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Karen is a slang term typically used to refer to a middle-class white American woman who is perceived as entitled or excessively demanding. The term is often portrayed in memes depicting middle-class white women who "use their white and class privilege to demand their own way". Depictions include demanding to "speak to the manager", being racist, or wearing a particular bob cut hairstyle. It was popularized in the aftermath of the Central Park birdwatching incident in 2020. The term has been considered pejorative by those who believe it is racist, sexist, ageist, classist, and controlling women's behavior. The term has occasionally been applied to male behavior. During 2020, the term increasingly appeared in media and social media, including during the COVID-19 pandemic and George Floyd protests. The Guardian called 2020 "the year of Karen". Origin In African-American culture, there is a history of calling difficult white women or those who "weaponize" their position by a generic pejorative name. In the antebellum era (1815–1861), "Miss Ann" was used. In the early 1990s, "Becky" was used. As late as 2018, before the use of "Karen" caught on, alliterative names matching particular incidents were used, such as "Barbecue Becky", "Cornerstore Caroline", and "Permit Patty". Linguist Kendra Calhoun connects "Karen" stereotypes to the older "soccer mom". For the term "Karen", several possible origins have been proposed. Early uses of Karen as a joke punchline include the airheaded character Karen (played by Amanda Seyfried) from the 2004 film Mean Girls, Dane Cook's 2005 sketch "The Friend Nobody Likes" on his album Retaliation, and a 2016 Internet meme regarding a woman in an ad for the Nintendo Switch console who exhibits perceived antisocial behavior and is given the nickname "antisocial Karen". In December 2017, Karen memes regarding entitled women went viral on Reddit, the earliest being from user karmacop9, who ranted about his ex-wife Karen taking custody of their children. The posts led to the creation of the subreddit r/FuckYouKaren, containing memes about the posts, and inspiring spinoffs including r/karen and r/EntitledKarens dedicated to criticizing Karens. A more pointed explanation, which involves race, is the expression originating among black people to refer to unreasonable white women. The term was popularized on Black Twitter as a meme used to describe white women who "tattle on Black kids' lemonade stands" or who unleash the "violent history of white womanhood". Bitch magazine described Karen as a term that originated with black women but was co-opted by white men. In an article on high-profile incidents in the U.S. of white women calling the police on black people, The Guardian called 2020 "the year of Karen". Meaning and use Kansas State University professor Heather Suzanne Woods, whose research interests include memes, said that a Karen's defining characteristics are a sense of entitlement, a willingness and desire to complain, and a self-centered approach to interacting with others. According to Woods, a Karen "demands the world exist according to her standards with little regard for others, and she is willing to risk or demean others to achieve her ends". Rachel Charlene Lewis, writing for Bitch, agrees, saying that a Karen does not view others as individuals and instead moves "through the world prepared to fight faceless conglomerate of lesser-than people who won't give her what she wants and feels she deserves". The meme carries several stereotypes, the most notable being that a Karen will demand to "speak to the manager" of a hypothetical service provider. Other stereotypes include anti-vaccination beliefs, racism, excessive use of Facebook, and a particular bob haircut with blond highlights. Pictures of Kate Gosselin and Jenny McCarthy's bob cut are often used to depict a Karen, and their bobs are sometimes called the "can-I-speak-to-your-manager?" haircut. According to Apryl Williams of the University of Michigan, the memes "actively call out white supremacy and call for restitution". Racial context Time called the meme "Internet shorthand ... for a particular kind of racial violence white women have instigated for centuries—following a long and troubling legacy of white women in the country weaponizing their victimhood". University of Virginia media researcher Meredith Clark has said that the idea of a white woman in the vicinity of whom black people feel a need to be careful because she would not hesitate to use her "privilege" at the expense of others "has always been there; it just hasn't always been so specific to one person's name". Karen Grigsby Bates agrees that Karen is part of a succession of characters like Miss Ann and Becky, adding that the concept of Karen, as black people had been using the term, became clear to white people when Saturday Night Live played a Jeopardy! sketch with Chadwick Boseman as his Black Panther character T'Challa. The Guardian notes that "the image of a white woman calling police on black people put the lie to the myth of racial innocence". Contemporary Karens have been compared to Carolyn Bryant (a white woman whom Emmett Till was accused of offending, resulting in his lynching) and Mayella Ewell (a fictional character in the 1960 novel To Kill a Mockingbird). The meme became most popular in 2020 when the Black Lives Matter movement surged in response to multiple events. Andre Brock, a Georgia Tech professor of black digital culture, connected the virality of the meme in the summer of 2020 with the coronavirus pandemic, the murder of George Floyd, and the Central Park birdwatching incident, noting that both incidents had occurred the same weekend during a period when much of the world had been forced to stay home and had plenty of free time to watch the videos. He said that the virality of the two videos was the result of an "interest convergence" in which the pandemic "intersected with collective outrage over police brutality" and "highlighted the extreme violence—and potentially fatal consequences—of a white woman selfishly calling the cops out of spite and professed fear". Apryl Williams of the University of Michigan called it a "Black activist meme", saying that it was ultimately beneficial in helping people recognize problematic behaviors, but warning that jokes downplayed the threat posed to black people. Multiple writers have rejected accusations of the term being a slur against white women. Karen Attiah, Global Opinions editor for The Washington Post, claims that it lacks the historical context to be a slur and that calling it one trivializes actual discrimination. Male context The term is generally used to refer to women, but The Atlantic noted that "a man can easily be called a Karen", with staff writer David A. Graham calling then-president Donald Trump the "Karen in chief". It's considered negative because it reflects a disregard for others' perspectives, a tendency to escalate minor i.... Discover the Heather Lang Floyd Cooper popular books. Find the top 100 most popular Heather Lang Floyd Cooper books.