A question of (over) confidence

Here is a question for you.

If a woman regards herself to be beautiful, and she carries herself with confidence and in a way that shows she is happy in her skin, do we immediately criticise her for her arrogance?

Is the fact that the woman feels compelled to announce to the world in the UK press that she is beautiful the point at which it becomes acceptable to open fire at this woman for her arrogance?

This is a complicated issue. For decades, women have been encouraging each other to have greater belief in themselves, to stop looking at the negatives and to focus on their positives. As a gender we have pulled together through national campaigns, initiatives etc to highlight the importance of natural beauty and how to love yourself despite any flaws you have worried about your whole life.

What Samantha Brick did yesterday is to put her head high above the crowd and say "hey everyone, check me out! I am gorgeous and I am comfortable with that".

On the face of it, well done her in my opinion. I mean, it is not something I would be comfortable to do, as i would worry about the tsunami of abuse that would surely follow, but at first glance, part of me has to admire that confidence.

Dig deeper though and you start to see that she isn't just saying how lovely she is, she is also saying that women resent her beauty and that they are threatened by it. This is not so good.

I can relate to what she is talking about to an extent....every woman can I'm sure...you know what it's like when you walk into work feeling great in your new outfit, and someone feeling less great will give you a quick all over look that makes you feel so uncomfortable you doubt yourself just for a moment......we have all fallen out with other women for a myriad of reasons and we have all probably upset other women at some point in a social situation. What do we do? We get over it and move on. Simple.

So has Samantha crossed the line? Yesterday saw her as being the second highest trend on twitter. Her article in the Daily Mail attracted around 18,000 comments. Clearly, she has provoked strong opinion. But to what ultimate gain?

Will the article make her more popular with other women? Doubtful. Is she likely to be propelled into celebrity as a result? Unlikely

Has she set us back a few years in the battle for women of all shapes and sizes to openly view themselves as beautiful? Quite possibly.