Thursday, April 19, 2012

Don't Hate Her Because She's "Beautiful"

The Daily Mail, one of the UK’s big papers (and surprisingly to me, NOT a News Corp. paper), has a columnist named Samantha Brick. A couple of weeks ago (April 5 or 5 April), Ms. Brick wrote an article about how women hate her because she’s “so beautiful.”  Cue worldwide firestorm. Here’s Samantha Brick, herself:

And here’s Kelly LeBrock from the Pantene “Don’t Hate Me Because I’m Beautiful” ads:

(Okay, well, technically, it’s from “Weird Science”, but the movie and the ads were contemporaneous).

Since then, we have moved on to more important stuff like transgender beauty queens, penguins biting Newt Gingrich (yea, penguin!) and Kim Whoredashian hooking up with Kanye (Ego Bigger Than Donald Trump’s) West while wanting to run for mayor of Glendale (there really isn’t one) because “there’s a lot of Armenians there.” This new ambition supports the theory of politicians being whores.

Speaking of which…

The Brickhead has opened her mouth again about how her “fabulous self-esteem” came from being Daddy’s “Number 1 Girl.” Now, she says she “thinks” he did this because she is his oldest daughter, but I will bet you a pony that either a) Daddy told this to all of his daughters or b) her four sisters are plotting to shave her head at the first opportunity. This kind of naked parental favoritism doesn’t make for healthy adults. According to her column, as she grew up, her father constantly told her she was beautiful and the most important thing in his life. The fact that she had a lazy eye surgically fixed at the age of 8 because Daddy “didn’t want her to get picked on” kind of undercuts that. Ms. Brick has 4 sisters and although she bitches about women “hating her for being beautiful” (really), she talks about rivalries among the five because “we each want to be the prettiest, the most intelligent, the funniest.” (Honey, you’re down two strikes and I’d have to see pictures of your sisters before calling you out. It’s only fair). Daddy used to tell her that all women were mean to each other. And since that's the energy she puts out...


She's now married to her second husband (according to her, the first one was a Peter Pan. I don’t think she traded up), a Frenchman named Pascal. Here is what she says about Pascal:  “strong masculine partner who would walk over hot coals to ensure no harm comes to me.” Unh huh.
Oh, we’re just gettin’ warmed up (to paraphrase Al Pacino from “Scent of a Woman”).

Let us set out here with the presumption that Ms. Brick believes herself to be a happy, well-adjusted woman with good self-esteem (not vanity) and a healthy self-regard. Everyone in the world is envious of her. This is the image she projects.  We are back to “My Cousin Vinny” and the scene with the playing cards and the brick (Yeah, I know. It just worked out that way).

“The D.A.'s got to build a case. Building a case is like building a house. Each piece of evidence is just another building block. He wants to make a brick bunker of a building. He wants to use serious, solid-looking bricks, like, like these, right?”

He pulls out the Ace of Spades.

“He's going to show you the bricks. He'll show you they got straight sides. He'll show you how they got the right shape. He'll show them to you in a very special way, so that they appear to have everything a brick should have. But there's one thing he's not gonna show you..”
He turns the card on its side.

“When you look at the bricks from the right angle, they're as thin as this playing card.” And the Ace of Spades is suddenly the Joker.

One of her columns describes her “lifelong obsession with her weight.” (Column dated April 19,2011) She refused offered dance classes because “Who wanted to see my hefty form attempt to pirouette across a mirrored room?” Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1377884/Ill-fat-girl-Samantha-Brick-obsessed-weight--chubby-child.html#ixzz1sYJAgOMA . There is at least one fat acceptance advocate who could tear this twit a new one. Samantha has a poor opinion of anyone  who is overweight. Here’s your first clue that perhaps the  emotional brick is not as solid as you may think.

Ms. Brick is certainly thin. Her husband, Pascal, sees to it by threatening to divorce her if she puts on weight.  He gave her an exercise bike for Christmas a couple of years ago and CHECKS THE MILEAGE to make sure she rides it and rides it enough to suit him. (Jesus Howard Christ)

I can think of at least 10 women who would have tied Pascal’s tongue around the spokes the first time he pulled that stunt.

He also checks the groceries to make sure Samantha’s not bringing home any foods he doesn’t think she should be eating. She goes along with it because “it’s not worth the argument.” She also cops to "sneaking" chocolate. She tells a story of bringing home a family-sized chocolate bar (doesn't give a specific weight or dimensions) and catching hell from him. What he DIDN'T know is that she had purchased two bars. The second one didn't make it home. If she's so happy with him monitoring her weight, why does she feel the need to sneak? Wouldn't she just happily fall in with his wishes?

Samantha is a British subject, they live in La Belle France, but they don’t go visit her family in England so much anymore because Pascal thinks it’s acceptable to loudly criticize the appearance of strangers who are too fat for his liking. Obviously, this does not apply to French douchebags. I don't want to see this guy in the national uniform of Speedo.

