Karen

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I would be pretty unhappy if my first name was used as a slur. But like with how autistic is used as a slur there is note much one can do about it but hope it is a fad that blows over.

Why do they have to use a first name when "stuck up b***h" has worked well for decades to describe the same type of person. I guess "stuck up b***h" is hate speech against female dogs, and we can't have that, can we? And besides "Karen" is just one word to type instead of three.

I think you're confused as to who's the SJW's here. The SJW's are currently busy raging against the Karen thing for supposedly being misogynistic.

And also, you're seriously hollowing out the idea of "hate terms" by trying to use it in this context. Karen is not the N-word.

This would not be the first time that a name has been associated with a behavior. Referring to someone as a "Benedict Arnold", or saying that someone got "Bork'd".

The whole point of a "Karen" isn't that they simply complain. Nor does it have anything to do with anyone getting fired. A "Karen" does not have to be blonde, white, female, or middle class. Anyone can be a "Karen". Technically, a male "Karen" is a "Kyle". The reason most "Karen"s are portrayed as white middle class women is cos white middle class women are more likely to have that sort of entitled behavior in a publicly visible way.

The point of a "Karen" is that the reaction is disproportionate to the offense, or the unmet expectation is absurdly unreasonable. You forget to bring a drink during a busy rush, but bring it a few minutes later, so they spend an hour telling you how stupid you are, don't tip, and tell everyone how rude you are. THAT is "Karen" behavior. You won't honor a clearly expired coupon of some meager amount, because the register recognized it as an expired coupon and won't enter it, but they won't leave or move or let you help anyone else until they talk to a manager, get told the same thing, demand to talk to their boss, make a big scene and threaten to never shop there again, and then they come back a week later and do it all over again. THAT is "Karen" behavior.

Someone who complains about a mistake is not a "Karen". Someone who demands a bunch of free stuff and goes off on a tirade tantrum for an hour over a minor honest mistake, is likely a "Karen". Someone who thinks they can get their way by raising hell and disrupting everything, is likely a "Karen". Someone who expects the entire process to come to a complete stop until they get what they want, is likely a "Karen".

There's a video of a woman screaming at burger king employees in the parking lot, to give her a refund right then and there, because they can't give her her food, because literally the entire building is engulfed in flames. The whole building is on fire, and she's screaming at them to give her a refund. THAT is a "Karen".

And it's not the fact that they "get people fired". It's that they are a royal pain in the ass and don't go away. They stay in the way and make it hard to do actual business. If you work in a corporately owned environment, you generally can't tell them not to come back unless they do something nearly criminal. They just call corporate, corporate gets all limp-wristed and apologetic, and corporate tells you to let them come back.

A "Karen" not only thinks the customer is always right, but also thinks they are the most important customer.

Even a jerk doesn't like to have it pointed out that they are a jerk, and will take it as an attack.

Excellent breakdown.

I've never heard of this before.

Where do you guys hear this? Is it in the media or do you hear it from real people?

I've never heard of this use of Karen, the name.

The only other Karen I know is an ethnic of people in Thailand called "Karen" as in "The Karen have fled the country due to famine and war. I believe they lived up in the mountains until they were forced out by one or another coup.

In wikipedia it says the Karen are from Burma. So I may be wrong about where they originally were located.

So, Karen is the name of an ethnic group.

Karen (slang)

Column: Is the ‘Karen’ meme sexist? Maybe, but it’s also apt

Karen: The Origins of a Meme

Spot on. A lot of people these days spend so much time on the internet, they seem to lose all sense of proportion and contact with reality and lose credibility regarding valid issues due to their own drama-queening and gross exaggerations.


I'm not necessarily challenging the concept/stereotype, but hijacking a perfectly innocent name like this is a sh***y thing to do - and ironically while claiming the high moral ground

I don't have a problem with the term itself (though I understand if some women who're actually called Karen do), but I have a problem with how it's sometimes used. "Karen" is often used as an insult (in the internet) to women who complain, even when there's a perfectly good reason to complain.

Is it a crime to make a customer service complaint,that's what people pay money for,is for service.

I have worked extensively in the restaurant business myself and I assure all that no one gets fired over frivolous complaints,if waitors/waitresses got fired for forgeting the ketchup or bringing a black Russian instead of a Martini then everyone would be fired because everyone has done it.

There are no mass firings of prolitarian workers because of so called Karen types and most frivolous complaints are rarely taken serious by management anyway,most managers were workers once themselves.

Sometimes a customer should complain but this usually results in a simple talking to,not any type of severe discipline.

Such slurs like "Karen" are not only mean but unnecessary as well.

I think Karen is racist, adds to divisiveness, and increases the overall animosity that is boiling over in American culture. An offshoot of “Ok Boomer”.
Entitled behavior is real but is not unique to any race or gender or age.
Some people think that women who have six babies with six fathers just to collect more welfare are their own brand of entitled because they never made any effort to work in school or life.
No life is as simple as one story or stereotype.
Workers are denied full time work, denied benefits, and denied adequate pay.
Service and manners have declined to being almost nonexistent.
Certainly the more one pays a worker the more one can expect from that worker but casting the blame and hate on the customer is misplaced, useless, and only increases everyone’s bad feelings.
Place the blame on the ones making historic profits and those actions may reap real rewards.

I hadn't even heard of this before this thread, but I don't see the problem. Some names have such associations, that's just how it is, same as certain other slang terms people have started reacting to over the last decade.

In Norwegian we have 2 names with slang meanings, Johan and Harry. "Å være litt Johan/Johann" means to be a bit dumb, wild or out of touch.

Å være harry means to be in bad taste, slightly vulgar, outdated.

Doris is supposedly the female version of harry, but I've never heard anyone use it.

Her cousins are Chad and Stacy.
I always felt sorry for any man named Dick.

You're still not getting it. It's not about the complaint, it's about the attitude and the inflated sense of self-importance to the point where other people are insignificant.

Storytime: I work in regional government, specifically in the bureaucracy pertaining to healthcare clinics. One day a co-worker who's in customer service gets a call. A woman feels she has been terribly wronged, and proceeds to spew so much bile over my co-worker for the next hour, calling her lazy and stupid and incompetent, to the point that she's in tears by the end. They didn't manage to resolve the issue. The next day she calls another of my co-workers. Same story. After the third time she's called in and repeated the procedure our boss said to connect her to her should she call in again. I don't think anything came of it, but here's the twist. What was her complaint? She had paid for a doctors visit in cash, and received a hand-written reciept. She demanded that she be given a machine-printed one.

THAT is a Karen.

Here in the States, every Tom, Dick, and Harry is an easy Mark for a Mary Sue or a Polly-Anna. Even a Bubba might fancy a Shiela or two.

...Or Willie... or John...etc.

There's a doctor in my city. Asian guy. Name of "Dr. Wang". He's a Urologist. I am not making this up.