I encourage you to put yourself in someone else's shoes. The "joke" is there's this archetypal character who is often named Karen who is entitled and makes unreasonable demands. If your name is Karen, that sucks. It's not about egocentrism, the villain in this joke is literally named Karen. Imagine you couldn't go through life and raise a concern about any issue because someone would be like "har har, you're being a real Karen". Even if it's a joke, when you hear it a thousand times that gets old and it sucks.

I have some friends who named their daughter Alexa before Amazon released the virtual assistant with the same name. Kids at school tease her. She can't go by Alexa, she has to go by Lex. Again, I encourage you to imagine yourself in someone else's place.

[+] MotoAsh@lemmy.world -1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) (1 children)

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[–] LesserAbe@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You're right, we shouldn't regulate this type of speech. I'm not proposing we outlaw calling someone "a Karen." I'm arguing that people who care about how others feel should reconsider this type of joke.

You mentioned that this sort of thing is only a problem if you're surrounded by morons. Let's be generous and call them people who don't see things your way. Isn't that all of life? I gave the example of a child named Alexa because it's a literal real life example. It is a thing that happens, not a hypothetical. I have a kind and quiet family member named Karen, and it's a nuisance in her life.

You mentioned egocentrism. Isn't it egocentric to think "I will say whatever I want and if that makes someone else feel bad who cares?" I try to live my life in a way where I'm not knowingly causing other people discomfort. Sometimes that's not possible for good reason. We can still try.