There are certain people in this world who just cannot stand to see someone else minding their own business. They have to poke, they have to pry, and they have to “prove” something, even when no one asked. One woman on Reddit just had the misfortune of working with the final boss of this category, a human-shaped HR violation we’ll call “Karen.”
Our narrator just started a new office job. She has a medical alert service dog named Max, who is there for a serious heart condition. Max is not a “pet.” He is not an “emotional support animal.” He is a highly-trained medical device who has literally saved her life multiple times. He has a more important job than anyone in that office, probably.
For a while, things were fine. And then, Karen’s crusade began. It started small, with the classic, loud “pets aren’t allowed in the office” announcement every time she saw them. Our narrator, a patient saint, “repeatedly” explained he’s a service dog and even showed his documentation.
A normal person would say, “Oh, my bad,” and then shut up forever. But Karen is not a normal person. Her new angle? To tell everyone our narrator was “obviously faking” because she “looks too young to be disabled.” Oh, honey. I didn’t realize disability had a dress code or an age limit. The audacity.
But the harassment was just warming up. Karen then decided to “test” this highly-trained medical dog by dropping food near him. Max, being a good boy and a consummate professional, ignored it. Karen, being a menace, also started reporting the narrator to HR weekly.
And this is where the story takes a turn from “unbelievably annoying” to “actually horrifying.” Karen, in her one-woman quest to “expose” a perfectly legal and necessary service dog, started purposely wearing strong perfume and spraying air freshener around the narrator’s desk. Why? Because this triggers the narrator’s heart condition.
Let’s be crystal clear. This is not “annoying.” This is not “petty.” This is assault. This woman was intentionally trying to make her coworker sick—the very coworker whose heart condition she was “faking”—to prove a point. She was literally trying to poison her colleague. I am screaming.
But that, somehow, was not the final straw. The final straw came when our narrator found out that Karen was taking photos of her and Max and posting them in a “fake service dogs” Facebook group. She didn’t just post pictures; she included the narrator’s full name and workplace and was asking this online mob for “ways to ‘expose’ me.”
This is doxxing. This is a five-alarm fire of harassment.
Our hero, who has the patience of a god, finally took her mountain of screenshots to HR. And HR, for once in their lives, did the right thing. They fired Karen on the spot for harassment and creating a hostile work environment.
And now? Karen’s friends and family are flooding the narrator’s inbox, calling her the ahole for “getting a mother of 3 fired over a dog.”
I’m sorry. Let’s correct that. She didn’t get fired “over a dog.” She got fired for being a malicious, ableist harasser. She got fired for doxxing. She got fired for literally and intentionally triggering a serious medical condition.
The narrator feels bad about the kids. And that’s sweet, it shows she’s a good person. But that guilt is misplaced. The only person who got a “mother of 3” fired is the “mother of 3” who thought it was a good idea to try and hospitalize a coworker to win an imaginary argument. Play stupid, life-threatening games, win stupid, unemployed prizes.