The shirt actually said, “Stop Being Desperate,” and Hilton showed another photo of her and sister Nicky wearing the matching tees. There are several photos of her in the real shirt, taken in 2005 at the Palms Hotel in Las Vegas.
Know Your Meme points to a 2013 Tumblr post as a possible origin of the photoshopped image, and the shirt has been debunked since then, but the meme (and the ideology behind “Stop being poor”) has persisted. Depop and Amazon both sell versions of the fake shirt.
Commenters were a bit shocked at the revelation, though multiple people claimed the shirt is still “iconic” and even “inspirational.”
Paris Hilton Debunks Viral Stop Being Poor Shirt Don’t believe everything you read, said the reality TV star and heiress.
Paris Hilton turned fact-checker in a TikTok video that attempts to set the record straight on a years-old viral photograph of herself apparently wearing a shirt with the slogan “Stop Being Poor.”
“I never wore that shirt,” the socialite-turned-DJ said in the video shared online Monday. “This was completely Photoshopped, everyone thinks it’s real but that’s not the truth.”
She said shirt actually read: “Stop Being Desperate.”
“Don’t believe everything you read,” added the heiress, who in February announced her engagement to boyfriend Carter Reum, while celebrating her 40th birthday.
Paris Hilton Never Wore That Viral Stop Being Poor Shirt!
by Stephanie Maida · May 4, 2021
Considering the fact that Paris Hilton defined the term celebutante and really leaned into her reputation as a spoiled rich girl in the 2000s, it really isn t surprising that one of her most memorable outfits consisted of a tank top that read STOP BEING POOR.
You know the one. It most frequently appears in a photo of Paris with her arms up, standing on a platform in what seems to be a nightclub, happily grinning at the plebeians quite literally beneath her feet.
Well, chalk it up to the Mandela Effect or the precarious nature of truth on the interwebs, but the fact is, Paris never actually wore that shirt!