Why do we dislike vanity?

Closely associated with pride, one of the seven deadly sins, vanity is something often seen as a negative thing. After the reappearance of the ever vain Samantha Brick in the news the notion of vanity has resurfaced. Many comment on how Brick's confidence in herself is just a toxic sense of vanity but what I want to consider here is why we're so against vanity itself.

 Surely we all know that person whose Facebook or blog consists heavily of photos of them in various different outfits and poses. 'How vain' we may think. Yes? So? Simple vanity itself doesn't seem to harm anyone. One possible reason is because in a vain person we see someone who is confident in themselves in ways we cannot be confident and therein lies some form of jealousy.
In Britain traits like modesty and humility often seem sociocultural expectations of character. We are often apprehensive to talk about our achievements and find the process of CV writing and job applications a little daunting.

In a time where notions of beauty are regulated, controlled and broadcast so heavily by the media and most women live their lives totally unsatisfied with their appearance as a result. In the articles I read about Samantha Brick one term often used to repeatedly describe her was 'self-satisfied' which prompted me to question what is so inherently wrong with being satisfied with ourselves? I'm not saying I agree with all of the articles and views Samantha Brick has broadcast in recent years. I'm simply questioning why we're so quick to point a finger and scream at vanity. Have we so heavily internalised the media-given images of what 'beauty' is meant to be that we then attack anyone who refuses to feel totally shitty about themselves?

Why should beauty be the sole privilege of the beholder? I've been overweight to some degree since I was at least 15. Even if it was simply a few pounds or when I was about a size 18 I was bigger than the typical healthy person should be. The strange thing is that it is only once I reached the age of 19, around a size 16 or 18, that I felt more beautiful than I ever had in my life. I'm still pretty curvy, I have piercings and a haircut that isn't seen as typically feminine but I feel beautiful. Does the borderline between my current state and 'vanity' lie in whether or not I speak about how I view myself? I simply cannot fathom why we criticise those who see beauty in themselves when we're constantly being told otherwise. Surely it takes more to ignore the messages we're constantly being subjected to and to be comfortable in our skin.

Are we wrong to hate Samantha Brick as much as we do?

Samantha Brick is back in the news and trending on Twitter. As per usual it is for all the wrong reasons.

This time Samantha is writing about her favourite topic, herself, whilst also doing the glamorous job of making people feel awful in the process. The only reason the Daily Mail continue to publish her articles that I can fathom is simply for the hype, publicity and attention they must receive in doing so.

Brick's latest article, which can be seen by clicking here, is about dieting and the importance of staying skinny and has set the social networking world ablaze in the process. Brick details her years of passing out from starvation, the glorification of hunger pangs and how her boyfriends and husbands were chosen because they would pressure her to remain thin. She says she became 'accustomed to surviving on fewer than 1,000 calories a day' which is roughly half the calories women need to properly function.

That was the bit that got me. She seems to mention her male counterparts multiple times and their importance in her weight loss.

Her need to remain thin, her emphasis on beauty, seems like an expression of internalised misogyny. Her husband tells her that if she gains weight he will divorce her. She has mentioned the importance of her father and his role in her life in previous articles. This is a woman who clearly puts weight onto the importance of having a man in her life and feels she must do whatever she can to keep him. This article almost seems like a cry for help, the plea for attention from a desperate woman. She is living within a marriage where her beauty, the thing she seems so obsessed with, is something she has to maintain her focus on for the sake of her marriage. In fact she details her marital role in a further article just as shocking as all the others. Though the article in question about dieting never mentions the term 'anorexia' her described behaviour mirrors that of the eating disorder. The article, however, is problematic as it glorifies such an eating disorder and does so to a wide audience.

This article is dangerous because it promotes body-shaming. She suggests women should feel bad because of their weight, as if the media didn't do this enough already, stating that nothing signifies failure more than fat. Offensive and dangerous though her comments may appear this article clearly comes from the mind of a warped and controlled woman. I get the feeling that something is very wrong here.

Perhaps Samantha Brick is a dreadful, egotistical megalomaniac whose main dietary compound is the life she sucks out of journalism and the attention on which she so frequently feeds... Or perhaps there is much more to be considered here.

What are YOUR thoughts on the matter?
Let me know in the comments section below: