Compliminsults

As far as portmanteaus go, we’ve come up with some pretty good ones so far in the 21st century. There’s humblebrag, when you pretend not to be proud of something you’ve done but are desperate for everyone to know. There’s mansplain, where you—on second thought, let me shut up for a second instead.

One recent addition I haven’t heard as much is compliminsult. Like humblebrag and mansplain, this one’s pretty obvious—but also, very useful.

Compliminsults are nothing new, though the word is. Urban Dictionary has an entry from 2010, but I couldn’t find anything earlier than that. Still, in spite of the word’s novelty, the idea goes way back.

In fact, it goes way back for me personally. Growing up in the American South, I was exposed to some of the most vicious and experienced compliminsulters who ever walked the earth: middle school boys.

Southerners are experts at this technique, and one phrase really drives the point home: bless your heart.

Blessing someone’s heart actually sounds pretty good overall, right? It’s not meant to be a cut-down of any kind, and the idea of wishing someone’s heart good tidings (or blessings from a deity) has been in common practice for thousands of years.

Here’s the thing, though: you’re not really talking about their heart… you’re talking about their brain here. You’re celebrating their strong and powerful heart…

…which is evidently more praiseworthy than their brain. This is an insult couched in a compliment—a perfect compliminsult.

Another great compliminsult is:

You’re smarter than you look.

This is a close cousin of bless your heart, but instead of someone’s kindness, it’s their dumb-looking appearance that’s called attention to here. Other versions of this theme abound, like:

• Not bad for someone like you!

• All things considered? Not too shabby!

• Way better than I thought you’d do.

Besides intellect, compliminsults can focus on aesthetics or style (you’re really brave to wear that in public) or effort (I can see you’ve put a lot of work into this). The setup is always the same: imply the virtue you’d like to see more of in the person, but praise another virtue instead.

The common thread here isn’t that you were pleasantly surprised; it’s that your expectations of the person started out even lower than they are now.