Is this OK?
“Cute”, “adorable”, “sassy” — these are some of the adjectives being used to describe a video of Kim Kardashian and Kanye West’s daughter North, 2, on her way to her ballet class.
The teeny ballerina, clad in a tutu and a custom-made Balmain jacket, is holding the hand of her nanny as a swarm of paparazzi snap her every move.
“No pictures,” she told the photographers in her tiny little voice. “I said, no pictures!”
Watch the footage here… Post continues after video.
North West is definitely cute, and quite precocious, but the idea of a toddler having to tell a pack of adult men that she doesn’t want to have her picture taken is a bit upsetting.
Of course, the photographers ignore her, and the video of her telling them to essentially bugger off then goes viral.
It is the kind of invasive attention that North West is already accustomed to, and it’s not likely to abate any time soon.
Kim Kardashian West is a celebrity of the highest order. Her private life is her work, and she makes millions of dollars from sharing it.
As such, North West has been a constant presence on Kardashian’s Instagram feed. She attends fashion shows and sits in the front row next to Anna Wintour. She accompanies her parents to film premieres and fancy restaurants.
This video might have been less disturbing if North had been accompanied by either of her parents, because we’d assume the photographers were there for them. But that a two-year-old is now the target of such rabid attention? Not cool.
Loads of Hollywood parents, such as Kristen Bell and Dax Shepherd, have campaigned against the publishing of images of celebrity’s children.
“They’re too little for all this judgment. They don’t understand any of it, they don’t understand that they’re a cog in the machine. All they feel is a predatory sense of oppression when the paparazzi follow them, and that’s intolerable,” Bell told Bustle last year.
The problem with North West is that her parents seem complicit in her exploitation. Why else would you dress a baby in Balmain for ballet? Why else would you take a one-year-old to New York Fashion Week?
Kardashian doesn’t seem concerned. She posted a pap picture of her daughter to Instagram on the morning of the incident, in her ballet ensemble, with the caption, “Balmain ballerina.”
Top Comments
Kim probably isn't concerned because she was likely the one who alerted the paparazzi in the first place. She thrives on this sort of thing. Publicity for her child is publicity for her. It's impossible to get the paparazzi to respect a child's privacy when her own mother doesn't. :\
My friend's toddler daughter is terrified of the paparazzi, no matter how her parents try to soothe her and explain she's safe. They've tried to shield her and maintain her privacy, but yet...
She feels like they're scary and hunting her, and you know what? She's right, that's exactly what they're doing! A little girl starting to show signs of anxiety, as a direct consequence of the actions of adults' with cameras and dollar signs in mind is NOT okay.
Even if they were to blur the photos of these children with their parents, the actual real life consequences on the children is the same. They should not be allowed to follow them at all.