Celebrity

Can't get enough of 'Blank Space'? Neither can Tay-Tay

Rachel Kramer Bussel is a New Jersey-based writer on sex, dating, books and pop culture.

It's her raison d’être

Kim Kardashian’s dual covers of the new issue of Paper magazine, with their mission to “Break the Internet,” and accompanying frontal nude photos inside, have put her exactly where she wants to be: on the world’s center stage, a position she’s managed to occupy in a unique way since her sex tape scandal in 2007.

Kardashian has never shied away from the spotlight, or her love of it; she even had stardom in mind as a 13-year-old. Rather than hate on her for her it, I can’t help but admire her devotion to it. She went from living in Paris Hilton’s shadow to becoming a household name and a brand that has netted her an estimated $45 million fortune, according to Wealth-X, a firm specializing in high net worth individuals.

Becoming the kind of star who attracts attention for doing anything and nothing at all isn’t easy in a 24-hour news cycle, where new reality stars are constantly being minted. Kardashian knows that, and is in it for the long haul. She’s willing to literally bare all, but also poke fun at herself by, say, getting her butt X-ray to convince us that her cheeks are real. She’s managed to transcend her sex tape origins to emerge as someone able to sell whatever version of herself she chooses, alternating seamlessly between romantic wife, doting mother, devoted sister and teetotaling but still fun party girl.

These photos arrive at a time when other female celebrities are fighting back against stolen nude images, and, in the case of Keira Knightley, Photoshopped images of female nudity. But Kardashian has no such concerns, which is refreshing in its own way. She is not trying to make a political statement about women and nudity or about race. Being famous and keeping herself and her family famous are her raison d’être, one she’s willing to go to almost any lengths for. After all, getting naked was her brainchild, according to Paper’s editorial director Mickey Boardman, and has kept her in the headlines for two days.

Kardashian plays with her sexuality, and the public’s fascination with her body, accordingly. She steps out in the kind of outfit most of us would never dare to, baring her breasts in a blazer while pushing a stroller. Part of why I’ve been hooked on Kim Kardashian is because she truly does not seem to care what others think of her, as long as we’re paying attention. And that’s what this shoot is all about.

Though we’ve seen Kardashian naked before, we haven’t seen her like this. She’s offering us an over-the-top vision of her post-baby body, one many have claimed has been Photoshopped, though makeup artist Mario Dedivanovic promises is the result of “just oil and great lighting.” Kardashian is forcing us to look at her, but there’s nothing subservient about her in these images. Instead she is staring back with a smile, in on the joke, gleeful not just to be taking off her clothes but to be the object of the camera’s eye. Nudity is bringing her power, not taking it away.

Photographer Jean-Paul Goude’s images of one of the most-photographed women in the world are meant to stop us in our tracks, to look, and look again. It’s pure fantasy, and I’m okay with that, because I consider the entire Kardashian empire a fantasy. Kardashian, and her entire clan, are playing the fame game flawlessly.

As Amanda Fortini writes in Paper, “She’s not performing, that is — at least not visibly. She is being, and being is her act. Her appeal derives from her uncanny consistency, as does that of her show.” To read one Kim Kardashian profile is to have pretty much read them all. Even those skeptical of or disturbed by her success find themselves captivated, admitting, at the very least, that she’s a marketing genius. This latest publicity coup has only cemented her power. Even corporations like Nissan and Southwest hitched a ride on the #BreaktheInternet hashtag. Not to mention the storm of think pieces the photos launched.

No, Kardashian isn’t out to change the world, though she has undoubtedly changed the nature of what it means to be a celebrity. I don’t care whether the images have been altered or not. These are glamour photos, meant to showcase a superstar, not a set of instructions to follow at home. That’s why Chelsea Handler’s mocking them with her own bare ass fell flat. “Real” is not what we expect from Kardashian, nor what we would probably want. We follow Kardashian because she does things we wouldn’t do, like wear outrageously cleavage-baring tops in public or throw a kidchella birthday party for a one-year-old. Plus, even though she clearly takes the business of being herself seriously, she can also laugh at herself and at others laughing along with her.

