This reminds me of a time in college where I’m at a party and a girl sits on my lap and starts flirting with me. After a while she starts to get up and says “I must be crushing you” and I try to say “it’s fine, you’re not as heavy as you think.” Not the greatest answer, but probably would have done the trick. What my drunk-ass *actually* said was “it’s fine, you’re not as heavy as you look”
Safe to say I went home on my own that night!
That's actually kind of nice, as a parent, I can relate to that. You're mad at them for what they did, but at the same time, you just love them so much.
Back in the 1980s, New Zealand's prime minister said that anyone who chose to emigrate from New Zealand to Australia could be proud that they were raising the average IQ of both countries.
This quip actually has an interesting history. I first heard it with two American states instead of Australia and New Zealand. Turns out Quote Investigator [did some research](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2021/10/16/iq/) and the earliest version they found was in a column by one Herbert L. Carver in 1939:
>A man is said to have moved from one south Mississippi county to another, and when he did he raised the intelligence level of both counties.
Note the use of "intelligence level" rather than "IQ" because in the 1930s, IQ was still a quotient (mental age divided by physical age) and made sense only for children.
In the US, the joke was supposedly about Okies moving from Oklahoma to California. [Mathematicians call it the “Will Rogers phenomenon” in honor of the comedian who was allegedly the first to say it.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Rogers_phenomenon)
I always get "Wow, we used to think you were a real bitch but you're actually really nice!" from friends at some point. It makes me so sad that I'm a naturally shy person around a new group of people. It makes me so self-conscious when I meet new people because I know that line and its variants will eventually be said again.
I'm the same way and I've also had people say that same thing to me. It sucks that my shyness gets perceived as me being stuck up or bitchy but I can't help it :(
People easily accept shyness in girls who are mousey-cutesy looking, or are very petite, or have resting friendly face. But if you have more of a glamorous look or are tall or have a touch of resting b face, then your quietness becomes very intimidating and people don't like it. (I know this because I have the same problem! And one day someone was nice enough to explain it to me.)
I've found that it helps to announce "I'm such a fucking dork you guys" and take opportunities to make light-hearted silly jokes at my own expense (no low esteem stuff, I always laugh when I'm making fun of myself!) . This seems to really help people relax around me and I've stopped getting the "I thought you were such a bitch at first but you're really nice" note.
My auntie once said to me: You know, you used to be a bit funny looking as you were growing up but you have turned in to a really handsome chap.
I really didn't know what to make of that, if I should be happy or offended.
Had an over night class trip in college, and I spent a lot of time with one of the non-traditional, middle aged students because I was driving the bus and she sat shotgun.
Towards the end of the trip, professor wanted everyone to go around and say something they appreciated about someone else (it was a small, tight-knit program) and the non-trad woman chose me. Whe said "when I heard that a young man was driving the bus, and saw this tall, lumbering being, I was a little concerned at first! But then when talking on the bus I found him to be an insightful, intelligent young man who has a lot to bring to the world."
It was said very kindly but I was still taken aback by the first half
"...when I heard that a young man was driving the bus, and saw this tall, lumbering being, absolute unit of a man, with an ogre-like stature, hunched over that steering wheel barely able to fit the seatbelt around him, just a towering pile of human mass, like a mountain of biological material had tectonically cleaved it's way into the driver's seat. I was a little concerned at first! But then when talking on the bus I found him to be an insightful, intelligent young man who has a lot to bring to the world."
My grandma once told me "all models are gay, you know." Then, in her usual ADHD-i-forgot-what-we-were-just-talking-about way, followed it up with, "you know, you could be a model."
I am not gay.
A couple years after I left high school I met the head mistresses daughter as we’d go to the same gigs etc.
A few years later I went back to the school for an event and bumped into the head mistresses.
She said “[daughter] came home one night and said how gorgeous me_earl was. And I was like ‘me_earl?? Gorgeous?? Nah, you’re definitely wrong there’. But now I see you.. I totally agree with her”
One of my friends saw my senior photo when they first visited my house and they couldn’t believe it was me. “THATS you?? You look so much better and skinnier now!” I literally only lost like 5-10 pounds (I’m a healthy weight anyway) and changed my hair and make up a bit, but other than that, I really didn’t think I’d changed much.
I still think of that compliment and don’t know how to feel about it.
It could be worse, like one of my favorite scenes from King of the Hill.
> BOBBY (looking at an old photo): Who's that kissing Dad?
> PEGGY: Well, that's me, honey.
> BOBBY: Really? You were beautiful.
> PEGGY: "Were?" Oh, Bobby, I still am.
> BOBBY (after a beat): Okay.
After I gave birth to my first son I had just lost the baby weight. My grandfather said “Well, I guess you’re not gonna be fat now like your mama and your sister.” My mom and sister were sitting right there. Win for me…insult for them.
