W
e all know Karen. She
is the minority of 30
to
40-year-old
white
women whose voice is loud despite how
misguided and misinformed she is.
She exudes entitlement and a superior
“Can I speak to the manager?” attitude.
She is unafraid to use her privilege as
a weapon. In today’s context, she is
audibly doubtful of any new COVID-19
research and public-health protocols,
especially when her long-overdue salon
appointment is at stake. And according
to Heather Suzanne Woods, a meme
researcher and professor at Kansas
State University, Karen “demands the
world exist according to her standards
with little regard for others, and she
is willing to risk or demean others to
achieve her ends.” This definition con-
tinues to evolve.
The controversial stereotype of
a woman named Karen has roots in
African American Vernacular Eng-
lish as well as a tirading subreddit,
and it has taken over internet culture
in the form of a meme. Karen’s notori-
ous behavior is best depicted in viral
TikTok videos, acting as a social com-
mentary towards absurd and indecent
behavior rooted in white supremacy.
However, the use of this meme was
quick to receive criticism on accounts
of sexism, racism, ageism and clas-
sism. While writer Julie Blindel went
so far as to call the meme a “slur” that
is “woman hating” in a tweet, oth-
ers even likened it to “the n-word for
white women.” In the name of reverse
racism and other baseless accusations,
the meme continues to be attacked.
And once again, the perfectly legiti-
mate message this politicized joke was
meant to express was underwhelmed
by another fruitless debate.
The meme is simple: Karen-like
behavior is problematic. It is problem-
atic because it is a direct result of white
supremacist sentiments that have
long been deeply embedded within
the current system. It is problematic
because when authority gets involved,
Karen is initially never at fault and is
never doubted. And it is problematic
because Karen knows this when she
picks up the phone to dial 911 at the
slightest inconvenience. In fact, just
this past Memorial day, a Twitter
video went viral revealing a similar
incident in Central Park regarding a
white woman calling the police on an
African-American man who simply
asked her to put a leash on her dog,
telling them he was threatening her
life. These kinds of false accusations
to the police against Black people are
extremely dangerous and have dire
consequences as history has revealed
time and time again, like in the case of
Emmett Till. But Karen won’t think
twice before racial profiling.
Defending any similar behavior
is problematic — especially on the
account of reverse racism. This fic-
tional term assumes that racism exists
on a level playing field and that there
exists a level of power and author-
ity the Karen meme has to affect the
white person’s privileges. But there is
no systemic relationship with power
here and, if anything, excessive use of
the joke contributes to racial prejudice
among white women, leaving all their
privileges intact. To liken Karen to the
“n-word for white women” is com-
pletely inappropriate, especially when
no word carries the same weight of
violent, systemic racism. To use sexism
as a victimizing justification for tak-
ing advantage of someone’s historical
oppression is nothing short of white
feminism, using feminism so long as
it’s comfortable and self-rewarding and
continues to further a white agenda.
As commissioning editor Kuba Shand-
Baptiste suggests in her column for
Independent, “getting to the Karen
equals
discrimination
conclusion
requires an enormous leap: Entirely
ignoring the racist behaviours the nick-
name originally intended to personify.”
The Karen debate is not one worth
having. Her behavior is explicit and
wrong, and it is justifiably called out
by internet culture. But it’s not the only
type of conduct that is unacceptable. It’s
easy to point out other people’s wrongs
and to criticize their absurd behavior,
especially when it’s trending. Subtle
racial profiling and implicit prejudice
may be quieter, but it is just as influen-
tial. Complicit silence is just as loud. As
protests for the countless Black lives
unlawfully lost to systemic racism and
police violence continue to take over
the streets across the country, claiming
you are not racist is no longer sufficient.
Our role as machines against injustice
continues to evolve. And it’s more than
likely that there exists a sliver of Karen
in all of us that we must constantly keep
in check. We must recognize our own
entitled tendencies towards any race,
class and gender.
4
Thursday, June 11, 2020
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
OPINION
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EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS
EASHETA SHAH | COLUMNIST
Easheta Shah can be reached at
shaheash@umich.edu.
Recognize your ‘Karen’
T
here is a massive mental health
crisis brewing as COVID-19
sweeps across our communi-
ties. While many of us are trying to fol-
low ever-changing protocols at home,
thousands of frontline workers are
perpetually immersed in the pandemic,
unable to escape the constant threat
of exposure. The number of cases and
deaths have overwhelmed our current
healthcare infrastructure — but the
depth of this unpreparedness goes far
beyond not having enough masks.
