Monday's Most Active Threads

The most active thread yesterday was titled, "Is Karen considered a racial slur?" and posted in the "Off-Topic" forum. The original poster says that her high school-aged daughter told her about a discussion at school in which a student was corrected by a teacher for using the term "Karen" because the teacher viewed the term as a racial slur. The original poster does not view "Karen" as a slur and asks whether this is a common interpretation. There are a number of issues to consider here. One is that there is no universally agreed upon definition of "Karen". Wikipedia defines "Karen" as "a middle-class white woman perceived as entitled or demanding beyond the scope of what is normal." Dictionary.com's definition is slightly different saying "Karen" refers to "an obnoxious, angry, entitled, and often racist middle-aged white woman who uses her privilege to get her way or police other people’s behaviors." When I first encountered "Karen" as a meme rather than a first name, I remember it differing somewhat from both of those definitions. "Karen" was a middle-aged, perhaps middle class, White woman with a bob haircut who wanted to speak to the manager. I always found this a bit bewildering because I was always taught that, if you were not satisfied with the service being provided, you should speak to the manager. In fact, I have spoken to a great many managers in my lifetime. So, what was the problem here? Eventually, the meaning of "Karen" morphed to describe a White woman who uses her racial privilege to harm or otherwise disadvantage others, especially Black men. However, I have seen posters on DCUM use "Karen" to mean any number of things. To some extent, it has simply become a substitute for the word "bitch". "Karen" as a name and in its original connotation as a meme is closely associated with white women. As such, there is no denying its racial and gender implications. Therefore, many consider it to be a racist and sexist pejorative. Several of those responding in this thread argue that "Karen" is used to silence women, particularly White women. An interesting discussion could probably be held on the relationship of race, gender, and privilege and how those things relate to the term "Karen". In its most common usage, "Karen" assumes that White women have racial privilege which they exploit, frequently against Black men. White women, on the other hand, often see themselves not as privileged, but rather suffering from gender discrimination that encumbers them with a host of disadvantages. As such, "Karen" is simply a misogynistic effort to discourage women from standing up for or asserting themselves. Another thing to consider is the difference between how the term many have been meant when used and how it was interpreted. Someone may very well call someone a "Karen" due to the individual's overly-entitled behavior. But, this could easily be perceived as criticism resulting from the individual's race and gender. For this reason, while I think the idea behind "Karen" can be useful, in actual practice, "Karen" is not the appropriate term for it. It would be great to have a term to refer to overly-entitled, self-absorbed, self unaware, obnoxious folks of whatever race or gender. But, instead of "Karen", I propose "Elon".

The next most active thread was posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. Titled, "What is the obsession on DCUM with university rankings and were your kid goes to school?", the original poster questions the interest in some of the most common topics of discussion in the forum such as the obsession with the top 10-50 colleges, the private vs public debate, and the college choices made by others. The original poster argues that everyone is doing the best for their kids and doesn't understand why all of this is so controversial. I didn't read more than four or five posts from this thread, but it appears that very few posters bothered to address the questions posed in the original post. Rather, posters described their own decisions and then other posters argued with them about those decisions. The thread appears to be simply a huge debate about colleges writ large. I think that part of the answer to the original poster's questions is simply the nature of who participates in a forum of this sort. Participation is self-selected given that nobody is forced to use the College forum, or any forum on DCUM. Users choose to read or post on their own volition. Naturally, those who do choose to participate have a particular interest in the topic. They probably have strong opinions and/or take the discusion seriously. College decisions are important to them and they want to make the best choices. Posters who don't care where their kids go to college are unlikely to spend much time debating topics in the College forum. Those hoping their child will make it into an Ivy League school are much more likely to seek advice and information on the topic. For comparison, imagine that we had a forum for discussing Pokemon Go. Those who don't care about the game would probably not participate. Those who are obsessed with the game would likely join discussions about the best stratagies for playing, which Pokemons are the best to capture, which locations are good places for playing, etc. To those not sharing the obsession, the discussions would likely seem pointless and we might question them. But, to those participating in the threads, the topics would seem entirely natural. So, the answer to the original posters question is simply that he doesn't share the same level of interest in colleges as other posters in the forum, and therefore, doesn't understand the obsession with certain topics.

The next most active thread was titled, "Jon Hamm settles down" and posted in the "Entertainment and Pop Culture" forum. Had I noticed this thread before just now, I probably would have deleted it. We have a rule prohibiting threads in which the original post consists of nothing but a link. In this case, the original poster included a single word, "Typical" in addition to a link. But, that hardly counts as discussion. The link went to a Daily Mail article about actor Jon Hamm marrying Anna Osceola in Big Sur, California. Hamm, of course, is the star of Mad Men. At least to me, it was not immediately clear what was "typical". Is it "typical" for a TV star to get married? Is it "typical" to get married in Big Sur? Not being interested in celebrity relationships, I don't know whether these are typical things or not. Based on the responses I read, the biggest issue was Hamm's age. He is 52 while Osceola is 35. There is considerable discussion about this age difference and its importance. One poster argues that "the highest quality women marry young men when they are also young". Therefore, Osceola's decision to marry Hamm indicates that she is not high quality. DCUM is a women-dominated forum and the Entertainment forum is particularly popular among female posters. It is one of DCUM's strongest tenets that women should be valued for more than just their looks. But, that message doesn't seem to have made it to the Entertainment forum where the only characteristics of women that seem to be valued are beauty and fertility. I didn't read enough to become informed about Osceola's fertility status, but I have no reason to suspect that will be an issue (I also have no desire to know and more than that). But, I did read enough to observe that, as far as many posters were concerned, Osceola came up very short in the beauty department. One poster deemed her a "7 at best" and a 6 in the wedding photos. To be sure, Hamm was not exactly leaving posters breathless with his looks either. There were many posters who considered him "attractive for his age" which is sort of a back-handed compliment. I see that in later pages the issue of fertility did come up, but mostly as an explanation for why Hamm had chosen a younger woman for marriage rather than a long-term girlfriend who, I gather, was older. But, frankly, none of this is interesting to me and I feel a bit embarrassed to even be writing about it.

The final thread at which I'll look today was posted in the "Tweens and Teens" forum. Titled, "DS given melatonin gummies as prank by 'friends' at sleepover", the original poster elaborates on the title by explaining that her 15-year-old son attended a sleepover with about 14 other boys and one of the boys gave her son a plate of snacks that included fruit snacks and, unbeknownst to her son, melatonin gummies. The next morning her son had trouble waking up and then vomited. The other boys teased and made fun of him. The original poster would like to tell the other parents so that the kids can learn not to do such things, but her son is afraid that this will harm his relationship with the other boys. Among the responses I've read, almost all urge the original poster to tell the other parents. Posters fear that if the other kids don't suffer consequences, they may do something more dangerous in the future. Several say that if they were the parents, they would want to know. The original poster's son is afraid that he will lose the boys as friends but several posters argue that they have already demonstrated that they are not really his friends. Most of the boys play on the same soccer team and some posters urge the original poster to tell the soccer coach and also to inform the school. Some posters think that even a call to the police would be in order. Eventually the original poster updated to say that she had contacted all of the other parents plus the soccer coaches (apparently there are two of them). The original poster said very little about the reactions from the other parents other than that one had refused to believe their child was involved. Such a denial was predicted earlier in the thread by some posters who said, correctly as it turns out, that some parents cannot accept that their child would do anything bad.