First Turkey hated Twitter, then it really hated YouTube. Now, in news that confirms that the Turkish government well and truly hates the internet, it has launched an attack on cats.
Energy Minister Taner Yildiz was able to turn a very tense press conference on allegations of election fraud into a total farce on Tuesday after he blamed an election-night power cut on the internet's favourite creature.
To what we can only presume were howls of laughter, he said: "I'm not joking, my friends, a cat entered a power distribution unit.
"It was the cause of the blackout and it's not the first time that it has happened. It is wrong to link it with the elections. It's wrong to cry foul play."
His comments, of course, sparked a frenzy on the interwebs, with social media users responding the only way the internet knows how – by posting and sharing various pictures of cats.
But is there more to it than meets the eye when it comes to internet 'cativism'?
Ethan Zuckerman, the director of the MIT Civic Media Centre, discussed the theory of a new type of web protest in a blog online.
As it is well known that most will take to the internet to click on a picture of a cute kitty, more so than a wordy protest, Zuckerman discussed how cats can be used to benefit important causes.
He wrote:
The Web was invented so physicists could share research papers. Web 2.0 was invented so we could share cute pictures of our cats. The tools of Web 2.0, while designed for mundane uses, can be extremely powerful in the hands of digital activists, especially those in environments where free speech is limited.
As Sky News sagely noted: "Lolcats mean more than just the lols."
