Federal Court Blocks UCLA-Berkeley Meme Group Merger

The two meme groups are legally forbidden from combining their assets.
The two meme groups are legally forbidden from combining their assets.

WESTWOOD—A federal judge blocked a proposed merger of University of California Facebook meme groups “UCLA Memes For Sick AF Tweens” and “UC Berkeley Memes For Edgy Teens” in a ruling issued this past Friday.

Citing the Sherman Antitrust Act, Judge John Bell of the US District Court of Southern California ruled that a merger of the two groups, with a potential share of more than 116,000 Facebook users, would constitute a meme monopoly.

“Just as the rise of big business in the late 19th century demanded new legislation to prevent one corporation from dominating the market, the rapidly-expanding meme industry requires similar restraints,” said Bell, who was able to rule on the matter only after he had received a 4-hour presentation explaining what memes were. “We cannot allow the two largest, most renowned UCs to control such a large share of the market. This would make it virtually impossible for smaller, lesser meme groups, such as ‘USC Memes For Spoiled Preteens’ and ‘Harvard Memes For Elitist 1% Teens’ to expand and become viable competitors, thus leaving the public with fewer meme options. If that were to happen, we would surely see the quality of memes suffer at the expense of consumers.”

University of California, Berkeley Professor of Public Policy Robert Reich applauded the ruling.

“While I have enjoyed observing the entrepreneurism of our students, it is too often that the little guys get cut out,” wrote Reich in a Facebook post in the “UC Berkeley Memes For Edgy Teens Group,” which received thousands of “angery [sic] reacts” before being removed from the group by administrators for not being an actual meme. “We cannot allow the top 1% of memelords to control this content. Memes, like any economy, flourish when they are in the hands of the people rather than the big guys.”

Meme group stakeholder and former pharmaceutical CEO Martin Shkreli expressed outrage over Judge Bell’s decision. “Fuck him,” said Shkreli, stroking his pet cat during a YouTube livestream from his Manhattan apartment. “Everyone comes after you the moment you become successful. He’s just as misguided as the judge that indicted me for hiking the Daraprim price. Monopolies actually benefit consumers when they’re controlled by the right people!”

The administrators of the two meme groups disregarded Judge Bell’s ruling and went ahead with the online merger, dismissing him as a “normie.”

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