‘You’re gonna lose a customer’: ‘Feral mum’ goes ham on dress shop employees because another girl dared to buy her daughter’s ‘dream’ dress

Some day, historians will look back on the era of the Karen — which arguably truly started during the pandemic — in wonder, pondering just what urged so many people to act the fool while fully aware cameras were rolling.

It’s a strange phenomenon and one that existed long before the pandemic rolled in to change up our lives. But it was the stress of that global experience which pushed so many people to show their true colors to the world, and it seems they’re now emboldened to do so anytime they don’t get their way.

Take the irate mother that accosted the TikTokers and employees of Gossip Gowns, an Australia-based dress shop that provides attire for a variety of formal events, including prom. She had every opportunity to fix her attitude, to treat the people she was confronting with a modicum of respect, but she went ahead and chose an alternate path. As a result, she’s now resoundingly viral, and extremely unpopular among the six million viewers who’ve witnessed a video of her antics.

It seems our outraged mum was only interested in a single dress for her little girl’s big event, but unfortunately, it was already sold. That’s about as much as the average viewer can make out from the original video, which is so full of outraged demands that it can be hard to parse at times. It’s clear from the outset that the interaction is headed in a bad direction, since Karen saunters in and, in response to an employee asking if “everything’s okay,” she hits back with “actually no,” before immediately demanding a manager.

It’s as if she’s playacting a Karen character with how quickly she hits all the stereotypes, from the instant calls for management to her unabashed insistence that her child deserves special treatment. This is all over a particular blue dress, which seems to have been sold before her daughter could obtain it. Even as the shop employees insist that the other girl wasn’t attempting anything malicious with her purchase — she simply “fell in love” with the dress — the furious mom argues that her kid deserves it more.

“Everyone knows she wanted the blue dress,” the mother informs the young employees. “They all talk about it, they all know things.” She then alleges that “some little snake’s come in” to steal her child’s chosen dress, even though it seems no one ever reserved the dress in the first place. In that instance, it’s fair game.

“I want her to have the dress she’s always dreamed of, so we’ve gotta make this right,” she insists, before immediately demanding that private customer information be revealed to her, seemingly so she can seek retaliation against a teenager. It only gets better when the employees refuse — because of course they do?! — and the woman bulls forward with a breezy “I’m actually demanding you tell me,” as if that’s enough to get her way.

She then goes on to explain that, if it’s the person she thinks, they’re actually quite “wishy-washy” and they’d “look better in a pink” anyway. When that doesn’t work, she tosses in a classic “you’re going to lose a customer” — Oh no! Every retail worker’s worst nightmare! — and implies that she’ll turn other people away from the business.

It’s a truly flawless Karen encounter, complete with a cover of all the classics — from the demand for a manager to the threats about losing business — and a nice new array of fresh offerings. I’ve never heard a Karen give out fashion advice before, that’s a new one. It’s also a stellar reminder that negative people will always exist in public spaces, but how we react to them is our choice. We can stoop to their level — something I must admit I’ve considered countless times — or we can take the Gossip Gowns approach and take out all those Karens with kindness.