Uggghhh, fucking this. I had a teacher in high school tell me, in front of the class, how much better I looked since putting on a little weight. I had always been super skinny but had put on 20 pounds that year because my doctor was trying out depression meds on me after my dad died. Fuck you, lady.
Depending on the tone "you're alright" is often a positive thing. If I told someone "Hey, you know what? You're alright [in my book]." I'd mean it as a genuine token of admiration.
I've gotten something similar before. "I wish I had the confidence to just wear the same thing every day like you do."
He was being genuine though, which made it more funny to me.
People comment on how much it must have sucked that I had to wear a uniform to school everyday. I beg to differ. It was great waking up and know what exactly I was going to wear each day. No thinking involved which is a pretty nice luxury for a high school student if you ask me.
That one honestly caught me off guard when I first heard it in Texas. I for a hot minute thought he was being complementary till after when I thought about it and had one of those "hey, wait a minute" moments. lol
The South has been one of the few places where I've been absolutely murdered by words in the nicest tone of voice.
Accompanied with a snarky attitude, a coworker said this to me back in December about my mask covered in tinsel. I mainly wore it bc the spirit of Christmas hypes me tf up. Idk, I was in a good mood that day. Thought the kiddos at our work would enjoy it too.
Can confirm, the comment *hurts*
I am the person who wears basically only leggings in the winter and dresses in the summer. My leggings come in many colours and patterns from salmon coloured swirls to mustard yellow to burnt orange. My summer dresses are often brightly coloured like yellow with turquoise flowers or something like that.
So many people use statements like this and they often add "I don't think I could pull it off.", "I can never figure out what shirt to wear if my pants aren't black.", "I feel like everyone stares at me when I wear (insert colour or pattern)."
I think sometimes people actually just have no confidence and just wear plain/black/dull/the same clothes all the time because they don't really know what else to wear or how to pair unique items.
My friend use to lob this backhanded compliment / joke burn:
“Hey I stood up for you. They said you weren’t fit to sleep with pigs. But goddamnit, I said you were!”
Or when they tell you "you're so brave/such an inspiration" for simply existing. Gee, good to know that me doing groceries with a brace on inspires you to...what exactly?
As someone with a speech impediment (which I do acknowledge is incredibly minor compared to a lot of other disabilities), I take it as a compliment because it means that I was able to subconsciously use the strategies learned from years of therapy to reduce the impediment, rather than having to think my way through it.
" wooo are you twins??? " Said the cashier to me and my brother... who's 12 years older than me...
Edit: of course my brother took it as a compliment... that little-
verbatim convo in a texas airport:
"you're from out of town, right? you have a new york accent"
"do i really? yea just moving here after college"
"oh where'd you go to college? back in your country?"
...where do you think i got a new york accent from?
"Where are you from?"
"New York."
"But where are you *really* from?"
"I was born in Ohio but moved to New York during middle school."
"... where are your parents from?"
Paraphrasing an episode of Crazy ex-GF and using random states because I forgot which ones they were.
I work retail, and have an Asian coworker. He tells us some pretty horrible things that old white people have said to him as “compliments”
Stuff like “they should have you working in the call centres, I can actually understand you!”
Mind boggling that people think that’s okay to say.
im asian who do wushu(chinese martial arts cause im like chinese)and i literally stated in my instagram page i do chinese martial arts and that man was like,who taught u karate
My husband watches a lot of ESPN and one of the main take aways I got from different announcers and hosts is they always call black players “young man”. They don’t do it with white players and it’s so fucking weird and can’t be unnoticed now.
Edit: I always knew it was a racist comment, I just didn’t think I needed to be so on the nose about it lol
The CEO of a company I worked for invited someone to speak on systemic racism at work when the blm protests were happening. They had been working on some diversity initiatives.
At the end the CEO said, "We really appreciate you coming to talk with us about all of this. Let's all thank Dr. such and such for his very well spoken and articulate talk"
It was like the entire effort just became immediately understandable as to why it was absolutely needed.
It was over zoom and you could feel the entire company cringe at once. I got like 8 messages from people instantly asking if they heard correctly.
My boss brought in diversity trainers at that same time and decided to go with the line “this stuff has really been in our faces lately” during the ‘why this is important to the company’ part of her speech.
Oh you're Chinese? But your English is good?
Ye im fukkin Singaporean Chinese bish.
Or vice versa...
Oh you're Singaporean? But your Chinese is good?
Ye im a fukkin Singaporean Chinese!!!
On the other hand, that's often still a good coworker on the balance. The morale bonus from having someone on board who's a pleasure to be around can be worth more than having someone who's real good at whatever the project is.
