White women try to "reclaim power" through #vanillagirl and #cleangirl beauty posts??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the ideas in this interview are racism. I do think they are wrongheaded and a massive rhetorical stretch. I also think it's part of a broader trend of blaming white women, and especially white women with the least amount of actual power (young women trying to make a buck on Instagram, middle aged moms) instead of the white women who have actually ascended to positions of real power and authority. Easier to complain about the soft power of some Instagram influencer than to talk about how some of the white women at high levels in the media or corporate world perpetuate white supremacy. Always easiest to criticize someone who will never, ever be able to offer you a job.

Also, if you've listened to the interview but haven't read Steffi Cao's essay that prompted NPR to invite her on, I recommend reading it. The tone of the interview makes her argument seem gentler than it is. Her essay is vitriolic in a way that really bothered me. Just the absolute disdain she has for her subject. I've read plenty of smart and valid criticisms of white women that have made me think and examine my own role in white supremacy. This wasn't one of them.

Agreed on all points. Cao’s essay was acidic in tone, irrationally argued and even poorly edited - it really read as a personal takedown of particular white peers she knew in college, who best I know, aren’t named Angela Merkel or Theresa May or Samantha Power or Anne Marie Slaughter or Marissa Meyer and so forth. Like she was having a staircase moment, a one-sided argument 15 years later against a girl she really hated in high school but couldn’t confront then. It’s pathetic, and it’s not reflective of even minimally nuanced thought.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I just listened and I think she is talking about a small subset (though having a wide audience) of YOUNG white women celebs drifting towards certain trends. Most posters here have some problem with listening comprehension.
I fit the vanilla color trend more than any white peer but I am not white. Most people dislike all beige wardrobes especially white women, who don't want to be washed out. The boleros and leg warmers of balletcore are for the young. This thread should be a case study in sensitivity. She wasn't even saying this reclaiming power thing as an insult but as a "hey look how these ladies left behind in some trends are presenting other equally popular trends". It was more of a "Notes from the style desk" than race bashing of who everyone in this thread views as the "real victims"

I listened too and "Notes from the style desk" is a ridiculous take. Talk about listening comprehension. She was absolutely saying that white women are trying to reclaim power by creating trends that take us back to white standards of beauty. It was most definitely an insult and critical of white women, young or whatever.

I don't want to take away from POC women's creativity. Why is she arguing that white women can't be themselves?

Like any abuser, they want to make you distrust your own beliefs, and make you turn to them for direction.

This just didn’t happen in the interview, sorry.

Yes it did. It's saying, essentially, "look, all these grandmas in their colorful blouses and white capris arent just old ladies buying stuff from the same chain store. No! All these trends, they come from somewhere. And that somewhere is an idealized view of whiteness, which is specifically created to oppress you."

That's a pretty good summary. Wearing beige is about power, but at the same time, bizarrely, it's about victimhood because that's how they'll oppress you. She literally said that nonsense.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I'm a woman of color and I find the article silly. What I guess I don't understand is the tremendous outrage it seems to have triggered here among white women. If you think it's dumb, that's fine, but what is it about this that makes white women so damn fragile about it all?

Being constantly told you’re a “Karen,” being constantly told you are not recognizing your privilege (never mind people having no idea what struggles you or your family have faced), being constantly told you’re a “basic B” or “have no culture,” being constantly told you’re not recognizing other people (again, when people don’t actually know who you are or what you’ve done), being told you’re not an ally, or not ally enough, or that your allyship is “performative,” being constantly told you are “fragile”…basically, you are never doing it right. Which is all fine and part of life and not a hard burden to bear, but it is never-ending.

I’m a white woman and no one tells me those things (let alone constantly!!!)

Have you considered that this experience of how you feel labeled as a basic Karen may have more to do with your personality than your race?

Doesn't the fact that there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men clue you in to how pervasive misogyny is? Easier to pick on the girls than the boys.

Chad is a white man.

For a frat boy type, fine. No one is referring to 50 or 60 to business executives as Chad. It's not at all comparable to Karen.

The assertion was "there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men." I think I'd agree with your more nuanced statement here. There isn't a widely recognized word for 50 or 60 year old white male business executives.

I've never heard of anyone except for like incels on reddit or 4chan use the term "chad" to refer to a white guy. And I could be wrong, but isn't it used as a sort of compliment? Like doesn't it just mean an alpha male, someone who is successful with women and also professionaly (or at least has money)? I know it's also criticizing these guys but it also seems to be admiring in a jealous way. Like incels hate Chads, but not because they are oppressed by them -- because they want to be them or have what they have.

