Professor Locs, aka Charles Easley, is an educator who explores race, class, gender, sexuality, media and popular culture with humor and insight. His column is published here each Wednesday. Opinions expressed are solely his own. Click here to read his blog.

Like many of you, I have tried to ignore the spectacle that is Kim Kardashian, but we are hard pressed to not be intrigued by this woman’s ability to keep our attention.

What is the secret to the Kardashian PR machine, and why are we so infatuated with this media goat rodeo?

Here we see a woman who has invited the cameras to document her courtship and nuptials, only to see it all dissolve in less than 72 days. I bet it took her longer to pick out her wedding dress. Hey, I think I spent more time at science camp as a kid.

KK has been a textbook example of society’s obsession with reality stars. We have watched her rise from absolute obscurity to being hailed as an iconic figure. How did this happen? Enter Ray J, Brandy’s little brother, and his homemade movie of his tryst with KK. We seem to forget that KK became famous by her more infamous sex tape.

My colleague, Barbara McWhite, recently wrote an engaging article about Tyler Perry’s recent decision to cast KK in his latest movie and how specifically black women might react. The column generated some interesting responses.

There does seems to be a double standard as to how some women are treated in the media.

Kim Kardashian makes a sex tape and becomes an icon with a reality show, clothing line and multiple endorsement ventures. How many Black women would get a similar break? Remember young child-star-turned-porn-star, Jamie Foxworth, from “Family Matters” I don’t see anyone fighting to give her a reality show, clothing line or perfume endorsement.

I can’t give Kim all the credit; her Mom seems to have a strong hand and historical habit of pimping her daughters. Kris Jenner has always been behind the scenes. It was KK’s mom who urged her to pose for Playboy to promote their reality show “Keeping Up With the Kardashian’s.” Nothing says mother-daughter bonding more than a nude spread in a men’s magazine.

Now we see poor Kris Humphries, the latest victim of the Kardashian media machine. I watched this young athlete during a few episodes, and in my mind I would hear the femme fatale Natasha from “Rocky and Bullwinkle” purring, “You big stupid good looking.”

You have this young basketball player with his mid-western values being thrown into the middle of the Kardashian Klan of craziness, where a future brother-n-law consistently calls his sister and Humphries’ fiancée a whore. I know, a real Norman Rockwell scene.

Humphries was a big fish out of water. He was not even aware that Kim had been married before, which he found out during one of the episodes. Really, how do you not know something like that? Do they not have Google in Minnesota?

Kim, however, has been busy escaping to Australia and doing media junkets before finally returning stateside to face the music, or in this case, the media. It is interesting that someone who has been a media darling is finding herself in troubled waters.

Kim claims that Humphries was not the man she thought he was and that’s what led to their speedy divorce. Maybe if she spent more time cultivating a relationship than she does planning her next PR move, then maybe things would have turned out differently?

But whose to say this is not exactly the result that was planned by the Kardashian PR machine.

What do you think? Is KK a true grieving divorcee or a manipulative media minx?

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