To be quite honest, this didn’t come as too much of a shock. In the age of online unreality, and reading headlines rather extending research, it is easy to slip up on social media. However, I really just cannot comprehend how someone as followed and ‘looked up to’ as Kim Kardashian can be so oblivious and so ethically corrupted when it comes to her recent controversial Snapchat stories explaining how flattering it is to be described as anorexic by her sisters.
“I don’t think you’re eating. Like, you look so skinny,” explains one of her sisters on Kim’s Instagram story today, to which Kim reacts with an ecstatic “Oh my God, thank you!”
It truly is mind-boggling how someone as famous as Kardashian could think that posting something this insensitive and triggering was OK. In a society where we are progressively talking and opening up about the darkness behind eating disorders and other mental illnesses, it is instances like these that make the people suffering lose utter hope. Rather glorifying and exploiting the subject, Kardashian should use her platform to discuss the taboos surrounded by most mental illnesses like eating disorders and maybe educate herself on why it is considered a sickness – not a compliment.
Is it too much to ask for celebrities to be ‘woke’ enough not to trigger their own fans? Apparently not. Social media is the perfect stage to develop unrealistic and unhealthy beauty standards as a young woman. The Kardashian family should truly be ashamed for posting such distasteful language about such dark and heavy stigmas online, especially knowing that most of their millions of followers are young girls.
In a society that tries so hard to be politically correct, too often we find ourselves biting our tongues when it comes to the topic of eating disorders. Eating disorders are not funny, nor a choice and are not something to wish for. If Kardashian wishes to discuss eating disorders that badly so publicly, we can only hope that next time it will be to bring awareness to the topic or educate her followers on why it is a real sickness that doesn’t usually go away.
Kardashian deleted the stories since, and hopefully, we never have to hear or see her be so disconcertingly closed minded ever again. And hopefully, it is not too late for her to educate herself on the topic, because once again it is something that stems from comments so inappropriate and misinterpreted.
Image taken from Cosmopolitan
If you or anyone you know is suffering from body dysmorphia and/or an eating disorder, visit Beat for information and advice.