Poor Jessica Has Become the New Karen (She Didn’t Ask for This)

For years now, women named Karen have been carrying an unfair cultural burden. Somewhere along the way, “Karen” stopped being a perfectly normal name and became shorthand for a perpetually unhappy woman with an asymmetrical bob who demands to “speak to the manager” like it’s a constitutional right.

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To “be a Karen” became the internet’s go-to insult for any woman perceived as entitled, dramatic, or mildly inconvenienced in public.

But times change. And apparently… so do the names.

Enter: Jessica.

According to the internet, Karen is getting tired, retiring, and passing the torch to her younger cousin. The logic goes like this: the oldest millennials are now entering their mid-40s, which is peak “I have questions about this” age. And since Jessica was one of the most popular names of that generation, it’s now the new catch-all label for women who complain.

Poor Jessica. She was just minding her business.

To be clear, we all know actual Karens and Jessicas in real life. But the problem is how loosely these labels get tossed around.

Example 1:
A woman is furious that an employee messed up her order, demands a manager, and insists on free fries for the rest of her natural life.
Okay. Fair. That’s earned.

Example 2:
A woman politely asks why her order is taking so long and how much longer it might be.
That’s not a Karen.
That’s not a Jessica.
That’s just a human being who is hungry.

Somewhere along the way, any woman who speaks up, asks a question, or looks mildly annoyed risks being branded with a name she didn’t choose and a stereotype she didn’t earn.

Naturally, this sparked the next obvious internet debate:
What’s the male version of Karen or Jessica?

And suddenly, everyone got real quiet.

Funny how that works.