'The year of Karen' - Guardian article

[ArabellaScott]

More tedious pish on the 'Karen' phenomenon.

An article that directly equates women calling the police (however unjustifiably, all they did was call the police, hardly an illegal act) with a policeman murdering a man. Because of course the two are equivalent. In fact, I think the article's logic is that the woman who has called the police has actually directly caused the death of the man - it's almost as though the policeman disappears and is absolved, the blame shifted neatly from the (utterly fucking monstrous) actions of the policeman to the (perhaps racist, presumably highly-strung) actions of the woman. (Of course these were two completely unrelated incidents, but never miss a chance to use the correlation = causation fallacy when it helps your argument).

Quoting the last particularly nasty paras so you don't have to read the article:

'Complaints about Karen being sexist were noteworthy mostly for how neatly they re-enacted the Karen dynamic. Confronted with evidence of their own agency and complicity, some white women responded by reasserting their victimhood.

What I’ve found especially useful about Karen memes is the way they’ve given willing white women a tool with which to assess their own behavior and, if they want, improve it. My own mother, who is white, has on rare occasions demonstrated behavior that verged on the Karen-esque. This summer, for the first time, she acknowledged some of those Karen tendencies to me and stated her intention not to act like that any more – a conversation I’m not sure we would have had absent the meme.

Williams recalled similar conversations with white friends, and offered three simple rules to avoid being a Karen. One: recognize the privilege and history of being a white woman in this society. Two: avoid calling the police on people of color unless someone is in imminent danger of harm. And three: “Understand that it’s just not always about you, period. People are not out to get you for the most part, people are not trying to hurt you or harm your property or make you uncomfortable,” she said. “You’re not that special, Karen. You’re not that special.”

By people, presumably the writer means 'men', but it seems striking to me how men have been absolved of all responsibility here. The demon is clearly the writer's mother, and all women who dared to think they were 'special'.

This is pure, naked, misogyny. I would not want to be a woman or girl in the US at the moment.

Interesting points from DandyMandy, SueDeMinn and Buffster.

The middle class flagellation by Guardian columnists is laughable.

*' it’s apparent you are unaware of the root of the name in media as it started as a derogatory meaning by the Incel community to refer to women who their members found unacceptable or unwilling to have sex. People be aware of this root!'

Is that true?*

I don't think that is true. It's certainly part of incel culture to use first names as derogatory terms for types of people (see Stacy, Becky, Chad) and I'm sure incels will refer to "Karens" in the way it's being used in this article. However incels normally use "normie" to refer to someone "average looking" and "low-tier normie" to refer to someone below average. Then "incel" would be used to refer to someone so unattractive that no one would sleep with them. However one of the memes on the incel forums is "there's no such thing as a female incel" as they think all women would be able to find someone who would want to sleep with them if they tried hard enough.

Source: I spent a lot of time on incel forums for some research I was doing (!)

@carlaCox was it book research? I'd be interested in reading your work.

@carlaCox was it book research? I'd be interested in reading your work

It was for research I was doing about online communities for my job. Probably can't say too much more for fear of outing myself. That's why I first joined MN but I actually think MN is a great community and so stayed!

I thought the incel world was fascinating tbh with a whole mix of different characters ranging from men who just seemed very sad and insecure through to raging misogynists. Quite a few "incel" women tried to join as well but were given short shrift by the other members because of the "there's no such thing as a female incel" thing.

That does sound interesting. I find it interesting as think that incel culture has definitely become rather mainstream.
Or maybe always was.
Not sure.

@TheBuffster

And Tom Felton has been called a terf. It doesn't mean it's not a term deliberately used to apply to women who don't know their place. These are the 20s versions of back to the kitchen and make me a sandwich.

Why on earth? Is it because he's as far as l know the only one of the HP Crew to not gleefully denounce JKR?

Pretty much. I think he also got caught liking a Maya tweet by Twitter police. He removed it after but it's all the evidence needed.
Bet his father heard about it 😂.

That does sound interesting. I find it interesting as think that incel culture has definitely become rather mainstream.

I know this is off topic but one thing I think is not really talked about in conversations about incels is the role that online dating has to play in this. If you're a stereotypically (by current beauty standards) very unattractive bloke then chances are you will get zero hits on online dating. Zero. Many incels will post screenshots of their online dating experiments as evidence of this.

Of course women aren't to blame for this (despite what the incels may claim) but this is an uncomfortable truth. One term that is often used is "black pilled" which refers to the realisation that you are below the threshold of attractiveness for women and so will never have sex/a girlfriend/a wife etc. Some people on these forums are genuinely contemplating suicide as a response to being "black pilled" which is very disturbing.

I make no excuses for the kinds of horrible, misogynistic things said on incel forums but I do think it is fair to say that dating has become more superficial when it comes to looks and this does have negative consequences for many men and women.

The focus on this this Karen thing is that it detracts from real issues impacting police brutality and racism...and yes, it's easier to focus on middle class white women acting badly because they don't actually have the power to push back, unlike police and men in power. It's like the kids who have dominating or abusive parents decide instead to punch each other because neither have the power to stop their abuser.

Apart from the lifestyle section, the Last Good Article I read in the Guardian was a very funny review of The Great British Bake Off when they did a celebrity cake thing. Everything 'serious' is like an '80's sixth form sociology essay.

