What’s in a name?
"I just tried to pick classic names that felt like they would have to work really hard to get mad at me about later,” — Mindy Kaling, joking about naming her children Katherine and Spencer
Well, FML for my nickname "Becky!" But, hey, at least my name isn't Karen, which I will get into momentarily….
Names matter. They can certainly affect your life.
In literature, when a name becomes an adjective it's because of a memorable character, like Pollyanna (based on the heroine in the classic children’s book Pollyanna by Eleanor Porter, originally published in 1913) and still holds up. Orphaned Pollyanna Whittier comes to live with her stern aunt, spreading perpetual cheerfulness and optimism among the miserable people in town, transforming the life of her lonely relative. (Have you actually met anyone named Pollyanna? I have not. Please make an introduction!)
Obviously while deciding on baby names, most parents have no intention of causing their children suffering or embarrassment. But these days? We have no clue what name will always be a gift OR turn into a curse, or pejorative label.
I wrote a magazine piece once where I interviewed women named Buffy at the height of the popular television series “Buffy The Vampire Slayer.” Many had actually been named after Grammy-award-winning Canadian folk singer Buffy Sainte-Marie, the first Indigenous person to win an Oscar. Unfortunately, from 1997-2003, when the show aired, Buffy's lived constantly with tiresome quips like, “How many vampires have you killed today?” (Very original, I know!)
“Becky” has also gotten a bad rap alongside “Karens.”
My parents named me Rebecca, after my great-grandmother. But they’ve only ever called me Becky. Everyone pre-university calls me Becky. Everyone else usually calls me Rebecca.
Growing up, Becky was just my nickname. Today, it's an all-encompassing term for materialist white women. The descriptor “getting becky’” has become known as a particular sexual act performed by “enthusiastic white women.” (Yes, I mean blow jobs!)
"These days, Becky increasingly functions as an epithet, and being used to refer to a white woman who is ignorant of both her privilege and her prejudice,” according to Merriam Webster.
I'm sure there were benefits for Karens as children, like finding their name in souvenir shops?
But how could their parents predict that decades later in 2021, Karen would be a moniker used to describe privileged middle-aged, rudely entitled and superior white women, or that Karen would become a descriptor mocking women who complain incessantly and say, “I want to speak to the manager!” a lot?
I feel for women named “Karen,” especially since restrictions are lifting, leading to prime “Karen-sightings.” For fun, I reached out to authors named Karen to give them extra love and ask how they felt about their name.
Almost all have been affected by societal pejorative labelling of Karens. They now must think twice about sending food back and preface any conversation with any manager by “I'm really not that Karen!”
(Shocker—there were fewer newborn girls named Karen in 2020 than in any year since 1932!)
Author Karen Gosbee is a mental health and addiction advocate. Her 2020 widely read memoir, A Perfect Nightmare: My Glittering Marriage and How It Almost Cost Me My Life(SutherlandHouse Books), is a chilling, beautifully written account of (to the outside world) living the perfect life — having a successful husband, beautiful children, multiple homes, A-list invitations — to her awakening of her husband's increasingly erratic behaviour, affairs, addictions and emotional bullying, ending in tragedy (and headlines.) Click here to buy this fascinating fast-paced memoir.
“I get it," Karen Gosbee says. “We need a descriptor for that middle-aged, unearned privileged white woman that complains. It just sucks that it's my name.”
She can't even go to Starbucks without it being awkward. “When they ask my name, I pause and contemplate all the other names I could be. When I tell them my name? The barista will do a five-second, mouth partly open pause. Then their demeanour turns sympathetic or pitiful. Ordering a coffee is a modern-day confessional now,” she says. “I have admitted my sin — my name!”
After Gosbee posted an Instagram story four months ago that read, "Happy Birthday to Me. Happy Birthday, Dear Karen (not a Karen) Happy Birthday to Me.” Another woman wrote to her, “Hello, and happy birthday. I am Karen too. I think we must band together to fight against the stereotype we have been given. I know your comment was in jest, but I ask you to consider not perpetuating the stereotype.” (I mean, talk about perpetuating being a Karen!)