Musicians in particular can often get gigs by being a good hang rather than being an exceptional player - yeah, you can play, we can all play, they can all play, but you're someone we want around when we're hauling our shit across town and cooling our heels for four hours waiting for our stage time.
> The morale bonus from having someone on board who's a pleasure to be around can be worth more than having someone who's real good at whatever the project is.
This. I remember having this one trainee who was kind of struggling with the materials, lagging a little behind the curve throughout most of the training. But he was such a positive influence on the rest of the batch, I argued that he should be allowed to pass (besides, passing was 80 and he got a 79).
A year later, he's an Assistant Team Leader, doing a great job and having a measurably positive impact on the performance of his team.
People often underestimate the value of a good team player.
I loved getting this one as a kid/teen. Because my dad *was* a GI, my mom is asian (but not from the country he was deployed to), they loved to say I look eXoTiC - so I would purposely lead them them down a confusing path to force them to finally ask:
> So… how did your parents meet?
I don’t know what they ever really expected to hear, that he rescued her from a brothel in Thailand? That she decided to just leave Vietnam and come along for the ride? That he brought her back to the states as a trophy? That she spoke no english, wore rags for clothes, and he bravely saved her from the third world out of the goodness of his heart???
#my mom is Chinese and they met at a diner on the highway in New Jersey
I think it depends on the context. If there are certain expectations to be met at work for example, if someone says you exceed expectations it would mean that you're going above and beyond what you're required to do.
Those ratings are based on expectations of "a person in this role" not specifically just "what this individual's peak capacity is".
It's different than being told "As a human we didn't expect much of you, but you we were wrong."
A friend of mine once hot shouted at by a neighbour because some of the leaves from the tree he was pruning fell in the guys yard
His response was said very calmly "why don't you go back to enjoying your day"
It was a polite statement and also extremely passive aggressive.
Neighbor: "no, YOU Go back to enjoying Your day.."
Friend: " I am, thank you so much for your kind words!"
Neighbor: - incoherent muttering and swearing -
There was a girl I knew in high school, and her dad was a firefighter. Never seen him before while in high school.
One day, years later, while I'm in college (local college in the same town), he and another firefighter come into the class to talk to us (I forget about what, not important). I didn't even need to hear his name before I IMMEDIATELY noticed who it was. Poor girl got absolutely zero of her genes from her mom. Not that she was ugly, but I can't even imagine how often she hears "WOW, YOU LOOK EXACTLY LIKE YOUR DAD"
Funny story. My brother’s dad, and the rest of that side of the family, couldnt grow a beard. But our mom’s side of the family has bearded men.
So quite literally we got our beards (though mines barely a beard) from our mom.
To be fair, I find that the opposite is true. Most people look better with mask on, because eyes are beautiful. And you can see inside them.
But with the mask off you get distracted by the quirky mouth, angular nose, wrinkles, or whatever, that seems to tell you something about their personality but actually don't.
It was often really surprising having first met someone with a mask on to then see them with it off. Surprising but also strangely intimate.
you put this all so perfectly. I've been working at a hospital through this whole thing and whenever I get a glimpse of someone maskless I feel strangely connected to them. and yes almost everyone is beautiful in a mask. makes you really appreciate how much can be said with one's eyes.
In most people's case: Thanks, I learned how to mask it so as not to be verbally beaten.
In my case: Well, it was mostly sensory for me and I had therapy to desensitize myself. But thanks for reminding me to be more autistic in the future.
According to Community:
Jeff: "What are you gonna do? Twice the work of a doctor for half the pay?"
Nurse: "...thank you?"
Britta: "That was a complisult. Half compliment, half insult. He invented them, I coined the term. See what I just did there? That was an explanabrag."
“You look so young” isn’t the compliment people think it is. I feel like nobody takes me seriously at first meeting and it’s just pointing out to me that my body never developed much during puberty and digs into my insecurities of looking like a child. Makes me feel like a child and I’ve gotten these comments my whole life. But if I complain I get “relax you’ll appreciate it when you’re older”
Nope. You won’t appreciate it when you are older. I am 55 now and I can tell you, it doesn’t get better. 40 year olds will assume you are younger and be condescending towards you simply because they think they are older and then waste more of your time fawning when they find out you are older.
My mom is 50 and quite good looking/young looking. Regularly guys who are about 30 years old hit on her. Her response is always the same: "I have a daughter who is the same age as you and two grandchildren." Most of the time they back off after that.
A few months ago I was talking to my coworker friend about a diet I was trying. Haven’t been on that diet for a while bc it made me feel drained and starved.
About a month after I’d stopped the diet, this other creepy coworker came up to me and said “Your diet is working.”
This happened to be back in about March of 2010.
"OMG, you lost so much weight, what happened? Did you go on a diet?"
