FOR THE MOST quiet Kardashian, somehow Kendall manages to possibly be the most hapless. A quick look at the list below, and it appears that there seems to be a pattern in the majority of her poorly thought out moves. Kendall isn’t really learning from her mistakes.
1. The Pepsi ad
Several months have passed and this has not gotten any easier to watch. In fact, the more you watch it, the worse it gets. The neutered, meaningless protest… The hip young kids that decide to bring their cello to a protest for nothing… Kendall Jenner inexplicably going from blonde hair to brown hair and a more neutral makeup look…
It’s all so bad, and that’s not even counting the absolute worst scene: the handing over of the Pepsi. It has totally changed the way we look at Pepsi forever. No longer a simple soft drink, but instead the answer to world peace.
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2. Appearing on the cover of the special 10th anniversary edition of Vogue India
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A lot of readers were really unimpressed with the fact that Kendall Jenner made it to the cover of Vogue India on their 10th anniversary, instead of you know, an actual Indian model.
During Vogue India’s entire existence, they’ve had twelve international covers, including Kendall Jenner’s cover. Lots of women of colour felt that the inclusion of Kendall on a special anniversary cover was a slap in the face for an Indian audience.
Vogue India later issued an unapologetic statement:
“India has given the world so many beautiful faces to admire. After all, we are Vogue, an international brand, and we want to give the love back by featuring some of the best international celebrities on our covers. Occasionally! :)”
Perhaps the timing was poorly thought out, but it definitely seems right at home with the rest of the racially insensitive series of ‘accidents’ that have occurred in Kendall’s career.
3. Being credited for making cornrows trendy by Marie Claire
This comment reveals the problem with cultural appropriation, for those who don’t see the problem with it. Cornrows have been worn by people of colour from as early as 3000BC.
They’ve also been the subject of ridicule and parody by white people engaging in black face and mocking black culture for many years but now that Kendall Jenner has approximately six braids in the side of her hair, it’s very “bold”, “epic” and “new”.
Marie Claire issued an apology that evening.
4. Getting cropped out of P. Diddy’s Instagram photo
Here’s the original:
Here’s the revised #BlackExcellence version:
5. Calling Tupac her ‘spirit animal’ in an interview
Well first things first, it’s weird to use the term ‘spirit animal’ because it’s associated with colonial understandings of indigenous beliefs and throwing it around to say things like “pizza is my spirit animal” is pretty much a bastardization of those traditions and beliefs.
Secondly, if P. Diddy is editing you out of photographs on Instagram, it’s very unlikely that Tupac would have had much time for you. Twitter users immediately shot down her claim that Tupac was her spirit animal.
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6. Endorsing the Fyre Festival… and never commenting on it
Remember that festival for rich kids that took place in the Bahamas back in April? Remember it was so hilariously disastrous and all of the bands pulled out, none of the luxury food that was promised existed and loads of rich kids got stranded on a desert island that they peed all over?
Kendall Jenner was reportedly paid $250,000 to advertise Fyre Festival on Instagram, and was surely responsible for a lot of people deciding to attend it, but there was not a peep out of her once everything went wrong, despite other influencers like Bella Hadid apologising.
7. Driving very dangerously on Kylie Jenner’s Snapchat story
After Caitlyn Jenner’s fatal car crash, the last thing the Jenner’s should be doing is driving recklessly for a joke.
8. Her poorly thought out t-shirt line with Kylie Jenner
Kendall and Kylie thought it would be a really cool idea to sell t-shirts in the style of ‘vintage band tees’, only with their Instagram photos printed over them to bump the price up about $110 to their retail value of $125.
This rightly upset the estates of Biggie Smalls and the photographer who captured Tupac in the image that is now blended with Kylie Jenner’s Instagram photo. Violetta Wallace, the mother of Biggie Smalls, took to Instagram to call them out.
She said that she had no idea why they felt that they could exploit the death of Tupac and Christopher Wallace to sell a t-shirt. It is fairly interesting that they didn’t use any rappers that were alive and could call them out on the move.
9. Being able to decide she wanted to be a model and then instantly becoming a supermodel, without much work.
Everybody has something that they want to be when they grow up. The vast majority of us don’t get there simply by saying out loud that we want to do it, but that was the case for Kendall Jenner whose sister Kim Kardashian sorted her out with the job easily enough.
This really generated a lot of anger from young models who had dedicated a huge amount of their lives to making their names known. Very few of which, will land covers on Vogue India.
10. Totally disregarding the moment’s silence for Mike Brown at the VMAs in 2014
For a pair of sisters that steal so much of their look, style and t-shirt ideas from African Americans, you would think that the least they could do would be pay attention during a moment of silence for a murdered black teenagers.
During the moment of silence at the award show, rappers and other celebrities like Snoop Dogg and Common bowed their heads in respect for the loss of Mike Brown’s life, acknowledging the significance and injustice. Meanwhile, the Jenner’s checked their phones.
When you look at how much Kendall has profited from African American culture, and more insultingly a Pepsi ad that attempted to rip off popular movements for justice in America like Black Lives Matter, it’s very clear how insensitive it is of her to not give her full attention to a moment of silence for a young black man that was murdered.
