I highly recommend that everyone read “from practice to theory, or what is a white woman anyway?” by Catherine Mackinnon. It could have been written yesterday.
Something I notice about the “Karen” thing is it highly magnifies the racism of white women while ignoring the men. Racist white women are hyper individualised, massively outsized grotesque caricatures; whereas racist white men are invisible forces of nature; background radiation. I’ve seen countless memes and cartoons and op eds about Amy Cooper , the woman who threatened to call the police on a black man in Central Park. I don’t know anything about the old white man who bellowed “white power” in the video that Donald Trump shared. Why has no one scrabbled to find his name ? Who is he? Where are the outraged memes, the write ups ? We all know who Amy Cooper is, and she was greatly punished. We have no idea who this guy is , and to be honest we don’t care. He’s just some white supremacist , placeholder or token. He doesn’t need to be anyone in particular. But I do wonder ... why have we chosen as society to punish the female racist but not the male one ? Why does he become representative of the wider problem of the alt right as opposed to an individual person who has committed a wrong ?
One more thing to highlight why karen is now basically a synonym for “that bitch I don’t like”. Before I deleted my Reddit account, I saw a video from the trial of Larry Nasser. Larry Nasser raped and sexually assaulted hundreds of girls in the US gymnastics team. During the trial the father of one of the girls asked the judge to grant him “just five minutes” alone with Nasser. After she obviously refused, he launched himself at Nasser (in front of his hysterical child) and promptly got arrested and dragged out.
After he got arrested, a woman rushed over to the witnesses and quietly but firmly stated that she didn’t want to see another parent arrested. She explained how this could hurt the trial. She explained how it handed power over to Nasser. She explained how it undermined the justice system.
The Redditors (who are mostly males) loved the macho display from the father. He was a hero. In fact , the other fathers were losers for sitting there quietly instead of all rushing up to get Nasser. And there was real bile reserved for that “Karen” , the woman who had stood up to talk to the parents. “Shut the fuck up, Karen” , said the comments. “Who the fuck is that annoying Karen with her stupid speech? I wanted to punch her.”
That “Karen” was the chief prosecutor who had prepared the case and took it to trial. That “Karen” was the woman who ended up getting Nasser jailed for hundreds of years. That “Karen” was the women who fought and campaigned on behalf of the girls so every single one could deliver a full witness statement - unprecedented in such a large trial. That “Karen” got justice for these young women, and the father only managed to succeed to make an ass of himself and traumatise his daughters further. And I’m sorry, but when you call a woman like that a “Karen” ... well, if that’s what a Karen is I hope I’m a karen too.