Kardashian was taking a left in her Mercedes G Wagon when Rafael Antonio Linares' car smashed into hers. Linares reportedly has his right blinker on, despite driving straight.
According to Gossip Cop, Linares filed the suit in Los Angeles Superior Court on March 1st, specifying that he “sustained personal injuries which caused and will continue to cause pain, discomfort, and physical disability."
At the time, witnesses at the scene saw both parties pull into the Beverly Hills Hotel, exchange information, then hug it out.
The damages Linares is seeking remain unknown, but he would like for Kardashian to pay for "past and future medical expenses," repair costs for his car, as well as cover costs incurred while his was in the shop.
When life gives you lemons, make a glass of lemonade.
If you're following Kim Kardashian's mantra, replace lemons with sex tape, and create a burgeoning career for you and yours.
There's a side to Kim that's relatable. She has fat days like the rest of us, and feels insecure without her armor (a good pair of Spanx).
And while it's impossible to completely emulate a life as lived by Kim, we sure can learn from her experiences.
Good on ya, Kim.
1. It's OK To Laugh At Yourself
Because if you don't, you'll bawl your eyes out.
2. Enjoy The Moment
You're allowed to be smug. You worked hard to get here.
3. Don't Just Sit There And Complain
(you may cry for a bit, but pick yourself up off the floor at some point and make a change)
4. Sometimes You Have To Lighten The Mood
Even if it pisses off your mother.
5. Even If You're Blue, Find a Bright Spot
Life taking selfies and getting "artsy" with your bad self.
6. Let Your Inner Fat Kid Out From Time To Time
Aren't we all, Kim?
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
For Celebrities' Children, The Spotlight Can Burn
Blue Ivy Carter, North West, Shiloh Jolie-Pitt andSuri Cruise lead lives that mere mortals can only dream of.
There's the outrageous wealth, the well-stamped passports, the blow-your-mind access to anything imaginable and a place in the spotlight — whether they want it or not.
It's that final "perk" of fame that comes with a set of issues — namely, bullies.
Blue Ivy's hair is a topic of constant, negative conversation.
North's parents, Kim Kardashian and Kanye West, have been accused of waxing her eyebrows and piercing her ears too soon.
Shiloh has been criticized for her tomboyish sense of style.
Suri has been bashed for wearing heels, carrying a blanket and seeking the affection of a doll.
With the convergence of modern celebrity and technology, the littlest stars, who are famous only by proxy, are being picked apart by a noisy sea of haters, often without names or faces.
"It's really easy to be obnoxious when you're anonymous," says Pop Goes the Week editor Brian Balthazar. "There's something about typing something out on a computer that makes you feel invincible and immune from harming people."
Case in point: the online firestorm that erupted in early June when a paparazzi shot surfaced of Blue Ivy deplaning in New York with her parents, Beyoncé and Jay Z. Social media went wild with commentary about the 2-year-old's hair, which appeared to be in twists on one side of her head and bushy and curly on the other.
"Bey can change her hair 3x a day but can't put some barrettes in Blue's hair?!" a user wrote on Twitter.
"Dear Beyonce, If People Talked About Jesus Than (sic) Blue Ivy Is Fair Game!" another wrote.
A Brooklyn woman named Jasmine Toliver took the ridicule to another level when she started a petition on Change.org, urging Beyoncé and Jay Z to comb their daughter's hair.
The petition, which garnered 5,000 signatures of support, reads, in part, "It's disturbing to watch a child suffering from the lack of hair moisture. ... This matter has escalated to the child developing matted dreads and lint balls."
Toliver later said the petition was a joke, posting on her Facebook profile, "Yes the baby needs her hair done I'll stick by that.! But the petition is obviously a joke and thanks to everyone who had common sense to realize it."
But experts say that the old sticks-and-stones adage is still applicable, famous or not.
"We know that with average kids, (teasing and bullying) can result in very high levels of stress, anxiety and depression," says child psychologist Stephen Gray Wallace. "We've seen a number of high-profile suicides because of these behaviors. For someone in the public eye, the way the child of a celebrity is, those effects could be amplified considerably. We don't know how shielded they may be. My guess is that a lot of their parents tried to keep them away from that, but that's pretty tough to do."
Of course, there are plenty of celebrities who manage to keep their children out of the public eye, thus avoiding paparazzi and, in turn, the potential for bullying, since it's often those prized photos that feed the gossip machine.
But, Balthazar says, the machinations and demands of Hollywood — especially for the A-list — are not that simple.
"Are they supposed to hole them up in their homes and hide them away? It's unrealistic to think that a celebrity should be deprived of growing their family and taking them out," he says. "Part of being a celebrity is that you really need to be out there and getting publicity and attention — it's part of the job. When your celebrity dies down, it's easier to shelter your children, but when you're in the thick of it, I think it's really difficult."