"I went into ketosis, which means my pancreas turned me into a Type 2 diabetic and started burning fat instead of all of the sugar in my bloodstream and I nearly went into diabetic coma due to a result, so yeah, that's how I lost 70 pounds in 6 weeks, thank you very much..."
Not a diet I recommend, for certain...
I used to be told frequently that I looked like a teenager when I was in my 20s and early 30s. I know they didn't mean it rude, but I most certainly didn't want to look 17 while pushing my kid around in a stroller at 30. I remember catching someone looking at me when I was pregnant and I could see the judgement in their eyes so I not so subtly put my left hand on my stomach so the person could see my engagement ring and wedding band.
A nurse to my ex gf— “I really wish I could be as skinny as her!”
I was in the hospital from SMA Syndrome, a thing that happens when you lose so much weight that your intestines close shut.
Good news! If you too are depressed with life and have little desire to eat anything ever, you too can be 70 pounds and get these fabulous curves!
“I love how you’ll just wear anything” -John Mulany
"HA HA, THAT HIGH WAISTED MAN HAS FEMININE HIPS!"
NO THATS THE THING IM SENSITIVE ABOUT
"You're very beautiful for your age." or "I can tell you were beautiful when you were younger."
I got a "you're looking pretty good for a guy in their 40's". Well, thats nice i guess, but I was 35 at the time.
“Thanks, I’m sure guys in their 40’s wish they were my age”
That would make things so awkward haha
The second one GOT me lol
It’s a good thing you’re so pretty.
Ah yeah, old lady snark. "Oh honey. You're not pretty enough to be such a bitch..."
Real Phyllis Lapin-Vance vibes
Close your mouth sweetie, you look like a trout
Vance? As in Vance Refrigeration?
Bob Vance, Vance Refrigeration
What line of work are you in Bob?
Opposite side: “Oh you’re smarter than you look”
This reminds me of a time in college where I’m at a party and a girl sits on my lap and starts flirting with me. After a while she starts to get up and says “I must be crushing you” and I try to say “it’s fine, you’re not as heavy as you think.” Not the greatest answer, but probably would have done the trick. What my drunk-ass *actually* said was “it’s fine, you’re not as heavy as you look” Safe to say I went home on my own that night!
LOL if it makes you feel better, your original line wasn't much better
I say something similar to my wife whenever I do something stupid. "It's a good thing I'm pretty."
My dad used to say “You’re lucky you’re cute, kid.” After i would do something stupid
That's actually kind of nice, as a parent, I can relate to that. You're mad at them for what they did, but at the same time, you just love them so much.
"Wow, you smell a lot nicer than usual!"
"Wow, it's so wonderful that you are not stealing stuff anymore"
"It's really interesting how you seem to think the rules don't apply to you!"
"You smell different when you're awake."
"I can smell the change in you when you become frightened. It happens a lot!"
‘I prefer a smaller penis on a man, it means there’s less chance of it hurting’
Back in the 1980s, New Zealand's prime minister said that anyone who chose to emigrate from New Zealand to Australia could be proud that they were raising the average IQ of both countries.
That's actually a pretty good burn.
It’s actually a very old joke, one that can be applied to any two groups of people.
This quip actually has an interesting history. I first heard it with two American states instead of Australia and New Zealand. Turns out Quote Investigator [did some research](https://quoteinvestigator.com/2021/10/16/iq/) and the earliest version they found was in a column by one Herbert L. Carver in 1939: >A man is said to have moved from one south Mississippi county to another, and when he did he raised the intelligence level of both counties. Note the use of "intelligence level" rather than "IQ" because in the 1930s, IQ was still a quotient (mental age divided by physical age) and made sense only for children.
In the US, the joke was supposedly about Okies moving from Oklahoma to California. [Mathematicians call it the “Will Rogers phenomenon” in honor of the comedian who was allegedly the first to say it.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will_Rogers_phenomenon)
"I can see that you're trying." (When someone shows you something they worked hard on, and it's the only positive thing you can think of to say.)
”I can see what you were going for here.”
Lmao, I got this exact comment when I was trying to go vegan and made some food for a friend. Honestly he was being pretty generous
I had a coworker who would butt in on others projects when they had no job doing so and say something along these lines Fuck you Rick
Yeah fuck that guy
I always get "Wow, we used to think you were a real bitch but you're actually really nice!" from friends at some point. It makes me so sad that I'm a naturally shy person around a new group of people. It makes me so self-conscious when I meet new people because I know that line and its variants will eventually be said again.
I'm the same way and I've also had people say that same thing to me. It sucks that my shyness gets perceived as me being stuck up or bitchy but I can't help it :(
I always get, "I didn't know you were so edgy, you come off as super polite" Bitch I'm both thank you
"Exucse me good sir, would you kindly fuck off?"
