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Samantha Brick, the Daily Mail writer who claimed that women hate her because of her beautiful face, appeared on the TODAY show this morning for an interview. Brick’s April 2nd essay titled, “There Are Downsides To Looking This Pretty: Why Women Hate Me For Being Beautiful,” went viral, eliciting strong (mostly negative) reactions from men and women around the world.
People took to Twitter and Facebook to ridicule or support Brick. While some commenters commended her for having the confidence to write such a brazen article, others attacked her attitude -- and her looks. This tweet by @boobygraffoe went was retweeted over 2000 times, according to TODAY:
After experiencing what she describes as “the most horrendous” 24 hours of her life following the publication of her piece -- and penning a follow-up -- Brick, 41, is speaking out in her own defense, first on British television and now in the States. TODAY’s Ann Curry said that when she first read Brick’s essay she thought it was tongue-in-cheek, and bluntly asked, “Are you serious?” Brick contended that parts of her piece have been “massively misconstrued” and began to backpedal a bit. “I’m not saying that I am attractive,” she said to Curry. “I’m talking about the perception of someone who is considered to be attractive by other men and women and what that does to our society.”
She went on to say that the instances of free bottles of champagne, comped bar tabs and train tickets, which made up a large part of her original piece, weren’t a part of her everyday life in rural France. However, as many commenters pointed out, perhaps the issues Brick raised weren't the problem but rather the way in which she raised them. When Curry asked Brick whether she was aware of how narcissistic her essay sounded, Brick said:
“Well the piece is a first person piece. It’s about my experience and my life. … Really it was just to trigger a debate, it wasn’t to have a kind of global, vitrolic attack on me as an individual.”
To see the full interview, watch the clip on the TODAY show's website.