The intensity of racist hatred of white women that the New York Times is proud to publish can be pretty astonishing even today. They really aren’t boiling the frog all that slowly. For example:
The name has come to represent an entitled and belligerent white woman. But what does this narrative say — and elide — about racism and sexism today?
To accompany this essay, the Columbus, Ohio-based artist Carmen Winant created six collages exclusively for T, all of which are titled “White Women Look Away” (2021). The works are a continuation of her 2016 series of the same name, made in response to that year’s presidential election and to the “lack of support Prof. Anita Hill received from white women” during her testimony in 1991, says Winant. “The center of my work is second-wave feminism,” she continues, “for all of its promise and potential — and for all of its problems.”
By Ligaya Mishan
Artwork by Carmen Winant
Aug. 12, 2021… In recent years, “Karen” has become an epithet for a type of interfering, hectoring white woman, the self-appointed hall monitor unloosed on the world, so assured of her status in society that she doesn’t hesitate to summon the authorities — demanding to speak to the manager or calling the police — for the most trivial and often wholly imaginary transgressions.
What’s striking is how there is absolutely no reason other than racist hate to specify that this type of woman is white. Surely, this kind of behavior is not restricted to a single race of women? For example, I’ve been informed by countless restaurant workers over the years that their very worst customers tend to be of that sacred race that the staff self-protectingly refers to only as “uh-oh, Canadians.”