Compare that to use of the term Karen, which has been used by journalists and culture commentators to describe a white woma exploiting her white privilege to endanger black people. I think at first the targets were actually white women doing scary things that did in fact endanger black people (I first became aware of it to describe that woman who called the cops on the black people having a barbecue). And then the Central Park birding incident really pushed it mainstream and I remember all these pieces in like Slate and the Washington Post and on cable news about it.

But then something happened, where it was no longer being used to describe a white woman's behavior, it came to describe her appearance, her hair cut, her age, her attractiveness, her job, etc. Karens were ALWAYS middle aged according to the cultural zeitgeist, even though the original definition absolutely wouldn't have been limited to older women (Carolyn Bryant, the woman whose accusation got Emmett Till murdered, was 21 at the time). Karens were also unattractive, and the implication was that the reason they were so unpleasant was out of some jealousy our anger attached to this lack of attractiveness. This is inherent in Steffi Cao's essay as well, which implies that white women are mad that they are no longer seen as desirable and are using TikTok trends to reclaim that.

And even the definition of Karen behavior got expanded to encompass essentially any behavior in which a white woman over 35 complained or asked for an accommodation. This might mean a white woman complaining about service at a restaurant (whether the complaint was valid or not -- the idea was that a Karen was entitled and it applied even if the thing she was entitled to was like basic service or edible food), but it could also mean a white woman asking her elementary school to accommodate her child with special needs, or a white woman advocating for better healthcare coverage from her employer, or a white woman upset about gun violence.

Eventually a Karen was just a woman over the age of 35 who opened her mouth to express anything other than gratitude or apologies. And the people leveling accusations of Karen-hood stopped being restricted to POC and or people in the service industry who'd been treated poorly. Suddenly, men in their 20s and 30s were using Karen as an epithet to describe any older woman who annoyed them, who spoke too loudly, or who dared to have an unflattering haircut or to lack of body they desired.

I remember the day an acquaintance I follow on Twitter, a white guy in his late 30s or early 40s who is a corporate lawyer, a father, and theoretically a progressive and feminist (he voted for Obama AND Hilary), posted a photo of Kate Gosselin (look her up if you are too young to remember) with something like "When are we going to talk about the the Original Karen and her Original Karen haircut???" Now, I don't have positive associations with Kate Gosselin, who was a reality star I never paid much attention to. But that was when I realized that privileged white men had decided Karen just meant "middle aged white woman I don't want to have sex with." It's just another way to tell women that their only purpose in our culture is to look hot and be quiet and convenient.

So no, Karen and Chad are not equivalent stereotypes, sorry.

I agree that Karen and Chad aren't equivalent, so you don't need to apologize.

But maybe part of the reason for this is that white men and white women don't necessarily act in equivalent ways. And I don't think "Karen" is solely used to describe a white woman speaking up. It's not pure misogyny, though there is surely some of that mixed in with the term. There's an element of class and privilege tied into the term as well. "Karen" isn't a poor or a lower class woman. She's at least middle or upper class. There is a whole vibe that took off because it accurately captured something in the zeitgeist. Often enough the term is thrown around unfairly, but it's capturing something real.

And maybe middle and upper class men simply don't act out in ways that are as off-putting in the same way. Which is not to say they are above scorn - white men are routinely trashed as creeps and bros; privileged, lame, and uncool. But they haven't been "named" yet.

I'm glad you used the word "off-putting ". Simply venturing into public space as a middle-aged woman is being off-putting. If you dare to bring yourself to anyone's attention because you are standing up for your family's needs, you've just reminded them that you're not supposed to be out in public while not hot.

Are you kidding? Ever seen a white guy whose table isn’t ready at a restaurant? Ever go to a sporting event? Ever see a white guy get the wrong set assignment on a flight? Maybe you don’t see it because you are so used to just ceding space to middle aged white men. Don’t get me started on the mass shooters! Men are shooting up our whole country, killing our children and they still don’t have a name for that took off like Karen. We just call them shooters.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I listened to the podcast.

So now my shortish oval nails (they’re more resistant to chipping than square cut) are an aggressive power symbol? And my nails are deeply connected to Miley Cyrus and the movement along a minority of white women to stay at home? Because it’s all part of an organized plot by white women getting together (Where? How?) to exclude nonwhites from having oval nails? So the solution is that we all where latex body suits?

I can’t even.

