NO! You Smile

As much as I try to refrain from making my blog an altar for venting, I need to get this one off my chest and hopefully women reading this post will offer their opinions and/or experiences as well.  I have gotten real damn tired of men passing me on the street and demanding that I smile, and I mean they yell it at me with hostility or some sense of authority no less. 

Whether I’m walking down the street to catch the bus, on the train or paying for my groceries after a nightmarish day at work I seem to get unwanted, unsolicited directives from random black men telling me I should smile.  Last week a man in a motorized wheelchair whizzed by me on the sidewalk and then screamed at me “Smile!”.   Mind you, it was 20 degrees outside and I was running to my Zumba class before it filled up and I yelled back at him, “you smile”.  I didn’t hear anything else from him as he made it across the street, but why do men think it’s appropriate to tell complete strangers that they should smile.  And it’s not just strangers they’re telling this to in the general population, it’s only and always women.  I know these same brothas aren’t walking past other brothas and demanding them to smile on any day.  They don’t know what kind of day I’m having, what I’m facing in my life or maybe I just don’t feel like walking down the street with a big, happy smile on my face.  I live in Harlem, NY and walking down the street as a woman with a smile on your face does indeed make you approachable, which in turn makes you very vulnerable.  You see, in the hood approachable is not the look a black woman is going for many days.  This, in part, may be why many black women get labeled angry because of our serious demeanor in public spaces.  What many of our men fail to realize is that this is a survival mechanism so that you don’t become a victim.  Do any of these men have sisters, daughters or wives?  Do they think their female family members should walk down the streets of a big urban jungle with a big ole smile on their faces?

I mean, what does the expression on my face have to do with anybody and their current emotional state anyway?  I’m not paying their bills or even conversing with them.  Nothing.  They are complete and total strangers.  I don’t want anything from them except for respect and common courtesy usually afforded other pedestrians, so why do they require me as a woman to smile for them?  Is there some kind of magical lift that a woman’s smile brings to their bank account, lowers their blood pressure or their rent.  It’s not nearly as bad as the street harassment that we sisters in urban areas deal with on the daily (that’s a whole other blog) but it is an annoying problem that brothas need to stop.  And I know all the well-meaning black men feel I’m overreacting to something that’s basically harmless. But if you don’t know what to say to a woman on the street, then just say, “hello” or “have a good day”.  Whatever.  But please stop feeling it is appropriate or your right to tell another adult, that you don’t even know, to do a damn thing.