole world upside down and given every dream and goal a new meaning and purpose. your sense of humor, honesty, generosity, talent, creativity, drive, heart and passion just blows my mind. cherishing your existence forever!! you tear every single fariytale to shreds. happy birthday baby i love you like nothing else!!

Cute, right? But it was a stark contrast from the other captions on her feed that were more short and sweet. Still, Viall didn’t seem to notice anything amiss. On a later post, he wrote to Joy, “I’ve never had someone put so much consideration and effort into my birthday... Thank you for making today so memorable. Love you.” (Eek!)

Now, I have no doubt that Joy did put “consideration and effort” into celebrating her beau’s birthday. For the special day, they took a trip to New York City, recorded a podcast episode together (with other Bachelor Nation stars), and had a surprise double date night on the water.

Still, Joy’s adorable birthday caption did not come from the heart as much as it came from someone else. The caption is a near-exact copy of two other birthday captions — both from Sulewski for her boyfriend Finneas (aka Billie Eilish’s brother). Twitter was ready with a side-by-side comparison of the posts, and the plagiarism is very obvious.

In short, Joy’s caption was definitely not the most original love letter in the world of Instagram (or otherwise). And people took notice — including Sulewski and Finneas. Finneas retweeted it first, writing, “HAHAHAHAHA LMAOO,” and tagging Sulewski. Minutes later, the vlogger chimed in by retweeting it and quoting the viral TikTok sound, “‘nobody’s gonna know.. they’re gonna know.’” So, yeah, Joy was definitely caught.

Commenting on the IG post, fans also pointed out the plagiarism. One commented, “do you have a discount code that we can use for unpublished birthday captions from claudia? Her public ones have been used already.” Another wrote, “This caption seems familiar, have I read it somewhere before?” A third added, “Happy birthday @finneas.” Oof.

Fingers crossed Joy is able to come up with an explanation for this — and that she uses her own words this time (unless, of course, Sulewski is taking commissions now).