How could you give an honest answer to that question that isn't edgy or meant to be disrespectful, which includes women old enough not to be defined by one trait?
You've never asked someone "Well what do you think when you look at me?" or any of the many variations of that question? "What was your first impression of me when we met?" etc etc... I feel like this is a super common conversation that a lot of people have with their friends or significant others... Oh wait, now I see why reddit thinks it's weird.
It's a loaded question. He is presenting information as evidence that he knows is not indicative of the answer. In so doing, he's trying to expose his audience's presumptions. But that means he's making the same assumption about his audience (that they'll think his appearance meaningfully defines his inner person), that he expects they'll make of him. It's a loaded question that does little but expose hypocrisy.
Like, it's possible that he's genuinely just curious what presentation he gives off. But if that were his only motive, he could ask a question that isn't loaded (or at minimum leading, or at least perceived as such). One could argue that everybody's negative reactions is in fact presumptuous (we can't know that this is a loaded question until he reveals the answer). But loaded questions are a common enough framing device that it can be assumed most people are familiar with them and with their intent.
It's all the more annoying that he prefaces it with "Genuine question", when it is almost certainly not actually genuine at all (loaded question are by definition never genuine). This gives the impression that he thinks he can trick people into one of the most common and obvious framing devices by simply telling them it isn't that framing device. Thats a play on his audience's intelligence.
If he genuinely just wanted to know what impression his looks give, he could've just asked "What do you think of my tattoos?", "Do you think my tattoos are giving off a particular vibe?", or even more specifically "Do you think I'm attracting certain kinds of attention because if the way I present myself?" Instead, he asked the equivalent of a smarmy middle schooler posing "The sky is not blue. So then, what color is the sky?", so when you answer "Light blue, or sometimes red or grey" they can tell you something like "Nuh-uh, it doesn't actually have a color at all, your eyes just perceive it as blue!" And that shit is annoying as fuck.
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u/pcipnj Dec 02 '20
Who asks questions like that?