That’s it, I thought to myself. That’s the last straw.
A writer I admire, a woman I respect, read and listen to, a woman who has been identified with the impressive title “public intellectual” — spoke on a podcast in which she used the name Karen as a pejorative.
I guess I shouldn’t have been shocked. I should have known that, eventually, even people I think highly of would feel free, indeed have license, to use my name in a derogatory manner. Of course, they don’t know me; they don’t know it’s my name. And they don’t care. It’s not personal, I’ve told myself. Still, it’s disappointing.
How unfortunate that it’s now common to hear and read about people referred to as Karens, plural. Or, worse yet, a single, contemptible Karen, a name used as a noun as one might say “She’s a harridan.” Objectified, “She’s a Karen” tells us right away the person is obnoxious, rude, intolerant, and intolerable. It seems it won’t be long now before Karen becomes an adverb, karenly — not even requiring the dignity of capitalization at all.
A contemporary pejorative, ‘a Karen’ typically means she’s an upper middle-class white American woman who’s overly demanding, entitled, privileged.
Since none of those adjectives describes me, I could just ignore it. And, because I live in Japan, I almost never hear it. Even when my first name is used at all, it’s always appended with the honorific to become Karen-san.
I recently had the following email exchange with a friend, an American woman who, like me, is a longtime resident of Japan and also a Karen:
“How have you been doing with all the recent madness surrounding our name? It really disturbs me,” she wrote.
My haughty reply: “I am aware of how our name is being debased. But please know I pay little attention to this kind of thing, and consider it just another manifestation of callousness — which seems to have no limits these days. Insensitivity abounds, and people hardly think twice about using insults and potentially offensive language that might demean others. I find it ridiculous — and deserving of my ridicule!”
She went on: “It is so very stupid, harmful and misguided. I’m thankful it doesn’t exist in Japan. But I know women with our name not only in the USA but also the UK and Australia who are having a terrible time with it in their everyday lives.”
I‘ve heard from some of these women:
“I didn’t even want to give my name at Starbucks for fear of having to do the walk of shame to pick up my coffee at the bar!”