I listened to it too and this comment is a wild misrepresentation of what was said. Do I think she reached on making some connections? Sure! But no more than any other cultural think piece. Beauty trends have always related to power. There’s nothing in the interview that accuses women with oval nails of being racist. I’m white and have oval nails (honestly they’re just bit into an oval a lot of the time) and I don’t feel attacked by it. Sometimes hair is just hair, but there’s a lot that goes into what society sees as “attractive” hair, right? It’s not an attack to discuss that.

You're misrepresenting the interview, or you didn't understand her theory, not that her theory was very coherent. Oval nails got mentioned not because they're overtly racist (as you claim). But because they're part of a beauty package that involves beige, capris and minimal makeup. Which aren't independent decisions made by middle-aged women shopping at Chico's for elastic waistbands.

Instead this is some sort of collusion among white women to regain (if they ever had it) soft power through clothing, manicure and makeup choices. And also paradoxically to regain power by being victims while wearing said clothing, nail styles and makeup. So they can use this soft power of (beige-colored) victimhood to continue oppressing POC.

If you can explain how clothing, manicures and makeup choices lead to power through (beige) victimhood, please give it a go.

If you disagree, please explain why Cao even mentions oval nails.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And all of this is why, despite loathing Trumpism, I am forced to identify as a conservative.

Um no. You're making that choice based on culture wars and ignoring all of the important stuff. Don't blame other people for your asinine ability to critically think.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I'm a woman of color and I find the article silly. What I guess I don't understand is the tremendous outrage it seems to have triggered here among white women. If you think it's dumb, that's fine, but what is it about this that makes white women so damn fragile about it all?

Being constantly told you’re a “Karen,” being constantly told you are not recognizing your privilege (never mind people having no idea what struggles you or your family have faced), being constantly told you’re a “basic B” or “have no culture,” being constantly told you’re not recognizing other people (again, when people don’t actually know who you are or what you’ve done), being told you’re not an ally, or not ally enough, or that your allyship is “performative,” being constantly told you are “fragile”…basically, you are never doing it right. Which is all fine and part of life and not a hard burden to bear, but it is never-ending.

I’m a white woman and no one tells me those things (let alone constantly!!!)

Have you considered that this experience of how you feel labeled as a basic Karen may have more to do with your personality than your race?

Doesn't the fact that there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men clue you in to how pervasive misogyny is? Easier to pick on the girls than the boys.

Chad is a white man.

For a frat boy type, fine. No one is referring to 50 or 60 to business executives as Chad. It's not at all comparable to Karen.

The assertion was "there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men." I think I'd agree with your more nuanced statement here. There isn't a widely recognized word for 50 or 60 year old white male business executives.

I've never heard of anyone except for like incels on reddit or 4chan use the term "chad" to refer to a white guy. And I could be wrong, but isn't it used as a sort of compliment? Like doesn't it just mean an alpha male, someone who is successful with women and also professionaly (or at least has money)? I know it's also criticizing these guys but it also seems to be admiring in a jealous way. Like incels hate Chads, but not because they are oppressed by them -- because they want to be them or have what they have.

Compare that to use of the term Karen, which has been used by journalists and culture commentators to describe a white woma exploiting her white privilege to endanger black people. I think at first the targets were actually white women doing scary things that did in fact endanger black people (I first became aware of it to describe that woman who called the cops on the black people having a barbecue). And then the Central Park birding incident really pushed it mainstream and I remember all these pieces in like Slate and the Washington Post and on cable news about it.

But then something happened, where it was no longer being used to describe a white woman's behavior, it came to describe her appearance, her hair cut, her age, her attractiveness, her job, etc. Karens were ALWAYS middle aged according to the cultural zeitgeist, even though the original definition absolutely wouldn't have been limited to older women (Carolyn Bryant, the woman whose accusation got Emmett Till murdered, was 21 at the time). Karens were also unattractive, and the implication was that the reason they were so unpleasant was out of some jealousy our anger attached to this lack of attractiveness. This is inherent in Steffi Cao's essay as well, which implies that white women are mad that they are no longer seen as desirable and are using TikTok trends to reclaim that.

And even the definition of Karen behavior got expanded to encompass essentially any behavior in which a white woman over 35 complained or asked for an accommodation. This might mean a white woman complaining about service at a restaurant (whether the complaint was valid or not -- the idea was that a Karen was entitled and it applied even if the thing she was entitled to was like basic service or edible food), but it could also mean a white woman asking her elementary school to accommodate her child with special needs, or a white woman advocating for better healthcare coverage from her employer, or a white woman upset about gun violence.

