Anti-Social

Inside Kourtney Kardashian and Younes Bendjima’s Social-Media Breakup

Decoding a modern breakup in a series of Instagram shades.

Whilst some might imagine that Instagram is perhaps not the ideal medium on which to thrash out delicate affairs of the heart, the Kardashians would beg to differ.

For, after news broke of the split between Kourtney Kardashian and her boxer/model beau Younes Bendjima, all sides took to social media to engage in rapidly escalating rounds of name-calling, shading, accusations, and mocking, with a side order of I-don’t-need-you-anyway self-affirmation. 

Indeed, the first signs that all was not well between the Keeping Up With the Kardashians star, 39, and her 25-year-old boyfriend—who got together in 2016—came after he left critical comments on her social-media photos.

“[That’s] what you need to show to get likes?” he wrote in a since-deleted comment on a picture that showed a bit of her butt.

To which one can only say, OMFG.

Publicly criticizing your girlfriend’s social-media post is the latter-day version of a screaming match with your partner at her best friend’s birthday party, and Bendjima swiftly became the focus of the wrath of millions of Kardashian fans, who rifled through his Instagram account and commented on all of his shirtless posts, accusing him sexism and hypocrisy.

Fast forward to Tuesday, and news of the breakdown in the relationship was confirmed by the revelation that they had unfollowed each other on Instagram. This is, of course, the modern equivalent of throwing your partner’s possessions out of the window of the apartment.

It was at this juncture that TMZ published a series of photos of Bendjima snuggling up with a bikini-clad Jordan Ozuna, a former Hooters waitress who has dated Tyga and Justin Bieber, while on holiday in Mexico.

Sneaking off to Mexico to hang out with hot chicks is, as you know, the latter-day version of sneaking off to Mexico to hang out with hot chicks. Bendjima revealed himself as a traditionalist at heart when he sought to cast this as a case of “just good friends” when he shared a screenshot of a Daily Mail article about the meeting as an Instagram story, writing over the top of the article in angry red graffiti, “They really want me to be the bad guy. F–k your Hollywood bulls–t (can’t have fun with your friends no more).” He also shared a picture showing the trip included a larger group of “12 other friends.”

“Once again, you guys failed,” he wrote. “I’m not attached to this ‘life’ so you can’t touch me… I know who I am where I’m from and where I’m going and that bothers you… only one opinion matter… the one of my lord.”

Kim Kardashian, Kourtney’s big sister, was not convinced, writing “Nice pics from your ‘boys trip.’”

The last word, however, goes to third sister Khloé, who has also had man trouble of late: “Alexa play ‘heard it all before’ by Sunshine Anderson,” she quipped at her sister’s ex, in response to his denials.

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Tom SykesEuropean Editor at Large

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