That will work out well for him
Oh good, another one. Smart move, gym dude.
This utter bozo demands to know what office they’re in, and then announces he’s calling 911 now.
I have to say, though, I don’t see anyone calling him a Bob or a Joe or a Kevin. It’s almost as if there is no generic name for a racist white guy who calls the manager.
I’m all in favor of coining a male equivalent term for a Karen. (I’m good with “Kevin,” as I like alliteration, but maybe we need a whiter name.) I think the main reason there isn’t one yet is because female racist assholes almost always “call the manager/police,” whereas male racist assholes only do that if they don’t think they can succeed at physically intimidating the minority.
And he tells the 911 operator that the black men “don’t appear to be part of” the building. Curious what that could be based on other than race. They’re wearing appropriate gym wear.
Even if the guy had turned out to be right and they weren’t tenants, I’m perplexed at why you would call the police anyway. If people who aren’t building tenants are using your building’s common areas, does that really injure you? Even if they’re contributing to overcrowding of the gym and slowing down your workout, that’s the kind of thing you address with the landlord. If they’re being disruptive or not following gym etiquette, that’s a matter for the landlord/building security.
Oh, and a preemptive fuck-off to anyone who wants to complain that the black men are to blame for not identifying their company or office. This guy isn’t the police. He’s not building security. He’s just some officious asshole. If some other tenant started interrogating me in my apartment complex’s common areas about whether I lived here and which unit I was in, I wouldn’t just politely decline like these gentlemen did. These self-appointed hall monitors shouldn’t be indulged.
Apparently this guy (Tom Austin) was also the guy who wrote a rather douchey opinion piece in the local newspaper in which he revealed that, lo and behold, the people who own expensive lakefront property mostly had no problem with the fact that it’s named after a notorious pro-slavery southern senator, and want to know what the Dakota people ever did to deserve to have the lake named after them instead. It’s kind of self-refuting, but this piece was a nice rebuttal.
I’ve heard “Karl” is the male equivalent, although “Kevin”, “Chad”, and “Todd” are also in the running.
Other people just use “Karen” for everyone, including males. Along those lines I have a friend who uses “mansplain” for any condescending lecture, regardless of the gender of the lecturer.
Screechy, I saw that (just as I had to run off so didn’t have time to add it). I would make “rather douchey” “VERY douchey.” Very gratuitous, too, much the way the “what office are you in?” was. Sort of like an old Gilda Radner Emily Litella routine – “WHAT’S ALL THIS FUSS ABOUT NATIVE AMERICANS WHAT DID THEY EVER DO FOR MINNESOTA.” God what a putz.
Who was the guy complaining on twitter that he couldn’t buy a toaster the other day (because covid shopping restrictions (i.e. mask and social distancing inside the shop)? I think he was a Todd. I did see tweets suggesting he should be the archetypal male Karen.
On the whole though, Karen, like most archetypes, is useful in only the sense that there is a germ of truth in it. When over used and applied in an ever broader sense archetypes change to unhelpful and sometimes dangerous dog whistles.
I vote for Todd, one of George Carlin’s favorites.
Here’s the bit so you don’t have to hunt for it >> https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=oo8CrY_ZfFk
twiliter,
Either Todd or Tucker. “Fuck Tucker, Tucker sucks.”
I miss Carlin, he was one of a kind.