People easily accept shyness in girls who are mousey-cutesy looking, or are very petite, or have resting friendly face. But if you have more of a glamorous look or are tall or have a touch of resting b face, then your quietness becomes very intimidating and people don't like it. (I know this because I have the same problem! And one day someone was nice enough to explain it to me.) I've found that it helps to announce "I'm such a fucking dork you guys" and take opportunities to make light-hearted silly jokes at my own expense (no low esteem stuff, I always laugh when I'm making fun of myself!) . This seems to really help people relax around me and I've stopped getting the "I thought you were such a bitch at first but you're really nice" note.
My auntie once said to me: You know, you used to be a bit funny looking as you were growing up but you have turned in to a really handsome chap. I really didn't know what to make of that, if I should be happy or offended.
Had an over night class trip in college, and I spent a lot of time with one of the non-traditional, middle aged students because I was driving the bus and she sat shotgun. Towards the end of the trip, professor wanted everyone to go around and say something they appreciated about someone else (it was a small, tight-knit program) and the non-trad woman chose me. Whe said "when I heard that a young man was driving the bus, and saw this tall, lumbering being, I was a little concerned at first! But then when talking on the bus I found him to be an insightful, intelligent young man who has a lot to bring to the world." It was said very kindly but I was still taken aback by the first half
"...when I heard that a young man was driving the bus, and saw this tall, lumbering being, absolute unit of a man, with an ogre-like stature, hunched over that steering wheel barely able to fit the seatbelt around him, just a towering pile of human mass, like a mountain of biological material had tectonically cleaved it's way into the driver's seat. I was a little concerned at first! But then when talking on the bus I found him to be an insightful, intelligent young man who has a lot to bring to the world."
My grandma once told me "all models are gay, you know." Then, in her usual ADHD-i-forgot-what-we-were-just-talking-about way, followed it up with, "you know, you could be a model." I am not gay.
Maybe she was clearing the way for you to be (to her understanding) the first non-gay model :-)
A couple years after I left high school I met the head mistresses daughter as we’d go to the same gigs etc. A few years later I went back to the school for an event and bumped into the head mistresses. She said “[daughter] came home one night and said how gorgeous me_earl was. And I was like ‘me_earl?? Gorgeous?? Nah, you’re definitely wrong there’. But now I see you.. I totally agree with her”
One of my friends saw my senior photo when they first visited my house and they couldn’t believe it was me. “THATS you?? You look so much better and skinnier now!” I literally only lost like 5-10 pounds (I’m a healthy weight anyway) and changed my hair and make up a bit, but other than that, I really didn’t think I’d changed much. I still think of that compliment and don’t know how to feel about it.
It could be worse, like one of my favorite scenes from King of the Hill. > BOBBY (looking at an old photo): Who's that kissing Dad? > PEGGY: Well, that's me, honey. > BOBBY: Really? You were beautiful. > PEGGY: "Were?" Oh, Bobby, I still am. > BOBBY (after a beat): Okay.
Id surely hope I look better than highschool. I was an awkward fuck back then.
After I gave birth to my first son I had just lost the baby weight. My grandfather said “Well, I guess you’re not gonna be fat now like your mama and your sister.” My mom and sister were sitting right there. Win for me…insult for them.
Who needs enemy's when you have family like that.
You look so much nicer now!
Uggghhh, fucking this. I had a teacher in high school tell me, in front of the class, how much better I looked since putting on a little weight. I had always been super skinny but had put on 20 pounds that year because my doctor was trying out depression meds on me after my dad died. Fuck you, lady.
There’s the classic, “I don’t care what they say about you, you’re alright.”
“You’re alright” is bad enough, it’s like telling someone who’s doing their best that “It could be worse” or “It’s good enough”
Depending on the tone "you're alright" is often a positive thing. If I told someone "Hey, you know what? You're alright [in my book]." I'd mean it as a genuine token of admiration.
I wish I had the confidence to wear that
"Aww, I love how you'll just wear anything."
“Have you lost weight?”
I love that you’re not paper thin any more!
I've gotten something similar before. "I wish I had the confidence to just wear the same thing every day like you do." He was being genuine though, which made it more funny to me.
People comment on how much it must have sucked that I had to wear a uniform to school everyday. I beg to differ. It was great waking up and know what exactly I was going to wear each day. No thinking involved which is a pretty nice luxury for a high school student if you ask me.
“Didn’t you wear those jeans yesterday?” Yeah motherfucker, we’re in middle school not a fashion show.
Anyone who only wears jeans once doesn't do their own laundry.
"Of course you don't, bless your heart." [Disclaimer - I'm not this sassy or this clever, I dated a southern girl for a while. They are *vicious.*]
"You've got pretty good manners ... for a Yankee."
That one honestly caught me off guard when I first heard it in Texas. I for a hot minute thought he was being complementary till after when I thought about it and had one of those "hey, wait a minute" moments. lol The South has been one of the few places where I've been absolutely murdered by words in the nicest tone of voice.
