Culture News
Can Kim Kardashian Really Live Without Instagram and Facebook? Can You?
With social media giants like Facebook and Instagram woven into our daily lives, does a boycott have real weight?
09.16.2020
Kim Kardashian has nearly 190 million followers on Instagram, where she's in the habit of posting at least once a day.
If her followers were a nation, they would be the 8th most populous on the planet. But the citizens of Kardashia (Kimeroon? The United Kimdom?) will not be receiving any diplomatic news or thirst traps from their dear leader on Wednesday.
As she announced on Instagram on Tuesday, she is taking part in the one-day boycott of Instagram and Facebook organized by Stop Hate for Profit and promoted by other celebrities, from Katy Perry to Leonardo DiCaprio.
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<!-- End Ezoic - under_second_paragraph - under_second_paragraph --><p></p><p>With less than two months remaining before the 2020 presidential election, Kardashian expressed that she felt compelled to "freeze" her accounts for the day because "misinformation shared on social media has a serious impact on our elections and undermines our democracy."</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-632"></div>
<!-- End Ezoic - undersecond12 - under_second_paragraph --></p><div id="ddfd7" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="b1deef6ef599e53030d794eba74d5e69"><blockquote class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-version="4" style=" background:#FFF; border:0;
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<a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CFKvmvIgADq/" style=" color:#000; font-family:Arial,sans-serif;
font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px; text-decoration:none;
word-wrap:break-word;" target="_top">Login • Instagram</a></p>
</div></blockquote></div><h4>Stop Hate for Profit<br></h4><p>A coalition of organizations including the NAACP, the Anti-Defamation League, and Sleeping Giants, Stop Hate for Profit launched in June of 2020 with a stated goal of "hold[ing] social media companies accountable for hate on their platforms." Their particular aim of fighting the spread of racism, anti-semitism, and electoral misinformation has been focused on The Facebook Company—which also owns Instagram and WhatsApp.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-633"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent1 - mid_content --></p><p><a href="https://www.marketwatch.com/story/the-facebook-ad-boycott-could-pay-off-for-companies-more-than-advertising-on-facebook-2020-07-01" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Back in July the coalition led a push for more than 1,100 companies</a>—from Microsoft to Starbucks to Coca-Cola—to "pause" their Facebook advertising for that month. The sum of these companies' advertising amounts to billions of dollars in annual revenue for Mark Zuckerberg's monolith, yet Facebook's stock barely budged—and has, in fact, been steadily climbing since.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-634"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent11 - mid_content --></p><p>Still, the advertising boycott seemed to be effective in forcing some concessions. As it's laid out on Stop Hate for Profit's website, it was in the wake of that effort that Facebook "announced the creation of a senior role to oversee civil rights ... established a dedicated team to study algorithmic racial bias" and "publicly released their long-delayed civil rights audit."</p><p>While Facebook may have hoped for those to be the kind of hollow corporate gestures that placate investors without really altering the profit model or addressing activists' concerns, the civil rights audit included the assessment that the way the company had caused "<a href="https://www.npr.org/sections/live-updates-protests-for-racial-justice/2020/07/08/888888476/report-slams-facebook-for-vexing-and-heartbreaking-decisions-on-political-speech" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">significant setbacks for civil rights</a>."</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-635"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent2 - long_content --></p><p>Of particular concern was <a href="https://www.popdust.com/mark-zuckerberg-trump-2646117777.html" target="_self">Zuckerberg's lenient approach to President Donald Trump</a> and his campaign for violating Facebook's official policies in a number of posts and ads. Unfortunately, it's not clear that any social media platform has the perfect solution for handling the fact that bigotry is baked into the highest levels of the US government.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-636"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent22 - long_content --></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDQwMTczOS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTYzNTk3NjQ3M30.9_1nO8lxDtr1VDSOA-f3ho6Q28srnMWlyrCHwNwCGZ4/img.jpg?width=980" id="f8fcf" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="17a727f5ada6145a21b1cdd48e07629d" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Trump looting tweet">