@ArabellaScott

Just realised I failed to include a link to the article in the original post.

For some reason am not that inclined to add one now ... but I just had a look at the writer's Twitter, one comment is:

' it’s apparent you are unaware of the root of the name in media as it started as a derogatory meaning by the Incel community to refer to women who their members found unacceptable or unwilling to have sex. People be aware of this root!'

Is that true?

I think it's more incel adjacent.

If you look at this link to urban dictionary the original meme was 'karen took the kids'.

www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Karen

It's more 'fathers for justice' than incel.

Gosh that's sad. Makes me glad I met DH before tinder took off. He was a bit of a lost soul but thankfully kind and adventurous so that shines through in real life. Sad to think things have continued on this superficial vein.
Had a few 'punching above your weight' nasty comments when we first started going out too, not a problem now highlights have grown out and baby weight up lol.
Mind you, despite this DH never been anything but respectful to women so couldn't see his sort going down the incel route. Still, loneliness is always sad.
Sorry everyone, massive sidetrack there.

I think there is a bad rabbit hole people can go down when things go badly for them or they fail at something, whereby in order to feel not quite so crap about it they congregate in groups and commiserate.

Trouble is the solution to any flaw or failure almost always entails self knowledge, and the tenacity to never give up. Whilst it might be therapeutic to surround oneself with those with similar experiences it invariably leads to a self-pitying co-dependant culture where no one faces up to the actions that may be enacted that may improve their lot.

Incel communities are textbook examples of this. If they spent less time around each other and sought out people who were successful where they feel they fail, they’d pick up what they’d need eventually.

I especially hate this blaming women rhetoric for all their woes, as it’s patently not true.

Very interesting, carla, though I think I'd have found that quite disturbing, too.

Also seems that there's a possible idea that online dating is the be-all and end-all, perhaps?

The whole Karen thing is enabled and spread by social media, of course.

Definitely spreading through social media and coming into online gaming for children and through YouTube gameplay "stars".

So children as young as 8 are hearing Karen, Chad and words like simping. First time I of heard Karen was early last year when DC's 10 year old friend said when playing together "On she's such a Karen" about another friend. They had got it from Roblox. The word is banned in this house.

DC talks about Chad and says Chad is someone who is good looking and gets the girls. "A hottie". They also talked about he's such a simp about a TV character whilst watching a show. We have had words.

Not getting at you KarensandChads but the attempts by some apologists to try to minimise how awful Karen is by citing the existence of Chad are really irritating.

There is no equivalence. Firstly Chad isn't an insult; secondly it's not widely used as a meme; thirdly maybe "Chad" is a normal, run of the mill, everyday name in the US but I've never come across one in the UK whereas in my office alone there are 4 Karens (running a selection of standard, run of the mill everyday UK female names through the staff directory produces 4 or 5 for each although oddly there are no Elizabeths- so that's how common a name it is)

I guess the closest male equivalent to Karen is gammon? (I.e. derogatory term aimed at older white men). It seemed to start off meaning only those with shouty, very right-wing opinions but eventually seemed to be thrown at any middle aged white man with a slightly round face.

Difference between Karen and gammon though is gammon means something new. Karen is just the 2010s bitch / cow / battleaxe / harpy. Same shit different decade.

I wasn't aware gammon was sex specific. It's not someone's name - I think that's what bothers me in part about this, as noted above it's a really, really common woman's name so it tars a vast number of women.

the writer’s poor mother! She deserves a medal.

Yes I do agree that using a name as an insult is particularly nasty and smacks of the kind of thing bullies do.

The other thing that's nasty about the whole Karen thing are the sniggering comments about the haircut.
It's another way to signpost this is about women of a certain age who are past being attractive. I know a lot of people with that short style and it does tend to be used by people who get to an age where they feel practicality trumps upkeep.
The whole thing just screams ageism.

@ArabellaScott

a Karen can be male/female/black/white/Asian

It's used to put women in their place. Maybe it is or was different in the US, but the way it's used here is nothing to do with systemic racism or even race; it's a term of abuse for women who complain. That's it.

I'm in the US and I can assure you with absolute certainty Karen is used with just as much misogynistic intent as anywhere else. The only difference is many people here will immediately jump to "racism tho" as an attempt to justify themselves and turn the tables on you for being "against anti-racist" terms. You see, they can't be wrong if you're even more so, and to be against Karen is to support racism! ... or something

Karen took the kids is heavily linked to the Reddit moderator whose ex-wife was called Karen. That was my first experience of the "Karen" meme - nasty bitter (white, incidentally) man complaining about his ex daring to have standards and leave him.

Incel communities are textbook examples of this. If they spent less time around each other and sought out people who were successful where they feel they fail, they’d pick up what they’d need eventually.

There used to be a ExIncel Reddit where men posted about their success in leaving online incel communities, getting into a healthier head space and making improvements in their lives. It was a really positive thing. Hopefully its still there but I haven't been back since Reddit decided that gender critical feminism was hate speech whilst rape porn was aok.

Thanks, Pickette. I think some of the problem is 'two nations divided by a single language', sometimes.

Yes, Molten, that seems to be right. So it's come out of a kind of MRA background. Unsurprising that it retains the original misogyny - I just am (still) shocked when the Guardian publishes this kind of anti-woman trope. Of course I should know better, but ...