Eventually a Karen was just a woman over the age of 35 who opened her mouth to express anything other than gratitude or apologies. And the people leveling accusations of Karen-hood stopped being restricted to POC and or people in the service industry who'd been treated poorly. Suddenly, men in their 20s and 30s were using Karen as an epithet to describe any older woman who annoyed them, who spoke too loudly, or who dared to have an unflattering haircut or to lack of body they desired.

I remember the day an acquaintance I follow on Twitter, a white guy in his late 30s or early 40s who is a corporate lawyer, a father, and theoretically a progressive and feminist (he voted for Obama AND Hilary), posted a photo of Kate Gosselin (look her up if you are too young to remember) with something like "When are we going to talk about the the Original Karen and her Original Karen haircut???" Now, I don't have positive associations with Kate Gosselin, who was a reality star I never paid much attention to. But that was when I realized that privileged white men had decided Karen just meant "middle aged white woman I don't want to have sex with." It's just another way to tell women that their only purpose in our culture is to look hot and be quiet and convenient.

So no, Karen and Chad are not equivalent stereotypes, sorry.

I agree that Karen and Chad aren't equivalent, so you don't need to apologize.

But maybe part of the reason for this is that white men and white women don't necessarily act in equivalent ways. And I don't think "Karen" is solely used to describe a white woman speaking up. It's not pure misogyny, though there is surely some of that mixed in with the term. There's an element of class and privilege tied into the term as well. "Karen" isn't a poor or a lower class woman. She's at least middle or upper class. There is a whole vibe that took off because it accurately captured something in the zeitgeist. Often enough the term is thrown around unfairly, but it's capturing something real.

And maybe middle and upper class men simply don't act out in ways that are as off-putting in the same way. Which is not to say they are above scorn - white men are routinely trashed as creeps and bros; privileged, lame, and uncool. But they haven't been "named" yet.

So because Karen is middle class she’s not allowed to speak up about the cold latte? I’m not following you.

She's obnoxious in a way that's different from how white men, poor women, and people of color are obnoxious. That's it. That's why the meme took off.

Please explain how by simply being a white woman, she is more obnoxious than other people.

This is racist. And typically ageist. It is unacceptable. Stop trying to defend hatred against white middle-aged women.

PP didn't say she's MORE obnoxious, PP said she's obnoxious in a way that's different. I agree.

DP.

OK, you’re going to need to define this “difference.” Let me guess, it’s that the words are coming out of her mouth while she’s white and middle-aged.

Don't forget pretentious and entitled.

So you read "pretentious and entitled" when a white woman is served a cold latte. She should just shut up and drink the cold mess.

Do you have the same standards for POC when they get cold lattes? Or is that an outcome of the soft power of white women's victimhood and a POC has every right to complain loudly?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I'm a woman of color and I find the article silly. What I guess I don't understand is the tremendous outrage it seems to have triggered here among white women. If you think it's dumb, that's fine, but what is it about this that makes white women so damn fragile about it all?

Being constantly told you’re a “Karen,” being constantly told you are not recognizing your privilege (never mind people having no idea what struggles you or your family have faced), being constantly told you’re a “basic B” or “have no culture,” being constantly told you’re not recognizing other people (again, when people don’t actually know who you are or what you’ve done), being told you’re not an ally, or not ally enough, or that your allyship is “performative,” being constantly told you are “fragile”…basically, you are never doing it right. Which is all fine and part of life and not a hard burden to bear, but it is never-ending.

I’m a white woman and no one tells me those things (let alone constantly!!!)

Have you considered that this experience of how you feel labeled as a basic Karen may have more to do with your personality than your race?

Doesn't the fact that there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men clue you in to how pervasive misogyny is? Easier to pick on the girls than the boys.

Chad is a white man.

For a frat boy type, fine. No one is referring to 50 or 60 to business executives as Chad. It's not at all comparable to Karen.

The assertion was "there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men." I think I'd agree with your more nuanced statement here. There isn't a widely recognized word for 50 or 60 year old white male business executives.

I've never heard of anyone except for like incels on reddit or 4chan use the term "chad" to refer to a white guy. And I could be wrong, but isn't it used as a sort of compliment? Like doesn't it just mean an alpha male, someone who is successful with women and also professionaly (or at least has money)? I know it's also criticizing these guys but it also seems to be admiring in a jealous way. Like incels hate Chads, but not because they are oppressed by them -- because they want to be them or have what they have.

