I recently discovered a book that gives suggestions for 365 days of social media prompts. I opened the book and flipped to an arbitrary day: February 13.
On this page, the suggested post was something acknowledging that women smile 62 times a day while men only smile eight. It then went on to remind men to buy their partners flowers for Valentine’s the next day to help the women meet their quota.
I’m actually surprised it didn’t suggest adding a photo of me smiling over a bouquet of flowers. I scoffed, ranted, and swiftly shoved said book in my desk drawer—I would have binned it, but, alas, it wasn’t mine to destroy.
Needless to say, I am not a fan of this book, nor will I be following its prompt. If anything, it makes me want to take a selfie highlighting the fact that I suffer from a syndrome commonly known as resting bitch face (RBF).
My RBF is the result of eye strain brought on from staring at a computer screen too much, giving me this awesome line between my eyebrows that a former (male) co-worker once suggested I remedy with Botox. But this isn’t about my RBF—although henceforth, I shall reclaim it as RESOLMTFAF (resting eye strain overworked leave me the fuck alone face); it’s about the disturbing idea that society is more concerned about men buying minimal-effort shit to make women smile than the fact that they smile an average of 7.75 times less.
Continuing down that rabbit hole, if I already smile 7.75 times more than men, why do I get reminded—by men—on a regular basis to smile? I mean, I’m not going to say this is another example of the patriarchy demanding women work harder for less payoff, but I don’t see a lot of Botox commercials directed toward men to rid them of their smile lines (although maybe I would if they upped their own quota).
The disturbing fact is this: men don’t smile even a fraction as much as women do. Does that mean they don’t feel joy on the same level as us? If so, has society shamed them into feeling they can’t express it, or are women just expected to slap on a Cheshire-cat grin and fake it?
Either way, I decided to rewrite the social media post: Everyone stop and smell the roses. It just might make you smile.