If you’re a middle-aged white lady with chunky highlights who would like to speak to the manager, has the police on speed dial, and posts anti-vaxxer Minion memes on Facebook, we regret to inform you that you might be a Karen. “Other people keep telling me I helped them so much, but they don’t understand - nobody understands - how much this video going viral like this is helping me,” she said, “because it’s giving me the breakthrough I so badly needed for so long.” At the time, people in all 50 states and around the world were protesting police brutality against the Black community, and Charles’ defiant words were sung at demonstrations and displayed on signs.Ĭharles told BuzzFeed News that she’d been homeless and dealing with a drug addiction, and the viral video helped her reconnect with family and get back on her feet. Months later, the video exploded in popularity in June after several DJs created remixes of it, the most popular of which has been played on Twitter more than 14 million times. Charles was ultimately not arrested, and the guard posted video of the incident on Facebook later that day, saying he was not mocking her but “posting it cause that rap was lit.” “Why are you detaining me? You about to lose yo job,” Charles tells the security guard in the video before breaking out into an improvised song and dance. 5, Johnniqua Charles was detained outside a club in Dillon, South Carolina, and wound up launching one of the biggest musical memes of the year. “Remember, stay home, or dance with us,” one of the pallbearers, Benjamin Aidoo, said with a laugh.
The troupe’s members have embraced their meme status, even making a PSA in May thanking healthcare workers and urging fans to practice social distancing. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the meme got a ton of use when UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and President Donald Trump each tested positive. People then found lots of utility for it during COVID times, using it to mock officials for not taking safety precautions seriously. The meme began its spread in February, when TikTok user posted a video with the song, featuring a clip of a skier on the brink of a wipeout paired with footage of the pallbearers. The Ghanaian pallbearers became one of the year’s most recognizable and defining ones footage (from the BBC in 2017) of the dapper group dancing while carrying a coffin - set to Russian techno song “Astronomia” - was juxtaposed with moments where people seemed to be flirting with death.
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