These Karen revenge stories are even funnier than memes

Ah, Karens. The nightmarish customers we’ve all be stuck behind, and the lucky few who work in retail have had to wait on. No matter what age, gender, or appearance, those who feel the need to belittle customer service employees are automatically dubbed a Karen.

The Karen memes have taken over the internet once again, but we can’t forget that these are sadly real people that roam our world. Poor customer service associates are forced to deal with people like this on a daily basis, as other customers are held up by their antics. 

Thankfully, we’ve seen some great stories appear on the subreddits r/pettyrevenge and r/prorevenge where employees and fellow customers alike have been able to get back at these horrendous Karens. If you ever come in contact with a Karen, take a page from these stories to use on them for some satisfying revenge. 

Note: stories are edited for clarity and formatting. 

Casino Karens are next level

“This is the story of a Casino Karen. Before we begin a few things to know:

• The house always wins (duh)
• Casino Karens are slightly different than regular Karens 1) they MUST win immediately upon sitting down at a slot machine and get VERY angry when they do not and 2) if you are winning and they are not, Casino Karens are even more unhappy.

So, last night late in the evening at a nearby casino I was meandering my way back to my hotel room after breaking even for the night (yay!). I stopped at a penny slot machine I like and decided to throw a few bucks in and play the minimum of 25 cents per spin just for sh!*s and giggles.

Shortly after sitting down, Casino Karen plops down at a slot machine two over from me (which I know is generally not a great machine-never see anyone really win on it and it is not played much as a result) and immediately lights up a cigarette while her boyfriend stands there to watch her. 

After a few spins at $1.25 a spin she immediately starts complaining and her boyfriend joins her saying “these machines are rigged” “this is AWFUL!” “I see why the casino regulars play the minimum”. Now, normally I am happy to see others winning because it makes the vibe more fun but Karens, nawww, I hope they lose.

So, it just so happens just about the time Karen starts complaining I get in a bonus. This pisses off Karen and her bf and I hear them make a snide comment about how of course I am in the bonus and only playing 25 cents – bitch, you know I can hear you right? Karen then gets in the bonus on her machine too and gets 40 free spins and only wins about $11 – which is about what I got on my bonus playing 25 cents to her $1.25. 

You would have thought the world had stopped. The complaining ramped up about 10 more notches and they kept bitching about 40 free spins and barely $10!!! So, karmic fates shine down and my machine decided to bonus several more times in very quick succession. 

Cue even more complaints. I try to be nice and tell them that I played it earlier at $1.25 a spin and couldn’t get a bonus to save my life and isn’t that how it goes I get in the bonus at minimum bet. Silence from Karen and bf. Okay, that’s how it is going to go (was already irritated at the snide remark)….

Casino Karen proceeds to continue her nonstop complaining (normal people just get up off a bad machine) and I could tell she was eyeing my machine up and would JUMP at the chance to get on it if I left. (been gambling a long time – I know when someone wants my machine).

 Despite being tired, part one of petty revenge is I decide to keep playing just to annoy her and manage to hit a $50 bonus which you can imagine irritated her as it would have been $250 if I was playing $1.25 like her. About 3 Karen cigarettes later she finally leaves but only goes about 7-8 machines down. I can tell bf keeps looking my way to see if I have left.

Part two of petty revenge is I pull out a ticket I haven’t cashed in yet from another machine that has about $250 dollars in slot credits on it and I insert it into my machine. This way, it looks like I won a REALLY big bonus if they walk by to see how I am doing and how many credits are on my machine. 

Of course, about 10-15 minutes later they stroll by and I can tell they are super annoyed to see I have over $350 dollars in credits on the machine. Hahahaha…..once it was clear they were gone for good I cashed out and went to bed.

Moral of the story? If you get that upset at what is supposed to be a fun activity you either have a gambling problem or are a Casino Karen (or Kevin) and I will happily do what I can to get under your skin and make you even more annoyed because u/feellikebeingajerk.”

Karen even in the workplace

“I used to work in an office, what kind of work isn’t particularly important to the story so just picture a basic office job. Every January, HR would send an email to all employees with the employee handbook. This included job descriptions, office policies, etc.

Every year since the PDF handbook had been established it would be named with the year following it to establish it was different than the original and all other years. Any changes would have updated next to the section in the table of contents so you could see what had changed from the previous year and familiarize yourself with anything new.