Pascal also picks out Samantha’s clothing for her, even once (and I am NOT making this up) “refused to open the car door unless I changed into something he approved of.”

What the…? Either you open the car door yourself or you open the front door to your house and stay there. Let me teach you a handy French phrase: Allez vous faire foutre.  (Go fuck yourself)

By the way, this is Pascal:

Monsieur Merde appears to enjoy his brie et vin. Either that or he’s due in about 3 months.
This is not a marriage. It’s a hostage situation. This woman has full-blown Stockholm Syndrome.

But wait, there’s more…

Ms. Brick left a position as a TV producer (most famously, a series based at a British fat camp called “Chubby Children.”) to devote herself to being Pascal’s victim wife. I can’t find information on IMDB about Samantha Brick, except for a PA on something from 2009 called “Sensored.” Just saying.

Let’s reiterate: Ms. Brick is taking a victim mindset. She states that her life is difficult because women resent her for being beautiful (she said a pilot on a flight had sent a bottle of champagne back to her seat. I’d like to meet this pilot and administer both a breathalyzer and an eye test). And when that column created an international shit storm, she whined about being the target of a global witch hunt.

In “Addams Family Values”, during a Summer Camp From Hell swimming lesson, Wednesday Addams is supposed to save a drowning victim. The alpha mean girl steps forward and says, “I’ll be the victim.” Wednesday retorts, “All your life.”

Ms. Brick, in a July 29, 2010 column, stated that “the TV industry is a world that ruthlessly allows women to be exploited.” She describes some encounter that, had they happened stateside, would have resulted in HUGE settlements in sexual harassment lawsuits. Victim of her own beauty, right?
Okay, let’s jump forward to her August 25, 2011 column about using her looks to advance her career and that “any woman with sense” does it.  “I learned very early on in my career how to clock within seconds who the important male was in any room and pandered to him accordingly.


And you wonder why they behaved like sexist pigs?  Really? If I hold a candle next to your right ear and blow in your left ear, will the flame flicker? Honey, if you're going to treat them like sexist pigs, how the hell do you EXPECT them to behave?

I have worked with women like this. And yes, I resented them because the work that wasn't getting done by them because they were too busy trying to play the men in the room got dumped on the rest of us. Those women, too, had the "all the other girls hate me because I'm beautiful" whine going. One was particularly ridiculous: she'd buy her clothes a size too small because she didn't want to admit to a double-digit dress size. It was funny as hell to watch her try to walk. It wasn't so funny having to clean up after the messes her incompetence caused.

Normally, I’m not going to dig into someone else’s looks, but as we say in the legal business, “the defendant opened the door.” Others have commented about her “meaty calves” and “matronly dresses” but I would ding her for the bulbous nose and uneven teeth (Daddy should have sprung for braces at the same time as the lazy eye operation).

I’m calling bullshit on the healthy self-regard and seeing a “twinkly-eyed temptress” (Ew.  Really? This is your self-description? Straight out of Harlequin Romances) when she looks in the mirror.  Look at the picture , again. Maybe there’s Botox involved, but that smile doesn’t reach the eyes. You know those hellish Christmas cards? The ones with the whole family in reindeer sweaters where you look at the kids and you know they just caught hell and are smiling in a “Look, I’m being good, honest, really” way? Smile on demand but not feeling it. It’s just plastered on to please someone and avoid…abuse.

And if your self-image is that of "temptress," are you really surprised that your friends think you're after their husbands? And that they don't like it? THAT'S WHAT THE FUCKING TEMPTATION IS, YOU SELF-ABSORBED DOPE!

I don’t hate this woman. From what I’m seeing, she’s living in a hell of her own making. When you are a victim, you have no power and she’s clearly ceded all of hers to the men in her life while deluding herself that coquetting and “frisking like a prostitute with a prospective client” (Rhett Butler, “Gone With the Wind.” I know that book by heart, practically) actually shifts power to her. If she really had the power, we wouldn’t hear about “sexist pigs”, nor would we hear whining about how everybody hates her because she’s beautiful.  Nor would she tolerate the control freak. He may not be hitting her (yet), but what happens if she tries to assert herself (that’s the true demonstration of power)? Not so much a twinkly-eyed temptress (ugh) as a doormat telling itself it’s a lioness. If you’re going to shake your ass to get ahead, Honey, you’d better be prepared to accept what’s coming.
My late father taught me to believe that since I had a brain, I should be relying on that to get me through life. My mother never told me to use my looks to get ahead (although it did drive her buggy if I left the house without mascara or lipstick or dressed in torn or too-casual clothing). I think I am a woman of sense. And while my male co-workers aren’t chatting me up, they do respect me.

“…you might be thinking I’m little better than a prostitute.” No, Samantha, you are NO better. And you’re a pretty sad one at that.




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