Samantha Brick, the Daily Mail columnist who has recently written extensively about her role as a trophy wife, is being criticized for her views.

"My husband runs a thriving building company where we live. When we met I was shown off to everyone as yet another perk of his success," Brick wrote.

Brick is married to Pascal Rubenat, a man born and bred in France. In the past, she has also assailed French women in her column, saying they are jealous of her beauty.

"As a Frenchman, he takes great pride in hearing other men declare that I'm a beautiful woman and always tells me to laugh off bitchy comments from other women," Brick wrote in her article, Why women hate me for being beautiful.

Brick's article drew flak from readers. One of the comments read:

"For your age you are quite pretty, but arrogance. But have you thought that actually the reason why women don't like you is because of your personality rather than your good looks?"

Brick continued writing about her self-perception to the extent of expressing her pride for being a trophy wife.

"At this point, many of you will be thinking I'm little more than a trophy wife for my husband, Pascal, and you're right. I am a trophy wife - and what's more, I'm proud of it," she wrote.

A trophy wife, however, is perceived differently by social scientists studying the subject in modern times. According to them, education and success matter more than a woman's good looks today.

"We're experiencing a historic change in the things people want out of marriage, the reasons they enter into it and stay in it," historian Stephanie Coontz of Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington told PsychologyToday.com.

Coontz suggested men are not just into good looks anymore, and the traditional concept of a trophy wife has changed in these modern times.

"Older men want the most impressive achiever in the office. In the eyes of a man's peers, the woman with the career and degrees counts for more than Miss America... Status is attached to a woman who is successful, not to a woman with a perfectly pear-shaped ass," said Frank Pittman, psychiatrist to Atlanta's elite.

The way that Ms Brick sees herself as a trophy wife must be a result of her agreement with her husband. If she sees herself as a trophy wife and her husband agrees, then that is their story. Live and let live, right?

However, Brick's recent article, "A husband who prizes your looks, not your mind is the key to a happy marriage" is not promoting a live-and-let-live philosophy.

"It pains me to read that women such as Hillary Clinton feel they've reached an age where they no longer need make-up," she wrote.

Is Samantha Brick serious about her recent writings? Is it all a parody of narcissm? In these modern times, when women are more empowered than ever, how many women out there are proud to be a trophy wife?