Could this viral video be an elaborate marketing ploy for one of the worst products out there?
A recently viral video has supplanted the longest-running mystery about Kidz Bop—who the hell is spending money on insipid Top 40 covers sung by prepubescent kids over hopelessly sterile backing tracks?—with another—who is Kidz Bop Karen?
Here’s what we know so far. KBK is the moniker given to the woman who, in a viral video, gets out of her car to scream at the rideshare driver who apparently cut her off in traffic. In the parlance of the Internet, a Karen is an entitled white woman, the kind of person who regularly asks to speak to the manager. It’s not a term of endearment.
The video was recorded by Chelsea Klein, the backseat passenger, who becomes the object of KBK’s ire. KBK sticks out her tongue, shoves her head through the open window, and does a weirdly menacing wave with her fingers instead of her whole hand. The whole time, her voice grates, dripping with condescension.
The KBK of this video makes you think that she can’t be real, that somewhere there’s a lab that built the ultimate Karen, a being that can reach levels of Karen-ness that don’t occur naturally in humans.
Near the end of the video, Klein criticizes Karen for calling her a bitch within earshot of her kids. KBK corrects her—a classic Karen move—saying that “They can’t hear me because they’re listening to Kidz Bop.”
This is the line that launched a thousand memes.
But despite the popularity of the video and the memes, we still don’t know who KBK really is. Apparently, TMZ spoke to her, but the notorious tabloid didn’t publish her real name.
That even one of the sleazier sites on the internet didn’t reveal her identity makes us wonder if KBK is an elaborate marketing stunt for Kidz Bop, a series that in the past has relied more on infomercials than social media. Kidz Bop 40 does come out next Friday, which would make this the perfect time to get Kidz Bop on people’s minds.
It’s probably just a coincidence, of course, but if the people at Kidz Bop figured out a way to get everyone talking about their terrible product on the eve of a new release? We wouldn’t even be mad, just impressed.