Unlike the chorus of voices wondering why Kardashian doesn’t do more than pose for still and rolling cameras, I am perfectly fine letting myself be entranced by her ability to keep upping the ante. I don’t need to know the “real” Kim to find the reality Kim worth keeping up with.

Rachel Kramer Bussel is a New Jersey-based writer on sex, dating, books and pop culture. She teaches erotic writing workshops, pens the Let’s Get It On column for Philadelphia City Paper and is the editor of over 50 erotica anthologies such as Hungry for More and The Big Book of Submission.

A brief excerpt from her book 'Bossypants' feels especially relevant right now

In an apparent attempt to “break the Internet,” Kim Kardashian bared her booty on the cover of Paper magazine this week. (She also posed with a champagne glass resting on her butt, which was clearly the most impressive part of the photo shoot.)

MORE: The Mean Girls Cast Reunited for a 10th Anniversary Photo Shoot

This got a lot of people talking, gawking, reacting, declaring her butt an empty promise, etc. But it caused some to recall an excerpt from Tina Fey’s 2011 book Bossypants, in which she briefly ruminated on women’s body image. Of course, she ends with a line about Kim Kardashian:

“Now every girl is expected to have Caucasian blue eyes, full Spanish lips, a classic button nose, hairless Asian skin with a California tan, a Jamaican dance hall ass, long Swedish legs, small Japanese feet, the abs of a lesbian gym owner, the hips of a nine-year-old boy, the arms of Michelle Obama, and doll tits,” Fey wrote. “The person closest to actually achieving this look is Kim Kardashian, who, as we know, was made by Russian scientists to sabotage our athletes.”

Yup, that about sums it up. So it’s time for us to move on. Shut it down.

Read next:

• Kim Kardashian’s Butt Might Just Break the Internet Today
• Kim Kardashian’s Butt Is an Empty Promise
• What Does It Mean to ‘Break the Internet’?

The pair play a game called Box of Lies on 'The Tonight Show'

Brian Moylan is a writer and pop culture junkie.

The celebutante's exaggerated behind on the cover of a magazine offers no truth or insight. It only makes us think about how it looks like a glazed Krispy Kreme donut

Last night Paper magazine released two of their latest covers, one featuring Kim Kardashian and the other one featuring an even more famous celebrity: Kim Kardashian’s butt. They were emblazoned with the words “Break the Internet,” and they certainly did. The images instantly shot to the highest currency in today’s media: they were trending. But that’s pretty much all they were. There is nothing behind that butt other than it being a really nice butt. That is the end–pun intended–of it.

This is not the first time that we have seen Kim Kardashian’s posterior. And it is not the first time that we have seen Kim Kardashian naked on the cover of a magazine. Strangely enough, she suggested back in 2010, the last time she was naked on a cover, that she wouldn’t pose nude again. She already broke that promise once this year, baring it all for British GQ. We had to know that it wouldn’t be true in hind sight (get it?).

The funny thing about Kim’s latest butt-shot is that all it is intended to do is create a frenzy, much like her famous “belfie” (which is a butt selfie for those of you at home who have better things to pay attention to). There is no reason Kim Kardashian wants to show off her ass or #BreakTheInternet other than because she can, she is expected to, and we fall for the trap every damn time.

It’s really provocation for provocation’s sake, the cheapest kind of stunt. Miley Cyrus, pop music’s current firebrand, was naked on the cover of Rolling Stone licking her shoulder. She revealed less physically, but more intellectually. It was that tongue hanging out, a pose she has repeated again and again while twerking. These moves, and, of course her memorable VMA performance with Robin Thicke, made us all think about cultural appropriation, female sexuality, third wave feminism, and what is appropriate behavior for a celebrity with such a large fan base of young women. Kim Kardashian’s butt on Paper magazine only makes us think about how it looks like a glazed Krispy Kreme donut.

