‘Karen’ in park unleashes tirade on schoolgirls picking berries, tells them ‘go back where you came from’
A 'Karen' was recorded shouting racist remarks at schoolgirls after she saw them picking berries and eating them while on a walk. The woman was seen in the viral video approaching the girls and telling them to "go back where you came from” during a heated back and forth.
According to a report by The Sun, the altercation took place on the High Knoll Trail at Minnekhada Regional Park in Canada over the weekend. The video started with the 'Karen', who has not been named, lecturing the students about picking berries at a public park.
“I pay for this park and I don’t like to see people wrecking it,” the woman said. In response, the girls argue they are "not wrecking it, there’s literally so many berries everywhere.”
first time encountering a karen in the wild today. this lady decides to yell at my friend @pwncssleeka and i for eating berries off a branch then proceeds to tell us to “go back to where we came from.” the entitlement some white people have is actually disturbing. pic.twitter.com/uerzowQiQC
— sara (@PashandiSara) June 29, 2020
The 'Karen', at this point, began waving her arms around animatedly and mocking the girls. “Oh my God, we’re not wrecking it, oh, there’s so many berries out here, there’s so many berries!” she screamed.
The girls told the woman to mind her own business after she was heard calling them "complete twits" while walking away from the situation. The 'Karen' immediately turned following their comment and said as she waved and pointed her finger at the girls, “You know, that is the f*****g rudest thing you’ve said to me."
“Go back where you came from if you want to use statements like that,” she added. The schoolgirls responded saying they were born in Canada, while the 'Karen' was forced to admit she was originally born in the United States but now lives in the Canadian province of British Columbia. They then called the woman a colonizer and suggested in the video that she go back to where she came from.
As per Metro Vancouver Parks’ official guidelines, visitors are urged to “leave vegetation, driftwood, rocks, and other natural materials undisturbed to protect park habitats.”
Speaking to local media DH News Vancouver, Elika Gholizadeh, identified as one of the two schoolgirls, explained that they “genuinely were not aware that there was a bylaw in place against picking at the small branches and we would have understood the woman’s concern for the environment, had she not approached us in such a condescending and rude manner.”
The video has gone viral across major social media platforms, and among the tens of thousands of viewers was Coquitlam Mayor Richard Stewart. Mayor Stewart expressed his disapproval of the Karen's conduct, pointing out that the comment, "Go back to where you came from," was simply unacceptable. "It's never acceptable unless you're speaking to a racist from the United States and asking her to, perhaps, take her attitude back to where she came from," he told CTV.
'Karen' has become a popular moniker to describe middle-aged women who talk down to people with differing opinions or are overly sensitive.
One of the most egregious incidents where a 'Karen' was ridiculed for her entitled attitude was the notorious Central Park incident involving Amy Cooper. According to The Sun, Cooper summoned the authorities and complained to them that a man threatened her life when in fact he simply requested her to leash her dog.