Kim Kardashian’s unphotoshopped body should come as a shock to no one

When The Daily Mail first shared pictures of an un-photoshopped Kim Kardashian on the beach in Mexico on Monday, Twitter erupted.

Among countless rude memes about her supposed likeness to Squidward, or comments about her “botched bum job”, were girls fed up of seeing yet another woman being body shamed by internet hounds.

There should be no shock in seeing a 36-year-old, mother-of-two having a bit of cellulite. If she didn’t everyone would accuse her of photoshopping or surgery anyway. How can she win?

After all, Kim was enjoying a private holiday with friends, what’s to say she expected paparazzi to take such intrusive photos of her having a swim. Even if Kim had been expecting the paps, it’s beside the point. This whole incident just shows the problem we now face when it comes to celebrity beauty ideals.

We have to embrace the unreality of social media. Kim’s bum may not have looked the same as it does in Instagram pictures – but when can anything on Instagram ever be taken without a pinch of salt? Is it up to the Kardashians to remind us they aren’t perfect by posting a picture of a spot every other day or a couple of their lumps and bumps? No, it’s up to us to recognise that social media is a space in which we cannot always expect to see the bare faced reality.

We can’t complain when we are the ones who encourage celebrities to present us with a perfect unreality. People feed in to the perfect image created online, they expect it and they like it. If they didn’t, the Kardashians wouldn’t each have over 50 million followers each, with Kim leading the pack at 98 million- there’s no doubt that there is an appeal.

The problem is that we have created a society where we expect celebrities to be perfect, we forget that they are human beings. Twitter will call Kim Kardashian’s cellulite gross and Piers Morgan will declare on Twitter that it’s “definitely nothing to ‘celebrate’”, then, in the same breath criticise her for photoshopping the pictures she puts on her Instagram.

It’s up to us to decide what we want from social media, because we can’t have our cake and eat it too.

The issue is not whether or not Kim alters her pictures or has had surgery (honestly who cares) it’s the fact that we expect celebrities to have perfect bodies and discuss them as if they’re public property. Whether it’s an escape from the everyday bustle of life or a result of the unprecedented rise of social media- the world can’t seem to get enough of looking in on the perfect celebrity lifestyle.

When we demand perfection we leave little breathing space for normality. We create a space in which celebrity must equal society’s perfect view of beauty: a perky bum and boobs, full lips, blue eyes, long hair, long legs – oh yeah, and you aren’t allowed surgery.

We build celebrities up so much that even two months after they’ve given birth we expect to see them waltzing around with flat stomachs. How can we expect celebrities to ever feel comfortable sharing their natural selves with us when we continue to idolise the photoshopped bikini and private jet pics they post.

It’s no wonder that in this climate the Kardashians have been able to forge careers on offering this idealistic fantasy of perfection, after all it’s what we seem to look for. How can we criticise Kim for looking different than she does online when that’s the Kim we beg to see.

It’s very easy for Katie Hopkins and various others to target the Kardashians as the root of the issue our generation seem to face when it comes to self love, but the fact of the matter is, the issue will not be fixed until we change our expectations.

It’s time to drop the ridiculous standards. Celebrities are human too and that shouldn’t come as a shock to any of us.