Guest Post by Kurt Schlichter
One of the least appealing aspects of the American character is the residual Puritanism that still compels a certain percentage of our countrymen, women and others, to nag, pester, and generally annoy the rest of us by trying to make us conform to their stick-up-the-Lieu vision of propriety. These people – these obnoxious Karens, for lack of a better FCC-compliant term – are delighted by the Chinese Bat Biter grippe and the opportunity it presents for them to try to impose their arbitrary will upon the rest of us. These mewling Mussolinis need to be slapped back, verbally if not physically, but as long as we are under this lockdown, they will not stop. They live for this, the chance to dictate to and control us, and the problem is some of them have positions of power.
This is yet another reason – as if the failure of the “We’re all gonna die!” model and the mass economic devastation the Twitter blue checks ignore were not reasons enough – that we need to be focusing on coming out of this Wuhan flu funk. If would be a pity if pangolin licking not only killed thousands of our most vulnerable citizens but also our will to resist petty tyrants who presume to scold us for such crimes as worshipping our God, seeing our families, and buying tomato seeds.
This is not to say that the Chinese coronavirus pandemic is fake or unserious, nor that we should ignore it and pretend that it’s just another flu. It is to say that there is more going on now than a respiratory ailment. There’s an economic ailment that most of us are painfully aware of, and there is a freedom ailment, where the Karens in everyday life and in the corridors or power are taking advantage of this crisis to let their fascist flag fly.
When you have some petty official commanding Christians not to gather together in worship, that’s a line that they don’t get to cross. No official gets to ban religious services. My church is doing its services by video, because that’s what we decided. Government officials don’t get to decide. The question of whether they can ban religious services got decided by the First Amendment, and while they may think it’s a really, really good idea to tell us what to do, they don’t get to. As federal judge Justin Walker put it in a powerful opinion that every American of any faith, or no faith, should read in its glorious entirety:
On Holy Thursday, an American mayor criminalized the communal celebration of Easter. That sentence is one that this Court never expected to see outside the pages of a dystopian novel, or perhaps the pages of The Onion. But two days ago, citing the need for social distancing during the current pandemic, Louisville’s Mayor Greg Fischer ordered Christians not to attend Sunday services, even if they remained in their cars to worship – and even though it’s Easter. The Mayor’s decision is stunning. And it is, “beyond all reason,” unconstitutional.
By the way, Judge Walker was appointed by Donald Trump and his confirmation was shepherded by Cocaine Mitch. Don’t channels the Fredocons by pretending that judges do not matter because you know there would be plenty of Clinton and Obama judges eager to rubberstamp the banning of Christian or Orthodox Jewish services by liberal political Karens seeking to own the normals.
In Michigan, Governor Karen O’Karenheimer decided that buying non-essential stuff should be outlawed, and guess who decided what’s non-essential? Well, dope appears essential, but dope smokin’ morons make up a lot of the Democrat base (and the Libertarian base too), so off course hopheads get a pass. But gardening supplies and seeds? Nah. Why? Because, that’s why. You might think it was mind-bendingly stupid if you did not understand her real motivation – it’s the giddy joy of bossing you around. To paraphrase a great line from Heat, which everyone should do as often as possible, the fascism is the juice.
The Karenists love this. Love it. And that’s why they are fighting tooth and nail to extend this lockdown in perpetuity. Oh, they have excuses and rationalizations to make it seem like this is for our own good as opposed for their jollies. “Safety.” “Lives at stake.” You know them all. And in theory, those are real considerations. But they are not the only considerations. Not for the Karens – they can want to save lives even as they gleefully get off on their own power – and not for us either. We need to balance all the considerations in deciding when this ends. Safety is an important thing, but not the only thing. If the standard is no life can ever be put at risk, say good-bye to cars, to steak, to swimming pools, to any kind of freedom to make choices. And to the Karens, that’s a feature, not a bug.
We need to come out of this and reopen soon, not just to save our economy – though we totally do need to save our economy – but to save ourselves from coming to believe that freedom is a luxury we can’t afford. Freedom is not a luxury; it is a necessity. Maybe a Karen’s life is worth living on its knees, but I’ve gotten used to being free and I’m thinking that if I can’t be free, then why bother being at all? How about you?
