why don't you smile?

     When you walk the streets of New York, you ride our trains, you visit our stores; one of the things that becomes readily apparent is that no one looks happy at all. Is that really the case? How could it be that in one of the richest most decadent cities on the planet; no one is happy and everyone is just living such a shit life. So much so that a scowl is a permanent fixture on every face. It is as if we have all decided that when in public we must suddenly become upset at the world and that everyone we see is just this horrible person that doesn't deserve so much as a smile.

     The truth is that many people are quite happy but wearing that happiness on your face seems to go against some sort of social normality. Why are we all so angry and indifferent and scared all the time? Could it be that those who have to power to influence public opinion often wield that power to create a climate that would advance a particular political agenda? Using tactics such as blatant misrepresentation of facts, fear mongering and just overall misdirection seems to have become commonplace. News stations and by extension big corporations and certain billionaires stand to benefit from mass hysteria because they always have the cure. What better was to make money than to ramp up fear so that people feel that something needs to be done and you are the one who can do it. Its exactly the tactics that our resident war hero General George W Bush used to get us to invade Iraq. If people are living in constant fear then what else can show up on their face besides that fear and anger at the fact that they are so afraid.

     In addition to the Geo-political aspect of this there is the domestic pressures that come with being a member of the American society.  If you smile at someone it can easily be misconstrued and misinterpreted into something that you did not intend for it to be. If a grown man smiles at a little girl he is automatically looked at as a predator or a pedophile or some form of scum. If a guy smiles at a girl she automatically thinks that he is trying too sleep with her or rape her or follow her or worse. What ever happened to common and uncommon courtesy? We are so preoccupied with how we appear to others that we dare not do or say anything that might be deemed as controversial. We just do what is expected of us and we say what is expected of us and we do not get out of line. Even the social non-conformist are all the same; following a set of rules that have been set out for how a social non-conformist is supposed to socially non-conform. We no longer wear our hearts on our sleeves for fear of being hurt, or broken or rejected. We no longer live with passion and emotion because its viewed as being to eager. Nonchalance has become such a virtue to the point where not trusting anyone and not caring about anything is celebrated as a triumph. It is as though you have won the social lottery if you can prove that you are the person who cares the least.