Maybe it's just me...

I don't understand it either.

What's most frustrating for me has always been that some women will accept compliments half the time, and then the rest of the time they tell me I'm dreaming, and they're really ugly/fat/whatever.

It's kind of like Russian Roulette.

It's mostly just self image. Coming from a teenage girl, I think that a lot of girls are way too obsessed with how they look. I have one girl in my class that uses the TV in my history classroom as a mirror almost every day. >.< It gets on my nerves so much... Some girls have such low self esteem that they won't believe you at all when you tell them they're pretty. I'm willing to accept compliments from friends with a smile, but I'm always worried about my face or being too skinny (which I actually am), and I know my hair's always a mess... We all have our flaws and our problems with ourselves... But sometimes if you obsess over them, then you just won't believe it when someone else tells you you're pretty... =/
And yes, it's definitely like Russian Roulette... xP


~Amber~

"And rarely do they deserve it."

For me it is this statement. What is worse, putting yourself down and having others tell you how beautiful you are? Or push yourself up and having people snicker and laugh at you behind your back? Not speaking for all women, but for me, the quoted portion above could be the answer.

Sydneyd said:

"And rarely do they deserve it."

For me it is this statement. What is worse, putting yourself down and having others tell you how beautiful you are? Or push yourself up and having people snicker and laugh at you behind your back? Not speaking for all women, but for me, the quoted portion above could be the answer.

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I'm with you on that.
Why can't anyone find a happy medium anymore?

~Amber~

It's either a) they're fishing for compliments, or b) they have a body image issue.

I don't know for sure, but I don't really care.

Sounds like your girl has body image issues.

MANY girls will say they're ugly just to get that confidence boost when a guy will say she's not ugly and she's very pretty. There's also a thing where we don't want to appear vain, so we try to push ourselves as ugly as to appear humble.

Girls do many tricks to fish for compliments and attention. Assume 99% of the time they want a compliment when they bash themselves.

The other few, it's probably self body image. Does she avoid looking in mirrors or stare into them constantly?

It took me a while to be able to say, "Thank you" when someone tells me I'm pretty. I went from doing the same thing, to making a joke, to just saying thank you. If it's a comment that comes without prodding for it, that's the best kind.

I think it's terribly hard to think that way of yourself if you have such low self-esteem. No compliment will get you out of that feeling, you just don't see what that person sees.

Button said:

It took me a while to be able to say, "Thank you" when someone tells me I'm pretty. I went from doing the same thing, to making a joke, to just saying thank you. If it's a comment that comes without prodding for it, that's the best kind.

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This is me exactly. Except that I'm still in the "making a joke" stage, mostly. Occasionally I'll just take the compliment with a thank you, but more often I lighten the mood.

It is a self-worth issue for me. It's not that I don't agree with some of the compliments I receive - it's just that I don't feel special enough that someone should comment on it. And I don't normally like being the centre of attention, except when I'm totally comfortable with that person (or, as it happens, if I'm on AW ). So I divert the serious tone by making a joke.

*shrug*

I'm also not sure I agree with the idea that most self-deprecating comments are just ways of fishing for a compliment. I self-deprecate a lot (though I'm starting to stop myself from doing that) and again, it comes down to not thinking I should be considered special. I always seem to say things like, "I'm not very good at X." BUT I say it in a way where I can shrug and smile, and make it seem like I don't care that I'm not good at X.

I do receive compliments quite often when I say I suck at something - usually middling compliments to the effect of, "Oh, I'm sure you don't suck at X." But that's not why I self-deprecate.

But that's just my particular case, I should hasten to add.

My earlier comment that "I don't understand it either" still stands, simply because people are very complex, so you can never be sure what their reasons are for acting the way they act.

I think most women take themselves and the entire thing way too seriously - over the top. To the point of being a perfectionist about it - which is a losing position. When women, and girls, try their hardest to look their best they still know someone 'out there' can top them.

Our society reinforces low self esteem when it comes to looks specifically.

