Karen is a slang term used as an antagonistic female character in memes. "Karen" is generally characterized as an
irritating, entitled woman, sometimes as an ex-wif
e who took custody of "the kids."
Origin[]
While it's unclear where exactly "Karen" began seeing use as a pejorative character, it perhaps started with the Oh My God, Karen, You Can’t Just Ask Someone Why They're White meme from Mean Girls. Others believe that the popularity of the name may come from the character Karen from the 1989 gangster film Goodfellas.
Some believe that usage of the name as a pejorative stems from the Dane Cook standup comedy routine "The Friend That Nobody Like," which first appeared on the album Retaliation, released on July 26th, 2005 and recorded 2004.
Spread[]
One of the earliest widespread examples was Nintendo Switch Karen. On October 20th, 2016, Nintendo released the first trailer for the Nintendo Switch.
In the trailer, a woman brings the Switch to a rooftop party. That day, Tumblr user joematar posted a joke about the woman arriving at the party with the caption “Oh shit, Karen brought her stupid Nintendo thing to the party again. We’re DRINKING, Karen. We’re having CONVERSATIONS.” As of December 27th, 2017, the post has over 23,000 notes.
On December 7th, 2017, the subreddit /r/FuckYouKaren was created, and has over 57,000 subscribers as of December 27th, 2018. The subreddit is devoted to mocking the character in jokes that characterize "Karen" as annoying. Many jokes revolve around the character having a specific style of haircut indicating her character (examples shown below).
On March 18th, 2018, Urban Dictionary user Cody Kolodziejzyk posted a definition of "Karen" as an annoying middle-aged white woman.
In late 2018, a series of jokes spread in which "Karen" is an ex-wife had taken the kids in a custody battle, many of which appear in the She Took the Fucking Kids meme. On December 24th, 2018, Redditor ashleyallday posted an inquiry to /r/OutOfTheLoop about the jokes, pointing to two examples.
#AndThenKarenSnapped[]
On January 20th, 2020, the hashtag #AndThenKaenSnapped began trending after Twitter user @RiotGrlErin first tweeted the hashtag after the stating "The Apps were cold". Twitter users began using the hashtag to tweet comedic scenarios in which the Karen character would get frustrated. Twitter user @MunaNawabit1 tweeted, "Found out that the study they funded to prove vaccines cause autism proved that vaccines don’t cause autism #AndThenKarenSnapped" and garnered over 9,300 likes and 2,300 retweets in a day.
That day, Twitter user @DeadStillPretty tweeted, "#AndThenKarenSnapped When Karen demanded to speak to the manager and I told her I AM the manager". The tweet garnered over 2,800 likes and 290 retweets in a day.