Now with that background, we will introduce Karen. Karen had been with the company a pretty long time (about 10 years I believe). She was fine at her job. Just fine. She would get things done, but not without making everyone else miserable in the process. She would ask questions that had already been answered, and basically just waste everyone’s time for fun. 

She was just plain nasty to people, and tried as hard as she could to make everyone stay far away from her. The worst thing about her, was she always seemed to be looking for a fight or looking for a reason to complain. 

She had threatened lawsuits a few times over any small thing, but would always just get over it and drop it bc she knew no laws had been broken and it would never go anywhere. She’d comment on how she should sue basically every business she ever went to because she could live off the settlement and retire early. Over the smallest issues you can imagine. 

She did her job and we never had a valid reason to fire her, especially knowing how lawsuit happy she was, so she stayed. Karen’s job description (as per the handbook) called for a bachelors degree. Karen did not have a bachelors degree, but had been hired prior to that being a requirement so she was grandfathered in. 

One day, a position above hers became open. A guy who we will call Terry had recently completed his masters degree after taking night classes for a few years, and since an internal promotion is typically better than an outside hire, he was chosen for the promotion. 

Terry had been at the company about 4.5 years, and was well liked and great at his job, the new job required a masters degree in its job description, and him being a recent grad it was a perfect fit and everyone was happy for him.

Everyone but Karen. Since she was constantly looking for something to sue about, she took it as a direct insult that she had not been considered for this promotion that she was not at all qualified for. She immediately cried discrimination and told our boss her lawyer would be in touch. 

We were all perplexed, since it was very clear that this position required a masters degree and given that she didn’t even have a bachelors degree there is no way she could have been hired for the role.

What we soon realized, was that Karen had saved the original company handbook named “company handbook” and had not bothered to open or save any new editions that were sent in the following 8 years. She just assumed no changes had been made and that it was just sent every year to ensure all employees had it. 

If she has bothered to open the file, she would have seen the sections that say updated in the Table of contents. Since Karen cried lawsuit a lot, no one expected much of this since it was ridiculous claim. But Sure enough, Karen gives her resignation letter via email and it is scathing, about how she can’t bear to work in such a discriminatory environment that would only promote men. 

When any higher ups try to speak to her about this and clear up the confusion, she basically tells them to fuck off and to ‘read the damn email, I don’t owe any more of an explanation’. She basically goes full Karen. 

Not long after, a letter comes in from her lawyer asking for a settlement to avoid a discrimination case. What Karen hadn’t realized was that our boss’s sister in law owned a law firm. 

She didn’t really take on clients herself anymore and mostly just managed the other lawyers of her firm, she was basically semi retired. What this meant was she had plenty of time to review any letters from Karen’s lawyer and advise us.

Since Karen didn’t bother to read any of the updated handbooks, she was unaware that this position had required a masters degree for many years now (I believe about 6 years). She supplied her lawyer with the original company handbook from 9 years ago, and he used that as reference in his settlement demand. 

This was when we realized she hadn’t read any new handbooks in years. Since Karen rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, Boss’s sister in law decided to personally take on the case. Every letter Karens lawyer sent, she sent back one 3 times in length. 

Some of it wouldn’t even really say anything, just wordiness, but it would certainly take Karen’s lawyer awhile to read it, and he did not come cheap. After several of these letters, they realize no settlement is going to happen, they want to take it to court. It’s a pretty cut and dry case. 

Boss’s sister in law shows evidence that Karen has received all updates via email. After the change was made and the handbook sent out, HR even sent an email to Karen specifically letting her know that she was grandfathered in and doesn’t need to worry, to which Karen replied “okay, thank you!”, confirming receipt of it. 

The best part was when Boss’s SIL said that they couldn’t break company rules to give Karen a job she was totally unqualified for while neglecting another employee who went above and beyond to get his masters degree to advance, as that would be unfair to all other employees.

Karen now had a huge (seriously, HUGE) bill from her lawyer for all of these letters and filing the case, etc., no job, no one she could list as a positive recommendation, and no degree. In the time she had been at the company, it had become industry standard to require a bachelor’s degree, so she was effectively shut out of her career. 

It would also be hard to explain how you worked somewhere for a decade and don’t have a letter of recommendation from anyone there. If she had only read her damn emails.

TLDR- Karen ignores job description updates for years, attempts a lawsuit, bankrupts herself in lawyer fees, and effectively makes herself obsolete in her career.”