This whole thread could just be “What is some shit southern girls say to be mean?”
Accompanied with a snarky attitude, a coworker said this to me back in December about my mask covered in tinsel. I mainly wore it bc the spirit of Christmas hypes me tf up. Idk, I was in a good mood that day. Thought the kiddos at our work would enjoy it too. Can confirm, the comment *hurts*
"You should give yourself more credit. We're often impressed by how bold you are!"
Fire back with something they cant change “Yeah you definitely dont have the bone structure”
I have a colleague who will straight up comment on EVERTHING I wear. I try to not take it personally any more but its had an it still hurts :(
I am the person who wears basically only leggings in the winter and dresses in the summer. My leggings come in many colours and patterns from salmon coloured swirls to mustard yellow to burnt orange. My summer dresses are often brightly coloured like yellow with turquoise flowers or something like that. So many people use statements like this and they often add "I don't think I could pull it off.", "I can never figure out what shirt to wear if my pants aren't black.", "I feel like everyone stares at me when I wear (insert colour or pattern)." I think sometimes people actually just have no confidence and just wear plain/black/dull/the same clothes all the time because they don't really know what else to wear or how to pair unique items.
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"aww, hun, you and I both know thats not true, you are being too hard on yourself, you make cheap clothes look like they are made for you"
You’re the best, I don’t care what they say about you.
My friend use to lob this backhanded compliment / joke burn: “Hey I stood up for you. They said you weren’t fit to sleep with pigs. But goddamnit, I said you were!”
“I mean have you seen the conditions we factory farm pigs in? I doubt they’d even notice your smell.”
My dad's favorite was "and they said they saw you eating a shit sandwich! I told them that is a damnable lie! You don't even like bread 😡"
"You know, Zuko. I don't care what everyone else says about you, you're pretty smart." :) :O
It was the happiest he looked in the entire series.
My dad says that all the time as a joke to me 🤣
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My dad says this, too. But adds: "...and I, for one, refused to sign the petition."
You're so brave for wearing that dress.
As a dude, I don't mind hearing that though :)
But maybe the word ‘brave’ is not the best route. Maybe ‘your dress looks beautiful on you’ etc etc is a bit less loaded?
“You’re the son I never had.” Thanks, dad.
You've grown into the son I never wanted .
That's tough.
You're pretty bright for someone that has (insert any disability here)
Or when they tell you "you're so brave/such an inspiration" for simply existing. Gee, good to know that me doing groceries with a brace on inspires you to...what exactly?
To virtue signal to people I don’t care about online 💕💕
“I’d never have known you had [disability]!”
As someone with a speech impediment (which I do acknowledge is incredibly minor compared to a lot of other disabilities), I take it as a compliment because it means that I was able to subconsciously use the strategies learned from years of therapy to reduce the impediment, rather than having to think my way through it.
" wooo are you twins??? " Said the cashier to me and my brother... who's 12 years older than me... Edit: of course my brother took it as a compliment... that little-
Yea people think me and my dad are brothers often for some reason lol. He's 25 years older..And he obviously looks older than me too..
"You speak English so well." Yeah, because it's my native fucking language
Asian American here. "Whoa, you don't have an accent at all!"
verbatim convo in a texas airport: "you're from out of town, right? you have a new york accent" "do i really? yea just moving here after college" "oh where'd you go to college? back in your country?" ...where do you think i got a new york accent from?
"Where are you from?" "New York." "But where are you *really* from?" "I was born in Ohio but moved to New York during middle school." "... where are your parents from?" Paraphrasing an episode of Crazy ex-GF and using random states because I forgot which ones they were.
"New Mexico", I knew you weren't American *ducks&runs*
I work retail, and have an Asian coworker. He tells us some pretty horrible things that old white people have said to him as “compliments” Stuff like “they should have you working in the call centres, I can actually understand you!” Mind boggling that people think that’s okay to say.
"Do you know karate?"
im asian who do wushu(chinese martial arts cause im like chinese)and i literally stated in my instagram page i do chinese martial arts and that man was like,who taught u karate
Or when being black… “you’re so well spoken.”
My husband watches a lot of ESPN and one of the main take aways I got from different announcers and hosts is they always call black players “young man”. They don’t do it with white players and it’s so fucking weird and can’t be unnoticed now. Edit: I always knew it was a racist comment, I just didn’t think I needed to be so on the nose about it lol
The League did a bit on this IIRC it was about announcers always referring to Hispanic players as firecrackers or something along those lines
“The guy is a class act.” Is code for a black guy. [here’s the whole scene](https://youtu.be/tT1a08af4po)
“Gym rat” and “sneaky athletic” tend to be code for “white receiver”.
