Kylie Jenner. The beautiful teen model from the hit MTV drama, "Keeping Up with the Kardashians." To be honest, I hate reality television because it gives people who represent a stereotype a platform to consciously either empower or destroy that stereotype (think "Jersey Shore" and "Teen Mom"), so I haven't seen much of Jenner on the show. But from what I've read about her online, she seems like she knows what she wants to do with her life outside of reality TV. I've read articles about her modeling career and her newest Instagram campaign for anti-bullying. She was even named one of "Time" magazine's most influential teens. But despite all of that, her newest photoshoot is incredibly ignorant and damaging.
What TV Guide calls "cringe-worthy" is Jenner's photoshoot spread for Interview Magazine. The photos consist of the 18-year-old Jenner clad in various styles of black leather (even some butt-less chaps) looking particularly vacant as she poses in 12 different shots, two of which feature Jenner in a black and gold wheelchair.
The other shots show her essentially as a sex doll (one even has her in a rigid doll-like position as a man holds her up), which already drives me nuts (because women empowerment pretty much flew out of the window), but the two shots above strike a different chord with me.
First of all, she uses a wheelchair as a prop for her edginess. A wheelchair is not a fashion prop for the able-bodied Jenner, or any able-bodied person, to use. A wheelchair is not part of a fad or fashion trend. The photos completely devalue people with disability in popular culture.Taking a wheelchair, something essential to the daily lives of people with disability, and turning into a prop promotes passivity towards people with disability, which is obviously not something Jenner should be promoting.
Secondly, her empty countenance supports everything that people with disabilities are not. They are not vacant or weak. They are not different than able-bodied people. They are people. Her facial expression promotes the stereotype of weakness that often alienates people with disability. Jenner's photos create a representation that is not reality and that is unacceptable.
Lastly, Jenner's usage of the wheelchair puts a huge damper on the already incredibly minuscule representation of people with disability in fashion. As stated before, the fact that she uses the wheelchair promotes it as prop when that is exactly what it's not. People with disability use wheelchairs everyday and they certainly look good while using them. But flip through any fashion magazine; they're extremely unrepresentative of people with disability. The small population of fashion models with disability doesn't need Jenner downplaying their entire representation because the fashion industry does that enough. Jenner, being a philanthropic, thriving star should definitely be able to recognize that.
Famous people do a lot of crazy and ignorant things and get away with them. Google "Justin Bieber and police reports" and you get around 61,000,000 hits about various assault charges, countries vowing to never let him into their country again and a slew of other crimes from two years ago. But if you could scroll through my Facebook wall today, you would see that the only mentions of Bieber are how he changed everyone—and yes, I mean everyone—into a Belieber with his new, angsty album about Selena Gomez. This happens all the time with celebrities; we all turn the other cheek to their actions because of their fame. But I am not going to let that happen with Kylie Jenner. Her photoshoot with Interview Magazine shows real ignorance and misrepresentation. I might be an able-bodied person, but even I can see how these photographs are not a step in the right direction towards the world that our generation, which includes Kylie Jenner, is trying to create. We need to raise awareness and educate ourselves so things like Jenner's photos won't be made and misrepresentations of people with disabilities will end.
For more information about disability awareness, visit the Center For Persons with Disability website.
