Connie: [squints] I have no idea.
Bob wears glasses, and Alice does not. One day, she either asks him "Can I borrow/see/try (or try on)/wear your glasses?" or says "Let me borrow/see/try (or try on)/wear your glasses." He gives them to her, and she'll likely comment on how bad his vision is (as demonstrated in the page image), the size of his head, or how cool/cute/smart she feels/looks (or all three). Related to the latter, she may outright ask him how she looks in them, with a frequent response being that he can't tell because he can't see (as shown in the page quote). Another common scenario is her just randomly pulling them off his face and putting them on. Another common situation, which is basically a combination of the above two, is her asking him for his glasses but ripping them off his face before he can actually answer.
There are a few reasons a character might want to wear another's glasses. As stated above, they may want to look "cool," "cute," and/or "smart." Similarly, they may just be curious if they've never worn glasses themselves. Both or either could potentially lead to the character taking a "glasses selfie," depending on the setting. Another, more practical, reason is that they're having trouble seeing something far away or reading something and may just be reaching the point where they might need glasses of their own. If this works, then Universal Eyeglasses is at play and could allow them to borrow a spare pair until they can get their own set. When The Bully does this, it's usually to mock their victim, especially if said bully is engaging in a game of Keep Away. In such situations, Bullying the Bespectacled is frequently at work.
Asking to try on someone else's glasses, or letting someone else try on your own glasses, could be seen as a way of flirting with them. Most of the time, when somebody (real or fictional) snatches the glasses off of someone's face without asking first, they come off as rude and are demonstrating their inability to grasp the basic concept of personal space (even if there's no malicious intent on their part).
A less common situation is when a character who already wears glasses wants to swap specs with another to see who has the stronger or weaker prescription. Related to this, a clear-faced character who used to wear glasses may want to wear somebody else's because they miss it.
It should be noted that there are bespectacled individuals (both in fiction and Real Life) who honestly don't care if and when other people need or want to borrow their glasses. In some cases, they may even enjoy letting others wear their specs, which might occasionally tie into the above-mentioned flirting applications if either the glass-wearer or the person they allow to try on their glasses is crushing on the other.
Truth in Television, as many glasses wearers can attest to. This behavior (which happens and is common across young people of all ethnicities, genders, races, and sexual orientations) typically starts during early or middle childhood and lasts all through grade school, usually (but not always) tapering off during or after college, when most people begin to realize how awkward and frankly bizarre it is to just take people's glasses off their faces.
People doing this are normally trying to invoke Bespectacled Cutie, Glasses Are Sexy, and/or some combination of Nerd Glasses and Smart People Wear Glasses. It can also be a direct consequence or result of Hold My Glasses. Depending on the style of glasses, this could easily veer into Making a Spectacle of Yourself territory. Related to Blind Without 'Em and Dropped Glasses and very similar to Purely Aesthetic Glasses. Can also function as a mild form of Obfuscating Disability. May overlap with the above-mentioned Universal Eyeglasses if someone is able to see perfectly while wearing someone else's glasses. May also overlap with the aforementioned Bullying the Bespectacled if people take wanting to wear someone else's glasses too far.
One final note- take care and use caution when trying on other people's glasses. As mentioned in the Real Life section on the page for the above-mentioned Universal Eyeglasses, wearing a prescription not made for you (especially for prolonged periods of time, which is common for this trope) can cause eyestrain, headaches, and even dizziness (the last of which can lead to nausea), which are rarely depicted as side effects in fiction. By the same token, a glass-wearer can also suffer from eyestrain and headaches if they go without their glasses for too long.
Examples:
- Gunslinger Girl. In "The Girl's Miniature Garden", the normally stoic Claes is not happy to find Petra trying on her glasses, which were given to her by her dead handler (who has been wiped from her memory, but she appears to remember him on a subconscious level). She responds by throwing Petra to the ground and wrestling them off her.
- My Hero Academia: During the dorm room contest, it's revealed Iida has a full shelf of spare glasses he treats as completely normal, much to Uraraka's amusement. It's not directly addressed, but attentive viewers may notice that for the rest of the competition, both Uraraka and Mina now each wear a pair of Iida's glasses.
- Rugrats:
- The August 23, 2000 strip has Tommy try on Chuckie's glasses, only to get dizzy.
Tommy: You must have really good eyes to be able to see through those things.- The April 10 and April 11 strips of 2001 both have Kimi try on Chuckie's glasses.
Kimi: These are supposed to help you see better? They make everything look worse for me!
Chuckie: Maybe they only work for boys.- In the January 25, 2003 strip, Tommy again asks to try on Chuckie's glasses while they're at the aquarium.
Tommy: Boy, Chuckie... No wonder you're always ascared!
Chuckie: Tommy, you have no idea.
- Chip Tunes: One day in gym class, school bully Nathan rips Jeanette's glasses off her face, puts them on, and runs off. He complains about how bad her vision is the entire time.
- One Equestria Girls fan-art by artist Ta-Na
shows Sunset Shimmer trying on Twilight Sparkle's glasses.
- Good, Old-Fashioned Values: For whatever reason, Chris loves wearing other people's glasses. On one occasion, he stole Meg's glasses, put them on, and refused to give them back even though they gave him a headache and hurt his eyes.
- Mi Encanto: In the nightmare Jermaine has on Wednesday night in "Dying Miracle", Isabela steals and wears Mirabel's glasses to mock her while the latter's restrained by the former's vines.
spoiler:Isabela: Look at me. I'm Mirabel. I always get in the way and try way too hard to be something I'm not.
- In the Ranma vs. Predator crossover fanfic by Jason Wages, Shampoo picks up Mousse's clothes (after the latter was turned into a duck) and gets curious about his coke-bottle glasses, trying them on. The extreme prescription disorients her at first, but it proves an incredible stroke of luck because the glasses' distortion happens to be exactly what's needed to cancel out the Predator's Invisibility Cloak, sparing Shampoo from being caught by surprise.
