When I was growing up and someone did you a favor or helped you out, a standard response to express your gratitude was to say “I appreciate it”, with the “it” being whatever action they took to help you out. These days, and only it seems to be within the last couple years, the typical response among younger people has now seemed to shift to “I appreciate you”, with the emphasis shifting from the particular action to the person doing the favor. Have other people noticed this? It kind of annoys me in some abstract way, but I don’t want to be the crotchety old guy and in fact, neither response seems to be more or less correct than the other.
If said too often, “Appreciate you” seems artificial to me, like it is a cheap way to oversay “Thanks!” just to impress people.
I first started hearing “appreciate you” from Black people, and as most popular things these days, it seems to have migrated from Black culture to Everyone.
I honestly don’t mind it, and I quite like it. To me it feels more sincere than “thanks,” which is actually worn out. It gives a little personal boost to the do-er.
I’ve never heard anyone say “I appreciate you.” I wouldn’t say it. I would say something like “Thank you so much for your help. I appreciate it,” thanking them for the act they performed for me, which I appreciated. I might also say “I appreciate your help,” which would again put the emphasis on the act, but it would sound (to me) awkward and perhaps too personal to say “I appreciate you.”
On the other hand, I wouldn’t mind it if someone said it to me, but it would still sound odd to my ears.
They may appreciate something I did and thus maybe appreciate the action…but why are they appreciating me?
Because whatever you did is just one example of your kind and generous nature?
They do indeed appreciate you as a person. You having been there and done that. Not just that the task got done but YOU did it!
Yes, and yes!
You mentioned a couple of years, but I feel like I started seeing/hearing it just a few months ago. In most situations it feels like overkill, and often comes across as insincere (which is one of my pet peeves).
I have noticed it. At first I found it a bit jarring because it seems a much too earnest and intimate way to thank me for letting somebody keep 67 cents in change.
Now I don’t notice it at all, it’s like “thank you” and “appreciate it” got hybridized in the normal way that language is mashing up and recombining things all the time. It doesn’t cause confusion or displace any irreplaceable phrases, so it doesn’t bother me at all.
“I appreciate you” sounds weird to me in a way that “I appreciate it” doesn’t. But “pre-she-ate-it” and “pre-she-ate-cha” both sound fine to me.
And while both are used as a sort of “goodbye” after having done something for someone, the former definitely does seem more focused on that one thing you did, while the latter seems more focused on they appreciate your willingness to help.
Even the demeanor is different. I imagine the “it” version being this guy with a bit of male pride who being fairly unemotional, standing off to the side and tends to have a rural drawl. When I imagine prototypical the “cha” version, it’s a smiling guy giving a slight pat on your back.
“I appreciate you” sounds like something out of The Giver.
“Do you love me?"
There was an awkward silence for a moment. Then Father gave a little chuckle. “Jonas. You, of all people. Precision of language, please!”
“What do you mean?” Jonas asked. Amusement was not at all what he had anticipated.
“Your father means that you used a very generalized word, so meaningless that it’s become almost obsolete,” his mother explained carefully.
Jonas stared at them. Meaningless? He had never before felt anything as meaningful as the memory.
“And of course our community can’t function smoothly if people don’t use precise language. You could ask, ‘Do you enjoy me?’ The answer is ‘Yes,’” his mother said.
“Or,” his father suggested, “‘Do you take pride in my accomplishments?’ And the answer is wholeheartedly ‘Yes.’”
I definitely hear it mostly from Black people. It rubbed off on me, and I say it from time to time, but I can’t think of another white person I know who says it.
The only person I’ve heard it from was a white fellow from Georgia at my auto repair shop - “I appreciate you.” Numerous times. I really dislike that phrase when it’s used to mean “We appreciate your business”.
He also insisted on calling me Miss Betty (if Betty were my first name). I’m willing to bet he didn’t call his male customers Mr. Billy.
“Appreciate you” feels like a deeper sentiment than I’m willing to offer to a random acquaintance for minor help. “Appreciate it” gets the job done without overcommitting. However, if that acquaintance saves me from something major—like, say, walking into a vat of molten lava—then “I appreciate you!” is more than deserved.
Same. I heard it from a white Georgia guy who sold me a fancy office chair off Craigslist. “I appreciate you”. ok buddy thanks for the cheap Aeron but that’s as far as this is going.
But it occurs to me that “we appreciate you” could be good, maybe even ideal abbreviation for “we appreciate your business”.
I hear it as condescending. The person saying it is, in some sense, asserting a right to pass judgment on the person that they are, allegedly, thanking.
Imagine you got to meet, say, the Pope. Would you feel comfortable saying to him “I appreciate you”…? Or would it feel rather disrespectful?
To me: the latter. As though I were one-upping the Pope. As though I were claiming a right to stand in judgment on him.
(It’s subjective, I’ll admit. But “I appreciate it” or “I appreciate this” or “I appreciate what you’ve done” are all, somehow, less personal.)
What if they add man after it? Because I forgot to mention that’s how I hear it in my head " 'preciate ya, man." And again as they are leaving.
That gives it a slightly different spin. Though I wouldn’t say that myself (I don’t call people “man” or “brother” or whatever), I wouldn’t feel weird if someone said that to me, in that way.
Yeah, I hear it all the time, pretty much in any kind of transactional situation…cashiers at stores, that kind of thing.
Seems way over the top. Like maybe they want to hold hands, look into my eyes, and be saying that, which I’m sure is not the intention.
I hear it. If it’s appropriate I don’t mind. Sometimes it seems forced.
Question for those that don’t like it, if instead they said “I appreciate you for doing that” would that be ok? Because it seems like a shortened version of that to me.