Karens: The Modern Mythological Hags
Karens and other forms of abrasive affluent white woman could be argued to just be modern versions of hags and banshees
- Like these mythological figures, they disproportionately occupy swamps
- I.e. large bureaucracies (“drain the swamp”)
- Like these mythological figures, they’re disproportionately of European ancestry
- One of our listeners proposed the concept of the concept of the Karen just being racism against European women
- “I think the “Karen” thing is a brown people taking charge of culture thing.”
- And to her point, The “Karen” as a named trope for an entitled, abrasive (usually white) woman emerged online in the 2010s and crystallized through Reddit and “Black Twitter”
- She continued: Picture old German white women keeping everyone in line and making sure they obey the rules…”Karen” lets white women know they can’t be oppressive rule-enforcers anymore.
- She told a story of a time when she and her husband were late for a plane in a South American country and the airline held it for them. “They made 300 people wait an extra five minutes or so for two irresponsible people. We didn’t think it was okay. We didn’t think they should wait for us. But that is the culture. “Be chill.” That’s also why they will never be rich or outcompete cultures that value not being chill....”
- She also pointed out: “Studies have been done on preferences for quiet showing that the northern European genome strongly prefers quiet compared to southern.”