Compare that to use of the term Karen, which has been used by journalists and culture commentators to describe a white woma exploiting her white privilege to endanger black people. I think at first the targets were actually white women doing scary things that did in fact endanger black people (I first became aware of it to describe that woman who called the cops on the black people having a barbecue). And then the Central Park birding incident really pushed it mainstream and I remember all these pieces in like Slate and the Washington Post and on cable news about it.

But then something happened, where it was no longer being used to describe a white woman's behavior, it came to describe her appearance, her hair cut, her age, her attractiveness, her job, etc. Karens were ALWAYS middle aged according to the cultural zeitgeist, even though the original definition absolutely wouldn't have been limited to older women (Carolyn Bryant, the woman whose accusation got Emmett Till murdered, was 21 at the time). Karens were also unattractive, and the implication was that the reason they were so unpleasant was out of some jealousy our anger attached to this lack of attractiveness. This is inherent in Steffi Cao's essay as well, which implies that white women are mad that they are no longer seen as desirable and are using TikTok trends to reclaim that.

And even the definition of Karen behavior got expanded to encompass essentially any behavior in which a white woman over 35 complained or asked for an accommodation. This might mean a white woman complaining about service at a restaurant (whether the complaint was valid or not -- the idea was that a Karen was entitled and it applied even if the thing she was entitled to was like basic service or edible food), but it could also mean a white woman asking her elementary school to accommodate her child with special needs, or a white woman advocating for better healthcare coverage from her employer, or a white woman upset about gun violence.

Eventually a Karen was just a woman over the age of 35 who opened her mouth to express anything other than gratitude or apologies. And the people leveling accusations of Karen-hood stopped being restricted to POC and or people in the service industry who'd been treated poorly. Suddenly, men in their 20s and 30s were using Karen as an epithet to describe any older woman who annoyed them, who spoke too loudly, or who dared to have an unflattering haircut or to lack of body they desired.

I remember the day an acquaintance I follow on Twitter, a white guy in his late 30s or early 40s who is a corporate lawyer, a father, and theoretically a progressive and feminist (he voted for Obama AND Hilary), posted a photo of Kate Gosselin (look her up if you are too young to remember) with something like "When are we going to talk about the the Original Karen and her Original Karen haircut???" Now, I don't have positive associations with Kate Gosselin, who was a reality star I never paid much attention to. But that was when I realized that privileged white men had decided Karen just meant "middle aged white woman I don't want to have sex with." It's just another way to tell women that their only purpose in our culture is to look hot and be quiet and convenient.

So no, Karen and Chad are not equivalent stereotypes, sorry.

I agree that Karen and Chad aren't equivalent, so you don't need to apologize.

But maybe part of the reason for this is that white men and white women don't necessarily act in equivalent ways. And I don't think "Karen" is solely used to describe a white woman speaking up. It's not pure misogyny, though there is surely some of that mixed in with the term. There's an element of class and privilege tied into the term as well. "Karen" isn't a poor or a lower class woman. She's at least middle or upper class. There is a whole vibe that took off because it accurately captured something in the zeitgeist. Often enough the term is thrown around unfairly, but it's capturing something real.

And maybe middle and upper class men simply don't act out in ways that are as off-putting in the same way. Which is not to say they are above scorn - white men are routinely trashed as creeps and bros; privileged, lame, and uncool. But they haven't been "named" yet.

So because Karen is middle class she’s not allowed to speak up about the cold latte? I’m not following you.

She's obnoxious in a way that's different from how white men, poor women, and people of color are obnoxious. That's it. That's why the meme took off.

Please explain how by simply being a white woman, she is more obnoxious than other people.

This is racist. And typically ageist. It is unacceptable. Stop trying to defend hatred against white middle-aged women.

White women are the real victims of racism.

The cure to racism is not more racism.

You’re talking about bigotry, not racism. Racism can only be perpetrated against those with less power. White people are at the top of the power structure in this country.

You have to ask why your movement has attempted to redefine racism in such a way that it is justifiable in some contexts. What do you achieve by tweaking the definition this way? What harm comes from keeping a definition in which the bad thing is judgment based on the color of a person's skin, and attempting to eradicate that?

That has never been the definition of racism, so your idea that you would be keeping something constant is mistaken, to start.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the ideas in this interview are racism. I do think they are wrongheaded and a massive rhetorical stretch. I also think it's part of a broader trend of blaming white women, and especially white women with the least amount of actual power (young women trying to make a buck on Instagram, middle aged moms) instead of the white women who have actually ascended to positions of real power and authority. Easier to complain about the soft power of some Instagram influencer than to talk about how some of the white women at high levels in the media or corporate world perpetuate white supremacy. Always easiest to criticize someone who will never, ever be able to offer you a job.

