"Why can't you SMILE??" [View all]

It's one of the most obnoxious, annoying, OLD misogynist hisses I know: "Smile, honey! You can't smile? What's wrong with you?!" It's belittling, insulting, hostile, demeaning, shaming, and sexist. Do the same men holler at other men to "smile," or call them "piggy?"

From chauvinist bosses to disgusting street harassers to grotesque construction workers, this has been a question for the ages (I'm old enough to remember it from early Ms. Magazine) : WHY do some men presume to demand that women smile all the time, and specifically, smile at them??

It's hostility in the very same guise as "lighten up a little, honey!" after a variety of harassment or even assault. You are to back down, go along, acquiesce. If you don't smile, you'll get a barrage of insults and verbal attacks; but if you do smile, you'll get a barrage of hoots and hollers that are not intended to be flattering (but hey, lighten up, honey). I don't know what it's like now, but when I was a young woman, these were all threatening, if not always frightening, situations.

Andy Borowitz suggests, "If Trump Wants People to Smile More He Should Resign." He goes on, "We must thank Donald Trump for giving women tips on their facial expressions straight out of an etiquette book from the 1950s." I contend "men's etiquette for women" didn't end in the 1950s.

(Edited to link to Borowitz!)