Domino's in Australia and New Zealand thought they’d do something nice for all the women named Karen.
The pizza chain recently launched a promotion where they said they were “taking the name Karen back," celebrating "all the great Karen's out there by giving them a free pizza!”
The free pizza campaign was met with severe backlash almost immediately, with many blasting the chain. Their social media pages were flooded with negative comments on the idea of being nice to people named Karen.
“There are so many GENUINELY marginalized people doing it tough right now/always, & you wanna give free pizza to... Karen? This misses the mark completely. Give pizza to people in poverty, people who can’t get a wage subsidy... people who are ACTUALLY struggling.”
“Not all Karens” reeeeally isn’t the hot take you think it is. People are holding entitled white women to account for dangerous & often supremacist behavior in the wake of some significant social movements like BLM & instead of supporting those movements you wanna do... this. 🙃”
One commenter posted “this is like saying “gee straight white men are really having a tough time and here’s free sh-- for ur already privileged asses” i’m bamboozled.”
And even real Karens turned on them. “My name is Karen. Please don’t waste a pizza on me! MUCH rather you donate pizza (or, $) to local orgs and charities supporting those actually affected by the 2020 crises.”
In response to some of the tweets, Domino's insisted that they do give “thousands of pizzas to key groups of people who need it. “We wanted to bring a smile to customers who are doing the right thing – Karen the nurse, Karen the teacher, Karen the mum,” they share. “In New Zealand, because it lacked this important context, people interpreted this in a different way than we intended. We appreciate how this has happened and have listened – we’ve removed this post.” They added, “Our intention was one of inclusivity only. Our pizza brings people together and we only had this at the heart of the giveaway.”
Looks like the world has rejected their inclusivity.