You're beautiful. Do you believe me?

(Written April 9, 2007)

Perhaps this shouldn't bother me as much as it does, but the truth is, I can't stand it when I tell a girl that she's beautiful, and she just rolls her eyes at me. As if she doesn't believe me, or I'm lying or something. I understand that she may not consider herself to be beautiful, which is fine, I guess, but I think the least she could do is believe that I think she's beautiful. I also understand that there are guys out there that are far too liberal and casual with this compliment. The more they say it, the more the sincerity seems to wear thin, and the less it seems like a compliment at all. I see it all the time, and it's always bothered me when I see guys do that. But with this in mind, does the phrase, "I love you" become less meaningful the more we use it? Most people would probably say "no." Maybe I'm wrong about that. So, what's the difference? What do you think?

"You're beautiful," "You're pretty," "You look very nice today," and other such phrases are not compliments that I ever use lightly. I will never say anything like that unless I really mean it.

Please don't think that I'm bitter about this or anything, because I'm not. This actually has not happened to me recently, but it has before, and I see it happen with other people almost on a weekly basis. Giving insincere compliments and not accepting sincere ones is a societal flaw that's been on my mind a lot lately, that's all. Maybe the girls can help me out with this. Am I totally off the mark on this one? Are there reasons that I haven't mentioned why girls seem to not believe this particular compliment sometimes? How do you differentiate between the sincere and the insincere?