Dont make her define her business. She has something for everyone. Especially if its a naked bathroom selfie
Tits out for fourth-wave feminism, now, as we examine the latest essay to rock the movement. Once again, the hilariously coveted Kim Kardashian endorsement seems to elude it, as madam is moved to pen another post explaining that she is not a feminist. Kim, Kim, Kim youre pushing at an open door, old stick.
Still, dont take it from Lost in Showbiz, take it from the high priestess of internet-breakage herself, who has unleashed her latest thinkpiece on her website (paywall), in which she refuses to identify with any number of civilian movements, apparently regarding them as forces that could somehow limit the supra-belief business of Being Kim Kardashian.
Im all about empowering and uplifting women, Kim claims. But why do we have to put labels on things? What, like nouns? Or like GIVENCHY? I havent performed a deep homophone analysis on this key text yet, but am guessing its the former. Never mind all this stuff you read about a post-truth world Kim is now post-noun.
Youre Republican, youre Democrat, youre bisexual, youre plus-size, youre poor, youre a criminal, youre a mother, youre a feminist. Im a human being, and I have thoughts, feelings and opinions about a lot of different things. I dont need to be defined by those beliefs, just as much as I dont want to be set apart from or viewed as being against those who DO define themselves by those beliefs.
Digested Kim: my oiled and heavily contoured media empire is a receptacle for anything you want it to be. It was Michael Jordan who famously declined to endorse a progressive Democrat over the racist segregationist Jesse Helms in a North Carolina senate election on the basis that Republicans buy sneakers, too. Like everything else she does, Kims post feels like it has similar commercial underpinnings the equivalent of observing affectlessly that misogynists create traffic/Nielsen ratings too. Forget the pink pound the first rule of 21st-century icondom is that you dont alienate the hate dollar. Indeed, the furthest that Kim will go in any direction is to assert that she considers herself as someone who advocates for the civil and social rights and liberties of all people. Except you, Taylor.
Just kidding. Kim nobly avoids the temptation to indulge in the other kind of Swiftian satire. And in interpreting her point, various commentators have decided she has feminist spirit, which sounds like something you could spray on you like a really sassy fragrance. Probably one at price parity and indeed philosophical parity with Diesels Only The Brave.
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figcaption class=”caption” caption–img caption caption–img” itemprop=”description”> Kim in her bathroom clothing optional. Photograph: Kim Kardashian/Instagram
So there you have it. Doubtless Kim will still have her unsolicited intellectual backers among those who think they wish to create a better world for women and girls, but are really just useful idiots. I never quite remember how this one goes exactly, but I think Im on the right lines if I explain to you that Kim is owning her own reality or something? And her truth? She is owning her own truth. I think she is also telling her own truth, and that is an inherently feminist act, even if it is by the medium of arse snaps. Above all, she is a successful businesswoman an achievement apparently so unique and ultra-modern that the nature of the product is a sublime irrelevance.
Of course, there will be some of you old-fashioned worrywarts out there who feel they can only regard Kim as a highly paid shill for Big Sexting, a role for which she is perfectly suited given her defining characteristic is a relentlessly mercenary form of sub-clinical narcissism. And you might even have concerns about that, given that a huge percentage of her fanbase is impressionable teens.
But listen: what you need to understand is that there really is no material, blindingly obvious difference between when Kims taking selfies for wider consumption in her $3m bathroom and when your 13-year-old daughters doing it in yours. Or, indeed, its being done by a 13-year-old girl you dont even know, whose entire street is worth very much less than $3m. As the Kim she looks up to would doubtless explain, that kid is Owning Her Own Reality. Anyone using her body in this way is living her truth, and the mere act of sexting effectively puts them in control of their own personal media empire. Right now its sole output is pictures of their tits sent to some teenage boy who really doesnt understand the stakes, but hey. We all have to start somewhere on the ladder, right? They are owning their own truth and their own reality. What need have they of labels such as feminist, daughter, or even woman? Come to that, what need have any of us of labels, except perhaps <a href=”http://www.vogue.com/fashion-shows/fall-2016-ready-to-wear/kanye-west-adidas-originals” data-link-name=”in” body link” class=”u-underline”>Yeezy Fall 2016?
Any starter feminists who want to get in touch and put me right on this stuff are advised I have a special file for that correspondence which is simply entitled: NOT FOURTH WAVING BUT DROWNING.