Kent residents have hit out at a meme mocking the county.

Popular Twitter page ‘No Context Brits’ shared a picture on Wednesday saying “stop complaining about your life, there are literally people living in Kent”.

The profile, which has more than 1.7million followers, garnered around 960,000 views on the tweet, gathering just shy of 11,000 likes and more than 600 retweets.

A number of people saw the funny side – with one Twitter user begging others to “send help ASAP” and another adding “we’re just over the border if anyone needs to escape for a few days”.

However, a number of other profiles took umbridge with the post – which is set on the backdrop of Sittingbourne High Street – with a debate being sparked among KentOnline readers.

A number of people sprung to the defence of the county, with Karina Barker commenting: “I used to moan about Margate. Then I had to go to Hastings for work, never complained about Margate since.

“Then last year, we went to Skegness and thanked our lucky stars we live in Kent.”

Sharon Davies asked: “What exactly is wrong with living in Kent?

“We have the most beautiful countryside. Wonderful places of history.

“Rather live in Kent than a concrete jungle!”

“Until you’ve lived elsewhere you don’t know how good you’ve got it in Kent!” added Sharon Hemmings.

However, some residents argued that – jokes aside – the post hit the mark.

Becky Helen said: “Possibly because it's so expensive and it does have rough areas...just facts. But we also have some lovely areas and locations to enjoy.”

Janet Matthews hit out at the amount of new housing.

“The great house building estate now we've got a garden town foisted on us 8,500 houses etc, swathes of fields and farmland gone!” she added.

“it’s a great county but the developers are doing their level best to screw it up,” added Terry Canning.

Ian Brender said: “Some small parts of Kent are lovely but not all. The biggest let down to the county is the state of the roads and verges which are litter strewn and filthy.

“This is worst in north Kent where there is no evidence of maintenance whatsoever. Every layby is either fly tipped or destroyed by lorries parking on the grass verges and ruining them.

“Almost any other county you visit has a degree of pride in its appearance whilst Kent is an unkempt rat run for lorries accessing the rest of the UK.”