This is not to say that we should pretend there’s no pandemic. In fact, few people do or want to – that’s not what freedom requires. It’s to say that persuasion must be the default, not intimidation. Like most of you, I mostly stayed at home, wore a mask, and distanced myself, not because some Karen was going to jump my Schiff if I didn’t but because I decided that these were reasonable precautions that I should take for myself and my fellow citizens. That’s how we all started off, and that’s how we should still be doing it, but the Karens gotta Karen, and we’re not going to take it.
You look at half-wit pols dreamcasting that we’re going to sit in our houses like sheep for the next year awaiting their permission to live again, and you see vids of cops shamefully tackling unmasked people on buses and you know that we’ve turned a corner. These goofs have overstepped. Rampant Karenism is going to provoke a backlash, one that might include people disregarding legit medical precautions because YouTubes of Keystone Kops chasing lone joggers around empty beaches have nuked the authorities’ credibility. The clock is ticking on our patience. This needs to end.
The President should set a federal timeline, with federal objectives for reopening America. Now, he’s limited in what he can order – the vast majority of the responsibility and the authority is the purview of governors and local officials who need to be doing what’s right for their own uniquely situated communities. But the President can certainly spotlight who is moving toward normalcy and who is trying to wring the last drop of authoritarianism out of the Weird Stuff Eating flu. And in November, we’ll remember who is a Karen, and who is not.
Karens start out nagging and end up much, much worse. Want to see how it goes if we don’t keep our freedom hand strong? Then check out my action-packed conservative novels about a dystopian blue state future, People’s Republic, Indian Country, Wildfire, and Collapse! And join up with Townhall VIP for near-daily chats with your favorite VIP reprobates, get my podcast, “Unredacted” every Monday, and also check out my new Hugh Hewitt-5caffiliated Salem podcast, “Fighting Words”!
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Karens – How do you write about women so well? “I think of a man, then I take away reason and accountability.” Jack Nicholson
Trump called this virus a plague of the likes this country has never seen before. Really?
He is correct, except it is the reaction to the virus that is the plague.
Every HOA has Karens, petty small minded Karens who live to tell other people what and how to live their lives. The Karens are always going to exist, the people who vote these martinets into office are the real problem. We have a huge contingency of busybodies out there, each one ready and willing to push for control of how other people live. If they were ignored and not allowed into positions of power they wouldn’t be a blip on the radar.
What has to happen is mass civil disobedience. They can take out one or two, they can’t take out the entire herd.
“What has to happen is mass civil disobedience.”
Agreed and participating. We few gather for church Sunday mornings as usual. I’ve been opening my ice cream shop as usual. I have friends over on Friday nights as usual. What I see however are a terrified lot of people. People who watch the morning and evening news to get their information. The majority are scared half to death by this virus and will thus do as instructed. Half won’t exit their cars and ask me to bring their orders to them curbside, which I do with a smile. They are too scared to disobey as they believe the talking heads making death toll numbers up as they speak. At least for now they are too terrified to disobey on a mass scale. I am living my personal life as if nothing has changed; although everything has.
Pastor: I live in the sticks so I’m not greatly impacted by what happens in the towns and cities. I’m one of those who is ‘at risk’ according to the consensus on who’s vulnerable, so I keep to myself, but then, I generally keep to myself. For now the folks are docile, give the current situation a longer term and I daresay that will change.
You take care of yourself and if this goes on much longer I do hope the middle starts to move on it’s own and get things back to normal. Civil disobedience is a very powerful tool.
The bigger problem will be unelected (county) local “public health officials” dictating which businesses, mostly restaurants but who konws, can open and when.
These entrenched, petty bureaucratic tyrants will milk their newfound power and fame for all it’s worth.
They are formally named State Governors, and most all like the one here in Nevada I have named the Three MMM idiots.
Three Ms = Mental Midget Morons.
