Hi everyone! First time posting here—hoping to get some perspective.
For the past few years, my friends and I have had this tradition of showing up at each other’s place at midnight to celebrate birthdays. They did the same for me this year.
First, they called me and played an AI-generated recording of my favorite rapper calling me “baby” and asking me to come outside. Then they gave me a cake with his face on it. We went inside, I cut the cake, made some tea—everything was going great.
Then it was time for the main gift. It was a hoodie, and at first I thought it was just merch. But it turned out they had made a custom hoodie with an AI-generated image of me hugging that rappe and he was covered in kiss marks.
A while back there was this trend with AI photoshoots with celebrities, and I did one for fun, laughed about it, and forgot about it. But now I see that image printed on a hoodie. The moment I recognized it, I immediately crumpled the hoodie and didn’t even look at it properly. And I definitely don’t ever want to show it to anyone.
I had shared that photo with them before, but I never imagined they’d actually use it like this.
I thought it was meant to be a joke gift—but apparently they didn’t expect that reaction. Still thinking we were joking around, when they asked, “So… you’re not going to wear it?” I said, “No. Maybe just at home” (truthfully, I wouldn’t even wear it at home).
I get that I made that photo myself, but I never went back to it, and I definitely don’t fantasize about being in a relationship with this person. To me, wearing something like that feels like those cringey “his girl” shirts with a boyfriend’s face—except here it’s a complete stranger. It just feels embarrassing and honestly kind of weird and unhealthy.
My friends got upset. They even said their other friends loved the idea and would wear something like that all the time. After that, the conversation got awkward. One friend tried to keep things going, the other just stayed quiet. You could tell they were hurt by my reaction. We eventually managed to get through the moment, but the awkwardness didn’t really go away.
I did thank them for the gift and for coming. They left, and after thinking it over, I feel guilty. Like I should’ve held back my reaction, or just lied, or at least not said anything negative. They clearly put effort into it and tried to make it feel like a “gift from the rapper.”
Now I feel bad for not appreciating the thought and effort they put in.
So… AITA for being honest and saying I didn’t like the gift?