A social experiment involving online compliments from men to women yielded interesting, if disappointing and unsurprising, results (h/t Ragen):

The next time someone sends you a “you’re so hot” opening line on a dating app, try simply saying “Yeah I am.” That’s exactly what one college student started doing, and she got some… interesting reactions.

Claire Boniface, a 20-year-old student, began conducting a social experiment she called “agreeing with boys when they compliment you.” Rather than profess thanks and gratitude to suitors offering compliments via online dating sites, Boniface politely agreed with them.”I was curious to see how the people that messaged me would respond,” Boniface told The Huffington Post. “Often when I get messages on that site simply complimenting me I just ignore them because the compliments are never sincere and I see no reason to respond, so I thought I would try out a simple response of ‘yes’ and see what would happen” She quickly found out that most dudes did not like this.

This is not the first such experiment  but the results do not seem to have changed at all.

Now, you might be saying that these are “just compliments,” and/or that she shouldn’t be so egotistical as to agree with the people sending her these messages.

To use a non-appearance or gender based example to address the “ego” question, I present the following hypothetical exchange between two men:

Dude #1: [Shreds on guitar.]
Dude #2: Wow, you’re amazing!
Dude #1: I know.

Dude #2 has at least two possible responses:

Option A:

Dude #2: [Aside to audience] Hmmm, this guy’s kind of a jerk. I’m not going to talk to him anymore.

Option B:

Dude #2: [To Dude #1] Uh, well, um, you’re not that great. You call that an arpeggio?

While Option B is probably not unheard of, I posit that Option A is the much more likely scenario. That seems to be true in every arena of human interaction except compliments to women. (It even applies to compliments between women.)

With regard to the argument that they are “just compliments,” consider the world of catcalling, where men who are “just saying hello” don’t seem to appreciate being on the receiving end of similar greetings. If these really were “just compliments,” agreement from the person receiving the compliment should not be a problem. 

Let’s stop kidding ourselves. This isn’t about sincerely complimenting someone. This is about control, plain and simple.

Furthermore, I don’t think the guys in these online exchanges just want control over the compliment. They want to be the first and only person to make that compliment. In all likelihood, the woman hears the compliment all the time, but she’s expected to pretend that not only is it a nice compliment, but that it’s an original one, too. This is a common trope in pop culture, as demonstrated by that “You Don’t Know You’re Beautiful” song  which is (or at least recently was) hugely popular among tween girls. It might as well be titled “Your Low Self-Esteem Is Sexy to Me.”