On the season four premiere of “The Kardashians,” which aired Thursday, Kim Kardashian and Kourtney Kardashian Barker peel back the glitzy, business-focused veneer that’s defined the family’s Hulu series, speaking with the intent to maim.
During a phone call shown within the first ten minutes of the premiere, Kim tells Kourtney that not only do Kourtney’s friends complain to Kim about Kourtney’s behavior, but she has a group chat called “Not Kourtney” to discuss it.
“That was pretty disturbing to me,” Amelia Kelley, a therapist who specializes in gaslighting and trauma, tells Insider. She added that the situation reminded her of how high-school students engage in mean-spirited gossip.
The heated season four conversation comes on the heels of the sisters’ years-long, on-and-off feud, which dominated season three of “The Kardashians.” That season’s drama centered on tension over Kim curating a Dolce & Gabbana show less than a year after Kourtney’s wedding, which Dolce & Gabbana designed.
While they reached a resolution in season three, the feud worsened once they watched the show’s edit and learned what each other had said, Kim says in Thursday’s premiere.
During the phone call, things explode. While the conversation begins with the sisters discussing their reactions to the season three edit and Kourtney’s wedding, it morphs into Kourtney calling Kim a narcissist, Kim expressing concern over whether or not her sister is happy, and eventually, Kim saying that everyone from Kourtney’s friends to Kourtney’s children complain about her behavior.
“I have a happy life, and the happiness comes when I get the fuck away from you guys,” Kourtney tells Kim over the phone. “Like, it’s specifically you.”
As reality television stars, business partners, and sisters, Kim and Kourtney’s relationship will always be fraught in some way, Kelley says.
But normal people can learn a lot from the behaviors the Kardashian sisters exhibit here — including what to avoid and how to actually find a resolution when both sides are hurt — if they find themselves in a similar situation, according to Kelley.
Weaponizing a group chat is never a good idea — and it could be narcissistic
Kelley, who watches “The Kardashians,” says she was shocked upon learning about Kim’s “Not Kourtney” group chat.
“If I found out that my family was doing that, I don’t know if I would feel comfortable being around my family,” Kelley tells Insider. She says that it would make sense for someone in Kourtney’s situation to feel unsafe around those group-chat members, and react with hurt and defensiveness, as she did when Kim brought it up.
“In my opinion, nothing positive can come from having a secret chat about a family member, unless you intend not to have a relationship with that family member,” Kelley says.
According to Kim, Kourtney isn’t being singled out — she says that she and her family members have “side chats about everybody,” and that she “expressed concern” about Kourtney.
Since Kim doesn’t divulge the specific origins of the group chat, it’s difficult to assess whether it came from a place of narcissism, according to Kelley.
She says that if Kim created the chat with the intention of getting others to be on her side and against Kourtney, that could be narcissistic, as it’s coming from a place of self-importance.
But if Kim created the chat in a moment of hurt or stress over how to handle a particular situation with Kourtney, and wanted advice from friends, that wouldn’t be narcissistic.
“Being malicious is not narcissistic. But elevating yourself above someone else through malicious tactics, never taking responsibility or having remorse, and looking to degrade them so you can be seen as better than them — that’s where it becomes narcissistic,” Kelley says.
In a dual confessional following the phone conversation, Kourtney says that she feels like Kim is “using any weapon that she could find, like, to hurt me.” Ultimately, she feels like Kim is attempting to “weaponize” her friends and family against her.
Kelley says that weaponizing a group chat and saying that someone’s friends and family are displeased with them could be considered a form of gaslighting, a common tactic used by narcissists. (Non-narcissists can gaslight too, though it’s less common.)
“You’re trying to throw this person off and make them question whether their relationships with everyone else they care about are real, which is very isolating,” Kelley says.
But ultimately, the chat’s origins and the creator’s intentions don’t matter, since Kim ends up using it to prove her point, rather than have a conversation about her conflict with Kourtney, says Kelley.
What really matters, according to Kelley, is that Kim injures her relationship with her sister by focusing on proving her point, rather than going directly to Kourtney and being honest about her hurt.
“It’s you, and my friends, and my kids, and everyone against me,” Kourtney says during the phone conversation. “You’re just a fucking witch and I fucking hate you.”
Read the original article on Insider
