“Karens have gentrified lean”: Why is an eyewear brand on Instagram suggesting moms drink cough syrup?
An eyewear brand introducing “summer moms” to lean just gentrified the recreational drug.
Eyewear brand Night Shift Glasses shared an Instagram post on May 5 that featured Sprite, cough syrup, and Jolly Ranchers—aka “lean”—to demo an ice cube tray that doubles as a flask.
The video's caption says, “Every summer, mom needs one of these.” As a result, people on X are saying, “Karens have gentrified lean.”
Lean originated in Houston among blues musicians in the 1960s. The drink was associated with southern hip hop culture and later went national via DJ Screw’s mixtapes in the 90s.
Night Shift’s post was likely shared as viral bait—albeit appropriative and very weird viral bait.
@OhThatsAT shared Night Shift’s video on X in a June 3 post that read, “Karens have gentrified lean lol smh.”
“Karens will call it Klean,” commented @I_can_Haz.
“What, they moved on from weed & bottles of wind already?? Damn,” said @Plumferno.
“They can have it,” replied @Thyblakkman.
What product is actually being advertised?
The original post comes from a seemingly suspicious brand’s Instagram account that sells tinted glasses called Night Shift Glasses. Their account name includes what appears to be a typo: @nightshiftgalsses, and the brand claims to have had “over 2000 happy customers.”
The relationship between the ice cube tray flask and tinted eyewear is not immediately clear, but the product used to hold the Karen’s lean appears in numerous posts shared by the account.
The videos use different drinks to demo the product and target various customer groups. Most posts from @nightshiftgalsses have a modest amount of engagement for a commercial account, but the “summer mom’s” lean demo has over 100 thousand likes.
People in the comments echoed sentiments expressed on X.
“‘Come make a sleepy girl mocktail with—.’ THAT IS LEAN,” commented @michelleh_5.
“‘It’s called Lean, you gotta try it Emily’,” said @ray4pay.
The poster's fingernails take the spotlight
However, people across platforms commented on the sorry state of the performer’s unkempt nails.
@courtney_mercury said, “I dunno what’s crazier the colonization of lean or them dirty azz nails.”
“Clean those nails ????,” commented @_based_Guy_.
The brand shares other weird videos on their account under the caption “Every summer mom needs—” for instance, a fruit smoothie made in a to-go cup that’s also a blender complete with a shoulder strap. Commenters claim the random product is purchasable on Amazon.
And like the dirty nails, people were distracted by the sloppy execution of the demo.
“The product doesn’t matter if you are spilling shit all over, just FYI,” commented @s.corbett579.
Doesn’t seem like the product matters at all if you're driving traffic.
“DJ Screw & Pimp C turning over in their grave ????,” said @TexansTeaTv.
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