Any BW who've faced smile harassment?
I tagged NSFW and spoiler. I'm trying to keep away the trolls away because people hate when women speak about our lived experiences. I've lived in places where smile harassment was extreme and I don't know how youthful black women live in those areas because it is even worse towards young or young looking black women. It's not always white people who do it. I can smile all day, but if I'm exhausted from walking and moving all day, I can get mostly random men coming in my face saying *smile* or giving me a nasty comment. I've been told " black women look like bulldogs" and all types of hateful shit because I had a neutral face. It's weird because I'm known to smile, but strangers and ex coworkers have harassed me about it. There's a city in Georgia that was really bad about it when I was there. Not to dox myself, but there's also a city in the midwest that is extremely anti black women. It's so bad we may need to make a cities to avoid list. Women in general are treated like peoples trinkets. Most men I've been around aren't known to smile all day, but women are expected to, and if you're black and youthful you are really expected to. Today I got lost because my phone maps was acting up and I had several errands to run and I was walking all day. I was exhausted and my skin was pale for a dark skin person and face was reddish when I looked in the mirror when I got home. I had a real sweaty in the face look because was tired. When I was 4 streets up from my apartment I heard misogynoir directed at me from across the street. The person who did it looked mixed and maybe a young college student because the area I was in. He said "I hate seeing a black woman" his friend said why? "because they don't smile, I don't like them" and the white man right beside him said "dude you're weird". I don't face it a lot here, like I did in that city in Georgia, but it still pops up in places where it's rarer because it's systemic bigotry towards black women. This has happened so much in my life that I just go home listening to my music while drinking my tea to relax because there's a lot of ignorant people outside.