Also, if you've listened to the interview but haven't read Steffi Cao's essay that prompted NPR to invite her on, I recommend reading it. The tone of the interview makes her argument seem gentler than it is. Her essay is vitriolic in a way that really bothered me. Just the absolute disdain she has for her subject. I've read plenty of smart and valid criticisms of white women that have made me think and examine my own role in white supremacy. This wasn't one of them.

Oh for God’s sake. The ultimate critique all of this coverage drives at is of how white women, when we have our interest in whiteness catered to in this way, ultimately do at the ballot box. We are unreliable allies at best—and that is absolutely generalizable across differential levels of “real power and authority” among white women.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the ideas in this interview are racism. I do think they are wrongheaded and a massive rhetorical stretch. I also think it's part of a broader trend of blaming white women, and especially white women with the least amount of actual power (young women trying to make a buck on Instagram, middle aged moms) instead of the white women who have actually ascended to positions of real power and authority. Easier to complain about the soft power of some Instagram influencer than to talk about how some of the white women at high levels in the media or corporate world perpetuate white supremacy. Always easiest to criticize someone who will never, ever be able to offer you a job.

Also, if you've listened to the interview but haven't read Steffi Cao's essay that prompted NPR to invite her on, I recommend reading it. The tone of the interview makes her argument seem gentler than it is. Her essay is vitriolic in a way that really bothered me. Just the absolute disdain she has for her subject. I've read plenty of smart and valid criticisms of white women that have made me think and examine my own role in white supremacy. This wasn't one of them.

Oh for God’s sake. The ultimate critique all of this coverage drives at is of how white women, when we have our interest in whiteness catered to in this way, ultimately do at the ballot box. We are unreliable allies at best—and that is absolutely generalizable across differential levels of “real power and authority” among white women.

What a handmaiden of the patriarchy you are.

You know they won’t care about you if you suck up to them. It doesn’t work that way.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:I'm a woman of color and I find the article silly. What I guess I don't understand is the tremendous outrage it seems to have triggered here among white women. If you think it's dumb, that's fine, but what is it about this that makes white women so damn fragile about it all?

Being constantly told you’re a “Karen,” being constantly told you are not recognizing your privilege (never mind people having no idea what struggles you or your family have faced), being constantly told you’re a “basic B” or “have no culture,” being constantly told you’re not recognizing other people (again, when people don’t actually know who you are or what you’ve done), being told you’re not an ally, or not ally enough, or that your allyship is “performative,” being constantly told you are “fragile”…basically, you are never doing it right. Which is all fine and part of life and not a hard burden to bear, but it is never-ending.

I’m a white woman and no one tells me those things (let alone constantly!!!)

Have you considered that this experience of how you feel labeled as a basic Karen may have more to do with your personality than your race?

Doesn't the fact that there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men clue you in to how pervasive misogyny is? Easier to pick on the girls than the boys.

Chad is a white man.

For a frat boy type, fine. No one is referring to 50 or 60 to business executives as Chad. It's not at all comparable to Karen.

The assertion was "there is a widely recognized word for white women but not white men." I think I'd agree with your more nuanced statement here. There isn't a widely recognized word for 50 or 60 year old white male business executives.

I've never heard of anyone except for like incels on reddit or 4chan use the term "chad" to refer to a white guy. And I could be wrong, but isn't it used as a sort of compliment? Like doesn't it just mean an alpha male, someone who is successful with women and also professionaly (or at least has money)? I know it's also criticizing these guys but it also seems to be admiring in a jealous way. Like incels hate Chads, but not because they are oppressed by them -- because they want to be them or have what they have.

Compare that to use of the term Karen, which has been used by journalists and culture commentators to describe a white woma exploiting her white privilege to endanger black people. I think at first the targets were actually white women doing scary things that did in fact endanger black people (I first became aware of it to describe that woman who called the cops on the black people having a barbecue). And then the Central Park birding incident really pushed it mainstream and I remember all these pieces in like Slate and the Washington Post and on cable news about it.

