Jacinda Ardern Called The NZ Opposition Leader A ‘Karen’ In The Most Savage Way Imaginable

Jacinda Ardern says 'Karen'

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has gone and called the Kiwi Opposition Leader a ‘Karen’ in parliament during a debate about the country’s proposed hate speech laws.

Ardern’s government has been looking to introduce harsher penalties for people who incite or normalise hatred, such as through hate speech. The proposed changes came off the back of recommendations from the Kiwi Royal Commission of Inquiry into the 2019 Christchurch mosque terrorist attack.

Opposition Leader Judith Collins (who heads the National Party, which is the Kiwi equivalent of our Liberal Party) has come out and slammed the proposals, saying people could go to jail for insulting one another.

Then on Wednesday, she posted on Twitter: “Will calling a middle-aged white woman a ‘Karen’ now be a crime under Jacinda Ardern’s law?”

Obviously, this is a lame line of reasoning. Hate speech laws are there to prevent serious instances of racism and other discrimination, which we’ve already seen boil over in Christchurch two years ago. If someone were to feel gagged by the harsher penalties, it says more about them than it does about the laws themselves.

Ardern directly brought up this ridiculous Tweet in parliament later on Wednesday in response to Collins rambling on about some negative opinion piece in the press. When it was her turn to respond, Ardern jumped out of her seat and let rip in a way only she can do.

“I also disagree with that statement, and I also, as it happens, disagree with the Member’s statement on Twitter that somehow it will become illegal to call someone a ‘Karen’,” Ardern said in Parliament.

“That is absolutely incorrect and I apologise. That means these laws will not protect that Member from such a claim.”

The chamber immediately burst into laughter.

Collins then tried to respond but quickly decided against it, claiming it would’ve been “too cruel”. Sure.

It seems like she simply had no choice but to awkwardly back down, and yet she still refused to admit defeat. Sound familiar?

It says a lot that Collins has been preoccupied with grandstanding about the plight of Karens, sincerely or otherwise, when she herself has a long track record of shitty, Karen-like behaviour in politics.

For example, in 2019, she literally said, “I am a woman of colour – the colour white.” And while it’s shitty to fuss over the appearance of female politicians, it’s hard to deny the pure *chef’s kiss* energy of the fact Collins looks exactly like a stereotypical Karen.

This whole debacle has only proved one thing: that Judith Collins is absolutely a Karen.

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