Saturday, it was a beautiful spring day and I went to town to my kids house to watch a crew take down a dead tree. There were 9 or 10 of us standing in the yard talking, laughing and having a great time watching the deftness which the crew was using to expertly drop this large oak tree, limb by limb without damaging either of the houses it used to shade.
At one point, the local police drove down the street on their regular patrol, slowed down to see what was up, waved and continued on his way. We were all in violation of the Mayors & Governor’s orders, but the cop knew we were in no danger and went about his normal duty. That is life in a small southern town. As soon as it dries up a bit, I will be headed back to rebuild the kids deck, along with a few of the neighbors and once again, we will defy the orders of out “betters”.
Karens, both the XX and XY sexes, the only sexes, all stem from one thing; they have never been punched in the mouth.
When I grew up, you could run your mouth, but you had better be prepared to defend your position and respect, physically. So you watched what you said, who you said it to and you minded your own business. There was a cautious respect between males. And of course, you didn’t hit females.
Then solving male dominance and respect issues by fighting became politically incorrect along with the rise in female participation in formerly male dominated fields. The result: a whole Karen generation or two, of both sexes, that have never been punched in the mouth for running theirs and don’t understand MYOFB; MIND YOUR OWN FUCKING BUSINESS.
Bravo. It also became politically correct to blame the retaliator and not the instigator. You steal from me , I punch your lights out. I get arrested and gaoled while you get the sympathy. Years ago many would have said, you deserve your beating for being a thief. Not now.
I guess that’s why multi corps don’t give a fuck, because no matter what they do, you retaliate you get punished.
Corona Virus—-Me Too!
Goddamn, there she is, the Fucking Gretch that ruined Michigan.
She’s already extended the lockdown until the end of April along with imposing new Executive Orders to take away more simple pleasures.
If she extends the lockdown again at the end of the month people are going to start losing their fucking shit.
Michigan is only in the top three covid issue states because of Detroit. A high percentage of blacks, maybe with no source of, or care of, government rules continue to socialize. The US Surgeon General, who is black, went on national tv to explain why blacks, who are predisposed to many other health issues are at greater risk to contagious viruses.
Nobody fucking listened, all they went on about was his “racist” remark about calling your Big Momma to tell her you love her.
The Gretch felt compelled to create her own taxpayer funded Task Force to get to the bottom of why our Black American brothers and sisters seem to get Covid more than whites. It must be a racist virus.
In my own town (Four hours from Detroit) we have what is called the Heights, predominantly black residents, the city imposed a curfew, because apparently you can’t catch “The Covid” after a government sanctioned time of safety………sheep bleated their approval. Because if a democrat made a law against a race, it’s not racist.
Being a libertarian, I am a avid supporter of individual rights. The problem lies in when your rights begin to interfere with mine. The issue with this virus, is that one sick person can infect hundreds of others a day. Until we can establish that there is a reasonable assumption that the average person is not sick and contagious, the rights of those who would be injured or killed by the virus outweigh the economic or personal rights of those who are being asked to self quarantine.
Most people are going to get infected eventually. Those who most want to avoid it will have to stay in their bedroom and have food left on their doorstep. A big problem is situations where people won’t want to work because of risk – or companies won’t want to be liable for their employees catching the virus.
Then you aren’t a supporter of individual rights, you are a collectivist.
Not a problem, but be honest.
HSF- you are one of the few commentators on this site who consistently makes sense and has brain.
All the best to you sir.
You’re right on except that there’s a much easier “fix” than self quarantining, which is everyone wears a mask in public and the only people quarantined are those who are immunocompromised. You should wear a mask, not because you’re a whiny cry baby afraid of getting the virus but because masks are reasonably effective if worn by the person with the virus to prevent them from spreading the virus AND a large percentage of the people with the virus have no symptoms. So unless you’re a selfish whiny cry baby who values your convenience over the lives of others you will wear a mask in public to help slow the spread of the virus and protect your family, friends, co-workers, and townsfolk until we have a simple, fast method of determining which of the 4 groups you fit in – COVID-19 positive, healthy and COVID-19 negative, COVID-19 immune (recovered from COVID-19 and have antibodies), and immunocompromised. Then you would only have to wear a mask when interacting with someone in the wrong group.
