A woman has found an unusual way to make unwanted attention at a club disappear, and the internet is calling her strategy both hilarious and heartbreaking.
Instead of repeatedly turning down men who approached her on nights out, My Linh came up with a far more creative visual solution.
The stunt has sparked a bigger conversation about the lengths some women say they feel forced to go to just to enjoy a night out without being bothered.
Highlights
- The internet had plenty to say about the unusual tactic a woman came up with that left men backing off.
- From fake wedding rings to “mythical boyfriends,” women are sharing increasingly creative ways to avoid unwanted attention.
- What looks like a hilarious club prank has sparked a more serious debate over why women feel they need such tricks to be left alone.
One person reacted, “That’s an extreme privacy filter, but I get the logic for a night out.”
A woman came up with an unusual way to make unwanted attention at the club stop
Linh, a content creator and SFX makeup artist, found herself dealing with men who kept approaching her even when she didn't want the attention.
Rather than repeatedly explaining that she was not interested, she came up with a much stranger solution.
She created a set of temporary prosthetic rotten teeth that made her smile look dramatically crooked, oversized, and unattractive.
She later shared footage of herself wearing the dentures while out at a club, turning the bizarre transformation into a joke about unwanted male attention.
The original clip was shared in March, with Linh captioning it, “When the guy bothering you in the club finally leaves you alone.”
SFX makeup artist My Linh wore fake “rotten teeth” to the club despite having a perfectly normal smile
She then removed the fake dentures, revealing a perfectly normal, healthy-looking smile underneath.
The unusual tactic struck a chord with viewers, many of whom saw the dentures as more than just an SFX makeup trick.
Another commenter added, “It's awful that a person has to do something like that to try to keep men away because they don't respect anyone, sorry diva, but at least you were creative.”
“Women deserve to have fun in public without feeling watched or bothered,” remarked a third.
Another comment read, “It's so sad we have to buy these kinda stuff, just to protect ourselves.”
Research suggests that many women regularly feel unsafe or uncomfortable in nightclubs and bars
The comments ultimately turned the viral clip into something of a debate over personal boundaries, with some viewers questioning why women are expected to develop elaborate strategies just to be left alone.
Research has found that unwanted s**ual attention and harassment can be significant issues in clubs and bars for women.
One 2024 study examining nightlife experiences in an English city found that 68.2% of female participants reported having experienced s**ual violence, compared with 33% of male participants.
The reported experiences ranged from persistent cat-calling to unwanted physical touching, g**ping, and grinding.
According to data from The Nighttime Foundation, 74% of women explicitly worry about their general safety during a night out.
For some women, concerns about unwanted attention can influence how they navigate a night out, from staying close to friends and choosing where to stand to finding ways to discourage approaches without escalating a situation.
The bizarre dentures quickly turned into a conversation about the creative ways women avoid unwanted attention
The fake dentures are far from the only unusual tactic women have shared online to avoid unwanted attention in public spaces.
Across TikTok, Instagram, and Reddit, women have discussed everything from oversized “subway shirts” designed to conceal club outfits to deliberately blank or intimidating facial expressions meant to discourage strangers from approaching them.
Others have shared more traditional tricks, such as wearing a fake wedding ring, inventing a “mythical boyfriend,” or pretending to be on an urgent phone call to signal that they are unavailable.
Some have even described intentionally acting strange or discussing deliberately unappealing topics when a persistent stranger refuses to take the hint.
Friends can also get involved, with women describing ways of physically pulling one another back into their group or using a dance-floor maneuver to quietly deflect an unwanted approach.
“Honestly, that’s a whole new level of avoiding unwanted attention. She really came prepared!” one netizen wrote
