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Nicest way to turn down friendship


Kathlen Onyx
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Ok, this might seem like an odd question but what is the nicest way to turn down someone that wants to be friends with you?  I had someone IM today and said "I'm so happy to see you at the club so I can have someone to talk to when we are here"  Nothing bad at all, except he's not really someone I would become friends with.  Honestly I make friends organically so if I'm in a club and I start to get to know someone in local by chatting or joking around I might IM them and start a conversation after a few weeks but I've never just IM'd someone and said "Hey, I want to be your friend"  If I'm in a club normally I use that time to sort my inventory or catch up on emails or stuff like that or chatting with the person I'm with if I come with someone.   This has happened to me twice in the last two days and I feel really bad because I'm sure they are nice people but just by reading their profile I know that we would have nothing in common.  It's easy when they actually send a friend request because I just say I don't accept random friend requests *which I don't* but how do you nicely turn down someone that just wants to randomly chat with you?  

 

 

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8 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

Ok, this might seem like an odd question but what is the nicest way to turn down someone that wants to be friends with you?  I had someone IM today and said "I'm so happy to see you at the club so I can have someone to talk to when we are here"  Nothing bad at all, except he's not really someone I would become friends with.  Honestly I make friends organically so if I'm in a club and I start to get to know someone in local by chatting or joking around I might IM them and start a conversation after a few weeks but I've never just IM'd someone and said "Hey, I want to be your friend"  If I'm in a club normally I use that time to sort my inventory or catch up on emails or stuff like that or chatting with the person I'm with if I come with someone.   This has happened to me twice in the last two days and I feel really bad because I'm sure they are nice people but just by reading their profile I know that we would have nothing in common.  It's easy when they actually send a friend request because I just say I don't accept random friend requests *which I don't* but how do you nicely turn down someone that just wants to randomly chat with you?  

 

 

First, turn on decline all friend requests to avoid people who try sending before even asking.  I don't say I don't accept random requests, I don't accept any requests.  I don't know why people get so dang upset when you say no.  Some people won't like it no matter how nicely you say it.  That's on them, not you.

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1 minute ago, Rowan Amore said:

~snipped~

Some people won't like it no matter how nicely you say it.  That's on them, not you.

Sadly, this is the reality. Telling them that you don't accept friends request easily might be a decent tactic, but often, feelings get hurt. 

My tactic is to be polite, and if they can't accept my reasoning, then they wouldn't have been a good friend anyhow. 

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   I'll usually accept the requests, and after a few days of radio silence I'll remove them again. Sometimes my suspicions are proven wrong and I actually make a friend out of it!   

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If it is someone that I know I don't want to be friends with, then I turn it down and I don't care if their feelings get hurt.

If it is someone that might ultimately make a good friend, then I'll accept it.

Typically though, even when I accept, the other person deletes me because I am the one that is the horrible friend.  I hate chatting inworld and so I never IM anyone and have a terrible time with chit-chat when they IM me.  I'm also not real big on hanging out until I really know someone -- which of course requires hanging out.  Yeah, catch-22.  Most of my good friends are folks that I got to know years ago hanging out with them at the Forum Cartel Hangout.  Took me forever to actually warm up to folks though.  So, I'd probably only get to know someone new by hanging out in a larger group somewhere - once I felt comfortable enough to go to said larger group to begin with.

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11 minutes ago, Orwar said:

   I'll usually accept the requests, and after a few days of radio silence I'll remove them again. Sometimes my suspicions are proven wrong and I actually make a friend out of it!   

HA! Well, I was doing that but I still felt bad.  I found the "reject TP's" and "reject friend requests" so that solves that problem.  That really wasn't the issue because they usually accepted it. I guess I have to just get better with the "x" and just close it and not respond. 

I had met a guy I was seeing briefly and by that I mean a few days.  One day I had come on and just wanted to be left alone so I unticked the box that showed me online.  Boy was he pissed. He sent me a IM the next day and said "I saw you were online all day *we rent at the same parcel *. You are a game player and I don't associate with game players" LOL..

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11 minutes ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

One day I had come on and just wanted to be left alone so I unticked the box that showed me online.  Boy was he pissed. He sent me a IM the next day and said "I saw you were online all day *we rent at the same parcel *. You are a game player and I don't associate with game players" LOL..

   People use their contact lists differently, and there's no such thing as a universal consensus on when to un-tick that box, or when doing so might be upsetting if discovered. Personally I tend to get a bit peeved and remove people if I find out they're hiding their online status from me whilst on my contact list - I don't see the point of having people on there without it (and besides I don't tend to prod people a lot, nor am I unable to leave someone alone if they're busy or not in the mood to chat without taking offense). If one wishes to be left alone it's more efficient to just toggle your status to unavailable or do not disturb, that way if someone does find out and starts spamming you kicking up dust about how they feel deceived.

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4 minutes ago, Orwar said:

   People use their contact lists differently, and there's no such thing as a universal consensus on when to un-tick that box, or when doing so might be upsetting if discovered. Personally I tend to get a bit peeved and remove people if I find out they're hiding their online status from me whilst on my contact list - I don't see the point of having people on there without it (and besides I don't tend to prod people a lot, nor am I unable to leave someone alone if they're busy or not in the mood to chat without taking offense). If one wishes to be left alone it's more efficient to just toggle your status to unavailable or do not disturb, that way if someone does find out and starts spamming you kicking up dust about how they feel deceived.

Never really thought about it that way. I was just busy in RL and in SL and thought it would be easier.  But I respect that perspective and may use the "do not disturb" from now on.

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7 minutes ago, Rowan Amore said:

I basically hide from everyone that way.

   You can hide, but you can't-- Run. No, wait, you can run, too. Or TP. Hm. 

