Because I’m a tennis junkie and the Australian summer tennis swing has been underway for the past week, I’ve been following the whole “people donating to fire relief” issue already. The Aussie players pledged to donate certain amounts of money for every ace they hit, and players of other nationalities quickly followed suit. Maria Sharapova announced a $25K donation and Novak Djokovic pledged the same. Simona Halep said she’ll donate every time she screams at her coach (she worried that she wouldn’t hit enough aces to make a big enough donation). There are very real concerns that the Australian Open in Melbourne will be greatly affected by the devastating brushfire too, especially the air quality and the tourism Melbourne sees every year for the AO.
Non-tennis people are donating too, including… the Kardashian-Jenners. Kylie Jenner actually seems to be donating a huge sum because she f–ked up on social media. Which isn’t the worst outcome, let’s be fair.
Kylie Jenner is donating $1 million to various relief efforts in Australia amid the devastating bushfires, PEOPLE exclusively confirms. The star’s generous donation comes after she faced backlash for posting a photo wearing mink fur slippers on social media, while simultaneously raising awareness about the rising death toll of animals in Southern Australia via her Instagram stories. Fans felt that Jenner, 22 was hypocritical after she shared a pic of herself wearing $1,480 Louis Vuitton mink fur slippers amid the wildfires devastation, which have claimed the lives of at least 25 people, burned through more than 11 million acres and taken the lives of at least half a billion animals since they sparked in September. The Kylie Cosmetics mogul previously posted several Instagram Stories raising awareness about the fires. But a source tells PEOPLE that Jenner wants to do whatever she can to help Australia.
“That post was completely unintentional,” the insider says. “Kylie stands behind her desire to want to help provide relief towards the devastation the fires have caused.”
Jenner’s donation comes shortly after after older sister Kim Kardashian West, 39, clapped back at a fan who accused her family of not donating to the Australian wildfires relief efforts on Twitter Sunday night. In the original since-deleted tweet that tagged Kardashian West along with sisters Kourtney Kardashian, Khloé Kardashian, Kendall Jenner and Kylie, the fan wrote: “Nothing gets me more heated than to see the Kardashians/Jenners talk about climate change/wildfires & not donate even a penny.”
Kardashian West replied by saying that just because they haven’t spoken out about making donations, doesn’t mean they aren’t doing their part. “Nothing gets me more heated than to see people think they know what we donated to and to think we have to publicize everything,” Kardashian West tweeted.
It was stupid and out-of-touch to even wear mink slippers, nevermind post a photo of the mink slippers while giving a message about the half a billion native wildlife that were killed in the still on-going fires. But $1 million is a good place to start. Here’s the thing though… I don’t get why we’re yelling at celebrities and shaming celebrities about donating? We need to yell at politicians, voting blocs and whole-ass governments about this, rather than some reality stars.
meanwhile kylie jenner posting her 1100 dollar REAL FUR slippers right after her “heart was broken” about animals being killed…. imagine being this disconnected from reality pic.twitter.com/EKOKtbPNMA
— Sebastian Williams (@sebas_williams) January 6, 2020
Photos courtesy of Instagram.
She’s a bit of an ahole but thank you
Yes, thank you, but … looking at her, my God, I think the only original body part she has are her eyeballs.
She’s a bit of an ahole but thank you
I hate when celebrities asked fans to donate. I understand they want them to be involved but arggghh
I get that a million bucks is better than nothing, but these people are ridiculously rich. a million is nothing to them. nothing! they could easily donate 5 million and still don’t make a dent in their savings. if celebs are donating to feel better and have themselves praised, they could cough up a sum that can actually change things.
You know what I hate about these type of comments is that, are we really pretending everyone in the world cares about this cause and has donated? I suppose few people have the resources to donate 1M, but you can donate 5 dollars right? Did you donate those 5 dollars? Were 5 dollars all you could really donate? Did you take the time and calculate how much money you could donate to the Australian wildfires without going broke? If you couldn’t donate at all then how broke are you really? Could you not walk home 3 times this week and donate that saved money?
… And so on. If we’re gonna dissect celebs for “not doing enough” we have to first wonder if we’re doing anything at all. Because I’m here writing a comment on a Kylie Jenner story while I could be helping.
Agreed, Cindy!
@Cindy – Just no! To the average person that donates, $5 is likely to be a higher percentage of their monthly income and this has been proven time and time again. Those who don’t have are generally much more giving of their time and money than those who are in the wealthier percentage. It’s those millionaires and billionaires who have a real opportunity to make a difference and don’t, quite simply because of greed. It’s usually greed in part that got them to that point in the first place.