Speaking of pop music provocation, this is nothing that Madonna didn’t do better, first, or smarter several decades ago. Everything from writhing around in her wedding dress on the first ever VMAs to her book Sex was pushing the envelope, but it was always with a purpose. It was about freeing herself from the shackles of the Catholic Church and conventional morality and showing the world that women can own their sexuality without being exploited.

And these aren’t the only women. Joan Rivers (RIP) was telling jokes that often raised controversy to show that if we can laugh at the Holocaust or 9/11, we can ease the pain we still feel about it. Sarah Silverman, another brilliant comic whose mouth frequently gets her in trouble, uses her jokes about racism, sexism, and homophobia to show the world how absurd all of those things really are when you examine them closely.

These are all people that think about what effect their actions are going to cause and see some sort of greater good by causing controversy. Kim Kardashian shows off her butt because she knows that people are going to freak out about it. Maybe it’s because Miley grew up forced into a sort of bright-eyed decorum by the suits at Disney that she knows how to rebel against something. Madonna had the Church and Rivers and Silverman have the male-centric world of standup comedy. They all have a barrier that they’re butting (ha!) up against and trying to tear down. What sort of obstacles did Kim, a pretty, rich girl from Beverly Hills, ever have to fight against?

Seriously, though, this is the only social currency she has in the world. I’m not going to break out that old saw that Kim Kardashian has no talent, but she has no occupation like Miley, Madonna, Joan, or Sarah. She has no outlet to express herself and keep herself relevant other than a highly scripted reality show with sinking ratings and her image. Remember, she is a celebrity whose initial fame, after being Paris Hilton’s closet organizer, was predicated on her having a sex tape. Kim Kardashian can only peddle in her body, and her ass is the most valuable part of that body.

Still, we follow it because that is what she does. It’s perfect that she’s married to Kanye West, whose hyperbole are so outrageous that we now just roll our eyes at them. It’s just Kanye being Kanye, much like Kim applying a liberal coat of oil to her derriere and slapping it on a magazine cover is just Kim being Kim. These two are all just provocation and bluster, repeated images that seem to offer us some sort of truth or insight but are really just self serving.

Kim Kardashian’s butt is the biological equivalent of click-bait. We can’t help but pay attention to it, but we’re always upset by the lack of substance. We want there to be something more, some reason or context, some great explanation that tells us what it is like to live in this very day and age, but there is not. Kim Kardashian’s ass is nothing but an empty promise.

Brian Moylan is a writer and pop culture junkie who lives in New York. His work has appeared in Gawker, VICE, New York magazine, and a few other safe-for-work publications.

Read next: Kim Kardashian’s Butt Might Just Break the Internet Today

"It's really the weirdest thing I've ever seen"

The two men are 17th cousins

Actor Benedict Cumberbatch is distantly related to Alan Turing, his character in newly released film The Imitation Game, genealogists claim.

Turing was a mathematician and code breaker who helped alter the course of World War II by breaking the Enigma code and creating a machine that allowed Britain and the U.S. to read secret German messages.

Researchers from the family-history website Ancestry have now said that Cumberbatch, 38, is actually Turing’s 17th cousin, sharing a common ancestor back in 14th century England. Tracing the paternal lines of both men revealed that the pair are related to John Beaufort, the first Earl of Somerset, who was born around 1373.

Miriam Silverman, U.K. content manager for Ancestry, said: “It’s amazing to think that that when stepping into the role of Alan Turing, he would not only be portraying a world-class code breaker but a real-life relation.”

[Daily Telegraph]

He died of kidney complications due to cancer, his manager said

Henry “Big Bank Hank” Jackson of the Sugarhill Gang died early Tuesday from kidney complications due to cancer, his manager said. He was 57.

“[Sugarhill Gang's Wonder Mike and Master Gee] had been in contact with him in the past year,” manager David Mallie told FOX411. “They had some great times and created history.”

“So sad to hear of our brother’s passing. Rest in peace Big Bank,” the two remaining members of the group said.

Sugarhill Gang is best known for its 1979 hit “Rapper’s Delight.” Other members of the rap community posted remembrances of Big Bank Hank on social media:

[FOX]