But then something happened, where it was no longer being used to describe a white woman's behavior, it came to describe her appearance, her hair cut, her age, her attractiveness, her job, etc. Karens were ALWAYS middle aged according to the cultural zeitgeist, even though the original definition absolutely wouldn't have been limited to older women (Carolyn Bryant, the woman whose accusation got Emmett Till murdered, was 21 at the time). Karens were also unattractive, and the implication was that the reason they were so unpleasant was out of some jealousy our anger attached to this lack of attractiveness. This is inherent in Steffi Cao's essay as well, which implies that white women are mad that they are no longer seen as desirable and are using TikTok trends to reclaim that.

And even the definition of Karen behavior got expanded to encompass essentially any behavior in which a white woman over 35 complained or asked for an accommodation. This might mean a white woman complaining about service at a restaurant (whether the complaint was valid or not -- the idea was that a Karen was entitled and it applied even if the thing she was entitled to was like basic service or edible food), but it could also mean a white woman asking her elementary school to accommodate her child with special needs, or a white woman advocating for better healthcare coverage from her employer, or a white woman upset about gun violence.

Eventually a Karen was just a woman over the age of 35 who opened her mouth to express anything other than gratitude or apologies. And the people leveling accusations of Karen-hood stopped being restricted to POC and or people in the service industry who'd been treated poorly. Suddenly, men in their 20s and 30s were using Karen as an epithet to describe any older woman who annoyed them, who spoke too loudly, or who dared to have an unflattering haircut or to lack of body they desired.

I remember the day an acquaintance I follow on Twitter, a white guy in his late 30s or early 40s who is a corporate lawyer, a father, and theoretically a progressive and feminist (he voted for Obama AND Hilary), posted a photo of Kate Gosselin (look her up if you are too young to remember) with something like "When are we going to talk about the the Original Karen and her Original Karen haircut???" Now, I don't have positive associations with Kate Gosselin, who was a reality star I never paid much attention to. But that was when I realized that privileged white men had decided Karen just meant "middle aged white woman I don't want to have sex with." It's just another way to tell women that their only purpose in our culture is to look hot and be quiet and convenient.

So no, Karen and Chad are not equivalent stereotypes, sorry.

I agree that Karen and Chad aren't equivalent, so you don't need to apologize.

But maybe part of the reason for this is that white men and white women don't necessarily act in equivalent ways. And I don't think "Karen" is solely used to describe a white woman speaking up. It's not pure misogyny, though there is surely some of that mixed in with the term. There's an element of class and privilege tied into the term as well. "Karen" isn't a poor or a lower class woman. She's at least middle or upper class. There is a whole vibe that took off because it accurately captured something in the zeitgeist. Often enough the term is thrown around unfairly, but it's capturing something real.

And maybe middle and upper class men simply don't act out in ways that are as off-putting in the same way. Which is not to say they are above scorn - white men are routinely trashed as creeps and bros; privileged, lame, and uncool. But they haven't been "named" yet.

So because Karen is middle class she’s not allowed to speak up about the cold latte? I’m not following you.

She's obnoxious in a way that's different from how white men, poor women, and people of color are obnoxious. That's it. That's why the meme took off.

Please explain how by simply being a white woman, she is more obnoxious than other people.

This is racist. And typically ageist. It is unacceptable. Stop trying to defend hatred against white middle-aged women.

White women are the real victims of racism.

The cure to racism is not more racism.

You’re talking about bigotry, not racism. Racism can only be perpetrated against those with less power. White people are at the top of the power structure in this country.

Hon, this definition of racism emerges from social theories (largely emerging from sociology) of SYSTEMIC power. This definition of racism was never intended, even by the sociologists who first articulated it, to be the only possible definition of racism. I feel such tremendous fremdschamen whenever I see people with BAs dropping this "knowledge" like it's hot.

[Anonymous]

This interview is ridiculous. They pan Haley Bieber for doing her makeup in a way that "centers whiteness" and in the very next breath attack her for using a dark lip liner bc that is a common trend among Latinas. It's like, y'all white ladies can't sit with us, and also, you're not allowed to have your own table. You really can't insist on sharp divisions among the race without making everyone, including white people, more "centered" in their race.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Media exists to sell itself, in the immortal words of a Harry Potter character, OP.

It's a very frequent occurrence in media to identify a trend, then a posteriori ascribe an intent to it, when its individual contributors had no such intent whatsoever. But by doing so, the media CREATES that intent: new members will embrace the trend because it has the political or social overtones that reporters just bestowed on it.

Media: know its influence and power, for good or bad.