</p><p>While <a href="https://www.popdust.com/trump-looting-shooting-2646126939.html" target="_self">Twitter has added fact checks</a> and limited the ways users could interact with a number of Donald Trump's tweets in recent months, their approach has sometimes been clumsy. And efforts to remove toxic communities from <a href="https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/juliareinstein/reddit-bans-subreddits-thedonald-chapotraphouse" target="_blank">Reddit attempted a balanced approach</a> that some claimed drew a false equivalency between violently hateful groups and groups violently opposed to hatred.<br></p><p>It's a difficult needle for online platforms to thread—especially when they're already widely <a href="https://www.popdust.com/trump-twitter-2646109103.html" target="_self">accused of suppressing and "shadow-banning" conservative voices</a>. How much does it serve the public interest to erase records of the president's hate and lies?</p><h4>The Sad Necessity of Social Media Censorship</h4><p>Do we really want privately owned, profit-seeking companies to be in charge of what information we're allowed to see? If you want to spread the idea that Mark Zuckerberg deserves to be in jail, do you want him to have a say in who sees that? Should there be any censorship on social media at all?</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-637"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent3 - longer_content --></p><p>Sadly, we don't have the choice to allow these platforms to exist as bastions of unfettered free speech. The reality is that their profit models are based on keeping people engaged, and—without oversight—that leads to algorithms that promote outrage, hatred, and misinformation.</p><p><a href="https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/04/us/blm-protests-peaceful-report-trnd/index.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">True stories about peaceful BLM protests</a> just don't spread as well as <a href="https://www.npr.org/2020/09/13/912449209/oregon-officials-warn-untrue-antifa-rumors-waste-precious-resources-for-fires" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">lies about Antifa fire-bombing the Pacific Northwest</a>. Functionally, this results in platforms that actively promote hatred and division for personal profit. And Facebook just so happens to be ground zero.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-638"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent33 - longer_content --></p><p>In addition to the deluge of fabricated stories that spread across the platform in the lead-up to the 2016 US presidential election, Facebook has been implicated in election interference in countries around the world. They have promised to do better this November, but have done little to prove it.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-youtube">
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<small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Rep. Ocasio-Cortez questions Mark Zuckerberg on when Facebook will fact check</small>
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</p><p>Even more worrying, <a href="https://time.com/5880118/myanmar-rohingya-genocide-facebook-gambia/" target="_blank">the platform was instrumental in inciting recent hatred and genocidal violence against the minority population of Rohingya people in Myanmar</a>. In a volatile context in which racialized violence is already a major concern—like, for example, the United States in 2020—a platform like Facebook has a massive potential to fan the flames of hatred and division.<br></p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-639"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent4 - longest_content --></p><p>One recent example of exactly that involved a militia group calling themselves "Kenosha Guard." The group—which was, by its nature, a violation of Facebook's policies—promoted an event for armed citizens to patrol the streets of the Wisconsin city.</p><p>While it's not clear that Kyle Rittenhouse saw the event before<a href="https://www.libertyproject.com/kyle-rittenhouse-rusten-sheskey-qualified-immunity-2647394285.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> taking an assault rifle across state lines and killing two strangers</a>, what we do know is that Facebook had ample time to remove the group and the event—which multiple users flagged for violating their policies—yet the pages were allowed to remain up even after blood had been shed.</p><p>Stop Hate for Profit hopes that pressure applied by celebrities and ordinary users during their <a href="https://www.stophateforprofit.org/week-of-action-toolkit" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Week of Action</a> can push the company to "take action to address racism, hate, and disinformation on its platforms."</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image">
<img type="lazy-image" data-runner-src="https://assets.rebelmouse.io/eyJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiIsInR5cCI6IkpXVCJ9.eyJpbWFnZSI6Imh0dHBzOi8vYXNzZXRzLnJibC5tcy8yNDQwMjAxNS9vcmlnaW4uanBnIiwiZXhwaXJlc19hdCI6MTY0NTcwNzYyNn0.jX0NHEq-esvg-M5hMFu5KT6dpl974KXISId9B8OhSYM/img.jpg?width=980" id="ba33d" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="c6cf01ce967d26061295b9f0a6d30069" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" alt="Kyle Rittenhouse's Facebook">
