I would argue that sometimes being a Karen is, in fact, justified. Such as when a train company strands you in a small town nowhere near your destination because of a problem *clearly* caused by poor maintenance.

(Yes, I got a refund, which almost covered the second ticket I had to get with a different company to reach my destination. And no, I didn't actually Karen at them because the place they dumped me? They had no employees there. I had no working cell phone in that country. There was no working internet. So I couldn't. I did vent at the poor employee of the OTHER rail company, and she told me that I was legally entitled to a refund from company one and not to shut up until I got it ;).

But I generally try not to, it doesn't achieve anything. Yet, sometimes, as Courtney said, it's the last straw.

And when I ask for a manager, it's typically, "I'm afraid I need to talk to the manager. It's not your fault." And I make that clear to the manager too, because I don't want to get anyone written up. (When it's tech support, the key phrase is "I think we need to escalate this." Tech support has tiers and the first person you talk to is the one with the least experience and seniority, so it's not uncommon to stump them, especially if, like me, you try all the normal troubleshooting *before* bugging tech support).

Most people are willing to fix their mistakes, I've had companies fix the mistake before I noticed it before ;).