Physical assault is ????? ??????? ??????? ???????? ?????????not a joke, even if it happens to a celebrity you don't like. It shouldn't need to be said, but here we are.
After Kim Kardashian West was robbed at gunpoint in France, the NRA joined the round of Twitter comedians using her personal horror as material for their jokes. The tweets seemingly attack her call for stricter gun control in America, suggesting that France's strict laws do not actually protect citizens.
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Kardashian West has been a proponent of gun control in the United States, using social media to support the cause on multiple occasions, including following the death of Valerie Jackson and the mass shooting at a gay club in Orlando.
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The NRA has a history of claiming that gun-related tragedies in the United States should not be politicized to push for more gun control, and yet tried to use Kardashian West's traumatic experience to push a political agenda.
Sunday's attack was terrifying. Kardashian West reportedly believed she would be raped or killed and screamed for her life. The armed assailants tied her up, locked her in the bathroom of her temporary residence in Paris and taped her mouth shut, according to TMZ.
The crime occurred merely days after Kardashian West and her friend, model Gigi Hadid, were both physically assaulted by Vitalii Seduik on separate occasions in Paris. Seduik has claimed the attacks were "pranks." While Seduik lifted Hadid up as she was leaving a fashion show in Milan, he planted a kiss on Kardashian's butt while she walked to her car in Paris last week. Kardashian West was previously attacked by Seduik in 2014 and, according to TMZ, she plans to file a retraining order against him.
When asked by the BBC whether he considered kissing Kardashian West's butt against her will counted as sexual assault, Seduik showed a complete misunderstanding of boundaries and the definition of sexual assault. "Sexual assault is basically rape," he claimed. "Did I rape anyone? No. I disagree. It's not sexual assault."
The idea that Seduik's attacks are entertainment or that the NRA's tweets aimed at Kardashian West should be considered "trolling" just adds to a culture that dehumanizes these real women who are victims and are told often that their bodies do not belong to them.
There is no reason to suspect that the motive behind Sunday's attack on Kardashian West was anything other than robbery or to characterize Seduik's actions as anything but attacks. However, the reaction to both is indicative of a culture that commodifies women to the point that threats to their personal safety are brushed off as punchlines.
Even defenses of female celebrities are often misguided. Comedian James Corden certainly had good intentions when he tweeted about the incident, but he used Kardashian West's relationships to other people to define her worth instead of simply stating her inherent value as a human being.
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Analyzing fragments of Kardashian West's identity to defend the sympathy she is warranted as a victim misses the point -- she didn't deserve to be attacked and she doesn't deserve to be mocked for what happened to her.