I have been telling people that I am ‘Pure and Upstanding’ for a couple of months now. This all started because I was accused of being ‘Shady’ and my response was ‘nonsense, I am totally pure and upstanding.’ My question to you is this:
If a 23 year old male told you that he was pure and upstanding, what would that mean to you? I want to know how high I am setting the bar by making this statement.
At first I’d laugh and think you had a kick-ass sense of humor. Once I figured out you actually meant it, I don’t know what I’d do. If you really were pure and upstanding, things would cool fairly quickly. If you turned out to be sullied and corrupt, we could be bestest friends.
I’m cynical so I’d assume he was feeding me a line of bull. Or I’d figure he was intentionally being ironic and telling me he was a slut and wants to sleep with me. If I thought he was serious, I’d figure he’s a pious stick-in-the-mud and likely a Jesus-freak.
‘Pure and upstanding’? I’d be a little bemused, me…
Oh, right after posting I thought of a fourth option. I might take it as an honest admission and a request to corrupt him.
I’d think…
I’d feel more comfortable with you demonstrating those qualities, as opposed to telling me you have them.
Instead of trying to convince others, figure out why someone thought you were shady. If they had some reasonable basis that you were/are shady, than you are. (in someone else’s estimation) Your time is better spent addressing whatever those issues are (if they are indeed true) than going on a public relations campaign.
Just my .02¢
I think it’d be much more effective if you had business cards made up. I mean, anyone can say that they’re pure and upstanding, but if you can back it up with a business card, well, then you’re on to something.
Vis:
**FlippyFly **
A Pure and Upstanding Guy
Yeah, I think you may be in business with that one.
If you told me that, I’d have to give you my buisness card:
________________________________
Regallag the Axe
*Corrupting the innocent, pure and upstanding*
*since 1985!*
________________________________Heyyyyyyy…
The formating didn’t work right!
Heyyyyyyy…
The formating didn’t work right!
This all sounds pretty strange. If you’re so “pure” (I’m not even sure what that means in this context) and “upstanding”, why don’t you show people by just being a nice guy instead of going around telling people you’re pure and upstanding? Sounds like you’re pretty insecure about it, anyway, if you’re going on message boards asking weird questions about what people would think if you went around calling yourself this.
“Pure and upstanding”? That’d just crack me up. (I mean I’d take it as a sarcastic admission that while you’re not really pure and upstanding, you’re not “shady”). It would be even funnier if you were perfectly serious about it, one of those (as aforesaid) Jesus freaks. It’s like an invitation to shock.
That’s probably closest to the truth. A lot of people meet me and think that I am, well, a pretty nice and straightforward type of guy. The reality is that I tend to be a bit more corrupt than most people’s first impression. Nothing too serious, but I am sexually active, drink, have used some drugs, lie from time to time, and have broken up more than my fair share of relationships. This is why, my close friends who know me well, they think I am shady – the discrepancy between what people who don’t really know me perceive and the reality about who I am.
For the longest time, I tried to fight this initial impression people had of me. I thought it was unfair to let them think I was a perfect angel when I wasn’t. The problem is, it didn’t work. I couldn’t seem to shake the good guy image.
So then I started telling people “I’m pure and upstanding.” This has been far more effective. People don’t really seem to know whether to believe me or not when I say it, but it definitely gives them some hint that what they see might not be all there is to the story.
I think the business cards sound like fun… maybe I’ll try that.
You need to get a tattoo or a nose ring or something like that. (No offense intended to those who have these things.) Those kinds of things generally give people the first impression - rightly or wrongly - that you drink and do drugs and sleep around. So then you wouldn’t have to correct wrong impressions. 
Aren’t you special? Man, you’re sexually active, you drink, and you’ve used some drugs. That’s amazing. I’ve been sexually active, drank a lot, and used most drugs you’ve heard of and several you haven’t. But I don’t act like I’m the shit for it.
So don’t. The people who care enough will see you for who you are, and with everyone else it’ll probably serve you to let them think what they want to think. Having a good-guy image gets you places sometimes. I’ve never regretted the morally ambiguous things I’ve done, but I have regretted going out and trying to get everyone to believe how bad I was, because sometimes–like when you want to get a job, for example–people need to believe that you can be a good worker. Some people don’t believe that you can hold a job if you’ve done morally ambiguous things in your past.
C’mon now, be nice. I’m not trying to act like I’m the shit, I’m just trying to give an instight to my SDMB friends about who I really am, so they can approach this P&U subject with some frame of reference.
Yeah but having a good-guy image will also exclude you from certain things too.
Personally, I think you’re just being fake. Don’t get me wrong, you sound like a real fun guy, and there’s nothing wrong with sex, alcohol and drugs. You don’t need to babble about how clever your “pure and upstanding” line is for people to see who you really are. You just have to be yourself and let people see it. As it is, all I can see is that whoever you are, you don’t seem to like it, and you want to play up another image. Look, I don’t want to turn this into a Pitting. I’m just saying that the only way people can ‘see who you are’ is to actually see who you are, rather than you trying to shove a contrived image down their throat.
What’s the big whoop about being pure, anyhoo? Hell, arsenic can be pure.
Hey don’t worry, you’re not the only one giving me crap about this. Here is what my buddies had to say after reading the thread:
Dude, just admit it: YOU ARE SHADY! By no means are you the shadiest I have met, but you are shady. What do you want to gain out of all this anyway? From what I can see, you want to be “bad” and people to know it. You just don’t want anyone to say it. Besides, like the saying goes… “Nice guy finishes last.” You don’t want to be last do you?
This has given me something to think about. I started this thread because I honestly wanted to know what people think when I throw that at them. The way it’s ending up, I am questioning my own motives and wondering if they go beyond having a fun and intriguing thing to say. I think my friend hit the nail on the head when he said you want to be bad and people to know it, but you don’t want anyone to say it.
Here is my now thoughtfull self considering these theories. :dubious:
I’d assume that you were a celibate, law-abiding type who was just a little bit too self-righteous.