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Telling women to smile is not OK.
- Thread starter lakitu
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Caporegime
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Exactly, the OP has linked to a snippet from a program on BBC The Social, which I've never heard of and had to Google.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/33sSDDn9wxm3mYqfrg5h4Kv/about-us
It's one women's opinion about a note she got, not any huge outcry that made national news
This. It is all rather dull.
Yeh. It is up there with letting out a small sigh and people going "whats uuup?" in a really patronising way.
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I think it's probably not ok. Perhaps, by itself, not illegal 'not ok' but not ok in a mind your own business kinda way. I think it's a bit presumptive to assume the right to approach a stranger and issue an unsolicited order, no matter how well intentioned it might have been. Men tend to forget that women experience the world differently. Im a runner who lives in a sleepy safe wee town. I'll happily run at any time of day or night. My female friends and family won't run after dark because it's 'not safe'. It feels not safe, I suspect, because they feel noticed - noticed and appraised - and they feel this way because of a thousand small and 'innocent' encounters similar to this. My female friends and family all report regularly encountering lewd comments, wolf whistles etc when they're running. They feel noticed, and the darkness, with fewer people around coupled with that feeling of visibility leads them to feel unsafe. By contrast, I rarely attract any attention, and the attention I do attract is always focused on my running not how I look. With this in mind, i can see why women might feel unsettled being approached like this, and might prefer men didn't do it. Surely their feeling of safety is more important than my right to do what I like?
What harm can it possibly do? None. Does everybody have to like it? No.
Does it cause offence? Apparently to some people. Is that an issue? Only for them.
Should we all think, talk and act in an approved manner? **** off.
Do I care if some of the innocent remarks I make cause crazy people to get offended? Not even slightly.
Is it therefore "OK" despite some random offended person saying otherwise? Yes.
Does it cause offence? Apparently to some people. Is that an issue? Only for them.
Should we all think, talk and act in an approved manner? **** off.
Do I care if some of the innocent remarks I make cause crazy people to get offended? Not even slightly.
Is it therefore "OK" despite some random offended person saying otherwise? Yes.
Caporegime
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So you feel this woman is "crazy" for telling us she felt a bit uneasy?
It was on my BBC news homepage earlier
Here's the link to the...nm can't find the blooming thing.
Here's another paper covering it though
https://metro.co.uk/2018/10/05/woman-given-creepy-note-by-a-stranger-telling-her-to-smile-8008638/
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Its hardly front page news, its pushing an agenda. People get offended when you look at them now, they are going over the top with any little thing.
This statement doesn't exactly help her case...
‘Some people might think that this guy was just trying to be nice to me but there are so many ways he could’ve expressed concern for me rather than handing me a note telling me what I should do with my face and then running off the train before I could even respond,’ she said.
If the agenda is to stop men from making comments, writing notes or otherwise behaving weirdly or predatory towards woman in public, then by all means they should push it.
The trouble is people have different opinions on what is weird and what isn't.
As for making comments in public? How exactly does one talk to a woman in public then? Or do you hunt them out in private which is far far weirder and more predatory?
Without leaving odd notes about how they should look more cheerful and then running off.
That isn't talking to a woman in public is it.
She even said
"there are so many ways he could’ve expressed concern for me rather than handing me a note telling me what I should do with my face and then running off"
Agreed, and it's only by women standing up and saying "This strange note left for me on a train remarking on my appearance made me feel uncomfortable" will some men perhaps start to appreciate that their behaviour isn't having the intended outcome.
By not doing the above?
People are being actively encouraged to engage with people on trains/stations who perhaps don't seem happy or are in some distress, but that involves having a conversation or making some friendly small talk, not being a creep.
They didn't run, this is another exaggeration on the woman's behalf. They walked off the train. I consider such exaggerations to be weird. I also consider a woman who complains about people commenting on her physical appearance to be weird whilst having photos of herself and a video of herself online to be really freaking weird.
In fact, I'd go so far as to call it downright hypocritical. If she was that concerned and finds people looking at her to be that hard then why did she feel the need to share these images of her posing and this video of her discussing the matter? It could all have been done without those visible aspects.
I think most people would dismiss it, whether it annoyed them or not. If it wasn't a one-off and was part of a pattern of stalking behaviour from one particular bloke then might I suggest going to the police would be appropriate.
Going to news/internets to inform men that "Telling women to smile is not OK" qualifies as a teensy bit crazy in my book.
We've gone from one incident which was a bit awkward to informing men that they can't say something apparently harmless to a woman in case she's the type to get offended about it.
She sounds bat**** crazy to be honest. Someone (who people have assumed identifies as a male) tried to send a message to cheer her up and she's gone postal in this way.
Good for you. Call up BBC social. You might get an article.
Her main complaint appears to be the note, not people looking at her generally, so you seem to be going off on a completely different tangent here. In fact, in that video of hers she didn't complain about him looking at her at all. She just commented that she noticed him glancing at her.