‘Karen’ and the violence of white womanhood
WHEN YOU LOOK UP THE HASHTAG #KAREN ON INSTAGRAM, a search that yields more than 773,000 posts, the featured image is a screenshot of a white woman staring into the camera, pursing her lips into a smile as she touches a finger to her chin, a movement that’s at once condescending and cloying. The woman’s name is Lisa Alexander, but on the Internet, she’s most recognized as the “San Francisco Karen.”
In a clip that went viral in June, Alexander confronts James Juanillo, who is stenciling BLACK LIVES MATTER in chalk on the front of his own home, and demands to know if he is defacing private property. Juanillo, who identified himself in a social-media caption as a person of color, is seen telling her and her partner that they should call the police if they feel he is breaking the
