When Will Loud Luxury Finally Die?
How many orange Lamborghinis are too many orange Lamborghinis?
TMZ; Kim Kardashian, April 2022
The other night, I had a date ask me if I watch Selling Sunset. I was a bit taken aback—not because I hadn't seen it, of course, but because he listened to Morgan Wallen and grew up in Wisconsin. We were sitting in a dive bar with TouchTunes, listening to "Reelin' in the Years." I was surprised to learn he was, in fact, in Selling Sunset's target demographic. I mean, hey, no judgement. As am I. A fun factoid: Most of the houses on Selling Sunset aren't actually for sale, and some of the buyers aren't actually buying. Yet still, we watch women with more filler than a pistachio croissant take us through tours of $10 million-plus properties. I love the correlation between the enormous glass windows found in many of those modern estates and how we display our wealth. Glass everything, practically. Imagine living your life constantly in view of someone else. Wealth on display for all to see.
I wonder how future anthropologists will study the Kardashians. What will their analysis be of America's royal family? How fitting it is that the Kardashians are American royalty—a family so incredibly un-private. The perfect example of capitalizing your way to the top. A family with no hard skills amassed billions of dollars by capitalizing on everything from a sex scandal to a 72-hour marriage to the plastic surgery of a seventeen-going-on-thirty-year-old who made 'lip kits' for girls. Nothing is off-limits for them; no body is too warm to step over en route to another planted tabloid leak and more wealth. However apparent my disdain for the Kardashians is, America is still entranced by this once relatable family.
Like many of today's most followed internet personas, relatability is what drove the Kardashian stock up. Ryan Seacrest and his team of executive producers chronicled the life of an attainably rich family in Calabasas. Back then, Kris probably grocery-shopped, and the faces of Kylie and Khloe still looked somewhat human. We gobbled up family fights over the trivial and the awkward first years in Hollywood for a socialite who started off as Paris Hilton's assistant. But now, on what feels like Season 187, we watch the Kardashian dolls attempt to maintain that same sense of relatability standing in closets that house their Birkin collections alone. Despite a viewership significantly smaller than the Kardashian peak in the early 2010s, Ryan and Kris continue to peddle the same vapid but luxurious bullshit from the depths of the uncanny valley.
Balenciaga garbage bag; FW22
American loud luxury isn't just about atrocious Balenciaga accessories or designer adult diapers; it's about the way we consume, absorb, and display wealth. We are obsessed with consumption and display. What's the point of consumption if there's no display? What's the point of a nice dinner at one of New York's hottest restaurants if the spicy rigatoni isn't plastered on your Instagram Story for all to see? To eat it? Don't be ridiculous. Loud luxury as a phenomenon has grown beyond the streets of Calabasas and Rodeo and into the walk-in closets of influencers that house puke-stained dresses from the year previous. In a social media landscape that confuses oversharing for relatability, the nouveau riche have tried to replicate Kris Jenner's equation and are failing miserably because no one is buying it. Because we literally can't.
We've been edged by a recession that's been on the way for 18 months. And while American media may say the future is bright for 2024, the evidence of an economic downturn remains in grocery stores, under Christmas trees, and in the homes of many families housing twenty-somethings who, despite a college education, can't afford rent. The ostentatious wealth that consumes our television screens in shows like Keeping Up or Selling Sunset stands as a mockery to those who work two jobs and are told by a socialite with five versions of her face that "It seems like nobody wants to work these days." It's not to say that reality television isn't fun—it is. But when it perpetuates America's wealth disparity to a generation that will struggle to buy a house, it loses its appeal to an audience who can't even try to aspire to that kind of lifestyle.
Money can buy a lot. It can buy a new body. It can buy private jets. It can even buy a cover of Forbes. But can it buy relatability? In this economy? No.
As we starve, just remember, no matter the dietary restrictions, there is at least one thing we can all agree on eating…
