LONDON, UK \u2014 Metropolitan Police officials were reportedly facing a difficult decision Sunday after being forced to choose between stopping a terrorist attack against a US air base and arresting an elderly grandmother who had shared a Facebook cat meme deemed potentially offensive.<\/p>\n
According to internal reports, counter-terrorism officers initially rushed to respond to reports of a suspected terrorist plot before receiving an alert about a 75-year-old woman in Kent who had allegedly posted a meme containing \u201cpotentially inflammatory content\u201d on Facebook.<\/p>\n
“This is an extremely challenging situation,” said one Metropolitan Police official. “On the one hand, we have a potentially serious terrorist threat. On the other, Brenda from Kent has shared a picture of a cat wearing a Union Jack and captioned it ‘You can\u2019t say anything anymore,’ which could potentially cause someone on the internet to feel a fleeting sense of anxiety. The threat to public safety from that meme was simply unprecedented.”<\/p>\n
The specialized police unit pointed out that while the terror suspects were plotting mass destruction, they had not actually posted anything offensive on X (formerly Twitter) all week, whereas the elderly grandma was guilty of active, digital violence.<\/p>\n