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San Francisco Lawmaker Proposes Anti-Karen "CAREN Act"

July 8th, 2020 - 11:25 AM EDT by Adam

4 comments

San Francisco Supervisor Shamann Watson struck acronym gold yesterday when he announced the "CAREN Act," a proposed law that would allow criminal and civil lawsuits against people who call 911 on minorities with the intent to infringe on their rights. "CAREN" stands for "Caution Against Racially Exploitative Non-emergencies."

The 2020 George Floyd Protests has brought forth a wave of white women-- so-called Karens-- who have been filmed engaging in racist and sometimes violent behavior against black people. Recently, Lisa Alexander, a "Karen" in San Francisco, went viral for dialing 911 on a local Filipino resident who was stenciling Black Lives Matter in chalk on his own property.

Walton stated the law would help "protect the rights of communities of color who are often targeted and victims of fraudulent emergency calls" in a statement. San Francisco Supervisor Matt Haney, who co-authored the bill, tweeted, "Racist false reports put people in danger and waste resources."

California state congressman Rob Bonta has introduced a similar bill for the state, known as Assembly Bill 1550. According to tweets from Bloomberg Law reporter Joyce Cutler, Bonta said, "We’re not seeking to have more lawsuits but we are seeking to end this action, this conduct that we’ve seen far too much of, that hurts disadvantaged communities, that hurts people of color, that hurts people based on their protected class."

"Karens" committing racist and violent acts have become a regular news story in the past several months. One of the most high profile cases was Amy Cooper, known as Central Park Karen went viral nationally for dialing 911 on a birdwatching black man who asked her to leash her dog. The same day, George Floyd was killed by police after someone dialed 911 for suspecting he used counterfeit money to buy cigarettes.

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Comments 4 total

Kommando_Kaijin

Jul 08, 2020 at 02:38PM EDT

Eh, it's focus is too specific. It should be against anyone who makes unnecessary 911 calls against anyone, regardless of demographic. Maybe have it so people get fined more harshly for wasting the Emergency Services time and potentially distracting them from more important tasks.

Personally, I think the concept of race and ethnicity should slowly be abandoned completely by society. Legislation should be the first to acknowledge it's superfluousness, making legislation that only applies to specific racially motivated scenarios will only prolong any racial discourse, preventing any meaningful progress. Race relations will only be optimal once the concept of race itself is discarded, forgotten and of no meaning to anyone. People must realize that it is cosmetic and nothing more, then we can function as a proper society without this nonsensical whining about each other's genes and ancestors.

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Adam

Jul 08, 2020 at 03:12PM EDT Kommando_Kaijin

"Race relations will only be optimal once the concept of race itself is discarded, forgotten and of no meaning to anyone. People must realize that it is cosmetic and nothing more, then we can function as a proper society without this nonsensical whining about each other's genes and ancestors."

I agree on this point and in theory, the law should be blind to race. Unfortunately, this is not the case as we've seen from countless examples, and in this specific instance, the vast amounts of white people using the police to their advantage in situations where they're annoyed by a POC needs to be addressed.

5

LastAngryWrestleman

Jul 08, 2020 at 02:30PM EDT

Wait, isn't it illegal to knowingly file a false report in the first place?

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