Leave Kim Kardashian alone: Why the hate is mostly misogyny
Recently I went through a time period of great stress. As one typically does during such periods, I took to watching an unhealthy amount of Ellen videos. One of the videos I happened to come across was called “Ellen FaceTimes with Kim Kardashian.” It was rather bland, mostly because it only really contained pleasantries exchanged between the two women. Of course, because it was YouTube, I should not have looked at the comments section, but I did. And what did I find? Only a pit of fire and rage against Kim Kardashian so strong it could melt your flesh off. As I know nothing about Kim Kardashian, I decided to turn to my guy, Google, and asked: “Why does everyone hate Kim Kardashian?” And as Google fed me lists upon lists of websites with reasons to hate Kim Kardashian, the one thing I noticed was that every single one of these websites seemed to share was an unbelievable amount of blind misogyny.
People seem to hate Kim K for the most irrelevant reasons – she’s “stupid,” a “whore,” a “bad influence,” etc. They complain about the fact that she’s famous for nothing, and that she acts in provocative ways. Yet at the same time, she is an incredibly successful businesswoman who makes $50 million a year.
The hate seems to stem from this idea that women are supposed to act a certain way, to look a certain way. People condemn Kim for posing nude, and for gaining fame from a sex tape. But isn’t this sort of slut-shaming exactly what we should be trying to avoid? What happened to those movements to allow women to do as they please with their bodies? Of course, if Kim K were racist, or sexist, or homophobic, there would be some reason to dislike her. But it seems strange to hate someone for simply doing nothing. Especially when the nothingness, which people seem to be so interested in, seems to make her millions of dollars, and one of the most famous Americans in the world today.
People often claim over the internet that Kim Kardashian represents everything wrong with America, because, in the opinion of these people, she is fake, inappropriately sexy, and stupid. Everyone seems to forget that Kim is a normal person, who poops, and cries, and has emotions like everyone else, and it seems unjust to hate someone for such things as being fake or risque when a normal person doing the same thing would not be condemned for doing so. One might argue that, as a famous person, it is her responsibility not to act in the way people dislike her to act. But why exactly is she famous? Only because people love to feed upon the empire her family has created, her products, and her business. Even if people claim to hate her, they still watch her – and that has made her successful. She is a success story, and no matter how despicable she may be to some, she is at the very least interesting enough for people to tune in to season after season of Keeping Up With the Kardashians and its spin offs. Are the ideals that Kim seems to represent not simply a mirror of American society in itself? Our society finds the utter fakeness that people claim Kim to have to be entertaining, and in turn, spends money on her.
It seems that women are so often criticized for not fitting a specific cookie cutter definition. It should not be a responsibility to act a certain way just because one is famous. Of course, women like Malala Yousafzai and Emma Watson are incredible role models, and it is honorable to try to be like them, but what we as a society should be trying to achieve is a feeling of self-acceptance and independence, rather than forcing women to fit a certain mold. It should be okay for someone to do as they please, so long as that person does not hurt anyone else in the process. Why waste your energy hating Kim? So what if she’s famous for nothing? So what if she loves to show off her body? Over the course of your life as an individual, these things should not anger you or even particularly matter. In the (modified) words of Chris Crocker, leave Kim alone. You’ll be happier.
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