The Kardashians Explain Everything (Because They Are Everything)

Kim Kardashian is not just a cover girl celebrity: she is a living map of how the media has changed over the past two decades. Consider this: her rise began with defending O.J. Simpson's father, exploded with a sex tape that went viral before “viral” was even an everyday word, and evolved into an empire spanning reality TV shows, memes, video games, and selfie collections. The point is not just fame, but how this fame adapts to each new platform and each new trend, to the point of becoming the trend itself. The argument put forward in M. J. Corey's book “Dekonstructing the Kardashians” is that the Kardashians are not merely a reflection of our time: they are its driving force, its evolutionary meme, the form that culture takes when it wants to be seen, replicated, and monetized. Instead of asking, “Why are they famous?”, the real question is, “How did they become the very language of fame?” Corey, who goes by Kardashian Kolloquium on social media, doesn't just observe: she herself becomes part of the machine, transitioning from spectator to content creator and amassing hundreds of thousands of followers through her videos and memes that blend the Kardashians with critical theory. And this is where the story really gets interesting. Kim Kardashian, for example, not only takes on new roles – from Paris Hilton's stylist to Kanye West's wife, from billionaire entrepreneur to walking meme – but she literally sheds her skin and transforms her body to anticipate and embody every new fashion trend: Kylie's lips, Kim's famous rear end that plumps up and then deflates according to trends, Kris Jenner's face that updates like an app. Everything is processed and relaunched as if it were a new software release. One detail illustrates the scale of all this: in 2015, Kim published a selfie book titled “Selfish” and succeeded in transforming the selfie from a narcissistic gesture into a form of contemporary pop art, legitimizing an entire way of telling one’s story. Or consider Kimoji, the $2 app that offered 250 Kim-themed emojis. The family disguises themselves to evade the paparazzi during a Hollywood tour, but the escape itself goes viral. And what about the Kim-Kanye divorce saga? Stylized by Balenciaga, it was used to launch a brand into pop culture more profoundly than any traditional advertising campaign. But there is one detail that debunks any simplistic theory about the Kardashians’ “superficiality”: their true talent lies in their ability to be everything and the opposite of everything, to change their identity, their body, their brands, their friendships, and to do so in full view of everyone. Corey puts it bluntly: “The Kardashians are like Las Vegas, Disney, or the WWE. They’re an American institution.” But the difference is that they can change shape endlessly, each time becoming the new standard. What few people notice, however, is the personal and social cost of this strategy. When Corey herself, who has become a sort of influencer for Kardashian deconstruction, backs down from a controversial case involving Balenciaga, she is subjected to attacks and boycott attempts by those who accuse her of “silence.” In an environment where attention is the real currency—and everyone is trying to steal audiences from one another—even those who analyze the situation risk being sucked into the system. Corey sums it up like this: “I just wanted to post my Barthes-esque reflections in peace.” And here comes the real twist: the Kardashians don't just explain pop culture—they explain it precisely because they have managed to become pop culture, a system that feeds on attention, reinventing itself as you watch. In the end, the phrase that sticks with you is this: the Kardashians are not a phenomenon to be understood; they are the software that runs on all our attention. If, after reading this story, you've seen celebrity culture in a different light, you can press I'm In on Lara Notes—it's your way of saying: This idea now belongs to me. And if, in a few days, you find yourself telling someone how Kim Kardashian has become more important than the medium she uses, on Lara Notes you can tag the person who was with you using Shared Offline—so that conversation stays in both of your memories. This was a note from The New Yorker: you've saved about twenty minutes of reading time.