</p><p>In addition to Wednesday's boycott, the schedule calls for users to spend Thursday and Friday spreading awareness of Facebook's "role in inciting violence, spreading racism and hate, and contributing to electoral disinformation." But is any of this likely to bring about real change?<br></p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-640"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent44 - longest_content --></p><h4>Can a Boycott Even Work?</h4><p>Sure, Kim Kardashian is among the highest profile figures on Instagram, but she's only taking one day off the platform. Even if every one of her 189 million followers followed her lead, it would hardly put a dent in the company's profits for September. And let's face it, many of those people are so addicted to social media that even one day off is out of the question.</p><p>The only way Mark Zuckerberg is likely to take the push seriously is if there's a threat of extending Wednesday's action to a sustained boycott. Which raises the question: Is it even possible for Kim Kardashian to quit Instagram and Facebook? Is it possible for any of us?</p><p></p><center><script async="" src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script><!-- Popdust Mobile Banner 320x100 --><ins class="adsbygoogle" style="display:inline-block;width:320px;height:100px" data-ad-client="ca-pub-4301469008561137" data-ad-slot="6952751205"></ins><script>
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</script></center><p></p><p>In the case of Kim and the rest of the Kardashian-Jenner clan, so much of their livelihood is tied to messaging directly to their fans. While Kim stated in her post that she can't "continue to allow the spreading of hate, propaganda and misinformation," does her family (leaving aside the fact that her husband <a href="https://www.popdust.com/why-you-shouldnt-vote-kanye-2020-2647173266.html" target="_self">Kanye West is himself a prolific source of propaganda and misinformation currently attempting to interfere in the election</a>) really have a choice?</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-641"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - bottomofpage - bottom_of_page --></p><p>In addition to using Zuckerberg's platforms to promote their various fashion and makeup ventures, they get paid big bucks for sponsored posts—with <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/49124484" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Kylie Jenner reportedly earning more than $1 million per sponsored post in 2019</a>.</p><p><a href="https://www.cosmopolitan.com/entertainment/celebs/a33977997/scott-disick-khloe-kardashian-upset-kuwtk/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">With <em>KUWTK</em> officially ending</a>, the reality TV dynasty will be all the more dependent on social media to maintain their celebrity and their incomes. Is there a viable option for reaching the masses that doesn't profit Mark Zuckerberg? Will they switch to vlogging on YouTube, or posting all their selfies on Twitter? Will the whole family end up <a href="https://www.popdust.com/why-is-bella-thornes-onlyfans-account-hurting-sex-workers-2647394390.html" target="_self">on OnlyFans</a>?</p><div id="d5377" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="d0575d0c8ddca6a522fb9b8c99b33ecf"><blockquote class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-version="4" style=" background:#FFF; border:0;
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<a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/B9crewEANXO/" style=" color:#000; font-family:Arial,sans-serif;
font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px; text-decoration:none;
word-wrap:break-word;" target="_top">Login • Instagram</a></p>
</div></blockquote></div><p>More to the point, can we, as a society, really let go of the digital communities that keep us connected? According to every commercial that has aired during quarantine, we need those connections "<a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/90491778/every-covid-era-commercial-is-the-same-and-this-supercut-video-proves-it" target="_blank">now more than ever</a>."<br></p><p><strong>But if those connections support companies that profit from hate-mongering and efforts to undermine democracy, can we live without the tether of social media?</strong> Can we go back to chat rooms, phone calls, and Christmas cards? Can we still exist without blasting our thoughts and our lives out into the world?</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-645"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent_4 645 - longest_content --></p><p>Failing that, <a href="https://www.theverge.com/interface/2020/7/30/21346575/tech-antitrust-hearing-recap-bezos-zuckerberg-cook-pichai" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">will Congress manage to break up big tech companies</a>, so they're more susceptible to public pressure? Or do we just need to wait for some benevolent tech company to come along and connect us without giving a platform to hatred and lies?</p><h2></h2><p>Because if we can't make a credible threat of abandoning Facebook and Instagram, Mark Zuckerberg will just keep offering hollow solutions—he'll have no reason to stop harvesting his billions from the violent collapse of our society.</p>
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Culture Feature
What We Can Learn From Emily Ratajkowski's New Essay
The model has accused photographer Jonathan Leder of sexually assaulting her in 2012.
