Karen laws are what happen when progressives get bored after running out of ways they can show the world how virtuous they are. These inane ideas come while they’re sitting around, sipping their soy lattes, reading Mother Jones, and brainstorming ways to show how much they are down with the struggle. The fact that the very first of these types of laws are being pushed in San Francisco comes as no surprise. 

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors approved legislation on Tuesday that would ban false 911 calls that are deemed to be racially-biased. According to a local CBS affiliate, the measure, which is called The Caution Against Racial and Exploitative Non-Emergencies (CAREN) Act, “passed the chamber with all 11 supervisors voting yes.”

As you have already guessed, the acronym is a reference to the “Karen” slang term used to describe entitled, white, middle-aged women who engage in obnoxious behavior, such as calling the police on black men for no valid reason. “We want to make sure people don’t continue to weaponize emergency calls to law enforcement,” said Supervisor Shamann Walton, who drafted the measure.

Under the CAREN Act, “calls to 911 with the specific intent to discriminate over someone’s race, ethnicity, national origin, place of birth, sexual orientation, gender identity or religion is banned. Victims of such calls will also be allowed to sue the caller.”

“Communities of color have the right to go about daily activities without being threatened by someone calling 911 on them due to someone’s racism,” Walton virtue signaled. “Rather than calling the police or law enforcement on your neighbor or someone who you think doesn’t look like they should be your neighbor, try talking to them and getting to know them. Let’s build relationships in our communities.”

The Board of Supervisors will vote again on the legislation next Tuesday. If passed, it will go to Mayor London Breed’s desk. 

Usually, these are the same style of feel-good legislation that white progressives concoct to do absolutely nothing while making it seem like they care about black folks. But in this case, most of the people pushing these measures seem to be black progressives, but the end goal is the same, isn’t it? 

In 2020, it there has been a noteworthy uptick in instances involving white women calling the police on black people for erroneous reasons. The fact that these incidents tend to happen in blue cities seems lost on many who are using these stories to race bait. 

The most recent example involves a white woman named Amy Cooper and a black man named Christian Cooper (no relation) who had an altercation in a New York City park. The confrontation started when Christian criticized Amy for not having her dog on a leash as required by the rules. Amy responded by threatening to call 911 and tell them an “African American man” was intimidating her. She ended up following through on her threat and called the authorities even though Christian was not physically aggressive. 

The woman has since lost her job and been subject to nationwide scorn for her actions, and rightly so. She is now facing charges for filing a false police report, a misdemeanor which can result in up to one year in jail. However, the investigation lacked one surprising element: cooperation from the victim of the crime. 

Christian Cooper decided not to cooperate with the investigation. He penned an op-ed for The Washington Post in which he explained his decision not to seek further action against Amy. 

“Those concerns must be weighed against what prosecuting the case means for us black people. I appreciate that it is important to uphold the principle of law, and that those who try to turn racism to their advantage by filing false claims against a person of color should be held accountable,” he wrote. “But note that laws against filing a false police report are already on the books and will remain enforceable, whether applied in this case or not.”

Cooper then suggested that Amy could be subjected to excessive punishment for an offense that does not warrant it. 

He wrote:

“Would I consider it fair and just if Cooper were found guilty and sentenced to anti-bias training and some form of community service? Yes. But black people know all too well that the criminal justice system often doesn’t work that way — that an ambitious DA with an election next year, in the current social climate, might seek and achieve a sentence of a year behind bars. All for an offense from which I suffered no harm, physical or mental. That wouldn’t be a commensurate punishment.”

Christian Cooper is correct in his assessment; It is already illegal to make a false police report, and calling 911 when there is no emergency tends to fit under that umbrella. It is for this reason that Karen laws are unnecessary and potentially dangerous. How would one prove that a 911 call was based on race? What if a minority gets away with an egregious crime because people were too afraid to call 911? 

Yes, the Karenesque tendency to call law enforcement is annoying and even infuriating in some cases. But the notion that adding an extra law to let people know that they really really really don’t like Karenesque behavior will somehow make black people safer is patently absurd. 

In the end, this is a piece of legislation that won’t actually do anything for San Francisco, the black community, or anyone else except those who just want a pat on the back for supposedly standing up for minorities. In other words, it is yet another example of progressives pretending to do something for black Americans while actually doing nothing. But would we expect anything else? 

Let me know what you think in the comments below!

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