It's ridiculous.

If you don't think yourself beautiful or attractive (and I think everyone is) then think of how you feel when you compliment someone and they shrug it off like your opinion means nothing.

Makes it easier to just say, "Thank you."

some days I look in the mirror and say 'hey, you know, I'm pretty hot'. Other days I look and all I can see is the flaws- which frequently are treated the same as moral failings by certain media sources.

How many times have you seen a gossip mag talking about how some star has cellulite or has gained/lost weight as if it's a failing in themselves as a person, rather than jus a physical thing?

I think that when I'm wearing nice cothes, good makeup and have done my hair I'm above average, but the rest of the time I see myself as a lumpy, pale ugly little troll. I know it's logically not true, and when people compliment me I say thankyou bu there it is. Low self-esteem isn't logical, nor can it be fixed by someone whose feelings are likely to be biased telling you something good about your appearnce.

Pistol Whipped Bee said:

I think most women take themselves and the entire thing way too seriously - over the top. To the point of being a perfectionist about it - which is a losing position. When women, and girls, try their hardest to look their best they still know someone 'out there' can top them.

Our society reinforces low self esteem when it comes to looks specifically.

It's ridiculous.

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Well the media and society reinforces the opinion women are nothing without their looks all the time. If you've gotten far in life and you're a women it must be because you have got a nice rack/slept your way to the top or you look good. It's not based on merit at all. If you are at the top of the ladder it is perceived you must be a bitch, mean cruel woman who is ruthless and heartless! Men don't get criticised to the degree or the same way that women do. I don't think anyway. I read that out of the whole of football (UK) only 3 out of 104 in top of the sport are women. Someone on the news who is one of the only females in football said that to get to the top of it she had to act like a man or else she'd get comments on her boobs and her butt and was constantly accused of sleeping her way to the top.

It's fishing for compliments, pure and simple.

It doesn't just apply to looks (which I'll admit to being insecure about, regarding scarring on my chest and one leg, and having suffered acne until well into my 30s). Some days I feel hot, others...blech. But the correct reply to a compliment is always "Thank you." Choose to believe it, choose to disbelieve it, but say "Thank you." You can't go wrong.

I'm sick of pretty women refusing to acknowledge their prettiness and as this is a writers' site, I'll say too that I'm sick of writers refusing to acknowledge their talent and, what's more, their success. "Oh I'm so insecure, I don't know if I can do this, please feel sorry for me, it's so hard having all this pressure on me to come up with the goods."

Oh cry me a fucking river. Yeah, it must be so hard to be attractive, and so hard to be successful.

I've got no sympathy for people like that. They're wearing; emotional vampires, the lot of them.

If you brush off a compliment, you're calling the other person a liar. Either that, or you're jonesing for another sycophant-fix.

scarletpeaches said:

Oh cry me a fucking river.

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I lurve you so hard.

Maybe they don't want to come off as egotistical by admitting that they are as beautiful as you and everyone else says.

Bmwhtly said:

I lurve you so hard.

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Thank you.

shyne said:

Maybe they don't want to come off as egotistical by admitting that they are as beautiful as you and everyone else says.

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Or maybe they're just attention whores who want people to keep telling them how beautiful they are.

I mean, unless people vomit blood when you walk down the street, you're probably okay to look at.

scarletpeaches said:

Or maybe they're just attention whores who want people to keep telling them how beautiful they are.

I mean, unless people vomit blood when you walk down the street, you're probably okay to look at.

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Winners of the genetic lottery indeed.

scarletpeaches said:

I mean, unless people vomit blood when you walk down the street, you're probably okay to look at.

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Oh well, when the apocalypse happens, at least I'll be used to the sight of blood.

scarletpeaches said:

I mean, unless people vomit blood when you walk down the street, you're probably okay to look at.

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Well, there's no vomiting but people do weep tears of blood as I pass.

Well that's 'cause you're so darn smexy.

Must be. The scream of utter horror and desolation is a little disconcerting though.