You’re so pretty, why aren’t you smiling? C’mon, gimme a smile!
Sound familiar? If you’re a woman, chances are you’ve heard it or some variation of it. By “it”, I mean one of the most annoying and infuriating things you can ever say to a woman: to smile more. Till this day, I remember the when a man followed my friend and I, screaming at us to smile. Demanding to know why we weren’t smiling at him, as if he deserved it. This type of patronizing, street harassment nonsense has been something that as women we’ve had to endure for far too long. Telling women to smile is not a man’s place.
However that doesn’t seem to stop them.
Last year, Serena Williams was asked by a male reporter why she wasn’t smiling after her win that day. Williams politely replied by saying she was tired and didn’t find the press conference “super enjoyable” as she was only fulfilling a requirement just like male tennis player Roger Federer who, by the way, was not asked why he wasn’t smiling. It probably never even crossed that reporter’s mind to ask Federer why he wasn’t smiling, because men aren’t expected to smile the same way women are. And let’s not forget about when MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough felt the need to tweet at Hillary Clinton to smile after sweeping the Midwest during the primaries earlier this year. Mind you, he didn’t tell Trump to smile or any other of the candidates but only the woman running for president. Oh, and what about the man in New Zealand who assaulted a woman after she smiled at him? Because according to him, in Malaysia it is customary that “women who smile are inviting men to follow them”. This is the kind of thinking that needs to change because the sexualization behind women’s smiles and telling them to smile is quite frankly alarming.
What most people don’t realise is that although they might think they come off as well-intentioned, playful or complimentary instead, by telling a woman to smile, their “complement” is just a sly form of catcalling and they don’t realise how condescending it is. How would you feel if you felt like society only saw you as pretty and happy and passive? Truthfully, this is not so much a problem on an individual basis, but more of a societal problem. What lies underneath men being okay with demanding a smile from us is that the reason women exist is to entertain and to perform. What a ludicrous idea. It would be insane to ask a woman how she feels or think that maybe she’s not interested. Instead, let’s normalize the condescending act of asking women to smile and let’s make it okay to sexualize the kind gesture that can be a smile.
Now, not all men tell women to smile or think it’s proper. I have male friends who have never engaged in this type of behavior, because A) They’ve hear me rant about, B) Have seen the terrified look in my eyes in some occasions and C) THEY KNOW IT’S WRONG TO TELL ANYBODY HOW THEY SHOULD LOOK OR WHAT TO DO WITH THEIR BODIES. But at this point in my life, there’s been enough men who’ve commented on my smile -or lack thereof- to make me want to write this article and address it. And I know I’m not the only one.
Without a doubt, one of the most popular excuses you’ll hear as to why men tell women to smile is because they’re flirting and this is where I get confused, not only because society conditions men into thinking women exist for the male gaze and their pleasure, but also because this type of reasoning makes sense to me, disturbingly enough. We are taught that women are prettier when they smile and so this makes men expect to always see us smiling or at least it gives them the privilege to feel entitled to give us unsolicited instructions as to how we should act, look, think and behave. This would explain the behaviour -however it still doesn’t excuse it.
If you’re a guy reading this, the one thing I would want you to understand from this article is how women feel when men tell them to smile. For example, I, for one, feel like crawling off my skin, from anxiety, anger and fear. I never know how the situation will end. I have to keep reminding myself to stay calm. I feel like I’ve become an object in his eyes, which makes it easier for him to mold me into what he wants to see. While he hears himself expressing, I hear him trying to control me and my actions. And I know I’m not alone, because after a man tells me to smile and I tell my friends about it, I always get the same responses: they shake their heads in disapproval, because it has happened yet again. If you’re a guy reading this understand: you have no more control over my smile than you do over any other part of my body.
Obviously, there are times when smiling is important, like job interviews, which tend to go better if you look enthusiastic about the position. Or if you like someone and you’re on a date, a smile can help you show that you’re interested and I’m not saying that smiling is off-limits when it comes to flirting. What I’m saying is that telling me I have a nice smile is very different from saying I’d look prettier with a smile on my face or that I should smile. Let’s not confuse these.
Sometimes I wonder if the idea or image of women not smiling is so appalling and intolerable to men, that they feel the need to persuade us into it? Why does it seem as if men can’t understand that certain behaviors to get women’s attention are not only uncomfortable, but invasive and overstep boundaries? Is this concept hard to grasp for some men? Or maybe they just don’t care? I know there are plenty of things I need to learn to lighten up about, but I don’t think this is one of them. And for those of you reading this thinking this is just another radical, feminist rant, let me ask you: when was the last time someone, a stranger most likely, demanded you do to something you didn’t want to do?
My reaction to all of this is: “Yeah, I’ll smile, but trust me, my smile has nothing to do with you. This is not for you. I smile because I want to and I’m happy with myself.”