I’m copying my favorite nyt comment here. (who knows, it may disappear) This has long been a nyt suspicion of mine, comments being closed because they started to run counter to the approved message. I’m starting to feel like a grey old man just gumming up the works in this brave new world.

@Jzzy55 - Indeed. This is just another way of trying to get women--especially women past their sexual usefulness--to shut up and generally go and hide themselves away. When we weren't burning older women who showed independence and/or who spoke out as witches, we were labeling them as "crazy cat ladies" when they (sensibly, IMO) decided life with an affectionate animal companion of manageable size was preferable to waiting hand-and-foot on a man and generally spending a lifetime in self-sacrificing domestic servitude. Older women now are too independent, too free, and too outspoken for some to be able to tolerate. They must be beaten back down! And therefore the beautiful name many of them hold (a derivative of "Katherine") has been deliberately turned into something ugly. Think of how harmful this is. A name is a central part of a person's identify. Think of the effect on the many hundreds of thousands of older women called Karen. My goodness, they will be afraid to ever open their mouths to speak out, complain, or opine ever again. Ah, but then again, that's the point, isn't it.