The line between The Onion and NPR has become increasingly blurred.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the ideas in this interview are racism. I do think they are wrongheaded and a massive rhetorical stretch. I also think it's part of a broader trend of blaming white women, and especially white women with the least amount of actual power (young women trying to make a buck on Instagram, middle aged moms) instead of the white women who have actually ascended to positions of real power and authority. Easier to complain about the soft power of some Instagram influencer than to talk about how some of the white women at high levels in the media or corporate world perpetuate white supremacy. Always easiest to criticize someone who will never, ever be able to offer you a job.

Also, if you've listened to the interview but haven't read Steffi Cao's essay that prompted NPR to invite her on, I recommend reading it. The tone of the interview makes her argument seem gentler than it is. Her essay is vitriolic in a way that really bothered me. Just the absolute disdain she has for her subject. I've read plenty of smart and valid criticisms of white women that have made me think and examine my own role in white supremacy. This wasn't one of them.

Oh for God’s sake. The ultimate critique all of this coverage drives at is of how white women, when we have our interest in whiteness catered to in this way, ultimately do at the ballot box. We are unreliable allies at best—and that is absolutely generalizable across differential levels of “real power and authority” among white women.

Agree that some white women vote along race and class lines, and I'm with you in feeling disgusted about that. But contrary to what you say, the MAGA women weren't allies in the first place.

But how on earth do makeup, clothing, and manicure choices "cater to whiteness"? Women of every race and color are following trends that work for them in terms of comfort etc. It's just math that some racial groups are a larger share of the population so they get more exposure on TicToc. Your statement that certain beauty trends should be abhorred because they "cater to whiteness" is as dumb as a lot of the associations in the article itself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the ideas in this interview are racism. I do think they are wrongheaded and a massive rhetorical stretch. I also think it's part of a broader trend of blaming white women, and especially white women with the least amount of actual power (young women trying to make a buck on Instagram, middle aged moms) instead of the white women who have actually ascended to positions of real power and authority. Easier to complain about the soft power of some Instagram influencer than to talk about how some of the white women at high levels in the media or corporate world perpetuate white supremacy. Always easiest to criticize someone who will never, ever be able to offer you a job.

Also, if you've listened to the interview but haven't read Steffi Cao's essay that prompted NPR to invite her on, I recommend reading it. The tone of the interview makes her argument seem gentler than it is. Her essay is vitriolic in a way that really bothered me. Just the absolute disdain she has for her subject. I've read plenty of smart and valid criticisms of white women that have made me think and examine my own role in white supremacy. This wasn't one of them.

Oh for God’s sake. The ultimate critique all of this coverage drives at is of how white women, when we have our interest in whiteness catered to in this way, ultimately do at the ballot box. We are unreliable allies at best—and that is absolutely generalizable across differential levels of “real power and authority” among white women.

what is my “interest in whiteness”? that kind of terminology is what just sounds conspiratorial and frankly race-based animus.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I do not think the ideas in this interview are racism. I do think they are wrongheaded and a massive rhetorical stretch. I also think it's part of a broader trend of blaming white women, and especially white women with the least amount of actual power (young women trying to make a buck on Instagram, middle aged moms) instead of the white women who have actually ascended to positions of real power and authority. Easier to complain about the soft power of some Instagram influencer than to talk about how some of the white women at high levels in the media or corporate world perpetuate white supremacy. Always easiest to criticize someone who will never, ever be able to offer you a job.

Also, if you've listened to the interview but haven't read Steffi Cao's essay that prompted NPR to invite her on, I recommend reading it. The tone of the interview makes her argument seem gentler than it is. Her essay is vitriolic in a way that really bothered me. Just the absolute disdain she has for her subject. I've read plenty of smart and valid criticisms of white women that have made me think and examine my own role in white supremacy. This wasn't one of them.

Oh for God’s sake. The ultimate critique all of this coverage drives at is of how white women, when we have our interest in whiteness catered to in this way, ultimately do at the ballot box. We are unreliable allies at best—and that is absolutely generalizable across differential levels of “real power and authority” among white women.

Agree that some white women vote along race and class lines, and I'm with you in feeling disgusted about that. But contrary to what you say, the MAGA women weren't allies in the first place.

But how on earth do makeup, clothing, and manicure choices "cater to whiteness"? Women of every race and color are following trends that work for them in terms of comfort etc. It's just math that some racial groups are a larger share of the population so they get more exposure on TicToc. Your statement that certain beauty trends should be abhorred because they "cater to whiteness" is as dumb as a lot of the associations in the article itself.

white college educated women are overwhelmingly liberal/democratic.