There are loads of “Karens” out in the wild—or so the internet makes it seem—but do remember that what you see on the internet has to be taken with a grain of salt. Or a good handful of it.
A video has recently surfaced, showing a conflict between a “Karen” and another woman (later, a whole mob of people) in a residential building garage after the former blocked the entrance with her car so that the latter couldn’t get inside for safety reasons.
But the question many have been starting to ask is who’s really the “Karen” here?
More Info: TikTok
While the internet loves a "Karen", not anyone you point your finger and shout at is necessarily one
Image credits: beingerikakane
So, TikToker and blogger Erika Kane (a.k.a Erika R. Lee) has shared a video on her TikTok channel showing a woman said to be blocking an apartment garage with her car. She kept demanding Erika show her her “clicker,” a remote for opening the garage door as proof that she lives there. And the issue escalated quickly.
In short, Erika refused to show the clicker, not just because she didn’t have to prove anything to anyone, but also because it didn’t really prove anything—if you’re gonna try to enter a residential garage without a key to it, you’re gonna have to eventually leave somehow, so it makes no sense why anyone would try to do it at all.
All while this was happening, the woman in the car was blocking the entrance, and all of the cars (at first 5, later 8) trying to enter the garage were simply waiting. The woman in the car said that she’d feel safer if folks would show their clickers and then everyone could move on.
However, since it was rather late in the day, everyone was tired, the situation got worse by the second and more people got involved in the conflict.
A video of some folks getting really angry at this one woman blocking an apartment garage entrance has gone viral
But it's not because the woman in the car is a Karen, but rather the folks shouting at her have reason to be such
Image credits: beingerikakane
Erika posted 3 more follow-up videos providing context (here, here, and here). It was late, around 10PM, when Erika and her boyfriend were coming back home separately. Because they share a clicker, one had to wait for the other to get there to open up the garage. However, another person—the woman in the car in the first video—got there first and hence opened the garage, after which Erika’s boyfriend simply tailgated.
Erika got there, saw her boyfriend halfway in the garage, blocked by another car, and went to investigate. The two women tried to talk it out, one asked to move, the other demanded to see a clicker, both decided to not do any of those things, and both started to get very antsy.
At this point, there were 5 or 6 cars, and one of the drivers from another car, wearing a FedEx uniform, stepped out and started fueling the conversation. Erika also points out that the majority of the folks there were black, so there may have been some racial tension there.
He explained that her “policing” everyone at this point made no sense as there was a second, permanently open (due to maintenance) garage door on the other side of the building, so it made no sense to be in this situation. In the end, there was a lot of yelling.
Image credits: beingerikakane
Some time, and several phone-whips (for recording purposes) later, the woman in the car moved, all 8 cars waiting got in, and everyone dispersed while the “alleged Karen” stayed in the car until everyone else was gone.
And folks were, well, not torn on the issue, but there were definitely several sides to it all and internauts made it very clear.
On the one side, there was a woman calling another woman a “Karen” because she was blocking everyone trying to reach their homes because she didn’t feel safe, or at least that's how it went at face value. And on the other hand, there was a woman actively tackling the issue of safety and security in her building.
But the issue here was much more complicated than one might think. Folks started pointing out a lot of unnecessary yelling and demands, namely that nobody really needed to block anyone for the issue to be resolved, and nobody really needed to refuse to show their clickers, if that’s all that there was to it.
Despite the original poster explaining the situation, folks online still think the woman blocking the garage entrance was right to do so
Besides that, others pointed out that there are rules and regulations demanding folks come into garages one car at a time as the driver opening the door is technically responsible for everyone entering the premises, and anyone tailgating them would fall under their responsibility as well. So, the woman in the car was actually right to demand folks prove they live there.
Finally, the tide started to turn, and Erika herself was beginning to look like the bad guy in this situation after commenters began noticing that the woman in the car wasn’t mad or angry as much as she was concerned and scared that what seemed like a mob was now shouting at her.
And while it wasn’t ultimately the woman’s job to police anyone, as one commenter stated—“Not her job, not her right, not her responsibility. Photograph. Note date and time. Contact management and police and get on with it“—but she was just trying to make sure everyone was safe.
Whatever the case, Erika’s video got nearly 5 million views, with the three other updates garnering another 700,000, coming out to a bit over 380,000 likes collectively.