Kim Kardashian for Mayor? America Created a Monster
I beg of PolicyMic's readers: Never vote Kim Kardashian into any political office. A lot has been written in the past weeks about Kardashian's recent interest in mayoral candidacy in the town of Glendale, California. Most of what has been written has called her potential candidacy a publicity stunt, absurd, and down right idiotic; all of which I am in complete agreement with. I am from that town and I still hold it close and dear to my heart. I spent the better part of my life in Glendale, attended its public schools, participated in decorating its float for the Rose Parade, and played on its fine sports teams. Kardashian and any “celebrity” of her caliber should never, ever joke about holding office. They should just leave political office to a real politico like Sarah Palin. Just kidding. The fact of the matter is, did we allow Kardashian to believe that this action might actually be possible?
It is not a stretch to say that our culture is celebrity obsessed; the number of magazines, television shows, and books that are marketed to us following our favorite celebrity is higher now than ever before. We are drunk on the wealth and fame that Hollywood portrays to us and generally we in turn want that for ourselves.
This is not the worst thing in the world, when celebrities recognized for their charitable efforts are household names because their talent does not irritate me, i. e. George Clooney and his work in the Sudan, or Oprah building schools in South Africa. When celebrities who have never been worldly, or spoken about politics in public believe just because of their name they can now hold office it makes us believe that we turned them into this monster.
Kardashian was not in the public eye until she was featured in a sex tape. Then it was her voluptuous behind that had us chatting, then her relationship with USC football player Reggie Bush, and of course Keeping up with the Kardashians which sky rocketed her into our everyday water cooler talks. As much as we despise her audacity to run for public office, we allowed it.
My frustration with this particular celebrity is that she has no ties to the city whatsoever, except that she shares the ethnicity of most of the cities residents. Glendale holds more of the Armenian population than anywhere else in the United States; this is a fact that is known by just about everyone in Los Angeles. Armenians, in general, are a a prideful group, always commemorating the genocide of 1915 with flags attached to their cars and blasting music. They have never made much of the fact that Kardashian is Armenian, mostly because she does not matter.
Living there for 18 years I never saw her once. In a town that holds many celebrities: The Game, Nicole Richie, Christina Aguilera I've seen them all at a gas station or a grocery store. Kardashian has never been on our radar. She actually believes she can run (and win) in a mayoral race because our celebrity obsessed culture has given her that power, and that is more than this Glendalian can stomach.
Her political aspirations were not forced on her by her family, and they are not a product of her dissatisfaction with our current foreign policies, but instead are motivated from the fear that her light was starting to fade and her fifteen minutes were soon to be up. She knew that to get people talking about her again she would have to come up with something so out of left field that she would be trending on Twitter for weeks to come; and she succeeded in her efforts. Whether or not her intentions were to actually run or just make sure her name was still being searched on Google everyday, her political stint has awoken the voices of soccer moms everywhere, and hopefully put Kardashian back in her place.
