To humour or to be honest?

Eight

Eight

Bare fists :tehe:
Veteran
Joined
Mar 24, 2007
Messages
1,110
Location
London, UK
Gil
0
I'm kinda dreading tomorrow, you see, my mate got a tattoo yesterday, and I just saw a photo of it on Facebook. Now, usually, I think tattoos can look good depending on who it is, whether it suits their identity, appearence and skin tone, if they got the right weight, height and muscle, that sorta thing...so I think you can see where I'm going with this. :wacky:

The tattoo takes up like, most of her thigh, due to her petite build, I feel it looks kinda ridiculous on her, but to each their own. However, this is where the problem comes in; I know tomorrow she's gonna ask me "What do you think? =D"

I see humouring someone as patronising, and I don't patronise people I'm close to or respect. Yet if I'm honest, she'll get all depressed and act like I'm sort of a stuck up snob. She's the sorta person who'd act like someone's opinions didn't effect her, yet it really did.

I'm at a moral standstill here, do I try and humour her? Even though, going by previous attempts, I suck at lying to those who I'm close too? (Based on experiences where I've recieved gifts I didn't like and attempted to lie and say I liked them, according to my mum, I'm awful at it xD) Or should I just say "I don't like it, but y'know, you clearly do, and that's all that matters"? I may be covering my arse with adding that, but knowing her, she'll probably still go all "._." over it.
 
Last edited:
Just lie and tell her you think its stunning.
Shes gunna have that forever so its better that she feels good about it. If it was me i wouldnt even be debating this question at all. Done it before many times with tats aswell. If it was something else, something non permanent like a haircut then telling her its hideous would be fine. But a permanent mark on yer body? No one wants to be told that its horrible looking.
 
There's nothing wrong with telling a white lie every now and then. The tattoo is permanent, so it won't do much good telling her it looks horrible when it's there to stay. Causing her to regret getting it (she'll come to do that on her own with time, I bet) isn't worth the trouble or the hard feelings.

A buddy of mine got a tattoo awhile ago. Same situation. It looked generic and crappy, yet I could tell he was proud of it. So I swallowed hard and told him it looked good. Happiness all around!

...though I do make fun of it behind his back. I'm only human.

Good luck, dude.
 
Chicks with giant tats look hideous, just tell her it looks bad and you don't like it.

She got the tattoo, she has to live with people who like it and don't like it. Not everyone's going to tiptoe around the fact that her tat is gross on her.
 
Theres the saying if you dont have anything nice to say then shut the fuck up.
Why say that its horrible? Especially when the persons yer mate? Thats just bein a cunt.
Like mrpoop said (lol) Chances are shel come to hate it herself one day. Nae need to be a prick about it.
 
I'm usually all for being honest, especially if it's your friend and they're making a decision that's important to their life. In this case, well she already has the tattoo. Telling her that it's horrible-looking will only hurt her feelings. Besides, if it looks that bad, some asshole is bound to tell her that down the road and like others have said, she'll probably end up regretting it later on. I don't see the harm in telling her it looks good to avoid hurting her feelings.

Like Lew pointed out, if it was something temporary like a haircut, it'd be find to tell her it looks bad so she can avoid another one in the future. :8F:

But in this case, there's not much to be done about it, so just smile and tell her you like it and then hope she changes the subject. (y)
 
I prefer being honest with my friends, but I have a heightened compassion for my friends' feelings. I get no satisfaction from lying to them (when I deem it necessary), but I'd get even less satisfaction from being personally responsible for their hurt feelings.

Having a few people around who are supportive of the hideous tattoo may make it easier for her to tolerate those who are outspoken about how much they hate it.
 
I'm hoping to god tomorrow we'll avoid the subject altogether xD I really don't want to lie to her, so I've even tried thinking about a point I like about the tattoo to exagerate about, the quote itself is nice, but as I say, it sorta reminds me of a little girl wearing mummy's wardrobe except this time, the outfit is superglued onto her skin. :rage:

That said though, I think I will have to warn her that some people may not like it and that she should brace herself for criticism. If I'm not gonna be fully honest with her, I feel like it's the least I should do.
 
Having a few tattoos myself, I went in knowing that not everyone would like or even understand all of my tattoos. Hell, one of them is a joke tattoo, obtained partially due to pride of birthplace, and mostly because it makes for some extremely crude one-liners. If you're going to put something permanent on your body, you should be ready in advance for people giving you hell about it, close friends included. If she wasn't ready for that (and if she didn't ask people their opinions prior to getting said tattoo, just to make sure it was a good idea), then it's already too late to help her.

Sounds like you already have the best plan available: compliment the tattoo based on what you do like about it, and avoid talking about it overall or anything else about it. Personally, I can be a pretty mean bastard, so I don't recommend my other suggestion: tell her the truth, if she's an adult she can handle it.
 
Tell her "Best tattoo I've seen."

It won't be a lie because you didn't specify what it's best at.

I would tend not to make this kind of suggestion, but no other options I'm hearing sound any better. Good luck but maybe it is best to be honest instead. It might blow up in your face, but anything else if you aren't sincere about it, might too.
 
