Kim Kardashian breaks silence on Balenciaga ad scandal (nypost.com)

Earlier this month luxury fashion brand, Balenciaga dropped their holiday ad campaign. This campaign featured children holding teddy bears in bondage harnesses and costumes that appeared very sexual. The brand is receiving major backlash for putting children in such a vulnerable position. Many are accusing Balenciaga of condoning pedophilia and child exploitation.

Among those people ridiculing the brand is pop culture icon Kim Kardashian. Kim has been a very vocal supporter of Balenciaga. She has had her own campaigns with the brand, and she recently had a cameo with Balenciaga’s Creative Director, Demna on her family’s Hulu show, The Kardashians. As a result, many people were ridiculing Kim for not speaking out about this issue when she has such a close partnership with the brand.

A week later Kim Kardashian decided to comment on the scandal stating that she was deeply disturbed and disgusted by the campaign. She said that she was silent for so long because she wanted to give the brand, which she has a close partnership with, an opportunity to discuss the situation with her personally. She shared that she believes the brand is deeply apologetic and doesn’t think something like this will happen again, but she is also having conversations about how it ever happened in the first place. Due to all the backlash, she stated that she is currently “Reevaluating” her relationship with the brand.

Many people took to address her post saying that they don’t believe she is being sincere and that all she cares about is money. Many think she only posted a statement because she was getting heat for not doing so.

It seems like a classic case where Kardashian was destined to lose. If she didn’t say anything people would have ridiculed her for that. However, her statement drawn out into for separate Twitter posts didn’t seem to be enough for many either.

In my opinion this scandal was Balenciaga’s fault and shouldn’t be attached to Kim Kardashian. That being said, it’s a big thing in the PR world to attach yourself to a brand because who and what you support becomes an extension of your personality. I think Kardashian should have either made a statement right away rather than waiting a week and hoping things would blow over or she shouldn’t have posted anything at all. After all, there are many other celebrity supporters of Balenciaga who are not making headlines this week or facing backlash even though they didn’t make statements.