That's just how her face looks.
August 5, 2015 1:08 AM   Subscribe

Mic article on Resting Bitch Face EJ Dickson article about people constantly telling her she looks angry and discovering that her "RBF" is a symptom of her anxiety.
posted by Enchanting Grasshopper (107 comments total) 34 users marked this as a favorite
 
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posted by newdaddy at 2:49 AM on August 5, 2015 [18 favorites]


Great post, liked the penultimate paragraph. :-( 4 EVA!
posted by Pigpen at 3:04 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


Oh wow, I hadn't thought about this connection before. My sister and I both have really intense neutral expressions. There are tons of hilarious photos of us looking really severe together. It's also true that neither of us is a stranger to anxiety (I have it worse, and I'm the one who always gets people yelling "just make a normal happy expression!" when they're trying to take my photo - this is my normal happy expression).

Of course, when it happens to guys like me, it's just called "looking serious," or something that isn't actually, you know, based around an insulting, gendered term. And then, of course, men get away with looking "commanding" or something, whereas for women it ties into everything about "ice queens" who don't work hard enough at being nice to the rest of the office, and so on, and so on...

Great post.
posted by teponaztli at 3:15 AM on August 5, 2015 [21 favorites]


When I found successful antidepressants, people started asking me for directions on the street for the first time and it was really quite nice. I've heard other people report the same.
posted by colie at 3:23 AM on August 5, 2015 [10 favorites]


Thanks for posting this. I am often scared or frustrated when people at work (regardless of gender) look permanently angry. From now on I'll remind myself that they might be struggling with anxiety.

I have the opposite problem. I always look like I've just won the lotto, even when I am in the middle of a major depression. So #1: I find it difficult to get appropriate help. #2: some people shout at me and abuse me for "being happy" when I should be depressed/stressed/angry etc. in their minds (and oftentimes I am, it just doesn't show).
posted by mumimor at 3:31 AM on August 5, 2015 [12 favorites]


I have had partial facial paralysis twice. Both times I fell into dark places. My doctor told me this was normal in his experience - when people couldn't express anything with their faces, things fell apart inside. I've never been a great believer in body & mind being intertwined, but these experiences with facial paralysis tell me something else.

(I am fine now except I have Resting Pouty Face which has its own implications. No, i am not judging you)
posted by kariebookish at 3:33 AM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


when people couldn't express anything with their faces, things fell apart inside.

I remember something from a psychology class about studies having people hold their faces in certain ways and discovering it affected their moods somewhat. In particular, they had them hold pencils in the mouths so they were making something like a "smile" without knowing that's what the test was about, and it did make them happier.

Ah, here's what I was thinking about. So yeah, no surprise there.
posted by traveler_ at 3:39 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


"Of course, when it happens to guys like me, it's just called "looking serious," or something that isn't actually, you know, based around an insulting, gendered term"

Not always. I usually get "you're scary" or "are you mad". Being black may or may not have something to do with this.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 3:40 AM on August 5, 2015 [67 favorites]


Brandon Blatcher, I'm sure that racism has some interaction with this, but I (a white guy) also get this reaction. Tellingly, people usually don't say it to me, but instead approach my girlfriend. "Is he angry? He's not going to kill us, right?"

Worse still, I can't smile convincingly on purpose. If I'm happy and don't think about it, sure. But for photos it looks like I'm a member of the Adams family, or trying to poop, or something.
posted by Humanzee at 4:43 AM on August 5, 2015 [31 favorites]


Male RBF is often first diagnosed when you see your own monstrous serial-killer grin ruining a family photo.
posted by colie at 4:55 AM on August 5, 2015 [20 favorites]


Male RBF is often first diagnosed when you see your own monstrous serial-killer grin ruining a family photo.

For me it is ID photos. I run the entire range between "violent offender" and "terrorist" (and that's for an older white guy).

Weirdly, people still ask me for directions all the time. I have two theories for this:

a) I am a librarian and my aura of helpfulness is well honed
b) It's not so much that my face/expression is horrible as it is that my face is usually in motion. Even when I am just walking along, thinking, my expression is constantly changing, and the photo that freezes my face in one expression is seriously alien to everyone.

To try b) at home, freeze a recording of Alton Brown. No matter when you do it, he is making the most horrible ghoulish faces. His face has to be moving or he's not even human.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:03 AM on August 5, 2015 [24 favorites]


I am intrigued by how, since I first heard of it, the phrase has changed from "bitchy resting face" to "resting bitch face." I think the former is more descriptively accurate.
posted by JanetLand at 5:04 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I really wish we could stop calling [ourselves and other] women bitches or bitchy just because they're not smiling. There is nothing bitchy about not smiling, and women aren't dogs, even when they ARE angry.

> I am often scared or frustrated when people at work (regardless of gender) look permanently angry. From now on I'll remind myself that they might be struggling with anxiety.


