How the 'Karen Meme' Confronts the Violent History of White Womanhood

[irisblue]

Source--https://time.com/5857023/karen-meme-history-meaning/

THIS IS THE AFRICAN AMERICAN GROUP, PLEASE RESPECT IT.

info from Editorials & Articles-https://democraticunderground.com/1016259988


Cause this controversial topic is not finished in GD.


snip--"The extreme pertinence of the Karen meme right now is significant, given that the meme had already been making the rounds online for quite some time. Although the Karen meme appears to have existed since at least 2017 on Reddit, according to Adam Downer, associate editor at Know Your Meme, the current iteration of the meme is taking on a new meaning that speaks to the sobering real-life consequences of what began as just a joke on the Internet about bad haircuts and entitlement.

“When it got to the protests and the avalanche of incidents where white ladies were calling the cops, that’s where it began to get a bit more menacing,” Downer says. “I think when people started pointing out who a Karen in real life was, like the ‘Can I speak to the manager?’ figure and starting to zero in on the exact kind of person they were talking about, it became a lot easier to see those types of people in real life.”


snip--"If we’re thinking about this in a historical context where white women are given the power over Black men, that their word will be valued over a Black man, that makes it particularly dangerous and that’s the problem,” says Dr. Apryl Williams, an assistant professor in communications and media at the University of Michigan and a Fellow at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard who focuses on race, gender and community in digital spaces.

“White women are positioned as the virtue of society because they hold that position as the mother, as the keepers of virtuosity, all these ideologies that we associate with white motherhood and white women in particular, their certain role in society gives them power and when you couple that with this racist history, where white women are afraid of black men and black men are hypersexualized and seen as dangerous, then that’s really a volatile combination.”


Much more at source

[irisblue]

1. Second recent article-How White Women Use Themselves as Instruments of Terror

Source--https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/27/opinion/racism-white-women.html


snip--"Specifically, I am enraged by white women weaponizing racial anxiety, using their white femininity to activate systems of white terror against black men. This has long been a power white women realized they had and that they exerted."

snip--"This practice, this exercise in racial extremism, has been dragged into the modern era through the weaponizing of 911, often by white women, to invoke the power and force of the police who they are fully aware are hostile to black men.

In a disturbing number of the recent cases of the police being called on black people for doing everyday, mundane things, the calls have been initiated by white women."


more at article by Charles Blow.


And there was an unhappy person complaining about the Time article before I finished the first post in this thread.

[Laelth]

6. +1 n/t

-Laelth

[brer cat]

7. *This*

Absolutely true.

Thanks for the OP, irisblue. Good food for self-reflection.

[Alacritous Crier]

2. Thanks!

Great stuff!

[gollygee]

3. It's a powerful meme

It forces white women - like me - to look in the mirror. I think it's important, also, to note that many of the "Karens" have been progressive, or at least left-leaning, white women. It isn't just conservatives who have work to do.

[irisblue]

4. Facing your own racism and bias is very very hard

In particular I think, when a white middle aged woman has struggled with some social issues, and seeing many white males zooming past them in society and politics.


The book, White Fragility, by Robin DiAngelo, I hope is the first of many that will be easily accessible and useful in dealing with ending the hold of white supremacy, unacknowledged racism and misogynistic behavior and thought.

[gollygee]

5. It appears to be selling like crazy

So hopefully people are open to learning.

(I'll post the youtube video of Robin DiAngelo for people who wonder what you're talking about)

[The Polack MSgt]

8. Kick and rec. Thanks for the link

[qwlauren35]

9. This is the reason

why I don't mind "Karen".

Which is more important?
1. stop using the name Karen
2. stop white female terrorist behavior.

I think #2 is more important.

White female terrorist behavior got Emmett Till killed. It's powerful, it's dangerous, and only white women can do it. When I look at the potential harm of the behavior, I find myself amused at people who push the "anti-Karen" viewpoint.

Calling a woman who behaves in a manner that endangers a black person's life a Karen. Name-calling vs. killing. It's such an obvious choice.

I don't use "Karen". I don't even think it. I think "racist white woman" because I don't want anyone to mistake the meaning of Karen, or get caught up in the "I know nice people named Karen" narrative. C'mon people. A person's life is threatened and you're upset about a name.

Perhaps we need to bring up Emmett Till more often. Drill it into people's minds. A white woman PRETENDED that a black teen offended her, told the men in her family, and got him killed.

If someone wants to call her a "Karen", well, "Karen" doesn't carry the intensity of the word "EVIL, manipulative, racist white woman" but as long as everyone understands the full connotations of "Karen", then I guess it's got to be good enough.

[qwlauren35]

10. If You Had to Choose?

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100213663907

I am amused that this got no comments, but maybe it is because it is a "push poll".

There was absolutely NO defense of calling "lying, manipulative, racist white women" as "Karen" in comparison to black men being put at risk.

Perhaps I should have offered the choice by gender.

[irisblue]

11. I didn't see that until just now.

I was making dinner.