'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.

The Karen meme is about white women in America assuming that law abiding black people going about their everyday business must be criminals and then proceeding to call the police on them, which as we all know, in the USA can quickly become a fatal situation because of their armed police.

The origin of the Karen meme is men complaining about their ex-wives and it is directed at older women regardless of whether a situation involves race or the police or if there is any situation at all.

The Karen meme is about white women in America assuming that law abiding black people going about their everyday business must be criminals and then proceeding to call the police on them, which as we all know, in the USA can quickly become a fatal situation because of their armed police.

It's really not though is it. We already have a word for what you've just described - racism. Also it's quite clear to me that if you ring the police on someone going about their everyday business and the police response is "shoot to kill" then the main problem lies with the police.

One question I have is why a bunch of people who constantly claim that opposing viewpoints make people ‘unsafe’ have any issue with anyone ‘claiming victimhood’. They seem to do nothing but, themselves.

I can’t be arsed to comment on the rest but the whole Karen thing and the (white SJWs) keen to indulge their misogyny in a legitimate way, is grim.

www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.marketwatch.com/amp/story/why-are-karens-so-angry-2020-07-29

Now this is interesting.

That was an interesting article, but very American.
One interesting thing during the BLM protests was that a lot of white allies educated themselves by reading American literature and stats. By reading 'White Fragility' instead of' 'Race and Class in the History of Empire' they were listening to white USA voice rather than a British black one. They then tried to defend BLM through the extreme examples used in the USA. It's not that there's not racism in the UK, but it's much more subtle than the US and can be missed by white people. It manifests as stop and search rather than police state sanctioned murder. By poverty and education chances. I do think a lot of people switched off because the argument being made to them made no sense and they wouldn't have done. Really struggled with mil suggesting why statues were being pulled down as she considered them part of history and just pretty. It was because slavery wasn't ever a huge problem over here that she didn't consider a slaver statue problematic. That, coupled with the fact that British History is predominantly focused on white males, despite the rich variety it holds. Mary Seacole, Walter Till etc.
I don't think exporting USA racism helps anyone, as it becomes very hard to convince people we have a problem when it manifests itself in a different way.
We, for example have very few black people in the house of commons.
We also have very few women.
Or very few people not privately educated.

Our own problems are very much layered with class and sexism in a unique way. Our own structures underprivilege both white and black working class (perhaps not equally, but not as stark as the US). It's no coincidence that the most hated people in the UK are single mums on benefits, who sometimes but not always have mixed race kids.
BLM actually turns into the tool of the oppressors when we try to export USA experience. A good way for people to go, "well at least we're not as bad as them."
In the meantime we have the very symbol of upper class white privilege making the wrong decisions about a virus that disproportionately kills black people. And then people just wave it away with oh that's just old dithering Boris for you.
Because to him, none of our lives matter, unless we are the upper class elite.

Same old sexist pish. Oceans of examples of white women being deplorable, tiny paragraph acknowledging sexism.

'Karen and Ken' isn't a thing. It's just Karen. It's misogyny.

And notice how the only time the author mentions missing context of what occurred off camera on viral videos is in relation to one where a black man harrasses a white woman to try to create a viral Karen video.

Boring.

It's the double whammy of being the only 'fair game'

Welcome to the world of the white hetrosexual man for the last 15 years all the worlds ills have been cast at his door its nice to see the woke hate shared around a bit.

But the difference there is the white heterosexual man isn't oppressed as a group. By class, yes.
But women are oppressed by their sex. You only have to look at British Parliament to see that.
Or the fact that it's women's spaces and language that are up for grabs to tra activists.
Because actually, men do create a lot of these problems. And yes, predominantly white men. White women are more privileged by association than anything else.
But we're not so privileged that two of us aren't killed every day at the hands of men.
White women get told to shut up by both sides. White men only one.
So no, we're not only just experiencing hatred. Hatred for women predates racism, classism everything.
And yes, people in power are always envied, but the fact it's been white men for thousands of years should tell you something

Buffster (or anyone) any recs for insightful reads on race in a British context? I got given 'why I'm not talking to white people' for Xmas and found it frankly mostly shallow and waffly, would welcome something with more depth and references.

(the article above was just way too much US culture for me, sorry).

Akala's Race and Class in the history of empire is really good, as is any talk he gives. He's such an intelligent guy (British rapper, known as the black Shakespeare. Brother of Ms Dynamite.)
It's like an analytical autobiography, his take on knife crime is very relevant and he has been on a lot of television shows representing black youths.
I'll have a look at my kindle later. I read a lot of books over the past two years, but a lot of them were American.
I'm also halfway through David Lammy's book. Again it's good because it's his own lived experience. I particularly love him because he talks about xenophobic constituents with empathy, as he knows class and economic factors led them to their opinions.
He also has a lot to say on algorithm opinions and echo chamber online culture.

'White Fragility' is not waffly and is a good read, but it is very USA focused. I haven't read 'Why I'm..' because the reviews characterised it as you've described.

Thanks, that's really helpful. Will check them out.

I think the US/UK issues are so very deeply different, I suspect it's actually harmful to try and impose a US template here.

I was a bit baffled by how much of 'How I'm' seemed to be a wee rant about the author's twitter spats, personal opinion and supposition. I'm sure there is plenty of data and research and theory out there she could have referred to had she chosen? And also the part where she created a strawman by saying she was surprised such-and-such didn't start quoting the 'rivers of blood' speech, then going on to give a sizeable chunk of said speech, as if it had actually been quoted by such-and-such (sorry, my memory is crap and I skimmed it).

Less Than Human: Why We Demean, Enslave, and Exterminate Others was a good read about human nature and why oppression occurs. It looks at it from a species point of view.
I suspect "Why I'm" suffers from the problem of having a memorable titles, so is more widely read as a result.

Sounds cheerful! Thanks, I'll add it to the list.

Agree about the title - it was perhaps a decent blog post that shouldn't have been extended into book-form.

Haha my reading list is rather dire. On a total tangent homo sapiens is a good read as it follows our journey as a species to civilization, looking at why we are unique and a bit of a virus.

Yeah I can't stand being tricked into Twitter clips and blogs when I am expecting prose.