- Atlantis: The Lost Empire: Kida takes and wears Milo's glasses while showing him around Atlantis for the first time due to never having seen the object until now.
- Adventures in Babysitting: Brenda makes the mistake of taking her glasses off and putting them in the chair next to her to take a quick nap while in the bus station. A homeless woman walks up, takes the glasses, puts them on and finds her vision improved (which likely wouldn't happen in real life), and walks off.
- Captain America: Civil War: When Tony Stark tries to recruit Peter Parker, the former briefly tries looking out of the goggles in the latter's Cheap Costume.
Tony: Lordy, can you even see in these? Aah, I'm blind!
- Charade: Reggie thinks that Peter's glasses are fake and tries them on, quickly discovering that they're quite real.
- Guest House Paradiso: Richie donned Eddie's glasses as a disguise. They were both rendered nearly blind as a result.
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1: Six other characters have to turn into Harry and consequently also have to wear his glasses. Hermione puts on a pair of Harry's glasses before transforming. Once she sees how much they adjust her eyesight, she criticizes his.
- Brooklyn Nine-Nine: In one episode, Santiago has to start using back-up glasses after her contacts dry out due to being forced to spend 48 hours in the precinct. Peralta snatches them off her face and wears them for a few seconds, which he soon regrets.
Peralta: You're a blind cop! How has there not been a made-for-TV movie about your struggles?
- Girl Meets World: As part of the makeover Smackle requests in "Girl Meets Smackle," Riley and Maya remove her glasses. Later on in the episode, Maya is seen wearing them briefly, likely to prevent Smackle herself from doing so.
- That's So Raven: In "Bend It Like Baxter," Cory wants to impress a girl who likes glasses by grabbing and wearing a pair from the Lost and Found. A Surprisingly Realistic Outcome occurs when he tries them on and can't see and later gets a headache from doing so.
- Zoey 101: Early in "Trading Places," Lola looks over at the street from the basketball court she and Quinn are playing at and thinks she sees Zoey. Instead of saying something, Lola pulls Quinn's glasses off her face and puts them on. When Quinn starts to ask Lola why she took her glasses, the latter merely says "Look over there!" while still wearing Quinn's glasses. Quinn has to snatch them back.
- Gentleman John Lynx (formerly of Prairie Wrestling Alliance) will sometimes recount an incident in which a wrestler jokingly tried on the pince-nez glasses Lynx wore as part of his costume — and found that not only were these spectacles not Purely Aesthetic Glasses, but also Lynx legitimately had a fairly strong prescription.
- The Ricky Gervais Show: Stephen Merchant mentions this being a serious pet-peeve of his, since the people trying on his glasses always react the same way; "Oh, I can't see a thing!"
Steve: What were you expecting, X-Ray Vision!? No!
- In Deltarune Chapter 2, if Kris enters the mansion's basement but exits it early, they'll see Susie teasing Ralsei by wearing his glasses and pretending to be a "big dweeb that loves homework". Ralsei's dialogue portrait also reveals that he has pink eyes underneath his glasses.
- In Ignatz and Petra's B support in Fire Emblem: Three Houses, Petra is curious about trying on Ignatz's glasses (as nobody in her homeland of Brigid has bad eyesight, or at least nobody who survives does). Petra proceeds to get nauseous, falls over with Ignatz, and with complete sincerity decides they are like the Heroes' Relics that only certain people can use.
- In one of her VR scenes in Megadimension Neptunia VIIR, Vert tries putting on glasses she borrowed from Chika to look more mature for the player. In an interesting variation, it isn't until she takes the glasses off that she becomes dizzy.
- Books of Adam: The subject of this strip◊, as shown in the page image, where someone asks to try on Adam's glasses and predictably comments that he's blind. Adam responds with an Eye Twitch.
- Eerie Cuties: When Chloe mentions that her glasses are hurting her eyes, Nina asks to try them on, curious how she'd look like. Chloe thus realizes she doesn't need the glasses anymore thanks to an Amplifier Artifact she's wearing. Despite barely being able to see with them, Nina stubbornly keeps the glasses for a while afterward.
- Gingerwood Institute: Eclair's Monster Research Adventures (NSFW): Used as a gag when the Sphinx steals Eclair's glasses and tries them on.
Sphinx: Well? How do I look?
Eclair: ... Blurry. - In a panel of Grrl Power, Dabbler keeps Sydney at bay with a hand on the latter's face after stealing her glasses and fooling around with them.
- Questionable Content: While both Faye and Marigold wear glasses, in this strip they choose to try each other's glasses. Faye's prescription is so strong, it shocks Marigold. Faye jokes that Marigold's glasses make everyone look like anime characters...
Marigold: That's not what my prescription is like. [starts to whisper to herself] I wish that was what it was like.
- In an early strip of Scandinavia and the World, Denmark tries out Sweden's glasses after the latter dropped them. Hilarity Ensues, since Sweden is Blind Without 'Em and Denmark gets nauseous because everything is so blurry.
Denmark: I think I'm going to faint...
Sweden: Then let me take them off you! Stop walking around! Where are you, Denmark!?
Denmark: I don't know! I can't see!
Norway: [eating from a popcorn bag full of fish; thinking] This is why I don't own a TV.
- In a Buzz Feed Violet video titled "Truths Every Girl with Glasses Knows", Sara's friend asks to try on her glasses. Sara obliges, and her friend asks if the glasses make her look like a "hipster librarian" before saying they're blurry. Other videos with titles like "The Stolen Glasses" and "He/She/They Stole Her/His/My Glasses" are similar.