If it was me, I would tend to say "Well..its definitely not something I would have/like, you you seem happy and thats all that matters" You are addressing any question she may have for you, but with slight misdirection, which in turn, will make her feel good about herself because you are hoping for her happiness :)


 
Big Casino said:
But a permanent mark on yer body? No one wants to be told that its horrible looking.
Click to expand...

It's true you'll destroy her confidence. If she's naturally quite pretty and she knows it you can even level with her and say it doesn't look that nice, but if she's the type who is overly hung up about her looks you might want to lie.

Trust me, being straight with insecure people (both male and female) never works. It's never a conversation you want to have mainly because they refuse to face what you're telling them. If she's that type then she doesn't deserve the truth IMO.

> just realised this is yesterday's news...
 
xD But lucky enough dude, the subject was avoided overall, I think she's letting people come to her instead of asking them, which I respect, it's best not to open up the can of worms if it can be avoided.

She's talking about getting another one too, you can tell she's caught the fever, but ya never know, maybe it'll be smaller and suit her better.
 
Yeah I mean there's this chick I know and she only gets small ones but apparently once you get one it's really easy to just end up getting carried away. I wouldn't know I don't have any tattooes and tbh I'm not particularly fond of the ladies having em either. But I still humour em :wacky:
 
I'm debating whether it's worth saying don't get carried away, she doesn't wanna end up looking like a regular on Jeremy Kyle. The only thing missing will be the piercings and the dodgy teeth.

I'm just hoping I'll be able to tell her this without making her go all "Oh, you hate my tattoo!" about it. Which is true, but that won't be the point, the point is, she doesn't wanna get too many and end up regretting it.
 
I usually just say "I don't like it but you know me I'm not a fan of any tattoos". It's true, I've never seen a tattoo that to me didn't look like a mistake.

But yeah when I speak to some of those who I know who have tattoos they do admit that sometimes they go overboard and find it easier to keep adding and adding. This one guy I knew got a tiger/dragon tattoo which covered his back it looked kinda cool 'cause he was wedge and shit (no homo) but I guess it's different with chicks. :hmmm:
 
Warbourne said:
I'm usually all for being honest, especially if it's your friend and they're making a decision that's important to their life. In this case, well she already has the tattoo. Telling her that it's horrible-looking will only hurt her feelings. Besides, if it looks that bad, some asshole is bound to tell her that down the road and like others have said, she'll probably end up regretting it later on. I don't see the harm in telling her it looks good to avoid hurting her feelings.
Click to expand...
My thoughts exactly. I would never promote lying, but in some cases, its the better solution. Telling her you like it would be your honest opinion, and there's nothing wrong with that. But considering that a tattoo is permanent (unless you're willing to dish out a ton of money to get it removed through burning skin treatments), it'll always be there. At least if it was with a haircut, like someone mentioned, they can simply grow it out or cut it off. But saying you don't like something that's permanent, its a permanent flaw that she just won't accept your disliking of. Lying isn't the best policy, but it's certainly the simpler and less painful way to go in this case, in my opinion.
 
I could never lie to someone about that sort of thing.

I tend to tell them what I think without being a bitch about it.

You can tell people in a nice way that you think it looks crap.

I'd just say that it's no something that I would have chosen personally for myself but you obviously like it and that's the main thing. And I have had to say this a few times even to Steve and luckily for me these people haven't had an issue with this.

You shouldn't get tattoos and other permanent things done to please other people. You get them done to please yourself and if she is going to cry every time someone tells her that they don't really like it, well then she shouldn't have got it done in the first place.

I've got a few tattoos myself and some people like them and some don't and all that matters is that it means something to me and I honestly have never been hurt when someone has told me they don't like them. Not that there has been that many which is always a good thing.

Luckily for me they're all in places that are easily covered up all the time. I'd have to wear something different to my normal day to day clothes to show them off. It's good for work and for when I get older and want to look more ladylike though. XD

Screw having a big fat colourful tattoo right on your thigh area though. By the time you're old it'll look all mushy and gross and very hard to hide. >.<

Same goes for chicks who get tattoos across their chests. How will they ever grow old gracefully? They look like they have hairy chests until you realise that it's actually a tattoo.
 
I don't really know. I was all for the honesty thing, but after reading some of the comments, it kinda swayed me. Maybe you should tell her what you like about it, or just a little white lie. In the end, she'll be happy.

And maybe it's best to warn her not to get carried away?
 
I dunno, I think it's good to be honest, but I think in the case of the original post, I'd at least attempt to have abit of tact over it - something Im not very good at, because Im a shite liar. But something along the lines of well, its not to my taste... I think, it would ultimately depend on who it was, I can be honest with Clare and she'd appreciate the honesty rather than be offended. I know she'd never get a tattoo anyway, and certyainly not without consulting me first, and then it would just be dude, no, if I didnt like it. In these situations, Im not sure how Id react til im actually faced with it, either way Im still a shite liar
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top