Pennsylvania’s Central Bucks School District was one of the places where Moms for Liberty lost big in the 2023 elections, with a right-wing school board majority swept out and replaced with Democrats. On Monday night, Karen Smith—who had been serving on the board in the Democratic minority prior to this election—was sworn in as the school board president, part of the wave of change from the anti-LGBTQ+, pro-book-banning board voted out in November. She made a powerful symbolic choice when it came to what book she’d be sworn in on: not the Bible or another religious book, but a stack of frequently banned books.
There are some damn cool Karen-looking folks out there.
When I was a gawky high schooler, I worked in a pet store. A lady came in demanding a refund for a broken bottle of flea spray. I apologized and took a look at it: turned out she hadn’t flipped the little fiddly bit on the end of the nozzle around correctly, so it was actually functional.
She still didn’t want it, and demanded a cash refund. Small independent pet store, so we didn’t do that for credit card purchases, or ones without a receipt: store credit only, unfortunately. She started to get mad, and I told her she could talk to the manager first thing on Monday. She wasn’t having it.
Behold the entrance of a Savior sandwiched between spiky dyed-blond hair and leopard-patterned pants. Summoning the strength of all the Karens out there - but wielding that power for good - she put herself between us. She started by simply telling her to “leave this poor kid alone, he doesn’t make the rules”, but when it was clear that the lady wasn’t going to budge, she advanced on her prey and said “if you’re too stupid to figure out how to use a spray bottle you don’t deserve a refund anyway”.
Wish I could thank her again: it defined the best and worst of working retail.