There are times when insulting women works.

You have a trusted connection with her in which you roasting each other is part of your relationship. You'd expect her to roast you also. You both understand each other and are careful to avoid crossing the line from playful roasting to insulting.

She asks for your opinion and you tell her what's truthful instead of what you think she wants to hear, but you're also careful to phrase it in a way that's helpful and not insulting.

You don't give her compliments on how young she looks, how thin she looks, or anything else that's only a compliment because of social constructs. You don't outright call her old or fat, but you also don't argue with her when she calls herself old or fat.

Characters: Hasan Piker//you **

Just something fun I came up with a few days ago, finally getting pen to paper on it. ENJOY

Now live on AoC here!

You’d watched him stream through power outages, through breakups, through the absolute dregs of modern politics. Hasan was background noise when you were folding laundry, entertainment when you were meal-prepping, emotional support when your landlord raised rent again.

He was a habit. A parasocial one, sure—but so is caffeine.

You rarely typed in chat. That space was its own chaotic biome—inside jokes, mods bickering, subscriber spam, emotes flying by like migrating birds. You watched. You lurked. Sometimes you smiled quietly to yourself when someone made a good joke. Sometimes you rolled your eyes when chat got weird about a guest’s outfit.

But you stayed silent. Safe.

Until tonight.

Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was the way his hair looked under that stupid LED backlight, pulled back messily, those loose strands catching blue around the temples like the moonlight was flirting with him. Maybe it was the way his hoodie dipped just low enough to reveal that chain on his collarbone—something about the soft cotton and gleaming metal that made you think about biting things.

Whatever the reason, you typed.

imagine sitting on your face during the trump debate stream. you’d never come back up for air.

You hit Enter before you could second-guess it.

The line scrolled by with a dozen others. You figured it’d disappear instantly. Forgotten.

Then he stopped mid-sentence.

His eyes flicked to chat.

Brows pulled together.

“Bro,” he muttered. “What the fuck—hold on...”

You froze.

No, no, no—

His eyes scanned the screen, then narrowed.

“Who the fuck is—‘OohLaLatte69’?” he read out loud. He pronounced it slowly, like he couldn’t decide if he was amused or deeply offended.

You wanted to dissolve into the floor.

Hasan leaned toward the monitor. “‘Imagine sitting on your face during the Trump debate stream. You’d never come back up for air.’ ARE YOU GOOD?”

The chat exploded.

💀💀💀

CAUGHT LIVE OMG

she horny on main fr

ban her lmfao

MODS

“I—I—bro. No. You’re getting muted. That’s a timeout,” Hasan said, clicking furiously. “You can’t just drop that in the middle of a take about fracking!”

Muted. Ten minutes. The little gray icon appeared beside your name.

The worst part?

You saw the exact moment he tried to hold back a laugh. His mouth twitched. His eyes crinkled. He ran a hand over his face and muttered something about degenerates and sex pests and needing a palate cleanser.

And then he moved on.

Just like that.

But you couldn’t.

You stared at the screen. Heart hammering like you’d just confessed a crime.

Muted. Silenced.

You didn’t even really regret it.

You regretted getting caught.

You didn’t tell your best friend.

She was a mod now. Deep in the trenches. She’d recognize your chat name instantly. She’d laugh herself breathless, then post a screenshot to the Discord. You’d never live it down.

So you stayed quiet.

You kept lurking.

After the timeout ended, you didn’t type anything for a week. Then a month. You changed your profile picture. Subscribed with Prime, but anonymously. You watched him play horror games with the lights off. Watched him rage at Valorant. Watched him argue with chat about rent control and milk pricing and how often men should wash their towels.

But you didn’t speak again.

You couldn’t risk it.

Especially now.

Because that same voice that mocked you for being horny on main?

That same face you watched from behind your laptop, curled up in bed with a spoonful of peanut butter and a weighted blanket?

It walked into your café.

Real. 3D. Larger than life.

And you—God help you—you looked him straight in the eye and said:

“Name for the order?”

Even if you aren't good at something and are just a beginner, he should not be mocking you or bullying you for that.

I'm not a great singer or painter, but I enjoy singing and painting sometimes. My ex would mock me and tell me that he wanted to marry someone who could actually sing.

I gave him another chance after he hurt my feelings. He was good for a couple of weeks, and then went right back to mocking me and putting me down.

Just run. You are beautiful even if you aren't good at everything you try. You don't need someone to put you down and try to harm your self-worth.

In one of the various "Pride and Prejudice is a toxic book that makes girls think they can change bad man" articles I've read, I saw Darcy accused of "negging" Elizabeth.

I don't think that's true.

Unless I'm mistaken, negging is a manipulation technique. It's when a man insults a woman to tear down her self-esteem, so she'll be grateful that he loves her despite her "flaws" and/or think no other man could ever love her except him.

When Darcy tells Elizabeth that he's struggled against his feelings for her and loves her against his better judgement because of her inferior social status and her embarrassing family, he's not trying to manipulate her into accepting his proposal. He already has no doubt that she'll accept. As far as I can tell, he's just being completely, brutally, excessively honest. That doesn't mean it's not a terrible proposal, of course, but he's not trying to break her self-esteem.

IMHO, the person in Pride and Prejudice who comes closest to negging is Mr. Collins, when he reminds Elizabeth of what a big favor he's doing her by proposing and that she's unlikely to get any other proposal because of her lack of fortune.