Keeping Up With the Kultural Kommentary.
Kim Kardashian leaves the Castro Theater on June 30th in San Francisco. / Via C Flanigan / GC Images
LaDoris Cordell, a retired state judge from Northern California, is onstage, seated in a very Kris Jenner-style white armchair, comparing outfits with Kim Kardashian.
"Jones New York, DSW and LensCrafters," she says, gesturing to her outfit, shoes and eyeglasses. "And now you do the same."
Kardashian smiles. She's petite, dressed in all black.
"Balmain dress, Manolo Blahnik shoes and Spanx."
"I wear pregnancy Spanx," she adds.
Having an opinion about Kim Kardashian is one of the easiest things in the world. Just pick a random card from the constant reshuffling of the internet commentary deck: "Famous for a sex tape!" "Ugh, she's had so much plastic surgery." Or perhaps something from the backlash against the Kardashian backlash: "Kim is a successful businesswoman and let's leave her the hell alone."
Having an opinion about Kim Kardashian giving a talk on the "objectification of women in media," as the event listing reads on the website, is even easier. Is there a sentence could glug cheaper irony?
As expected, then, this week's Kardashian Bay Area appearance has been fraught with intellectual hand-wringing. Kardashian is being hosted by Inforum, a wing of the prestigious Commonwealth Club of California, which has also accommodated the likes of Martin Luther King Jr., Nancy Pelosi and Franklin Delano Roosevelt. "SHAME on you for having hosted half-wit Kim Kardashian instead of some other, much more intelligent and deserving person," writes one person on Commonwealth's Facebook page, amidst others who have angry-typed the same. "Agree with [Kardashian] or disagree with her, we're looking forward to a spirited conversation and a different perspective," Commonwealth posts in response.
The show must go on, DESPITE Bay Area haters.
Jess Misener / BuzzFeed
The venue has been moved at the last minute from Oakland to the Castro Theater, which, hardly sold out, is dotted with empty seats all the way to the end of the program. Each seat contains a goodie bag: a Kim Kardashian West tote bag containing a copy of Selfish, Kardashian's new selfie anthology, which at 445 pages feels as hefty as the Oxford English Dictionary.
Cordell, a Stanford graduate and the outgoing San Jose Independent Police Auditor, has been chosen to interview Kardashian on "the Kardashian Jenner clan, the business of millennial culture, and more." Her questions range from the wild success of Kardashian's mobile game to the Supreme Court's recent same-sex marriage ruling. The answers come, in Kardashian's trademark flatline intonation. Like the talking head interviews you see on her E! program, most of them are blandly positive. She speaks in halting sentences.
"The key to a good selfie is lighting."
"I'm so open. I do share a lot on social media."
"My game has brought a feminist audience to the gaming world."
The answers don't really seem to matter. Seeing Kim Kardashian in the flesh, fame incarnate, is what matters. "We love you!" someone shouts. (The crowd "woo"s everything Kardashian says. She mentions Kanye — people woo. She mentions Caitlyn Jenner — people woo. "Get it, girl!!!" a person yells when she mentions Paper magazine, her infamous nude cover that was intended to "break the Internet." Everyone woos a woo of affirmation.)
"KRIS JENNER FOR PRESIDENT!!!" a man shouts. Kim pauses. "I'll tell her, she'll love that," she says.
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