Some stories go viral because they’re funny or inspiring. Others because they shine a light on something much uglier. That was the case in Ventura last weekend, when a local folk art shop found itself at the center of a firestorm after a woman hurled racist abuse over the sight of a Mexican flag.

The incident unfolded on Saturday, August 23, outside La Catrina Folk Art on East Main Street. The family-run store, known for its hand-painted Mexican crafts, was hosting a “Cafecito” event with Boxha Coffee, a mobile coffee cart. To mark the occasion, the owner’s daughter placed a Mexican flag in front of the shop.

That simple gesture was enough to draw the ire of a white woman who stopped her car, marched up to the shop, and began berating her. The daughter pulled out her phone and started recording. What followed was a now-infamous exchange: the woman demanded to know why a Mexican flag was “flying in America” and escalated to telling the young woman to “go back to Mexico” before driving off in a white Volkswagen Jetta.

The video was soon everywhere, racking up more than 300,000 views and catching the attention of online activist Michael McWhorter, better known as @tizzyent. Within hours, locals had identified the woman as Lisa Kay Vanderlaan Burke, a Santa Barbara horse trainer. Screenshots from her since-deleted social media accounts suggested she had long embraced Trump-era immigration rhetoric—though, in a twist not lost on La Catrina’s owners, she once proudly posted photos from a Mexican cruise.

The shop didn’t let the matter drop quietly. In a follow-up post, they called out Burke by name, telling her that “every action has a consequence.” The irony of enjoying a Mexican vacation while berating Mexican culture in California was not lost on them either.

It was, in a sense, a classic “Karen” encounter. But what made it stand out was how dramatically it backfired. La Catrina reported a flood of support—calls from around the country and even abroad, along with new customers coming through the door.

The same day, another video surfaced from Goleta, just up the coast, showing a man threatening to call ICE on laundromat workers. Taken together, the two incidents were reminders that, for all the talk of progress, racism is still simmering in daily life—and that it doesn’t take much for it to boil over.

What it does take, however, is one viral video to make sure the world sees it.