I wish I was Samantha Brick… with her acne and weight problems…
April 4, 2012 Leave a comment
No, not really, but presumably that statement got your attention since she is suddenly the most popular name across the Interwebs. Also, I am not trying to be mean by mentioning her ‘acne’ and ‘weight’ problems, as you will see below these are things that Samantha has written about herself.
If you have been sheltering under a rock and missed Samantha’s article in the Daily Mail (lucky you) about how women hate her because she is just so damn hot then you can catch up on it here. You can also read the follow-up article here.
Samantha Brick - 2010
It’s all quite clever really, the perfect formula for a ‘hit’ article. By ‘hit’ I don’t mean good, because it actually makes me despair for the quality of journalism, even by the Mail’s poor standards. What I mean by ‘hit’ is hugely popular, provoking numerous comments and discussion. In the article, Samantha describes how other women hate her because she is too attractive and they are jealous, she details the abundance of freebies her looks have gotten her over the years (champagne, flowers, free cab fares etc) and the harsh treatment she has received from all those nasty, not as good-looking and not as slim women because of this. Nice, yah-yah sisterhood!
The article is so ridiculous and contentious that it was obviously engineered to provoke a storm. Comments flooded in, from both men and women, mainly criticising Samantha for her arrogant attitude. Of course, in the follow-up article Samantha uses the storm she created to prove that her original article was right: women hate her because she is beautiful and that’s why they have left negative comments. Simple. This ignores the fact that many comments were left by men and is just generally a poor, illogical argument. Of course, I am now also opening myself to the same accusation, I am criticising Samantha and the article so I must also be suffering from a fit of jealousy, inspired by her wonderous beauty. I’m not. Whether you believe that or not is up to you (although please consider that I am in my mid-20′s and Samantha is in her 40′s) but the reason the article makes me dislike this woman is nothing to do with the accompanying pictures. I dislike her because she comes across as shallow, arrogant, condescending and makes it sound as though all women are shallow, jealous harpies who make friends based solely on looks and bully women they deem to be more attractive than themselves. She is basically insulting an entire gender.
Samantha, striking a more flattering pose in recent times
I am sure that there might be women out there who dislike other women heartily simply because they are better looking than themselves but this is not something I have come across within my circles of friends and collegues. I know many women who I would describe as much better looking than Samantha (who don’t feel the need to bang on about it either) and they are lovely people, nor, mysteriously, do they get free flowers and champagne flung at them day-to-day.
What I find most interesting in all of this are the previous articles Samantha has written, which seem very at odds with the latest article. Her article history is as follows:
The adult acne epidemic – Forget teenagers – modern age lifestyles mean middle-aged women increasingly suffer the misery of bad skin - An article where Samantha laments her recurrent, adult acne outbreaks.
I use my sex appeal to get ahead at work.. and so does ANY woman with any sense - This article opens with the words,
The truth is, I’d much rather work for a man than a woman. I’ve always dressed with the express intention to please and gratify my male bosses in the workplace.
If I had a choice of how to spend my ideal lunch hour, it’s a no-brainer. Each and every time I’d choose to flirt over lunch with a male superior rather than engage in mindless gossip with the girls over a Pret sandwich.
Which rather contradicts her words in the recent article,
I’m not smug and I’m no flirt
Don’t eat anything that won’t fit on a fork: It’s the daftest diet idea ever, but it actually works - One of Samantha’s many articles obsessing on weight and diets where she describes her,
double chin, chunky thighs and spreading middle
I’m sure she looked fine but this statement is somewhat at odds with her descriptions of how people hate her because she is so slim and beautiful and how she has regularly been lavished with gifts “throughout my adult life” because of her beauty.
Would YOU let your husband dress you? Samantha does and says she never looked better. Here Samantha describes how crap her dress sense was before her husband picked her outfits for her – again, isn’t this at odds with the whole “throughout my adult life” statement.
In her husband's chosen attire.
Skipping past the articles about IVF and pre-nups you move on to:
I’ll always be that fat girl: Samantha Brick has always obsessed about her weight… all because she was a chubby child. In this article Samantha claims she has been a Size 12 all her adult life (see next headline).
Samantha Brick: Why a magazine for large women is just a big, fat con (and I should know, I used to be a Size 16) - Liar, liar, pants of undetermined size on fire?
My husband says he’ll divorce me if I get fat. - Almost a creepy as the my husband dresses me headline…
How TV is run by sexist pigs who only want one thing (and it’s not ratings): The shocking inside account from a former TV executive. - I’d like to refer once again to this quote,
The truth is, I’d much rather work for a man than a woman. I’ve always dressed with the express intention to please and gratify my male bosses in the workplace.
If I had a choice of how to spend my ideal lunch hour, it’s a no-brainer. Each and every time I’d choose to flirt over lunch with a male superior rather than engage in mindless gossip with the girls over a Pret sandwich.
How could a well-educated TV executive let her addiction to psychics cost her £25,000 and ruin her marriage? - This headline sort of speaks for itself…
I’ve missed out a few, including the one where Samantha is bitching happily about her husbands ex-wife but they can all be found here.
What you learn through looking through her article history is that Samantha regularly contradicts herself and basically just writes whatever she fancies to get a reaction, seemingly regardless of the truth. To be blunt, she writes utter bollocks but is clever enough to write something that will provoke a huge reaction and make her name famous, for about a week anyway. I could do the same by writing an article for a national paper about ‘how people hate me because I am super intelligent and they are dumb and if you disagree it’s cause you’re jealous cause you are dumb too’ or ‘why God hates you because you are gay’ or even ’how Hitler was a nice chap really’. Like Samantha, I’d be famous for a week or so, but afterwards, when all the hysteria died down, I’d just be that silly twat with no friends who wrote that untrue and offensive article that everyone talked about for a few days.
Honestly, I don’t personally think Samantha is stunning looking or mind-blowingly ’beautiful’. I think she is pleasantly attractive to look at but nothing extraordinary. I assume that she probably has (too) high levels of confidence which make her appear more attractive in person, as confidence does. What I find hugely unattractive is her personality, her belief that all the women who dislike her do so because they are simply uglier than her and her insistence that any negative comment towards her now just proves that she is right. I assume that this is actually why other women dislike her, if what she is saying about her bad experiences are actually true.
What is annoying is the reaction she has managed to provoke, she, and the Mail, have got the attention, the site hits, and comments they were looking for. What is more annoying is that I find myself compelled to join in on this argument (although part of the reason is I am hoping that due to the current popularity of anything Samantha Brick related this post will get me some good traffic. In effect I am unashamedly leaching of her undeserved popularity. Well, why not?).
The best thing (possibly only good thing) to come out of all this was probably this parody article where Nick Clegg bemoans why liberals hate him for seeming Tory. Worth a read.
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