   To be fair, if you really, really want to get in touch with someone and you know their name, it's not difficult to find them. Unless you don't show in search and block IMs from non-friends. I let my contact list run pretty rampant, if someone wants to be on it, I don't really mind .. Until they start sending mass TPs to their clubs or exhibitions. Especially if I point out to them that it's rather frowned upon in SL to do so (it's even in the how to behave in SL guide!). If they don't stop after that, I'll boot them off of there.

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Tell them you live in China and the great firewall blocks any friend requests from westerners.

Tell her you never get any friend requests and when you get out of prison you will visit her.

Tell him you don't want to accept his friendship because the last two people who friended you died in real life and you don't want it to happen to him.

Tell them you always flip a coin to decide if you want them as a friend. Pretend to flip a coin and tell them it didn't work out.

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3 hours ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

  It's easy when they actually send a friend request because I just say I don't accept random friend requests *which I don't* but how do you nicely turn down someone that just wants to randomly chat with you? 

very easy ...simply tell you don't friend after one talk, but need to know them a bit better. If they are offended you have the first good reason to tell them  ..."told you so" .

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I just tell them that I keep my friends list as tidy as possible - and that's actually a friends list, not just a buddy list; That I add people to it after a year or two of constant talking when I trust them enough. The best part is... I'm actually not lying - I do the same thing in social media as well. ~

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1 hour ago, panterapolnocy said:

and that's actually a friends list, not just a buddy list

   Strictly speaking it's a 'contact list'. Being on that list does not necessarily mean that you're friends, nor does not being on that list necessarily mean that you aren't. I'd compare it more to your contact list in your email - you may not be 'friends' with your boss, co-workers, landlord, or neighbours - but it may be nifty to have them on your contact list in case you need to contact them to let them know you won't make your shift or that their ex is putting prim *ahems* all over their backyard (alternatively having their contact card, but that's something a fair few people don't seem to know how to use anyway).

   If you find it annoying that your nearby chat is spammed when people log in or out (which seems to be a common complaint and a reason to keep the list as short as possible), you can turn that feature off, or switch to toasts instead. If someone is being annoying and typing you constantly even though you don't want to talk to them, tell them that, and if that doesn't work, take them off the list, and if that doesn't work, block them.

   You have all the control you could possibly need for how your contact list works and which features to use or not to use - including who to put on it, of course - but making up emotional reasons such as 'we're not close enough for you to be on my friend list' sounds just a little bit childish. If someone randomly throws a friend request at you, you are by no means obliged to accept it; after all, it's considered impolite, just like requesting or sending random TPs or objects to people.

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Myself I have my Out of Office reply on by default :)

Send me a message and it will respond that I am AFK. Friends know this and I answer them anyway, and if someone IM's me I do not know and not care about in the given situation (Hi you look sexy! at a shopping event) I can just ingore them as they see I am AFK.

Might not be the most effective at a club maybe, but it can help.

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2 hours ago, Zeta Vandyke said:

Myself I have my Out of Office reply on by default :)

Send me a message and it will respond that I am AFK. Friends know this and I answer them anyway, and if someone IM's me I do not know and not care about in the given situation (Hi you look sexy! at a shopping event) I can just ingore them as they see I am AFK.

Might not be the most effective at a club maybe, but it can help.

I do exactly this too. Ill answer any friends straight off but all *Hit ons/unknown friend requests* get left to be deleted at the end of the log in...Grins 😁😜😀

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1 hour ago, Ditto Darkfold said:

I do exactly this too. Ill answer any friends straight off but all *Hit ons/unknown friend requests* get left to be deleted at the end of the log in...Grins 😁😜😀

I've got the friend request issue solved. I like this idea of just not responding.  I think I'll just "x" out people that I don't think we have much in common and if they are serious they will IM again or perhaps put something other than "OMG! Your avatar is GORgeous"!  lol

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3 hours ago, Sam1 Bellisserian said:

"OMG! Your avatar is GORgeous"!

   To be fair, if they do capitalise the first three letters in gorgeous as a hint of what they may be into, I would advise throwing a block their way before hitting the x. Unless of course you're into that sort of thing ...

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Just now, Orwar said:

   To be fair, if they do capitalise the first three letters in gorgeous as a hint of what they may be into, I would advise throwing a block their way before hitting the x. Unless of course you're into that sort of thing ...

OH! Yes...that was an error in typing and no I'm not into GOR at all!  Too friggin' funny.

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15 hours ago, Orwar said:

Until they start sending mass TPs to their clubs or exhibitions.

Hmmm, I will confess to sending out a notification when i have an exhibition, though I do not have that many of those, not quite sure what  you mean by mass, I have had friends who used to send me multiple TPs a night to the club where they ar DJing. I never send more than one per show, though they are mass in the sense that they go out to virtually everyone. 

 

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3 minutes ago, Talligurl said:

Hmmm, I will confess to sending out a notification when i have an exhibition, though I do not have that many of those, not quite sure what  you mean by mass, I have had friends who used to send me multiple TPs a night to the club where they ar DJing. I never send more than one per show, though they are mass in the sense that they go out to virtually everyone. 

 

The problem with that though is that if you are interested in getting notices you can either join the club or the DJ fan club.  Then there is no need to send TP's to anyone unsolicited.  Honestly just the fact that it's bothersome to have to close boxes is irritating to me.  Madpea just sent out a notice about their photo contest. They send out the same notice in their regular and premium groups as well as then sending the exact same message in the chat groups.  That's four notifications in a matter of minutes.  If I'm not at your event it's likely I either don't want to attend or I'm busy.  Personally I wish clubs would do away with the half time notices.  It's like someone came up with something and it NEVER changes.  

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