but regarding telling someone to smile
it's not the sentiment as possibly intended
{and what is the purpose behind it? telling me to smile?}
moreso than how it is received.

as tlyn said in the swipe, it's as if your body isn't your own. we don't know one another, and yet you're inserting yourself in my sphere and telling me to do ANYTHING. i'm not smiling. that's it. it doesn't need to be cultivated or coaxed out of me. i am AWARE. and i think that's what's setting off little neurons in us. you're trying to make me unaware somehow, disarm me. that's how i feel. even if i do smile. that you're trying to take me out of my zone.
now, is your goal only for a second so you in turn can smile at your success?
is it because you are looking to foray into more of my time? i mean, you did just give me my smile back. least i could do is let a brother walk me to the bus.

mind you

we didn't solicit any of that.

we did not approach you.
we did not acknowledge you if we were aware of you.
we left y'all the fuck alone.
let you continue on in your zone.

so it's going to take you, rather than being expected to empathize {tho i don't think this is the surest, deftest route}, to instead listen and HEAR what we are asking you to not do. you might not ever "get it", doesn't make it any less vital for it to cease.


and really
YOU ALL KNOW the women who are out there manifesting attention. and 9/10 on the low side, the women you all are catcalling are not those women.