LETTER: You're So Vain

I just have a few questions regarding Jennifer Kornreich's column "No Dirty Fingernails, Please" (DP 1/14/92). My first question would be, where do people with birth defects or burn victims or other individuals with physical deformities fit into your warped view of self-image? How can they overcome these deformities, these lapses in beauty, to please you, your highness, protector of the moral conscience of our society? I wonder, just who are your friends, if "most people [you] know have trouble finding someone else's 'true self' if there is an exceptionally horrendous bag of flesh containing it" ? Maybe your problem was not your nose, but your friends. Other thoughts come to mind, such as: do you drop your friends if they become over-weight, but give them brownie points for becoming anorexic? Does your view on outward appearance mean you can't get to know your grandmother's inner-self because you can't see past her wrinkles? And just one last question: Will you lose your self-worth when you become ugly? Because, unlike Eos, my dear, you are mortal and you will grow old. LIZ KNAPP College '93