Khloé Kardashian caused quite a stir recently after opening up about her history of photoshopping her social media images. The Kardashians are aware of the public’s criticisms when it comes to the highly edited images that have become a calling card for their brand. In many instances, it has been quite obvious, whether it involves using a filter or blurring something out in the background.
During an episode of her podcast, Khloé seemingly addressed the years of accusations and rumours that she’s constantly photoshopping and face-tuning her photos. It comes on the heels of what seems like a calculated PR decision by the family to be more open and honest about their previously denied surgeries and beauty treatments.
While on her podcast “Khloé in Wonderland,” Khloé responded to a fan who wrote in, “You Photoshop every picture you post.” While Kardashian responded that she doesn’t, she acknowledged that in the past, she did participate in that culture of constantly over-editing photos posted online.
“I don’t,” Kardashian replied. “But there was a time that I did. There was a time when I was around some people who would make me feel like I needed to. I also think it was the era, too. I felt like a lot of people were Photoshopping or heavily Photoshopping more than they do now.”
Khloé continued, explaining that there was a time when she and everyone else she was hanging around with were so consumed with the “filter lifestyle” that they were unable to see their true selves. She admitted that there are still days when she believes that she needs a filter, explaining she prefers seeing herself in video format.
“I’m the most photogenic, but I’ll take 500 photos to get the one that I like. That’s okay. I’m allowed to do that,” she added. “But I will say there was a time that I heavily photoshopped.”
She recalled looking back at past photos and being taken aback by how much she looked like a cartoon character. She claimed that it was “humiliating” for her to think “that was even a version of myself.”
“I feel bad that I thought I needed to look like that,” she continued. “But I was around people who were all doing that. And if they took my photo, they would make me look that way before giving it to me. And then I would think that’s how I looked. And if I got paparazzied, I’d be like, ‘I don’t look like that. I look like this photo.’ And I had to reprogram my mind to be like, okay, we have to lay off the filters. This isn’t real. That’s not how I look. And I don’t want to look like that. It was a strange time.”
Khloé insisted that while she was incredibly consumed with the entire filter world and having her face look a certain way, she’s no longer living that lifestyle now. For her, taking a good photo now solely depends on lighting. “I like to have good lighting,” she shared. “I have more controlled photos, like good lighting, and I might take a bunch to get the ones I like. But I don’t have to Photoshop every photo.”
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But as body positivity and beauty expert Nicola Dall’Asen sagely wrote in a recent opinion piece for Allure, let’s call a spade a spade here. This newfound honesty isn’t anything more than part of their current business plan, just like denying they ever filtered, Photoshopped, or plastic-surgeried was a calculated plan in the past. And it was a plan that helped them build billionaire fortunes in lip kits that promised filler-like pouts and workout gear that would give you that BBL look.
Dall’Asen wrote, “I’ve realised in the past couple of weeks that our demands for the Kardashians’ transparency have been misguided all along. On the surface, what people were asking for was a little more honesty from them, but I think what we’ve been seeking all this time is an apology, some kind of recognition that the impossible beauty standard they helped set has hurt us. Closure.”
Similar to Khloé admitting that she once Photoshopped her photos and opening up about the mindset that she had in past years, many of her other family members have started pulling back the curtain as well. The Kardashian matriarch, Kris Jenner, recently turned heads for seemingly having an entirely new face that made her look quite youthful.
It sparked a flurry of speculation among fans about the work she must’ve had done, and while Jenner didn’t outright admit to anything, she also didn’t deny the faceliftrumourssHerer representatives told Page Six that she had “recent work” done by Steven Levine, MD, though they didn’t expand on what exactly Levine did to Jenner’s face.
Then there’s the youngest Kardashian-Jenner, Kylie, who revealed the specifics of her plastic surgery. Kylie commented on a TikTok video from a content creator who was looking to copy Jenner’s exact breast implant, and so the reality star gave the details, responding, “445 cc, moderate profile, half under the muscle!!!!! Siliconee!!!GarthFisherr!!! Hope this helps lol.”
Kylie has also expressed regret over some of the surgeries she’s had in the past after insisting that she’d only ever gotten filler in her face. One of the surgeries she admitted to regretting was getting her breasts done. However, now that the Kardashian-Jenner family has been more vocal about their surgeries and editing, people feel that it’s a case of too little, too late. Sure, this famous family capitalised on the beauty standard for so many years, but they were also victims of it themselves.
Their coming out and talking openly about their plastic surgeries, 5 to 10 years ago, might not have even made a difference. It wasn’t like they were the only celebrities who were participating in that culture, but they were just the ones that everyone paid attention to. At the end of the day, their transparency shows there has been a shift in the conversations that we’re having about plastic surgery and beauty in general, and maybe that’s a good thing.
As Dall’Asen concluded, “knowing for sure that Kris got a facelift or that Kylie has breast implants can’t and won’t resolve the feelings of resentment so many of us have toward them for their impact on how we’re expected to present ourselves. And we shouldn’t expect the Kardashians — or anyone famous, for that matter — to give us that. Not because they don’t owe it to us, but because that closure has to come from within ourselves.”
