Nikki Osborne on why women become Karens

Karens everywhere, ruining people’s days in a proud display of recreational outrage. But why do people become Karens? I have a theory, writes Nikki Osborne.

Columnist Nikki Osborne is taking down Karens.

The other day I caught myself doing the unthinkable.

I was out walking the dog with my husband in our “Pleasantville” estate, when a boganmobile with a P plate opened up out of the roundabout and fanged towards us.

Without thought, I found myself lifting my arms and giving the “slow down” signal to him. My husband then turned to me, eyes wide with horror, and I turned to him, tears of realisation welling in my eyes. He then said to me in disgust: “WTF are you doing?!”

This column was originally published in January 2024 and has been resurfaced as part of The Courier-Mail summer columnists series.

I was overcome with shock and shame when I realised I’d just done a “Karen”.

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What’s a Karen? Well, there are multiple criteria to qualify as a Karen but a pithy summary would be: someone who anoints themselves as chief funbuster and thinks they’re the authority on rules and regulations; and they’re not afraid to vocalise this to innocent strangers.

Karens are people who value rules over logic and, since Covid, we are overrun with a cacophony of Karens.

Karens everywhere, ruining people’s days in a proud display of recreational outrage.

There are multiple criteria to qualify as a Karen.

One of my all time favourite Karen encounters was on an empty beach during Covid.

I was walking the dog and, given the beach was empty, lowered my mask.

Here I was, splendouring in a moment of calm as I’d abandoned the shit show that was homeschooling in a feeble attempt to restore my sanity.

Then I saw in the distance, a woman, storming towards me. The “Karen” marches straight up to my face and screams: “Put your mask on you’re going to kill people!”

This is where the rules vs logic comes into play. She’s just abandoned total logic of maintaining a safe distance to enforce the safety rules on to me, thus putting herself directly into the danger she’s so keen to avoid. It’s moronic behaviour. I’m proud to say my response to her was: “Okay Karen”.

I have a theory that Karens become Karens for five reasons:

1: They grew up with strict parents and feel the need to inflict their regimen on to others so they might suffer too.

2: They never got to be class captain at school and are now flexing some sort of authority.

3: They watch too much news and take it as gospel.

4: They just need a good shag.

5: They’re just miserable cows.

However, the one true result of a Karen episode is they always do more harm than good. My son showed me a US video of a Karen bailing up a woman and her six-year-old daughter for not having a permit for their lemonade stand.

She would not relent, in fact, she dialled 911 resulting in the six year old crying hysterically. My son asks me: “What the hell is wrong with that woman, Mum?!”

I watched the video again and it reinforced my Karen criteria. She first says: “I had a lemonade stand once and I was shut down.”

Okay, so she’s decided to inflict the same on others. There are memes that do the rounds on the internet about “breaking the cycle of abuse”.

She’s clearly not seen that meme. She then says, “I have five children.” Okay. So she’s a miserable cow too. Point made.

But I must stress that Karens are not just women. Men do it too, however they usually have a more calm, misogynistic tone as opposed to screeching outbursts.

Columnist Nikki Osborne is taking down Karens.

I recall skimming rocks with my boys at a beach once. There was nobody around. Until … Mr Karen, who was swimming in from an entirely different direction to our rock skimming, decides to swim in, stand in front of me and say: “You shouldn’t be doing that here.” I laughed and said, “What, I shouldn’t skim rocks at the beach … at the beach? Where should I do it? On your car?”

He then started towards me in a threatening manner but thankfully my husband then moved towards him and asked if he had a problem.

Now I’m all for a modern man but I must say I was rather afluster at my husband’s chest-beating display and, funnily enough, Mr Karen no longer had a problem with me and my boys skimming rocks at the beach.

So my questions for you: should logic always overrule rules? I believe it should because sometimes rules are created by repressed nerds. Also, what’s your best Karen story? And lastly, what should a male Karen be called? By-law Ken?

Originally published as Nikki Osborne on why women become Karens