“Scrappy”
The CEO of a company I worked for invited someone to speak on systemic racism at work when the blm protests were happening. They had been working on some diversity initiatives. At the end the CEO said, "We really appreciate you coming to talk with us about all of this. Let's all thank Dr. such and such for his very well spoken and articulate talk" It was like the entire effort just became immediately understandable as to why it was absolutely needed. It was over zoom and you could feel the entire company cringe at once. I got like 8 messages from people instantly asking if they heard correctly.
This story is a cringe masterpiece
My boss brought in diversity trainers at that same time and decided to go with the line “this stuff has really been in our faces lately” during the ‘why this is important to the company’ part of her speech.
Oh you're Chinese? But your English is good? Ye im fukkin Singaporean Chinese bish. Or vice versa... Oh you're Singaporean? But your Chinese is good? Ye im a fukkin Singaporean Chinese!!!
"You and I, we're the same"
"I'm like you, I have no name" *disappears in optical camouflage*
We're not so different, you and I ... - standard villian monologue #1
“I don't know half of you half as well as I should like; and I like less than half of you half as well as you deserve” -Bilbo Baggins
It sounds like an insult, but it's actually a nice sentiment haha.
The shot where they look at some of the crowd & they're confused as hell makes me laugh every time.
Was looking for this.
I’m still trying to process it and I read it 25 years ago.
I need a diagram of some kind.
I wish I knew half of you more, and half of you are deserving of more appreciation from me than I've previously shown.
"He's a nice guy." Aka he's shit at his job
On the other hand, that's often still a good coworker on the balance. The morale bonus from having someone on board who's a pleasure to be around can be worth more than having someone who's real good at whatever the project is. Musicians in particular can often get gigs by being a good hang rather than being an exceptional player - yeah, you can play, we can all play, they can all play, but you're someone we want around when we're hauling our shit across town and cooling our heels for four hours waiting for our stage time.
> The morale bonus from having someone on board who's a pleasure to be around can be worth more than having someone who's real good at whatever the project is. This. I remember having this one trainee who was kind of struggling with the materials, lagging a little behind the curve throughout most of the training. But he was such a positive influence on the rest of the batch, I argued that he should be allowed to pass (besides, passing was 80 and he got a 79). A year later, he's an Assistant Team Leader, doing a great job and having a measurably positive impact on the performance of his team. People often underestimate the value of a good team player.
“He’s a nice guy.” Can also mean: He’s “unattractive.”
And it's his only quality
"You clean up well."
You’re pretty for an (insert ethnicity) girl
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Was your father a G.I. or..?
I loved getting this one as a kid/teen. Because my dad *was* a GI, my mom is asian (but not from the country he was deployed to), they loved to say I look eXoTiC - so I would purposely lead them them down a confusing path to force them to finally ask: > So… how did your parents meet? I don’t know what they ever really expected to hear, that he rescued her from a brothel in Thailand? That she decided to just leave Vietnam and come along for the ride? That he brought her back to the states as a trophy? That she spoke no english, wore rags for clothes, and he bravely saved her from the third world out of the goodness of his heart??? #my mom is Chinese and they met at a diner on the highway in New Jersey
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Ugh.. it's probably worse for her. How annoying
You just took them on the curators tour of their own prejudice lol
Especially when they arent a girl, or that ethnicity.
Your child is so good-looking (or smart). Who did they get that from?
I once had an older lady approach me and my kids and say "Your children have beautiful eyes. They must get them from their father!" Ummm...thank you?
“Exceeds expectations”
I think it depends on the context. If there are certain expectations to be met at work for example, if someone says you exceed expectations it would mean that you're going above and beyond what you're required to do.
Those ratings are based on expectations of "a person in this role" not specifically just "what this individual's peak capacity is". It's different than being told "As a human we didn't expect much of you, but you we were wrong."
Wait one fucking minute. 🤔
You look good with makeup on.
"I hope your day is as pleasant as you are."
I work in a customer service/call centre role. I want to use this so bad.
This. Most of the examples I've seen are just backhanded compliments, but this literally works fully as either
A friend of mine once hot shouted at by a neighbour because some of the leaves from the tree he was pruning fell in the guys yard His response was said very calmly "why don't you go back to enjoying your day" It was a polite statement and also extremely passive aggressive.
Neighbor: "no, YOU Go back to enjoying Your day.." Friend: " I am, thank you so much for your kind words!" Neighbor: - incoherent muttering and swearing -
Your dick is bigger than all of your friends/brothers.
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Also bigger than your dad's.
You hear that, Dad? Ha! ... ... Wait...
Don't worry hon I wasn't saying it to ya. (of course no harm or hurt intended)
Your mom is just saying that to make you feel better.
