Let them down easy with this clever trick.

For Japan’s nation of manga artists, sometimes the best way to express a feeling or thought is with a cute little comic strip on Twitter. So far, we’ve seen handy insights into social media and lessons in the art of umbrella-holding expressed through the medium of art online, and now Twitter user @replus_mickey is here to show us how to let men down easy with a three-panel comic strip that’s got everyone’s attention.

Reading the message accompanying the tweet, it sounds like @replus_mickey has definitely been burned by women using this technique before:

“How to dodge an invitation from a man you’re not interested in. All you ladies out there, please feel free to try this out. It will let you convey the “I’m not interested in you” message in a way that flows naturally. Incidentally, I’m now going to go home and soak my pillow in tears.”

In the first panel of the comic, we see this statement: “When a guy you’re not interested in says something like this“. In the image, a man approaches his female friend, saying “XX-san, do you have a boyfriend?” to which she replies “No, I don’t.”

Emboldened by her reply, the man starts to ask her out, saying, “Well, well then … next time …” Before we get to the next panel, though, the artist adds a little advice box that states: “When it starts to look like he’s going to ask you out, let’s say this…

In the final panel she rolls out the line, “So, please introduce me to someone nice!” Alongside is the comment, “The results are extraordinary“.

Since being posted online, the tweet has received tens of thousand of likes and retweets, with people leaving comments like:

“I bet she would fall in love with someone if they had a witty comeback for her.”
“I would just introduce myself to her then!”
“I can vouch for the fact that this technique hurts.”
“Reading this is like a punch to the gut!”
“Tears make you grow strong, like a flower growing out of asphalt.”

Indeed, tears do make you grow strong, but if you do get this sort of reaction from someone you’re interested in, don’t spend too much time crying into your pillow. It just means that she respects you enough to not want to hurt your feelings, so you won’t be investing your time towards a relationship that’s never going to happen. And that just means that in the long run, you’ll probably be saving yourself from one of these potential breakup disasters.

Source: Net Lab
Featured image: Twitter/@replus_mickey