Throwaway, friend group knows my main account. I (37M) went out New Year's Eve with a group of friends, and the group had some friends of friends, basically people I've only known in passing. One of them, Andy(39M) brought his girlfriend Julie (30'sF).

Julie decided to show a tattoo she got last week. She rolled up her sleeve to show it, and she announced proudly it said "Strength and Beauty" in Chinese. It was on her forearm and I almost spit take.

Now, I have to explain I'm half Korean, but people have mistaken me as hispanic, so I don't really look Korean to most westerners. I'm also not fluent, but conversational in Korean and able to read. The tattoo was in Hangul characters, and it definitely did NOT say "Strength and Beauty".

Julie got upset at my spit take and asked what my problem was. I said "It's not Chinese, and it doesn't say what you think it does". She got even more mad and said what I would know. I explained I was Korean-American, can read Korean, and what it says is not nice.

I asked her what happened at the tattoo shop and she said she always wanted to get asian characters, and went to a shop and saw a 'chinese guy' in the shop and demanded he be the one to do her ink. I asked Julie and Andy if Julie did anything that could've pissed the tattoo artist off.

She denied it, but Andy confessed she was super pushy about it and kept saying she wanted him to do it over any other artist in the shop because he would be used to the characters, plus a few other statements. By this point she was crying and not enjoying hanging out for New Year's Eve. She wanted to leave wanted Andy to take her.

On her way out, she asked me what it said. I said "It's like the worst thing you could call a woman, it's like 'bitch' but worse." She just burst into tears while walking out. After the two of them left, the rest of my friends said I was a real jerk for spoiling her new tattoo and I could have made something up or not reacting.

I had to explain that the word used is really a cultural faux pas and to see it on skin is shocking to the highest degree, and the fact I was sipping on a beer when she revealed it only made a spit take impossible to avoid. Well, this morning I got some messages from friends saying I really should apologize to Julie for traumatizing her about her tattoo.

I feel like this is ridiculous, like, it's a really vulgar word on her arm, and if I had that on my skin I'd like to know. But everyone else thinks that I should have just complimented her instead. So, Reddit, am I the asshole for revealing to a friend what her tattoo actually says?

UPDATE: My friends contacted me a day later and apologized for responding to me that way they did New Year's Eve. They said they were more worried about the NYE party being brought down that night, but after sleeping on it and getting back to work most of them realized they too would have wanted to know if they got branded with a vulgar word.

Also, very few knew Julie, and only knew her through Andy, so they mostly tolerate her. Apparently this isn't her first incident either. And, Julie isn't white, which is kind of funny everyone painting her as some blonde white girl, lol. I decided to play peacemaker and talked to Andy and Julie, and even offered to meet them at the tattoo shop.

We went Friday night, walked in and I saw the tattoo artist in question. Funny thing is most asians can tell I'm half asian by looking, so he saw he and went "You told her what it said, yes?" kind of nonchalantly in Korean. We had a brief discussion in Korean(he remarked my accent had a 'American twang' to it, asked where my family was from, found out both our families came from the same city).

The gist is I pointed out he could get sued for the tat, he admitted he pressed his luck with it, and offered to pay out of his pocket for another artist in the shop to do a coverup. I relayed that back to Julie, and that seemed to appease her. She went to one of the, I guess tattoo people would call it a work station? and he explained that she still has to wait 2 months.

Julie didn't like that, even when the artist explained that standard procedure is to wait two months for a tat to heal until a cover up is done. Andy thankfully googled it and pointed out that 2 months seems to be a minimum, and more complex tattoos have up to six months recommended healing before a cover job. She accepted the offer for a free cover and paperwork was signed and such.