09.16.2020
Content Warning: The following article contains depictions of sexual assault.
Emily Ratajkowski isn't one to stay silent.
The model and actress, who's perhaps most widely recognized as "the girl from the 'Blurred Lines' music video," has used her platform over the past few years to engage in notable activism. She was spotted at Black Lives Matter protests in Los Angeles earlier this year and has been a loud advocate for women's rights, even serving as a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood.
<p>But Ratajkowski recently revealed some harrowing behind-the-scenes details about being one of today's most sought-after models. In a new essay for <em>The Cut </em>titled "<a href="https://www.thecut.com/article/emily-ratajkowski-owning-my-image-essay.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Buying Myself Back</a>," she detailed an alleged sexual assault at the hands of photographer Jonathan Leder, who—without her consent—later sold and displayed suggestive photographs he'd taken of her.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-632"></div>
<!-- End Ezoic - undersecond12 - under_second_paragraph --></p><div id="3bb1e" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="02723fd0820b956b9a54f0b18f38d159"><blockquote class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-version="4" style=" background:#FFF; border:0;
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<a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CFKFQswsSJQ/" style=" color:#000; font-family:Arial,sans-serif;
font-size:14px; font-style:normal; font-weight:normal; line-height:17px; text-decoration:none;
word-wrap:break-word;" target="_top">Login • Instagram</a></p>
</div></blockquote></div><p><br></p><p>"In 2012, my agent told me I should buy a bus ticket from Penn Station to the Catskills, where a photographer named Jonathan Leder would pick me up and reimburse me for my fare," Ratajkowski wrote. "We'd shoot in Woodstock, for some arty magazine I'd never heard of called <em>Darius</em>, and I'd spend the night at his place, she said. This was something the industry calls an unpaid editorial, meaning it would be printed in the magazine and the 'exposure' would be my reward."</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-633"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent1 - mid_content --></p><p>Ratajkowski then explained how Leder photographed her on a Polaroid camera as she posed both in lingerie and nude, drunk off the glasses of wine he kept serving her. "The second I dropped my clothes, a part of me disassociated," she wrote. "I began to float out of myself, watching as I climbed back onto the bed. I arched my back and pursed my lips, fixating on the idea of how I might look through his camera lens. Its flash was so bright and I'd had so much wine that giant black spots were expanding and floating in front of my eyes." </p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-635"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent2 - long_content --></p><p><script async="" src="//pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/js/adsbygoogle.js"></script>
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</script></p><p>She then described how Leder allegedly, painfully assaulted her —"I don't remember kissing, but I do remember his fingers suddenly being inside of me"—before sending her off on her way the next morning without discussing the incident. </p><p>Ratajkowski recalls receiving a call about her new book of photographs a few years later, an endeavor she was unaware of. "When the news broke of a book being sold with my name on it—the cover was completely white and read only EMILY RATAJKOWSKI in bold black lettering— several media outlets reached out to me directly, thinking they were being generous by offering their support to a new project of mine."</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-636"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent22 - long_content --></p><p>Perhaps unsurprisingly, Leder was behind the book. She continued: "Confused, I searched my name online. There it was: <em>Emily Ratajkowski</em>, the book, priced at $80. Some of the images were posted on Jonathan's Instagram, and they were among the most revealing and vulgar Polaroids he had taken of me...And from what was being said online, a lot of people believed the entire situation had been my doing. I, after all, had posed for the photos."</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-637"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent3 - longer_content --></p><p>Ratajkowski explained that her lawyer sent cease-and-desist letters, on the basis that she had only consented for the photos to be printed in the magazine they were intended for. Upon learning that Leder would also display some of the most compromising photos in a Lower East Side gallery, she realized she hadn't signed anything regarding a gallery in her model agreement for the initial photo shoot.