Healthcare workers must deal with
a high daily influx of COVID-19 cases
coming into hospitals with composure
while patients and families are suffer-
ing. Their workload has skyrocketed,
alongside a constant uncertainty of
ever-changing protocols. Burnout is
typical in the medical field even when
there isn’t a crisis at hand, and with the
added stress COVID-19 and govern-
ment failures put on frontline medical
workers, the emotional toll is going
to be unprecedented. Since the sharp
increase of cases in the United States in
mid-March, these workers have had no
time to process the emotional weight of
the crisis, and have no time to seek psy-
chiatric support.
Facing
continuous,
inescapable
stress both in the workplace and inter-
personally is having a devastating
impact on healthcare workers. There
are three critical psychological impacts:
acute stress response, moral injury and
post-traumatic stress disorder. Stress
reactions range from physical symp-
toms like headaches to behavioral
changes like drug and alcohol abuse.
If these reactions are not recognized
and confronted, feelings of guilt and
shame can accumulate below the sur-
face. Moral injury occurs when there
is a betrayal of what is considered right
— during this pandemic, healthcare
workers have to consistently go against
their own beliefs to uphold hospital
protocol. Healthcare workers cannot
touch, comfort or support their patients
in ways they used to, and they must
act as the liaison between families and
patients that are separated at the door.
While no family was allowed to
enter the room of a dying 75-year-old
COVID-19 patient, one nurse remained
by his side. She held his hand and moist-
ened his lips to help comfort him. Ulti-
mately, “she held an iPad close to him,
so he could see the face and hear the
voice of a grief-stricken relative Skyp-
ing from the hospital corridor.” After he
passed away, she wept in the secluded
hallway. Coping with a moral injury
takes time that frontline workers do
not have. Finally, the unavoidable stress
and moral injury they experience can
lead to PTSD, a mental health disorder
with symptoms similar to a traumatic
brain injury, that severely alters how
someone experiences stress.
When someone experiences trauma
and does not have the social or psy-
chological support needed to process
and manage the weight of its emo-
tional impact, they can develop coping
mechanisms to help relieve temporary
frustration. However, the trauma can
ultimately rewire the brain, leaving
the nervous system on constant high
alert for the next stressor. The residual
effects of suppressing the impact of
trauma does not aid healing, but rather
creates a cacophony of physical and psy-
chological symptoms that can be debili-
tating. PTSD is a mental health disorder
that alters the function of the amygdala,
which regulates emotions and stress
responses. The hippocampus, critical
for verbal declarative memory, is also
highly sensitive to trauma. Addition-
ally, PTSD can permanently alter the
medial prefrontal cortex, which helps
regulate emotions and behavior.
It is critical that we take the time to
educate ourselves about PTSD, anxi-
ety disorders and the impact of trauma
on one’s well being while the rapidly
churning news cycle buries the threat
of the mental health crisis. Thanking
the medical frontline heroes for their
tireless work is a good first step, but we
must effectively support these workers
by actively listening to their struggles
and addressing the structural failures
of psychiatric care.
In order to appropriately address the
crisis at hand, we must provide ongo-
ing and wide-scope care. According to
Dr. Jessica Gold, an assistant professor
psychiatry at Washington University
in St. Louis, that includes “preventive
measures (stress reduction, mindful-
ness, and educational materials), in-
the-moment measures (hotlines, crisis
support), and treatment (telepsychiatry
for therapy, and medication if needed).”
As a community, we must collectively
work to destigmatize mental illness
and seeking treatment and choose to
be supportive rather than dismissive.
We need to check in and be prepared
to actively listen to the struggles and
traumas these workers are willing to
share, even when it is painful. Keeping
a strong support system is difficult dur-
ing this time of social distancing, but it
is critical for the successful recovery of
frontline medical workers.
In the United States, mental ill-
ness is slowly becoming less stigma-
tized. However, the progress toward
acknowledging and confronting mental
illness is not urgent enough.
The mental health of frontline workers
ELIZABETH COOK | OP-ED
Elizabeth Cook is an Opinion Senior
Editor and junior in the College of Literature,
Science & the Arts and can be reached at
elizcook@umich.edu.
Read more at MichiganDaily.com
Read more at MichiganDaily.com