Kendall Jenner Opens Up & Sobs Over Her Controversial Pepsi Ad
No one was pleased with the absolute tone-deaf advertising Pepsi debuted last year with Kendall Jenner. After the numerous nation-wide protests for civil rights, The United States did not welcome this incredibly hollow Pepsi ad. The ad featured a young Jenner fleeing a photo shoot and offering a police man a Pepsi to seemingly halt police brutality towards protests. The public lashed out, at both Pepsi and Jenner, until the ad was retracted.
Kendall remained notoriously silent during the whole incident, not bothering to issue a personal statement. Pepsi apologized on behalf of Jenner as the star remained silent, much to everyone's dismay. Last night on Keeping Up With The Kardashians, Kendall finally opened up as to how the ad's serious backlash impacted her.
"When I first got this offer, I mean, [Pepsi]'s a huge company … the people I was following were so iconic and amazing….to get something like that, it was so exciting. And I trusted everyone, I trusted the teams. But after I saw the reaction and I read what people had to say about it, I most definitely saw what went wrong. I was so stuck and I really didn’t know what to do that I completely shut down."
Kendall later cried, stating, "I would never purposely hurt someone, ever…if I knew that this was gonna be the outcome, I would have never done something like this. But you don’t know when you’re in the moment…I just felt so fucking stupid. The fact that I would offend other people or hurt other people was definitely not the intent. And that’s what got me the most. Is that I would have ever made anyone else upset."
Father Caitlyn Jenner wrote in her memoir that Kendall saw and approved the script prior to the commercial which Kendall refutes. "What upsets me the most is that Dad brought up the commercial. … She doesn’t actually know what happened. She just like, word-vomits."
Half-sister and megastar, Kim Kardashian, offered Kendall some sage advice, "This is your first real experience with something like this … It should affect you in a way where you grow from it…I just wish that you could see that there’s light at the end of the tunnel and that it will be okay if you’re just honest and open."
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Kendall ended the episode saying, "I just feel really, really bad. I feel really bad that anyone was ever offended. I feel really bad that this was taken such a wrong way. I genuinely feel like shit. I have no idea how I’m going to bounce back from it. I don’t even know what to do."
Fortunately for her, the incident blew over with time but this definitely didn't help the public's perception of Kendall Jenner. Hopefully Jenner can apologize for her actions in the future - especially when she offends millions of people.