“She has a point. But I’m not going to deny I was personally hurt. I was finally embracing the reality of my name. I was moving from hurt to humour to make light of my name," Gosbee says. “I don’t usually make a big deal about myself or my birthday, so I embraced the circumstance on social media. And then I was called out — by a Karen.”
“I wanted to say to her, ‘We need each other!’ We are still second-class citizens, because we are female.” I don’t disagree! We make light of calling someone a Karen, as I am, but it IS also sexist and ageist.
It’s happened more than once while Gosbee was talking that a young person (typically, in her experience) and usually another female would cut her off mid-sentence, calling her Karen to her face. “A lot comes up within me, mostly empathizing and understanding of what many generations endured due to mistreatment by white people. In those situations, I am rendered voiceless — and it's a role I am very familiar with as a survivor of domestic violence."
Gosbee believes complaining Karens could embrace their inner Karen to advocate for collective good. “This is my dream.”
Author Karen (Kaz) Connelly has written 10 bestsellers, has been nominated for the Governor General's Award, and is one of my favourite Canadian authors. Unlike Gosbee, Connelly actually enjoys the buzz over Karens. "As soon as I heard about the attack on Karens, I stopped using my nickname, Kaz, on my social media platforms and went back to…Karen! As a therapist and writer, I'm fascinated by polarities, by extremes," she says. “Personally and politically, I am the quintessential anti-Karen. So how interesting to be in the midst of a big cultural storm over my name!”
Her novel The Change Room (Penguin Random House Canada) is a fabulous story about Eliza, a mother whose only “me-time” is her swims at the community pool. One morning, she encounters a young woman. Seeing her naked in the change room completely undoes Eliza. A steamy, intimate affair ensues. The sex is all-encompassing but threatens Eliza's happy family and her lover’s world. Purchase this fun and erotic read here!
Karen Katz is an American writer and illustrator of numerous children’s books, inspired to write her first, Over the Moon, Square Fish when she and her husband adopted a child from Guatemala and welcomed her into their home. My America (Henry Holt and Co.) came out just last month and is a picture book that celebrates immigration to the United States, told through the experiences of children who have come from around the world.
"I didn't know Karen was a name with a bad rap until my husband informed me," Katz says. “I thought it was funny because I immediately thought of Karen on Will and Grace. Am I a Karen? Not a chance!"
Author Karen Krossing’s YA novel Punch Like a Girl, published by Orca Books, features a moody and violent teen, Tori, with a hero complex. While doing community service at a shelter for victims of domestic violence, she bonds with a young girl and comes face to face with an ex-boyfriend who sexually assaulted her. Buy this gripping read, dealing with justice and identity here.
"I identify as me, not a meme,” says Krossing. “If the Karen meme can break down female white entitlement, go for it. If it's used as sexism and ageism, I'm against it.”
“So my name’s Karen. Hey, after 64 years, I'm not complainin’,” says Karen Shenfeld, a widely recognized poet, who was shocked when she first learned about the Karen meme. “Many Karens are my age. We are old hippie flower children, not racist or complainers in the least!” You can probably see this in her latest poetry collection To Measure the World, which focuses on the chimerical nature of love. Buy it here. (Eratosthenes Editions)
"I now mumble when I’m asked my name, though I try to be as courteous and charming as possible," says Karen Levenstein Sokoloff, founder of the newish TINYabc (This is Not Your Average Book Club) Facebook group. “I’ve seriously considered using a pseudonym at times. I mean, really! And shouldn’t Canadian Karens not count? We’re always polite.”
I’m not sure about being “always polite," but please join her fun and polite Facebook book club group here.
Doesn't all this make you wonder: Will my name be next? Even Mindy Kailing may not be laughing in the future over her "safe" baby names!
Know authors named Karen, or Becky, or Pollyanna that need some extra love? Put them on my radar.
xo
Becky (just this once!)