We should be yelling at politicians, celebrities and the wealthy alike.
@Cindy–YES!! Trashing people donating any amount is classless. She didn’t HAVE TO donate anything.
Exactly. It’s so ungrateful to say they can do more. They could also do less. And honestly, they could also just say “it’s not our fault or problem, we’re not Australian. It’s not affecting us.” No matter what their motives are, it’s still beneficial to the cause and it’s still a good deed. Every dollar adds up.
THANK YOU! I was gonna say…this is the change in their couch cushions! They could/SHOULD do a LOT more, considering THEIR carbon footprint/over-consumption! I hate hypocrites!
I think $1mil does change things…..? Also, this isn’t the ONLY thing going on in the world right now asking for donations, so perhaps she is donating to other causes as well. Also also, out of curiosity, what percentage of your savings have you donated?
Has anyone seen the horrific damage in Puerto Rico due to the earthquakes this week? It’s not getting much news coverage or Americans just don’t care. It’s like one disaster gets all the news for some reason.
@ME, insane! I have not seen the news coverage for that, so thank you for posting that here. I can’t believe how much is happening on a day to day basis. Meanwhile, CNN has a headline preetttttty close to the top that reads, “Nicki Minaj’s Madame Tussauds wax figure is being roasted online”……………….
That being said, no shame in needing to relieve the stress of our news cycle with some gossip or whatever. But I don’t see anything on that site right now about Puerto Rico, which is scary to say the least.
She’s not required to give anything. It’s HER money.
receipts….or not true. the entire bunch would want you to believe they are good people but actions speak better than words. js imo
1 million is a generous donation, no matter how much she has. I don’t get people criticizing ANY donation. There’s so many other things to rip on people for. Giving a million bucks should not be one of them.
“Here’s the thing though… I don’t get why we’re yelling at celebrities and shaming celebrities about donating?”
I agree that we should be yelling at politicians, but celebrities definitely contribute a lot more than us regular people to climate change…private planes, yachts, big houses.
Still it’s great to hear celebrities using their platform to talk about the fires.
I live near Melbourne, and there was a fire in my town this week. Fortunately, there were no lives lost or property damage, but it was frightening. The smoke has been horrific too.
I’m good with yelling at EVERYONE. Celebrities, politicians, everyone can do something.
A family member of mine lived in Melbourne for a few years and loved it, and really wanted to stay. I’m so sorry you are all going through this, it’s horrific.
Also, those slippers are gross and I’m glad people called her out on it. We should also be calling out LV for making such a gross product.
I’m one of those people who’s fairly neutral about fur as long as its sustainably attained, but man is she stupid and tasteless. Just complete disconnect with reality, that family.
Australian here and I agree with Kaiser about shaming politicians instead of celebrities.
This is an unprecedented situation so every dollar helps.
However, I’m f***ing pissed off because Scott Morrison refused to meet fire chiefs since April of last year to discuss how to prepare because him & the Liberal party are climate change deniers. We need to stop voting in people that value coal profits above quality of life.
Prior to fire season there were communities without water. (The Howard Liberal Government privatised water which screwed up the Murray Basin). Grass roots organisations having been doing water runs. Meanwhile the Government didn’t provide it.
Anyhow that was a rant, sorry. We appreciate the donations! It’s disturbing that actors like Nicole Kidman & Russell Crowe are giving more informative statements about the consequences of climate than our Prime Minister.
Australian too, and yes, yes, yes to everything you wrote. Our PM can’t talk about the fires in any depth or address root causes, because he doesn’t believe in climate change! But hey…we voted him in.
RHOAtlanta alum Kim Zolciak Biermann offered to donate “10% of sales of her lip kits for 24 hours”.
I was genuinely appalled.
I saw something this morning that several tennis players, Serena and Federer included, are planning a benefit event.
They really need an education and should have gone to school!
Are we seriously shaming celebrities that don’t donate enough money in our eyes? Really? Kylie only donated a million, boo hoo let’s publicly berate her? How much did you donate you a—wipe? Yeah a million may not decimate their bank accounts, but it’s THEIR damn money to do with whatever the hell they want and it’s not our place to say what or where THEIR money should go. Lets just golf clap that she donated at all and move the hell on… and no, I’m not a fan of the kardashians…
Kind of how the self-proclaimed ‘animal lovers’ out there turn around and sing the praises of bacon.
