Microaggressions

They're the little annoyances we deal with every day. The things we mostly just shrug off because they happen so damn often that we've basically come to expect them. Over time they add up, drain us of our energy. And every now and then you get a day like today when they all happen at once and it feels like the universe (or half of it) is out to get you personally.

The man who walks directly at me on a wide-open sidewalk and snickers each time I change course to avoid crashing into him.

The man who sits next to me on the metro and spreads his legs as wide as possible so I'm crammed up against the wall.

The man who brushes up against me and "accidentally" touches my ass in the crowd to leave the metro station.

The homeless guy, calling me "pretty girl" in an effort to get my attention so he can sell me a copy of Street Sense.

The guy on the park bench who whistles when I walk past.

The man who leers at me as if I can't see him, or maybe just doesn't care that I can.

And then the asshole at the end of it all. Yelling at me to smile; life isn't that bad. Getting angry when I walk past him without acknowledgement. Offering me a dollar if I'll just smile for him. Continuing to shout at me as I do my best to ignore him. But it is my face, damn it, and I will look tired or angry if that's how I feel, and I will smile if I feel like smiling but not because some stranger wants me to.

Taken individually, each of these is a minor incident. Something I'm able to brush off as I go about my day. At least one of these things happens every day, and every one of them has happened before today. If I got angry every time I'd never be anything but angry. This is the world we live in, where men feel like their mere existence gives them some right to a piece of the women around them.

So we learn to ignore the unwanted attention, the trespasses on personal space, the judgement based on looks alone, the infantalizing comments. Because saying something would likely result in escalation, increase our risk. It's easier, safer, to just pretend it didn't happen.

But then a day like this happens, and I'm exhausted before I even get to work. It's days like this that I wish I never had to leave my house. Or that I was actually invisible. Or that I could just make all the men disappear.

It days like this that I actually have to say something. Because these so-called microaggressions are a big deal. They add up to so much more than the sum of the parts, reinforcing the idea that women exist for men to look at, comment on, toy with, touch, possess. That we should be grateful for the attention. That our feelings don't matter. That we are worth less. And that attitude needs to stop.