Kim Kardashian has grown significantly since the 2016 controversy and now approaches public situations with far more caution and thoughtfulness than she did a decade ago, according to sources close to the Skims founder.
Taylor Swift described the entire ordeal as 'career death'—and insiders confirm there's absolutely zero communication between her and either West or Kardashian today. These people are done.
On July 14, 2016, Kardashian posted Snapchat clips of a phone call where Swift can be heard telling West the 'sex' lyric could be seen as a 'compliment.' The full 25-minute call leaked in 2020, proving Swift never approved the 'bitch' line.
Ten years later, Taylor Swift got her vindication when that 25-minute recording surfaced—but let's not pretend this feud didn't nearly destroy her career. Some wounds don't fully heal; they just scar over.
When Kanye West premiered his "Famous" music video at The Forum in Los Angeles on June 24, 2016, the energy inside the $25-a-head crowd was electric. Nearly everyone sang along to the track—while West himself flashed an occasional smile surrounded by wife Kim Kardashian, her family, and fellow rappers Travis Scott, Desiigner, and French Montana. But outside that famed arena, a storm was already brewing.
As Tidal simultaneously live-streamed the video, the world tuned in to witness shockingly voyeuristic scenes depicting lifelike naked wax sculptures of West and 11 other celebrities sleeping in bed together—and all eyes landed on the two figures flanking him: Kardashian and his longtime nemesis Taylor Swift. The backlash was swift. "Famous" racked up more dislikes than likes on YouTube, and one of Swift's closest friends, Lena Dunham, called the video "disturbing." The song itself had already ignited controversy when West debuted it at a Madison Square Garden listening party in New York City back in February 2016.
Swift's representative issued a statement claiming she had privately "cautioned" the rapper against releasing a track with such "misogynistic" lyrics—specifically: "I feel like me and Taylor might still have sex / Why? I made that bitch famous." West insisted he had her blessing; Swift maintained he never gave her any heads-up about the "bitch" line. Special effects artist Michael Dinetz, who worked on those infamous sculptures, exclusively told Us Weekly he thought Caitlyn Jenner would spark the biggest reaction given her status as a trans icon at the time—but internally, nobody in the effects world was even tracking the Swift feud.
"Most of the people working on it never even knew that a feud happened," Dinetz admitted bluntly. The confrontation reached its boiling point on July 14, 2016, when Kardashian took to Snapchat and posted clips from a phone call between West and Swift—clips she likely believed would vindicate her husband. In the recording, Swift could be heard telling West the "sex" lyric could be seen as a "compliment," though she'd previously pointed out he never mentioned the word "bitch." As Kardashian fired off snake emojis on Twitter and #TaylorSwiftIsOverParty began trending across platforms, Swift responded with what would become an instantly iconic statement: "I would very much like to be excluded from this narrative, one that I have never asked to be a part of, since 2009." The feud itself had roots stretching back seven years earlier, when West infamously stormed the stage during Swift's MTV Video Music Awards acceptance speech in 2009 to declare Beyoncé should have won Best Female Video.
Remarkably, they'd managed to reconcile by 2015, when Swift even presented West with the Video Vanguard Award at that year's VMAs—but "Famous" shattered any pretense of friendship permanently. These days, there's no communication whatsoever between Swift and either West or Kardashian, who finalized their divorce in 2022. "Kim and Taylor don't have a relationship," a source tells Us Weekly.
"They have both moved on. It's not this active, lingering drama anymore, but they're not in touch or anything like that. If they saw each other in passing, they would be cordial." Swift herself called the "Famous" video "revenge porn" in 2019 and described the public fallout as a full "career death" during a Time interview in 2023: "I moved to a foreign country.
I didn't leave a rental house for a year. I was afraid to get on phone calls. I pushed away most people in my life because I didn't trust anyone anymore." But vindication arrived in 2020 when her full 25-minute call with West leaked online, proving definitively that he never informed her about the "bitch" lyric—and at one point she even said, "I'm glad it's not mean. … I thought it was going to be like, 'That stupid, dumb bitch.' But it's not." Kardashian responded to that leak with a series of defensive tweets rather than any apology: "This will be the last time I speak on this because honestly, nobody cares." Despite the ongoing controversy surrounding his work, Dinetz remains unapologetic about the sculptures.
"It's a music video for what would be considered, in terms of status, a high-ranking artist," he reasoned to Us Weekly. "It would be no different than when I worked on a Marvel movie. On a résumé, it's great." Kardashian, meanwhile, has largely compartmentalized the entire chapter.
"Kim really hasn't given much thought or energy to this situation in years because so much has happened in her life since then," the source explained—adding that while the Skims cofounder "doesn't necessarily regret inserting herself," she does view it with 20/20 hindsight now. "Jumping in just made it turn into something much bigger. At the time, she really felt like she was sticking up for her husband and their family, but it spiraled way more than she expected." If the same scenario unfolded today?
The source says Kardashian would handle things differently: "Kim has grown a lot since then, and it's not in her nature to be so reactionary anymore. Back then, her instinct was to jump in and say something, but now she's a lot more careful about what she gives energy to. She's learned no one really wins in a public feud like that. It just keeps going and going, and everyone gets dragged."
