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I just want to know how to show skepticism towards something that, in my opinion, is obviously false (or a joke). I think that with friends, I would say

Na, du willst mich verarschen.

Nevertheless, this sounds perhaps vulgar. I guess verarschen automatically evokes arschen (stark veraltet; see also the Wiktionary entry), and thus Arsch. So I'd like to know how rude/agressive is saying

Willst du mich für dumm verkaufen?

If it is rude, or if it just shows some unnecessary agitation, how to tell somebody that you don't believe what he or she says, but that you are not upset and you accept the jokes?

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    Arschen ist kein Wort. Der Weg führt von verarschen umwegfrei direkt zu Arsch. Aug 14, 2013 at 2:15
  • @userunknown Ok dann, arschen war ein Wort vielleicht, dessen Bedeutung ,,die Hinterbacken lecken" war. Sollte ich das Wort in der Frage löschen?
    – c.p.
    Aug 14, 2013 at 6:54
  • What is "daf". I was about removing it but you explicitly added it in an edit. Can you explain?
    – Em1
    Aug 14, 2013 at 8:42
  • @c.p. Well I saw that you introduce "Deutsch als Fremdsprache" and I don't like it. Actually I don't know for what reason we need it. Imho tags are needed to specify what the question is about. E.g. word-meaning tells us that OP is looking for the definition of a word. "daf" doesn't tell anything about the question, except that OP is non-native. But I can tell this from the question. "daf", however, is worthless. It's like in programming where you should use variable names that are clear. If you want this tag, try English "German as foreign language". But still, we don't need it I guess.
    – Em1
    Aug 14, 2013 at 8:54
  • @Em1 It's not important. I can remove the tag; I added it rather to know how to make tag synonyms (and, of course, I thought that somebody could eventually use it). And I was thinking rather of making the distinction, because the English.SX site does make it: there is ell.stackexchange.com Well, yeah, and I was thinking of the native speakers, for which it might be boring to read very basic questions (like a pair of those of mine): such a tag would say "the question is really elementary".
    – c.p.
    Aug 14, 2013 at 9:51

1 Answer 1

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Here are some example how you can say what you want. These are the ones that I know directly, so there might be even more. And for each how rude is it:

Du willst mich wohl verarschen.

Really rude. Unless you love pain, don't say that to somebody. Or at least to somebody that knows how you mean it.

Willst du mich für dumm verkaufen?

It's better, but it shows a really good amount of being upset. So unless you aren't upset this is not what you're looking for.

Da nimmst du mich aber auf den Arm. Nimmst du mich etwa auf den Arm? Du nimmst mich doch auf den Arm.

All of them show that you think your opposite didn't tell the truth. Unless you don't pronounce it as being upset it's a common neutral and thus bit humorous way to tell people you got it.

Das glaube ich nicht. (Guter Versuch ;-) )

Simple and direct way to tell somebody you don't believe him. "Guter Versuch" it's kind of a funny way to show that you understood it was a joke and are not offended.

So there are different ways. All of them can be used with "Sie", too. But the direction don't changes when replacing Du by Sie. I would in most cases tend to the last one. Simply show in simple words that you got it, it was a joke and you aren't offended.

Last but not least here a really uncommon way I remember and personally use lots of times:

Mein Ironiedetektor kam zu keinem eindeutigen Ergebnis.

In my opinion it's a really funny way (and even not used by anybody else) to tell that you aren't sure if it was ironic or not. (Note that Ironiedetektor is not a real word. Source: unknown)

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    Ist Ironiedetektor kein wirkliches Wort oder kein wirkliches Gerät? Aug 14, 2013 at 2:13
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    Please be careful with your last statement. AFAIK "Ironiedetektor" is neither new nor invented by a comedian (which?). It probably originates from Usenet chat (here's a quote from 1998: groups.google.com/d/msg/de.etc.sprache.deutsch/5Z5HJxpR9K0/…)
    – Takkat
    Aug 14, 2013 at 6:10
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    "Ne, is klar" - "Von wegen" - "Du kannst jemanden anderes an der Nase rumführen" - "Ich lass mir keinen Bären aufbinden" - "Willst du mich zum Narren halten?" - "Ist denn schon wieder der 1. April?" - "Verarschen kann ich mich auch alleine" - to be continued...
    – Em1
    Aug 14, 2013 at 8:47
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    @Em1: "Ach komm, hör doch auf", "Erzähl mir doch nix", "Laber nich","Hmmm träum weiter", "Genau, und ich bin der Kaiser von China."
    – Emanuel
    Aug 14, 2013 at 9:08
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    @BertramNudelbach: Ein wenig Netzjargon schadet nicht, ich meine der Absatz kann durchaus bleiben. Du kannst aber überlegen, eine Frage zur Herkunft und Bedeutung vin Ironiedetektor zu stellen, und dann hier zu dieser Frage verlinken. Das fände ich eine prima Lösung.
    – Takkat
    Aug 14, 2013 at 11:56

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