</p><p><em>Emily Ratajkowski, </em>the book, sold out and was reprinted three times. Leder later published another book of photographs from that same shoot and put on another gallery. "I almost felt like I was checking in on a part of me, the part of me he now owned," Ratajkowski wrote. "For years, while I built a career, he'd kept that Emily in the drawers of his creaky old house, waiting to whore her out. It was intoxicating to see what he'd done with this part of me he'd stolen." </p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-638"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent33 - longer_content --></p><p>These photos of Ratajkowski were blatantly published against her consent. Her story mirrors that of countless fellow models, as <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/13/style/mario-testino-bruce-weber-harassment.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">more and more photographers have been accused of similar abusive behavior</a>. But as disturbing as this instance is, the law isn't on her side here.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-639"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent4 - longest_content --></p><p> <a href="https://www.technologylawsource.com/2015/04/articles/intellectual-property-1/who-owns-the-photo/#:~:text=The%20wildlife%20photographer%20who%20owned,the%20person%20in%20the%20photo." rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">U.S. law states</a> that "a photograph is the property of the person who presses the shutter on the camera—not the person who owns the camera, and not even the person in the photo." That's why Ratajkowski was once sued for reposting a photo a paparazzo had taken of her, as she detailed in the first portion of her essay.</p><p>The loophole to these copyright laws about photograph ownership is if "a written agreement exists that makes the photo a work made for hire," meaning Ratajkowski is within her rights to take legal action against Leder, because he used the photos outside of the purpose she agreed to.</p><div id="17132" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="4fff549b33cac4d004abd63b1b6bfeba"><blockquote class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-version="4" style=" background:#FFF; border:0;
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</div></blockquote></div><p><br></p><p>But, whether or not Leder is legally entitled to publish books and host galleries of these, Ratajkowski's essay brings to light a disconcerting conversation regarding how models are treated—especially those who, like Ratajkowski, are known as sex symbols.</p><p>There was a clear exchange of power in the moment when Ratajkowski, who had posed nude before, timidly removed her clothes in front of Leder; from then on out, she knew she would be depicted from Leder's point of view. By continuing to share photos of her that she didn't consent to being published, Leder is attempting to strengthen his hold of power over her. </p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-640"> </div>
<!-- End Ezoic - incontent44 - longest_content --></p><p>By bravely writing this essay, Ratajkowski opens a Pandora's Box of questions regarding ethics in editorial photography: <strong>When do photos go from being sensual to straight-up exploitative? What psychological and emotional damage is being done by men who contort female models into their sexed-up ideals, and how would fashion photography change if women took photos of women instead?</strong></p><p>Ratajkowski said that when the fact-checker she worked with on her story reached out to Leder for comment, his response included: "This is the girl that was naked in <em>Treats!</em> magazine, and bounced around naked in the Robin Thicke video at that time. You really want someone to believe she was a victim?"</p><p>What Leder and a never-ending list of men fail to understand are the nuances between women being <em>sexual</em> and women being <em>sexualized</em>. The difference is in who holds the power. </p><p>When Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion <a href="https://www.popdust.com/cardi-b-and-megan-thee-stallion-2646922542.html" target="_self">rap about female pleasure</a>, they have the power in that instance because they're choosing how to be perceived. When Emily Ratajkowski hesitantly poses nude after being served multiple glasses of wine, the power lies with the photographer, because she is unable to control how she's perceived. But, as Ratajkowski writes, she "will continue to carve out control where she can find it." Hopefully, her brave essay will inspire other women to do the same.</p><p><div id="ezoic-pub-ad-placeholder-641"> </div>
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