Racists gonna racist, and in Trump's America, in a pandemic, with lots of people on edge in public, their racism seems to want to bubble up and proudly burst forth all the more. This week's candidate for Karen of the week is a woman losing her shit on an Asian postal worker at a post office in Los Altos, and using a racist slur.
A thankfully masked woman was visibly and audibly frustrated with the service being provided her at the Main Street post office in Los Altos. The incident unfolded last Thursday, July 23, as ABC 7 reports, and Twitter user Tyler Brumfield captured it all on camera.
The Karen in question is berating the postal worker, who is Asian American, and saying, "Can't you just do your job?! It's simple!" And "A letter with certified return receipt! I don't need to hear all this other stuff you want to try to dictate to me!" At some point the word "supervisor" can be heard, and then, only barely under her breath, the woman says, "Ch**k."
Onlookers in line, including Brumfield, then start calling the police and telling her she's out of line, at which point she becomes agitated, gathers her postal business, and walks out — but not before more audibly saying, "Fucking ch**k" on her way out, just so the camera can hear.
The video has since gone viral on an account called Karens Gone While By Pavel Paulinich.
Racist “Karen” harrasing Asian Woman at the #Postal office#LosAltos #California
— Karens Going Wild by Pavel Paulinich (@pavelpnews) July 27, 2020
She calls the worker “chi*k”#pavelpaulinich #westcoast #la #cali #usps #ups #fedex #amazon #prime #letter #karen #karensgonewild #karensgoingwild #kevin #racist #asian #asiangirls #asianamerican pic.twitter.com/KllQXpidbX
The incident is notable partly because of how brazen the racist speech is, and how the woman appears to know she's being film and she flaunts it. Also: This is Los Altos and not Fresno, or some other Republican stronghold where we're now fully used to seeing incidents like this.
At this late date, how do people not understand that these things go viral? And you could likely lose your job for being publicly racist.
But, apparently, this Karen's postal activities were very urgent, and she has no patience with anything, and she just really wanted to use that slur.
The USPS is reportedly investigating the incident.
Brumfield tells ABC7's Dion Lim (who recently wrote an op-ed about the glut of "Karen" coverage), "The reason I [posted the video] it was to spread awareness and to let people know that this is happening all around us. We live in Silicon Valley and this is happening in Los Altos, California. We are all humans and we should respect each other as such, because someone is different or has different melanin doesn't mean we have to disregard the humanity of that particular person."
Related: Local TV Journalist Suggests Media Should Not Publish Every 'Karen' Video Without Adequate Context