ANSWERS: 9
  • Not all southerners use the statement...
  • Most southerners I know enjoy insulting northerners. I'm actually a westerner, but in my time in the south I was told over and over that there are 2 kinds of Yankees. Yankee tourists, and damn Yankees, the ones that move in. That said, I find nothing offensive about 'you sure clean up good.'
  • We Southerners have many euphemisms that others including Yankees do not understand are not insulting, but simply our way of relating something that we grew up with. When I was 19 and moved to NYC, I couldn't understand why people always referred to me as 'youse guys', knowing first of all that I was not a guy and second of all that youse is no more of a real word than y'all. I found it easier to just get over myself and roll with it than it be confrontational about it, being an adherent to the old adage, 'when in Rome...'. I have still never adopted referring to anyone as 'youse' though.
  • If someone said that to me, I would think they meant that I bathe very thoroughly. Now what does it really mean, so I will be prepared if I ever hear it?
  • It's a teasing and funny way to tell someone they look nice. I hear it and use it all the time. There's nothing offensive about it.
  • I think I am considered to be a "Northerner" (from Ohio) and someone telling me I "Clean up good" wouldn't insult me at all. I actually would take it as a compliment---maybe it's just you.
  • I'm pretty Northern (being Canadian and all) and I've never been offended by it.
  • No offense taken here.
  • Haha. I don't actually say that. I didn't know that there was a north/south divide on the statement either. I think it's pretty obviously supposed to be a compliment though. Maybe said notherner is a bit sensitive?

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