this post was submitted on 24 Dec 2025
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That Karen telling people she's allergic is a contributing factor to why people don't take allergies seriously.
OK but let's think why a person might feel like they have to lie about severity to secure compliance with a food request. I reckon the woman with a name that has transformed during her life into a gendered insult and an actual allergic person share a common struggle, a well-founded fear of betrayal by the person preparing their food.
I have preferences for things I don't like on my food and ask for removals or substitutions regularly. Sometimes those requests are forgotten or ignored and I will get it remade, or maybe I just suck it up and deal with it if it's takeout and I'm a half hour from where I got the food. Not once in my entire life have I considered telling people I have an allergy.
So yes, I have thought about why a person might feel like they have to lie about severity, and my conclusion is "that person is a self-centered asshole."
Okay, but that's just a preference. What about stuff like lactose intolerance, where it's not an allergy, but it still makes somebody feel sick?
If you knew a food made you sick, I could understand saying it was a milk allergy to make sure people actually knew it made you sick, even though that's not the truth.
Sure, that's not a problem. Calling a legitimate sensitivity an "allergy" for the sake of expediency isn't a problem. It's still a legitimate dietary concern that needs similar handling.
Okay, but you understand that she's still what most people would consider a "lying karen", right?
No? I very much don't believe it is.
Speaking as somebody with a brassica intolerance, it absolutely is a very common sentiment.
This kind of distills down to the "I suffer needlessly, so others should too" fallacy. Perhaps your food preferences aren't as health-critical as other people's, but I still think you'd be justified in demanding what you actually paid for more often. And you not doing so doesn't mean that other people are assholes. Really, I think the food preparer who is inclined to take everyone's food requirements less seriously merely because they get more food requirement requests is truly a real asshole, way before the person who realizes that framing their preference as a requirement more often gets them the respect that everybody's preferences deserve.
I literally said that I do get it corrected unless doing so is a huge inconvenience for me.
I don't lie about why I need special treatment.
I suspect that it only takes one or two situations where a near certain mistake which would be a huge inconvenience to correct is averted by lying before the average person begins feeling safer lying from the outset as a general rule.
I guess I'm more averse to lying then this supposed "average person" then.
I'm okay with that.
People should respect other people's body autonomy where food dislikes are concerned just like they should for just about every other form of body autonomy. The fact that they don't is the reason this problem exists.
Yes, a person who asks for no onions shouldn't get onions, but a dislike doesn't require workspace and utensil sanitization to the same degree as an allergy.
Someone saying they're allergic but then getting food prepared on a surface that was just used for the thing they're allergic to can still have a reaction to it, but it's perfectly fine for someone who just didn't want it on their food.
Telling someone you're allergic when you're not either creates an enormous amount of extra work for the kitchen staff to avoid cross contamination, or reinforces not taking it seriously because they don't and nothing bad happened. In both of those scenarios the person lying about being allergic is an asshole.
I'm a former head chef of two kitchens, one that specialized in vegan/gluten free/specific diets. If someone feels the need to lie about an allergy, I don't care as long as they understand their food might take another minute or two — if that. It doesn't actually take that much longer. Food allergies are to be expected, it's up to the chefs to organize their kitchens and train their staff to handle them.
Edit: We used to get Jainists, who don't eat onions or garlic as a religious thing. So I don't care what people's reasons are, I'm there to cook food they like that won't make them sick.
That's a fair point. Handling such request is part of the job, and if someone isn't willing to do that then they aren't doing their job correctly. I can definitely appreciate that perspective.
It's unfortunate in both cases that someone with a preference and someone with an allergy don't always get the appropriate response, but I still maintain that someone without an allergy saying that they do is just making things worse.
I respect your stance. I inform folks about food stuff when I can and accept I can't change everyone, only make the kitchen more efficient.
Even with all the bullshit it was a great feeling to be able to make safe, good food for people who had hard time finding places to eat out. Our integrity and no-questions-asked attitude was worth it.
Someone with an allergy can be just fine with cross contamination if their allergy is mild.