Enter North West. Her parents' profile swelled in May and June as they prepped for their Italian wedding.
With it came increased scrutiny of North. Social media bashed Kardashian and West for piercing their 1-year-old's ears. "That's cruel and tacky," one user tweeted. Mainstream media chronicled the controversy: "North West's pierced ears spark debate," a Huffington Post headline read.
And when Shiloh Jolie-Pitt hit the red carpet with her parents, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, for the L.A. premiere of Maleficent in May, her decision to wear a vest and slacks like her older brother Maddox fanned the years-long debate that she is transgender or gay.
"Wow. Shiloh is really going all in with this lesbian thing, eh?" one Twitter user wrote, along with a photo from the red carpet.
Kristen Bell, who has been at the forefront of the No Kids Policy, a crusade to keep celebrity children out of entertainment media such as magazines, websites and newspapers, says she realizes her cause is a "small problem" for people who seemingly have none, but she's still a mother first.
"We've been waiting for someone to slap the wrist a little bit and go, 'Wait a minute. Suri Cruise isn't fictional. She lives in the real world, and she has real feelings.' I'm the first to admit, this is one of the smallest problems on the planet. But knowing that it affects my daughter, I'm not going to shut up about it."
So why would grown-ups stoop so low and make fun of a child? It's jealousy, Balthazar says.
"People are resentful of celebrities and their success and therefore feel like a child is fair game. It's hard for me to imagine that any levelheaded adult could say these things to a child or write them directly on a child's Facebook wall or send an e-mail saying these things. So they somehow think that this just goes out to the Internet, and it's dead air. The thing about the Internet is this lasts forever. It's shameful."
Making fun of celebrity children is nothing new — just ask Chaz Bono, Rumer Willis,Liza Minnelli and Melanie Griffith — but the Internet and social media have given way to an unprecedented brand of cruelty, says American University media professor Kathryn Montgomery.
"We are creating a culture where a lot of people, particularly young people, are really being socialized in this culture. They have a sense of being able to comment in any way they want. You've got an unfettered conversation that can happen online, and unfortunately, sometimes it does not include civility. It's partly because it's not face-to-face. There's a kind of action that takes place online that's very different from the kind of interaction person-to-person. You're not seeing other people's responses."
Someday, celeb kids will be able to wander online and see the hurtful things that have been lobbed at them by strangers.
"Even the most mature person would have to admit that it hurts. Rude comments, critical comments about your appearance hurt, no matter who you are, no matter how successful you are, no matter how rich you are," Balthazar says. "Unfortunately, their parents can't put them in a bubble forever. Someday, they're going to discover that these things were done and said, and I think it could make these kids close themselves off from society. Why would you want to be surrounded by people when you never know what they have said or will say about you when you leave the room? I do worry and have concern that these kids will have some kind of psychological impact."
Historically, the children of celebrities have made waves for acting out in a number of ways for a number of reasons, and Wallace says this new generation of cyberbullied celebrity kids could certainly face similar challenges.
"We see lots of children of celebrities having substance abuse problems, anger management problems, eating problems — it really runs the gamut of mental health issues. I think it's a challenge both for young people who are famous in their own right, and those who are the children of famous parents."
In the case of Blue Ivy, that negative impact could come in the form of self-hate about her looks and her hair, a long-standing point of tension among many in the African-American community.
"If one hates their own hair, they're going to hate anything that resembles it. Obviously, this person that started this petition, we know that she doesn't like herself. I mean, come on — Beyoncé's baby?" says Pamela Ferrell, founder and owner ofWashington, D.C. salon Cornrows and Co.
The Internet "has allowed people to come out and publicly attack our hair. There's always been these conversations that go on in the home, like, 'Girl, did you see that child's hair? She needs to straighten her hair!' But now, you have social media, and it's kind of like this world discussion. I think the baby is beautiful. Whether her hair is combed or not, she's beautiful."
The co-hosts of ABC's The View, Lucky magazine and singer India.Arie were among the chorus of Blue Ivy supporters who denounced the bullying and Toliver's petition.
In a series of tweets, India.Arie shamed online bullies, writing, "This celebrity culture that hypnotizes people into thinking a person is LITERALLY NOT REAL because you see them on television is a spell the watcher HIM or HER SELF MUST BREAK. Blue Ivy -- is a CHILD."
Indeed, the tendency to think of these children as rich and famous celebrities themselves belies the reality of who they really are, Wallace says, and it's a burden they should not have to bear.
"Would you want your child to be that object of discussion? A child is a child is a child, regardless of who their parents may be. We have the same duty of care to those children as we do to our own children or our neighbor's children."