At least she donated…. or will. A 1mil pledge doesn’t mean 1 check but it’s a great donation even if split up. As for posting fur content the same day, how do you think she’s paying for the donation? Ad money. If she has contracts for posting ads, then she wouldn’t change them. As if anything posted doesn’t bring in revenue.
Off topic: her period boobs are insanely huge. Aunt Flo tsk tsk.
We should be shaming the politicians who have refused to take action against climate change,
we should be shaming the companies that are destroying our planet,
we should be shaming the uber-rich (celebs included) who live wasteful, earth-destroying lifestyles
Can she find Australia on a map of the world?
A map that has Australia lit up in neon?
I wish people yelled at Politicians to donate like they yell at celebrities. $1 mil is more than anyone in any sort of powerful position has donated, so good on her. She may be stupid and out of touch but at least she’s doing something which is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more than everyone yelling at her.
I think it’s great when anyone donates. Let’s just hope all this money being donated actually goes to the people that need it in Australia.
As a side note, why does she still photoshop and filter her pics to death? We know what she looks like in real life. That “family” pic of the sisters is ridiculous, they all have the SAME chin in the pic ! Is that a new “chin filter”or something lol?
Has anyone else watched billionaires explained on Netflix? It really sums up what their money is as opposed to us. Like Ferrari is like a $60 kids toy car, private jet is like a subway ticket and so on. If this is the case then why aren’t more of them doing more?! It’s great to bring attention to these causes but put your $$ where your mouth is. These people could be doing so much good but sit around in fur slippers.
We need to tax this bs at 90%, I’m voting for Bernie.
Yelling at celebrities is one thing but Kylie is a different variety of celebrity given that she’s a “billionaire.” She is part of the 1%. Everyone who is part of that club should be getting grief for not doing enough. Where the F is Bezos? And the Walton family? And Bill Gates? All of them should be making huge, splashy donations. Bezos and just one of the Walton heirs alone could put together a billion for Australia, the Amazon, and pretty much ever crisis to come but they don’t. In my book this makes Kylie the least problematic billionaire, even with the stupid mink slippers.
I mean are we going to harass this girl for giving 1 MILLION DOLLARS….yeah she’s rich af she could donate more. However the above amount I’m sure will be greatly beneficial to the fires. Am I missing something?? Why the outrage? Ellen has a GoFundMe aiming to create a 5 Mil donation from plebs like you and I. She could easily pay that herself. Where’s the cry for her to do more? Sooo yeah I don’t get it.
+1
I don’t mind celebrities promoting general public fundraisers, assuming they donate as well and don’t just do the publicity part.
I assume she donated herself too, especially considering her wife is Australian.
I can’t help but wonder if she would have donated if she hasn’t been called out.
As an Australian I’m pretty uncomfortable with some of the donation shaming I’m seeing (eg. and so hasn’t donated yet, or so and so didn’t donate enough).
The donations are lovely gestures, but we shouldn’t need them, and honestly it would probably be more helpful if nobody donated a cent and instead focused on pushing our politicians to open the coffers instead. It’s not like we don’t have the money to deal with this, it’s just that the governments choosing not to deal with it, and the donations are helping them do that.
I’m glad you said this as I agree with you. Australia is not a third world country. It has money, lots of it. The Australian government should be ashamed of itself. Your country shouldn’t need donations from citizens of other countries. I wonder where all these millions being donated will actually go?
Good for her. Yep, I mean it.
Can we start eating the rich yet? Because tbh I’ve been pretty ready for a while
I truly never expect nuance, reflection, subtlety, or thoughtfulness from the K-J clan, but it is nice that she donated $1 million, even if for her that’s almost nothing.
We can all do something, of course, and we should (it would be good if the attention and $ support Australia is receiving right now were also offered to those in places that are not first-world countries and whose tragedies are seen as somehow more normal). But, I think it’s kind of silly to shame regular working people about being annoyed at Kylie/other celebrities and wishing they put their money or activism where their mouth is. I would never go as far as specifying a dollar amount of how much a celebrity SHOULD donate (what do I know about the specificities of their finances?) but to act like the impact, influence, and direct effect on climate change they have is comparable to ours is laughable. They travel on private planes, are hugely wasteful (remember the posts about Kylie’s house being literally filled with roses?), and publicize their excessive materialism online, which makes people obsessed with obtaining the same or knock-off version of those things.
Why regular people like us are so obsessed with defending the ethics of others’ excessive and unjust wealth is beyond me.
Is no one going to mention her fresh batch of surgery, or are we just desensitised to that now? Nose; lips? No?
I can’t believe how stupid she is, and mink slippers?? Cruel, vain woman.