You typed it into the search bar and felt a little ridiculous doing it: is buttcheek one word? One word, two words, a hyphen somewhere in the middle? And somewhere in the back of your head, you already suspected the question was setting you up.
Good instinct. It's a real spelling question and a very old joke at the same time. Let's settle both.
Is "Buttcheek" One Word or Two?
"Butt cheek" is usually two words. Most dictionaries and style guides write it as "butt cheek," occasionally hyphenated as "butt-cheek." Closed up as "buttcheek" it's informal but everywhere online, and the formal single word for the whole region is "buttock." So: two words, technically — which is the boring half of why the shirt asks "or should I spread them apart?"
The anatomy term most people reach for is "butt cheek," two words — the casual cousin of "buttock," which is the formal single word. You'll occasionally see "butt-cheek" hyphenated, and you'll constantly see "buttcheek" jammed together online, because the internet spaces and hyphenates nothing. None of those are exactly wrong. "Butt cheek" is just the one a dictionary will back you up on.
Where the "Spread Them Apart" Joke Came From
The shirt isn't really asking about spelling. The full line — "Is buttcheeks one word, or should I spread them apart?" — has been circulating through dad-joke accounts on X, Facebook, and every group chat since at least 2019. The mechanic is clean: "spread them apart" is the legitimate answer to a grammar question and an entirely different instruction wearing the same straight face. You don't explain a joke like that. You print it on a shirt.
The Shirt
Our version hands the question to a grumpy little retro peach — arms crossed, deeply unimpressed, rendered in the kind of 1930s rubber-hose mascot style that makes a butt joke look weirdly wholesome. "Is Buttcheeks One Word" up top, "or should I spread them apart?" underneath, on a Comfort Colors 1717 heavyweight that's garment-dyed and soft from day one.
More Cheeks in the Lineup
The peach has company. If you're committing to the bit, commit all the way.
Same energy runs through a couple of our other explainers — see what "your hole is my goal" means and the whole Boyardeez Nuts deez-nuts canon.
