Who is Karen?
The phenomena of the “Karen” is an interesting recent development into our cultural consciousness. Starting off as light-hearted jest, it became a legitimate symbol for a certain type of personality emerging in society. The Karen is a moniker given to those middle aged women who like to complain to the manager.
But who actually is the Karen? and can we actually locate the mechanisms that caused this type to occur? Nothing happens in a vacuum, and a type, if it becomes universally recognised, arises for a reason.
Here i will offer four hypotheses for the development of the Karen:
Displacement of aggression caused by busyness
The Karen comes from generation x women and maybe the younger boomers. These women were the first to really enter the workforce in numbers, they were the guinea pigs of the feminist experiment. They began working, but they increased income did not translate to more leisure at home, they still had all the responsibilities of a full time mum, as most husbands are lazy at home and were not prepared to assume that role.
By basically doing two jobs, they were obviously busy, distracted and angry. Thus aggression, not finding a good outlet in the children, probably went to the husband. Once that got boring, it went to the poor man at the front of the grocery store. Because women cannot physically intimidate they became masters of litigation, using complaints, bad reviews and lawsuits to vent their frustrations. By targeting those who are contractually obliged to be nice to them they put themselves in a position of power.
The nature of bureaucratic authority
All of Karen’s aggression is bureaucratic, she is not slamming heads into street corners, she is making phone calls to offices, booking appointments to talk to managers and so on. Therefore, we cannot consider Karen’s behaviour without considering the special importance that companies and the government have for her. I would argue that women now rely on bureaucracy as a replacement for paternal authority. They have replaced the father with a collection of fathers. The absolute authority of individual men over women has been superseded by a more reasonable yet more invisible authority in the bureaucracy. The Karen, understanding this authority, uses it to her advantage. A middle manager will not yell at you, he could lose his job. As a customer you always have a certain privileged position. This means that you may be granted favours you do not deserve if you complain hard enough.
The downside is this, that whilst Karen revels in her illusory power, she doesn’t realise that she isa very dependent woman. Not dependent on the safe, strong arms of a man - yuck - but on the quick service of a mechanic, the safe delivery of a herbal tea from interstate, or the continued speed of her internet connection.
Over commercialisation of everyday life
This is related to the last hypotheses. Modern life is so arranged that you do not have to provide anything for yourself. To get food, clothing, shelter, and comfort you have to go through someone to provide it for you. The more needs that you have and the less able you are to provide for those needs for yourself the more useless you feel and the more that other people become split into either facilitators or obstacles to your goal.
It is hardly surprising that people become irate at service providers who threaten the attainment of their needs. Even within the past 20 years there have been so many new things introduced, flat screen tv’s, iphones, ipads, the internet, and cable tv just to name a very few. These objects have created many opportunities but at the same time they create needs. When needs arise they need to be met, and the person providing the service has to meet expectations. Karen maybe values consumer products more than most middle aged men who can survive a few months without ordering anything, and this high valuation of consumption makes her more dependent.
Irritability caused by general lack of health
‘‘Annoyance is a physical malady that is in no way cured just because the annoying situation that causes it is eliminated’’ Friedrich Nietzsche
It is entirely possible that middle aged women are just not healthy individuals. By this i mean that they have excess energy that they cannot rid themselves of, an excess of anger, or sadness, or even happiness that they feel which they cannot digest and assimilate into their experience. Whether it is the busyness, the high internalised expectations, or the lack of a capacity for leisure and enjoyment, the Karens of today are just not balanced.
Are middle aged white women alone in this? No, probably not. But unlike middle aged men or younger people, middle aged women do not/cannot engage in grandiose displays of aggression. They’re mothers, they’re supposed to be compliant, submissive, tender! So these feelings are thwarted, blocked, and distorted. They return again as petty complaints, as ambition through the child, as an obsession with chores and logistics, and as an emotional dependence on television personalities.