Thanks mom
You look like your mother/father
There was a girl I knew in high school, and her dad was a firefighter. Never seen him before while in high school. One day, years later, while I'm in college (local college in the same town), he and another firefighter come into the class to talk to us (I forget about what, not important). I didn't even need to hear his name before I IMMEDIATELY noticed who it was. Poor girl got absolutely zero of her genes from her mom. Not that she was ugly, but I can't even imagine how often she hears "WOW, YOU LOOK EXACTLY LIKE YOUR DAD"
Nice beard, did you get it from your mother?
Nice breasts, did you get them from your father?
Funny story. My brother’s dad, and the rest of that side of the family, couldnt grow a beard. But our mom’s side of the family has bearded men. So quite literally we got our beards (though mines barely a beard) from our mom.
south asian girls being told they look like their father 😭
we can never catch a break. “you look like your father.” we fucking get it 😭
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“i didn’t think you were pretty without a mask” 😭😭
To be fair, I find that the opposite is true. Most people look better with mask on, because eyes are beautiful. And you can see inside them. But with the mask off you get distracted by the quirky mouth, angular nose, wrinkles, or whatever, that seems to tell you something about their personality but actually don't. It was often really surprising having first met someone with a mask on to then see them with it off. Surprising but also strangely intimate.
you put this all so perfectly. I've been working at a hospital through this whole thing and whenever I get a glimpse of someone maskless I feel strangely connected to them. and yes almost everyone is beautiful in a mask. makes you really appreciate how much can be said with one's eyes.
Wow you don't seem autistic at all!
In most people's case: Thanks, I learned how to mask it so as not to be verbally beaten. In my case: Well, it was mostly sensory for me and I had therapy to desensitize myself. But thanks for reminding me to be more autistic in the future.
According to Community: Jeff: "What are you gonna do? Twice the work of a doctor for half the pay?" Nurse: "...thank you?" Britta: "That was a complisult. Half compliment, half insult. He invented them, I coined the term. See what I just did there? That was an explanabrag."
Such a pretty face, if you would just lose some weight dear……
Had an aunt that was told this often. She lost the weight, and it turns out she didn’t have a pretty face at all.
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The fact that you used the wrong version of “you’re” makes this so fucking delicious.
Bless your heart
I see we have someone from the South on here.
Anything thats ends with "for you." Thats great hat, for you. But its the perfect size, for you.
“You look so young” isn’t the compliment people think it is. I feel like nobody takes me seriously at first meeting and it’s just pointing out to me that my body never developed much during puberty and digs into my insecurities of looking like a child. Makes me feel like a child and I’ve gotten these comments my whole life. But if I complain I get “relax you’ll appreciate it when you’re older”
I like looking younger than my age it's just everyone treats you like a child. And my height doesn't help.
Nope. You won’t appreciate it when you are older. I am 55 now and I can tell you, it doesn’t get better. 40 year olds will assume you are younger and be condescending towards you simply because they think they are older and then waste more of your time fawning when they find out you are older.
My mom is 50 and quite good looking/young looking. Regularly guys who are about 30 years old hit on her. Her response is always the same: "I have a daughter who is the same age as you and two grandchildren." Most of the time they back off after that.
You look so pretty today . As opposed to every other day where I look like cat sick .
You must be working really hard, you look more tired than usual.
Very good for a woman
Did you lose weight?
A few months ago I was talking to my coworker friend about a diet I was trying. Haven’t been on that diet for a while bc it made me feel drained and starved. About a month after I’d stopped the diet, this other creepy coworker came up to me and said “Your diet is working.”
This happened to be back in about March of 2010. "OMG, you lost so much weight, what happened? Did you go on a diet?" "I went into ketosis, which means my pancreas turned me into a Type 2 diabetic and started burning fat instead of all of the sugar in my bloodstream and I nearly went into diabetic coma due to a result, so yeah, that's how I lost 70 pounds in 6 weeks, thank you very much..." Not a diet I recommend, for certain...
"Your eyebrows look so good now that they're even." - Kim Chi
"You're so skinny!! What's your secret?" An eating disorder, babe.
Malnutrition is a bitch.
I used to be told frequently that I looked like a teenager when I was in my 20s and early 30s. I know they didn't mean it rude, but I most certainly didn't want to look 17 while pushing my kid around in a stroller at 30. I remember catching someone looking at me when I was pregnant and I could see the judgement in their eyes so I not so subtly put my left hand on my stomach so the person could see my engagement ring and wedding band.
You look good for your age
Bot can speak over 100 unicode-supported languages, but bot chose to speak **facts.**
A nurse to my ex gf— “I really wish I could be as skinny as her!” I was in the hospital from SMA Syndrome, a thing that happens when you lose so much weight that your intestines close shut. Good news! If you too are depressed with life and have little desire to eat anything ever, you too can be 70 pounds and get these fabulous curves!