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About

Karen is a slang term used as an antagonistic female character in memes. "Karen" is more often than not characterized as an irritating, entitled woman, sometimes every bit an ex-wife who took custody of "the kids." In 2020, the term was broadly applied to a swath of white women who had been filmed harassing people of color, including dialing the emergency services on them for no criminal reason.

Origin

While information technology's unclear where exactly "Karen" began seeing utilise as a pejorative grapheme, information technology possibly started with the Oh My God, Karen, You Can't But Ask Someone Why They're White meme from Hateful Girls. Others believe that the popularity of the proper name may come from the character Karen from the 1989 gangster moving-picture show Goodfellas (clip below).

Some believe that usage of the name every bit a perjorative stems from the Dane Cook standup comedy routine "The Friend That Nobody Likes," which first appeared on the album Retaliation, released on July 26th, 2005 and recorded 2004. In the routine, Cook says:

Then I'grand hangin' out with all of my buddies, and uh, I realize something, I realize something. Remember of the group of people you've known the longest in your life. Call back of the group of friends you've hung out with the virtually, perchance y'all're all here tonight. And this is what I realized, I had an epiphany, and hither it is, right here: There is one person, in every grouping of friends, that nobody fucking likes. You lot basically keep them in that location, to hate their guts. When that person is not around the rest of your little base of operations camp, your hobby, is cutting that person downward.

Example: "Karen, is always a douchebag."

Every group has a Karen and she is always a bag of douche.
And when she's non around, you lot just look at each other and say,
"God, Karen, she's such a douchebag!"

Spread

On August 7th, 2015, comedian Jay Pharoah released the standup special Tin can I Be Me? In the special, he refers to an annoying adult female named Karen. "It'southward always a 'Karen,'" he said.

Years later, on October 23rd, 2020 in an interview with Amusement Weekly, he said of the joke, "I'm the 1 who started, 'There'south ever a white woman named Karen."

One of the earliest widespread examples was Nintendo Switch Karen. On Oct 20th, 2016, Nintendo released the first trailer for the Nintendo Switch (shown beneath).

In the trailer, a woman brings the Switch to a rooftop party. That twenty-four hours, Tumblr user joematar posted a joke about the woman arriving at the political party with the explanation "Oh shit, Karen brought her stupid Nintendo thing to the party again. Nosotros're DRINKING, Karen. Nosotros're having CONVERSATIONS." As of December 27th, 2017, the post has over 23,000 notes (shown below).

Tumblr post with still from the Nintendo Switch trailer about a woman bringing the console with her to a party and annoying the other guests with it

On December seventh, 2017, the subreddit /r/FuckYouKaren^[ane] was created, and has over 57,000 subscribers as of December 27th, 2018. The subreddit is devoted to mocking the character in jokes that characterize "Karen" as annoying. Many jokes revolve around the character having a specific style of haircut indicating her graphic symbol (examples shown beneath).

stages of Karen meme with pictures of different objects and people with a stereotypical white suburban mom haircut

post by a person defending the stereotypical Karen haircut and a reply offering they speak to the manager

On March 18th, 2018, Urban Dictionary user Cody Kolodziejzyk posted a definition of "Karen" as an annoying center-aged white adult female.^[2]

Urban Dictionary definition of the word Karen

On April 7th, 2018, Chadwick Boseman appeared on Sat Night Live. ^[1] During a "Black Jeopardy" sketch, Boseman played T'challa from Blackness Panther. After struggling to understand the game, Boseman answers a question about a white person named Karen bringing her potato salad to a black person'southward cookout. Boseman says information technology is likely Karen did not flavor her food and likely added raisins to the potato salad, before answering "Aw hell naw, Karen. Keep your banal-donkey tater salad to yourself!"

In late 2018, a serial of jokes spread in which "Karen" is an ex-wife had taken the kids in a custody battle, many of which appear in the She Took the Fucking Kids meme. On Dec 24th, 2018, Redditor ashleyallday^[iii] posted an enquiry to /r/OutOfTheLoop near the jokes, pointing to 2 examples (shown below).

Pulled a Little Sneaky meme about purposely losing the kids in a custody battle to Karen

Star Wars Battlefront just like the simulations meme about Karen taking the kids

#AndThenKarenSnapped

On January 20th, 2020, the hashtag #AndThenKarenSnapped^[4] began trending after Twitter user @RiotGrlErin^[5] first tweeted the hashtag after the stating "The Apps were cold" (shown below, left). Twitter users began using the hashtag to tweet comedic scenarios in which the Karen character would get frustrated. Twitter user @MunaNawabit1^[half-dozen] tweeted, "Found out that the written report they funded to bear witness vaccines cause autism proved that vaccines don't cause autism #AndThenKarenSnapped" and garnered over ix,300 likes and two,300 retweets in a twenty-four hours (show below, right).

OODol) @MunaNawabit1 Found out that the study they funded to prove vaccines cause autism proved that vaccines don't cause autism #AndThenKarenSnapped X_antisocial butterfly Anti-vaxxer group furious after study they funded debunks vaccine-autism link - DeadState deadstate.org 8:09 PM · Jan 20, 2020 · Twitter for iPhone Face Hair Skin Chin Blond Photo caption Human

That day, Twitter user @DeadStillPretty tweeted, "#AndThenKarenSnapped When Karen demanded to speak to the director and I told her I AM the manager" (shown beneath). The tweet garnered over 2,800 likes and 290 retweets in a day.

#AndThenKarenSnapped When Karen demanded to speak to the manager and I told her I AM the manager movie.twitter.com/FGYgjTuM3q
— Queen Bee (@DeadStillPretty) January 21, 2020

Central Park Karen

Cardinal Park Karen is the white cop-caller nickname of Amy Cooper, who was recorded calling the police force on an African American birder in Central Park in New York City after being asked by him to leash her canis familiaris in the park. Later video of the altercation went viral, Cooper apologized for the incident.

On May 25th, 2020, Christian Cooper published video of the atmospherics with Amy Cooper (no relation), which took place in the Ramble, a popular section of Central Park for bird watching. He wrote:

Central Park this morn: This woman's dog is vehement through the plantings in the Ramble.
ME: Ma'am, dogs in the Ramble take to be on the leash at all times. The sign is right there.
HER: The dog runs are airtight. He needs his exercise.
ME: All y'all have to practice is accept him to the other side of the drive, outside the Constitutional, and you can let him run off ternion all you want.
HER: It's too unsafe.
ME: Look, if you're going to practise what you want, I'thou going to do what I want, merely you're not going to like information technology.
HER: What's that?
ME (to the dog): Come up here, puppy!

HER: He won't come to you.
ME: We'll meet nigh that…

I pull out the dog treats I deport for just for such intransigence. I didn't even go a chance to toss any treats to the pooch before Karen scrambled to catch the dog.

HER: DON'T Y'all Touch MY Domestic dog!!!!!

That's when I started video recording with my iPhone, and when her inner Karen fully emerged and took a dark turn…

The video received more than 12,000 comments, seven,200 shares and half dozen,900 reactions (shown below).