Ho Annie, that’s too sensible.
Jdog, I’ve been saying all along that the virus is dangerous and infectious and not to treat it like it’s a hoax or the flu, but even I don’t agree with destroying the economy over this disease. Where is common sense? We know how to use masks and gloves, how to hand wash and keep our distance, we also know to protect the vulnerable and isolate them from the crowds.
We cannot continue to destroy businesses, livelihoods and incomes. That is as bad if not worse than the virus.
Jdog – you are not a libertarian- you are an IDIOT. You do realize- maybe not because IDIOT- that your
position would require a lock-down for all illnesses and permanent social distancing. You are a craven coward like all the other chicken little’s cowering in their little hovels afraid of this made up virus. You and all the other f…tards deserve what’s coming. Think Jackboot on your neck forever.
My cousin is a Karen. She got super mad at me because how dare I go kayaking without a life preserver, on a lake that is mostly shallow. She actually sent her daughter out on her pontoon boat to fling life jackets at me ON THE LAKE. She made sure to text me it is the “law” to wear a life preserver (it is not, only from October to April, and even then you don’t have to wear one, just have it with you). So when I still refused she banned me from using her kayaks (that were sitting under a tarp with spiders living in them). She actually texted me, in caps “NO MORE KAYAKS FOR YOU!” So I went out and got my own and I make damn sure to paddle by her house every chance I get sans life jacket. It is glorious.
I hate people like this, they make me nuts and I find that they usually are super jealous of any life you may have versus the completely lacking one they have.
I bet holiday family dinners area treat. Bring a baseball bat for the next one and report back after the dust settles.
I am a free American citizen of good report and am intelligent enough to heed the necessary warnings to use reasonable precautions when I decide venturing out into the public domaine . I understand the risks and responsibility to avoid situations where I may contact or spread this coronavirus .
I am a successful transplant patient alive 7 years immune suppressed . I have had a few infections minor in nature to most but major for me . My numbers are better than most because I manage me !
I do not need or require meddling in my affairs by anyone including government wonks and Karen’s !
I had to stop working on the advice of medical staff because I am in contact with far too many people in a normal course of my work day . So I adhere to a stay at home order because of my responsible and accountable decision not due to some gas bag politician or badge wearing Dudley Do,Right .
Any restrictions on me are by me from me not from some panicked unconstitutional order .
To all responsible Americans I wish you well thru this pandemic and God Speed !
To all busy bodies and government who but I ass wipes :
FUCK OFF
Thanks, and Godspeed to you, be well.
Hear, hear. As it should be ?
It’s all a f..king hoax. Are you so stupid that you believe anything the media tells you. Have you all been living under a rock. The virus” is just a cover for the real cause of the crash which was coming anyway and which I knew to the exact day it would happen. Is the death of a few old farts(I’m an old fart) ready to die worth destroying the U.S. economy over. Really- you think the people in power give a damn about any of you. You think this is about saving lives. You f..king idiots. I’ve been reading this site for years an one thing I have observed is the almost none of you appear to learn a f..king thing no matter what information is put in front of you. If I was your Mama I’d take you out back a slap the s..t out of you.
I have been saying this for quite a while now. This was an opportunistic power play off some moron in China fucking up in a poorly-run lab. This is not some evil geniuses stroking a white cat and asking for “A MILLION DOLLARS”. This is China, land of the fake, home of the imitation. Why do it right when you can do it cheaply and fast, with zero safety features and if it includes hazardous material, oh well.
If it was really on purpose bio warfare, I would think they would have come up with something much more deadly. But again….incompetence.
I never knew that it was Mrs. Karen Kravitz from “Bewitched”.
Here is a Formal letter to Trump from Armstrong, which I have sent and distributed to other blog sites to get more distribution. The INSANITY of the lock down is properly compared to killing a good viable body to avoid the loss of a few frost bite fingers and toes.
Liberated women have been karens the whole time. They simply intuit how far they can go, which is dictated solely by the potential for retaliatory violence. You should never hit a karen. She has a vagina.