Airport Karens ruining vacation

“Flying out of Philadelphia after visiting a good friend for a week. I travel pretty frequently and like to make security check as painless as possible for me and everyone else involved so usually the only thing I need to get on the belt is my carry on bag, shoes and phone. 

I get to the security table, kick off my shoes, throw them in the bin with my phone and boarding pass so there’s nothing in my hands. Bag is on my shoulder and the bin is in my hands and I’m ready to go.

Enter TWO wild Karens. Perhaps they are not full blown Karens separately but together their powers have amplified. Combined the Karens have about 6 bins of toiletries, electronics, shoes and other nonsense and they are taking their sweet time. They obviously know this as moments before I entered the line Karen 1 had allowed someone to pass on front of them.

Anxious to get through as I’m in a tight spot between the Karens in front, the stand where they check your boarding pass and ID behind me and the table to my left. I cut around the other side to the table and ask Karen 1 “do you mind if I just jump ahead?”

Karen 1 is instantly miffed and responds, “No, and I don’t know where you think you’re going. That side is blocked off.” Not one to stay quiet I respond, “just trying to get my stuff on the belt but fine take your time.” Both Karens ignore me, leave their bins on the table and proceed to the body scanner…

I stand there confused for a moment. Still at the end of the table about three feet from the belt where items are supposed to be placed. Did they expect me to place all their items on the belt for them?

No thanks.

I grab my bin and bag, place it on the belt and begin towards the body scanner. The guy who checks the boarding passes stops me to ask if the items left behind are mine. Nope, keep moving forward. I hear him calling across the security checkpoint to ask who’s items have been left behind. I apologize to the casual bystander in this petty nonsense.

I encountered the Karens on the other side as they look perplexed as my items come through first. I hear Karen 1 whisper to Karen 2 “our stuff is still on the table on the other side” Yikes. I grab my items and leave and the Karens have to return to the other side, push their items through and get re-scanned.

Moral of the story? Probably don’t be rude to people if you’re going to leave your stuff with them.”

Karens running your public library

“I was in my hometown this weekend and drove past the branch library where I misspent so much of my youth. Reminded me of this story.

I very rarely had to go downtown to the “mothership” library (five stories, almost a city block) . But that day, I was in the main reading room doing research. As usual, the room had quite a few homeless people, all mostly keeping to themselves and enjoying the air conditioning – it was BRUTALLY hot that day. 

There were several rows of rectangular tables, each with six chairs, giving folks plenty of room to spread out. Suddenly I hear this *PLOP.* An armload of magazines slams down on the table across from me. Karen sits down and only then asks if she can share the table, because she doesn’t want to sit near homeless people. 

I don’t recall the exact words but she was not trying to be tactful at all, nor quiet. Several occupied tables were in earshot. She sits there for about 25 minutes and never.shuts.up. She has the magazines (cooking magazines) strewn all over the table. She wants to talk about recipes. She wants to profess her love for some grocery store she used to visit back home that “makes Publix look like sh!*.” 

She wants to talk about what a nasty city this is. And she really wants to talk about how the library is being ruined by vagrants and bums and they should not be allowed inside. I was doing my best to just *mmhmm* and *ah* instead of actually answering her, hoping she would STFU.

My simmering dislike of her went up to boiling hatred when she started tearing recipes out of the magazines. I finally looked her right in the eye and told her to stop it. She started to sputter and I said “Jeez, just take pictures with your phone.”

She vibrates in place for about 20 seconds and then decides my behavior is too offensive to endure, so she slams her stuff together (leaving the half-destroyed magazines in a messy pile) and does the Flounce’n’Bounce.

As she’s walking away I see a notebook she left on the table. I think about it for a minute, then pick it up, run after her and give it to her. Very saccharine sweet: “You forgot this!” And she had to pretend to be thankful. Pretty lame, right? But wait.

What you need to know about this library was that parking was in a giant garage about a block and a half away, and library patrons could park there for 3 hours free with a validation slip from the library – you handed them your ticket at the reference desk and they’d staple the slip to it.

No slip? You paid the hourly rate indicated by your time-punched ticket. It was like $2.50 an hour. No ticket? You paid the *daily* rate, which at that time was about $20.When I picked Karen’s notebook up, I could see the little ticket sticking out of the top with the slip stapled to it. When I handed Karen her notebook … well, golly gosh. Where did that ticket go?

Shame. Hope you had a 20 in that giant purse, Karen.”