Why TikTok Defended The McDonald's Workers Who Refused Service To A Male Karen

Karens come in all shapes, sizes, and genders. BuzzFeed claimed that yes, male Karens are a thing, and they are just as obnoxious as female Karens. The publication even provided 17 examples of outrageous male Karen behavior, including one man who left a KFC a bad review because he was not allowed to walk up and order at the drive-thru without a vehicle.

One of the latest fast food male Karens was a wanna-be customer at a McDonald's, where his encounter with an employee and manager was captured on video by observers and posted on TikTok by user @phillysohostile. The video begins with a caption over the video stating, "Rude man DEMANDING to be served at a busy, UNDERSTAFFED McDonalds" and features the employee turning and walking away from the Karen who appears to be placing an order, stating, "You're not nice." A bystander steps in defending the employee, whom the Karen repeatedly tells to "shut up." Soon the manager comes out and tension heightens.

As the TikTok video continues, the Karen remains at the counter, seemingly determined to order. The manager seems to try to defuse the situation with the employee and take the order. Bystanders have an issue with the manager seeming to take the side of the customer, encouraging him to refuse service. The text overlay on the video changes to read, "Manager is completely spineless and doesn't care that his employee got treated like crap for simply doing her job!!" The Karen then gets in the face of an onlooker defending the staff member — to which the employee approaches, pulling something out of their pocket, which the TikTok poster confirmed was a pocketknife. Eventually, the Karen gives up and leaves the restaurant and the video cuts out.

Unfortunately, the employee isn't alone when it comes to poor treatment from customers, as NPR reported many fellow fast food employees are simply fed up with the way they're being regarded. "I never want to do something like this again. They're just yelling the whole time. I am done with fast food," said Marcus Brotherns, a former coffee shop drive-thru employee. Unfortunately, it doesn't always happen, but luckily for the McDonald's employee in this TikTok, the other customers in the restaurant had their back.

TikTokers also took the comments to stick up for the McDonald's employee in the TikTok video, which as of this writing has over 202,000 views. "This is EXACTLY why these places are understaffed. nobody has time for all that BS," wrote one user while another chimed in, "Fire the manager and give her the job with a raise, she knows the job better than he does and has a spine, I got your back." Other TikTokers praised @phillysohostile and onlookers for defending the worker. "thank you for speaking up!" wrote one user to which @phillysohostile replied, "Absolutely! I will never allow someone to be rude and treat good people like garbage!" @phillysohostile said they were able to speak with the employee afterward, calling them "lovely."

As for the issue of the pocketknife, which was never opened, @phillysohostile said the employee just wanted to make sure they were safe. "She pulled out the knife for her protection because the guy was acting eratic," they wrote.