Forget Karen! If you’ve got one of these names you’re likely a whinger

Karens have copped a pretty bad rap in recent years. The name has become of a stereotype for white middle-class, middle-age women who love a cropped haircut, drive an SUV, and aren’t shy to put forward a complaint to the store manager.

The trend has its roots in racism and can be traced back to 2018, when a series of videos popped up online showing middle-aged white American women complaining about people of colour doing everyday things like walking their dogs, barbecuing in the park and watching a football game. Thanks to the power of social media, the phrase ‘don’t be a Karen’ quickly took off and spread to cover everything from racist attacks to complaining about customer service and holding conservative views.

You may have noticed memes popping up on social media that made fun of the Karens of the world, or perhaps you’re a Karen who was targeted online by anonymous trolls. Now, perhaps in a bid to take the heat off Karens, British company Psydro has scoured the internet to find out which name really is the most likely to complain about something.

Apparently, that area of expertise is belongs to the Tracy’s and Collin’s of the world.

Psydro, a social review platform, analysed negative online reviews from the last 18 months and came up with a list of names most likely to complain about a product or service in an online review.

Besides Tracy, other females most likely to complain included those named Sue or Suzanne, Vicky, Wendy, Caroline, Jan, Abbie or Abigail, Sharon, Julie and Jackie or Jacqueline.

For males it was those named Colin, Greg, John or Jon, Ian, Martin, David or Dave, Paul, Arron or Aaron, James and Mark, who were most likely to have a moan.

The company also listed the top 15 British counties home to the most complainers. To get these findings, the company looked into where the highest concentration of people who were leaving one- or two-star reviews were from. These included Nottinghamshire, South Yorkshire, Surrey, Greater London, Bristol, Hertfordshire, Greater Manchester, Kent, Northumbria, Oxfordshire, Herefordshire, Gloucestershire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire and Lancashire. Meanwhile, residents of Dorset proved to be the most positive online.

Tony Ward, founder of Psydro, said while the review was a bit of fun, a thank you does need to go out to every Tracey and Colin, explaining: “We might be being a little bit tongue-in-cheek here but at Psydro, we’re committed to ensuring that the customer has access to the most transparent, honest and helpful reviews. So despite the negative connotations of being a complainer, a bit of a thank you does need to go out to every Tracey and Colin, for making other customers aware of potential issues with a product or service so they can spend wisely.”

As Karen was a popular girls name in the 1950s and ’60s, many Starts at 60 readers found themselves the butt of the joke, including SAS blogger Karen Jones, who wrote about her experience in a story titled ‘Yes, I’m a ‘Karen’ – and I’m sick of being shamed and judged for my name’.

“Myself and several other Karens I know have now noticed that our name has been somewhat tainted,” she wrote. “In fact, I was commenting on a local community post on Facebook recently when an anonymous person wrote: “Don’t listen to her — she’s a Karen”. And then the Karen stuff started flying!”

Here’s hoping the Colins and Tracys of the world are off the hook soon!