People React Very Differently to Being Told They're Beautiful

Not everyone accepts the compliment graciously
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 8, 2015 7:23 AM CST

What happens when you tell someone they're beautiful? As 18-year-old Shea Glover discovered, all kinds of different things. As a high school senior in Chicago, Glover was playing around with her new camera, taking photos of people she found beautiful, when she realized their reactions to being called beautiful were "actually pretty interesting," she explains, per People. So instead of snapping photos, she clicked her camera's record button. The resulting video captures the subjects' reactions as Glover tells them she's filming beauty. And they're priceless. Many people smile widely or sheepishly. "That is so nice," says one girl. "Now you're making me blush," adds a young man. One woman, however, gets frosty. "I'll cut you in the face," she says before turning away. "You better watch your ass," she adds. "Clearly you’re being goofy."

A male also seems bewildered by the compliment. "I kind of don’t believe you," he says. "A lot of people don't like to think of themselves as beautiful beings, especially adolescents, so it made them visibly vulnerable," Glover, now a Pace University student, tells ATTN. "Unfortunately 'beauty' as in physical appearance is valued so highly in our society, yet talking about our own beauty is taboo." Since the video was posted to YouTube in May, however, it's been viewed 6 million times and Glover says 90% of the response has been positive. Though her beauty-inspired project "turned into a social experiment halfway through," she adds "beauty in people or nature" still inspires her every day. "There is so much beauty in the world," she writes in one of the video's captions. "If you blink, you'll miss it." (Watch this 18-year-old interview himself at 56.)

Get the news faster.
Tap to install our app.
X
Install the Newser News app
in two easy steps:
1. Tap in your navigation bar.
2. Tap to Add to Home Screen.

X