The social media team for the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation made a quick PSA not to bring mountain lions inside, which begs the question how often do people bring mountain lions into their homes? But the reminder, which included a positively adorable of a puma rolling around in the snow, tempted people to adopt mountain lions.
"If I'm ever killed by a mountain lion, just know my last words were 'here kitty kitty' someone responded. Other pranksters joked that belly rubs were probably okay, triggering a slew of gifs from the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation that expressed frustration and disappointment. One mischievous replier even edited the photo to dangle yarn in front of the ambush predator— which TSA swiftly karate chopped out of the way.
Turns out mountain lions, which are capable of breaking your neck and mauling you to death, can look just as cute as their domesticated feline relatives.
The tweet got over 100,000 likes— about 10,000x more than the account's typical post. In response to the viral moment, the dogged civil servants who run social media for the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife and Conservation updated the Twitterverse on the "state of the union," which implied that they had made "the entire state of Oklahoma want to pet a mountain lion."
I enjoyed the debacle and learned a bit about the proper treatment of wild cats. In addition, I was reminded that even though both the government and social media can be disheartening in their own ways, government agency social media feeds can be delightful. Take, for example, the dad-joke heavy Instagram feed of TSA. I didn't know it was possible to pack so many puns into a caption!
