WATCH: Anti-mask “Karen” accused of staging tantrum at newly-opened LA Trader Joe’s
Despite the difficult business environment caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, specialty supermarket chain Trader Joe’s nonetheless went ahead with their plans to open a brand new store in the North Hollywood neighborhood of Los Angeles this morning.
What would normally be a celebratory environment was marred, however, when one woman went on an extended public freakout over the requirement to wear masks inside the store as Governor Gavin Newsom has mandated in the latest guidelines (Updated:03/15/2022) issued in the face of infection rates in the state that are still consistently rising, with Los Angeles as the epicenter of California’s coronavirus crisis.
According to eyewitnesses, the screaming tantrum appeared to be deliberately staged as a political protest by the woman over the supposed violation of her rights to go mask-free and potentially spread the deadly virus to others in the vicinity.
Watch the video below taken by an astounded bystander who witnesses the woman call the workers and patrons of the new branch of the supermarket “Democratic pigs” as she stomps angrily out of the store after flinging her empty shopping basket to the floor.
https://twitter.com/RexChapman/status/1276882898730323968?s=20
Now read the account of the incident posted to Twitter by another patron in the store this morning who claims that the woman wore a mask while standing in line to enter the store and only took it off once inside.
This witness claims that the angry anti-mask crusader then pretended to shop for a while without actually ever putting a thing into her shopping basket while seeming to be looking to provoke someone to ask her to comply with the mask regulations so she could make a public display of her ignorant, harmful, and anti-social political convictions.
The backstory of the incident was further filled out by this additional video footage in which the woman claims to have a “breathing problem” that prevents her from wearing a mask — something that apparently wasn’t a problem while she was waiting outside the market to enter the store — without ever producing a doctor’s note exempting her from the mask rules.
Saw this video first, which seems to pick up right after the other video ended. Then I saw this thread. Thanks for the extra info.https://t.co/xtYvpeLrPe
— cstephens2 (@cstephens2) June 27, 2020
Social media denizens reacted to the videos and the backstory as with the revulsion that one would expect.
"Ma'am, why are you standing in line with an empty basket?"
— Captain Renault (@NotClaudeRains) June 27, 2020
https://twitter.com/held_space/status/1276926507634565120?s=20
“Making a scene in a line outside” brings your chances of a Fox News hagiography way down
— Misandrosaurus Bex (@bexone) June 27, 2020
Given that anti-shut down protestors stormed the statehouse in Michigan last month demanding their freedoms to ignore public health guidelines and endanger the health of their fellow citizens — all while armed to the teeth — the scenario described in the last comment is all too concerning.
Call her a “Karen,” call her a deranged QAnon devotee, call her a hysterical crisis actor, but perhaps the best name for any woman who reacts like this to disease prevention measures is a shopworn term from an earlier era: Typhoid Mary.
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Update: This story contains a new link to California’s mask guidelines after a reader pointed out that our old link was broken.