Or... it could just be how their face looks.
posted by Too-Ticky at 5:09 AM on August 5, 2015 [28 favorites]


Problem: People think I look angry
Cause: Social anxiety
Solution: Look angrier
posted by timdiggerm at 5:09 AM on August 5, 2015 [24 favorites]


Entire countries tend towards this disposition and I suspect in parts of France and Germany there are people getting socially anxious about their "Inane grin resting face". Definitely no laughing matter.
posted by rongorongo at 5:13 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I think we can all agree that while there may be consequences for men whose resting faces look angry, they haven't spawned an acronym and countless trend pieces, at least one of which suggests plastic surgery to resolve the problem.
posted by telegraph at 5:15 AM on August 5, 2015 [8 favorites]


Resting Bitch Face combined with my current unkempt Hobo Hair provides me with superpower levels of introversion space. It's wonderful if a bit lonely but I need to be careful about standing still lest cops move me along.
posted by srboisvert at 5:33 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


Oh yeah, no question that women are getting a certain kind of flack for this, mixed in with bunch of other completely ridiculous and gendered flack.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:33 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


I totally have this. White male, mid 40s. As she suggests, I tend to "lean into it." I'd just as soon not have to make small talk with strangers. If I'm on crowded public transport and there's exactly one empty seat, it will be next to me - without having to say or do anything. I'm good with this.
posted by jzb at 5:37 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


For me it is ID photos. I run the entire range between "violent offender" and "terrorist" (and that's for an older white guy).

I once had my photo taken by a professional photographer, using a fancy expensive camera, lighting and whatever, to be used as a placeholder in the profile pages for a website we were building. Then we had to take some more where they specifically instructed me to smile, because the website was not Uber for contract killers.
posted by Dr Dracator at 5:37 AM on August 5, 2015 [11 favorites]


jzb: I totally have this. White male, mid 40s. As she suggests, I tend to "lean into it."

You do realise that that's easier for men, right?
posted by Too-Ticky at 5:38 AM on August 5, 2015 [5 favorites]


On the objections to the word "bitch", or the basic notion, as misogynistic:

The comedy video that coined the term (written and acted entirely by women) rang pretty clearly as anti-misogynistic to me. That is, it took this common frustration—men telling women to smile; people in general policing women's public demeanor—and satirized it by presenting unsmiling women as people with a pathology.

Just my interpretation, though. And once the term enters the general lexicon, all bets are off.
posted by escape from the potato planet at 5:40 AM on August 5, 2015 [7 favorites]


One of my wife's bandmate recently described her as having this. I suffer from a bit of the serious-looking syndrome myself, and it's caused me relationship problems and endless invitations from well-meaning people to "smile" or "stop being so serious," so I can only imagine how much worse it's been for her.
posted by saulgoodman at 5:44 AM on August 5, 2015


Or you can try to change it by smiling a bit more

Oh goody.
posted by phunniemee at 5:47 AM on August 5, 2015 [12 favorites]


Try being fat and having RBF. It's like having an Invisibility Cloak. I don't really see this as a bad thing, though...
posted by Anne Neville at 5:47 AM on August 5, 2015 [26 favorites]


Or... it could just be how their face looks.

Yeah. I would never question the author's own experience, but for me, I'm pretty confident my default facial expression has nothing to do with my mental state or some inner turmoil or anything. It is literally the face I was born with and this is just looks how it looks when it is neutral and relaxed. Apparently that look comes off as rude or angry or unfriendly to some people* but it really doesn't reflect anything going on internally.

I try to be understanding when people initially misjudge my mood based on my outward appearance. I'm less forgiving when they judge my personality based on my outward appearance, or actively tell me I should change said appearance to suit them.

*men
posted by retrograde at 5:56 AM on August 5, 2015 [17 favorites]


I once had my photo taken by a professional photographer, using a fancy expensive camera, lighting and whatever, to be used as a placeholder in the profile pages for a website we were building. Then we had to take some more where they specifically instructed me to smile, because the website was not Uber for contract killers.

All of my photo IDs for my Canadian Permanent Resident cards inevitably come out as "yeah, I killed them. I killed them all. I ain't got no regrets."
posted by Kitteh at 6:02 AM on August 5, 2015 [27 favorites]


I have Resting Bitch Face, or more accurately, Gender Neutral I Don't Fucking Care What You Think of My Face Face. I also have social anxiety. They're not related. I just, y'know, don't fucking care what you think of my face.
posted by Metroid Baby at 6:04 AM on August 5, 2015 [28 favorites]


I alternatively show Resting Smiley Face, Resting Monk Face, and Resting Panicky Guy In A Gay Bar For The First Time Face. It makes for interesting social interactions.
posted by sonascope at 6:05 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


Yeah, people can just stop policing my facial expressions. If I'm sitting and thinking about picking up dog food on the way home or what's on TV tonight, I don't know or care what my face is doing. If I'm not interacting with you or even if I am, just STFU about whatever you imagine my state of mind to be.
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:05 AM on August 5, 2015 [6 favorites]


I'm a dude with RBF and people have teased me mercilessly about it and it makes it worse, so yes, I understand this piece and identify completely.
posted by mrdaneri at 6:07 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I'm a bald dude with resting serial killer face, and it has earned me the nicknames "Prince of Darkness" and "Ming the Merciless." I am comfortable with both.
posted by nevercalm at 6:09 AM on August 5, 2015 [5 favorites]


This is really interesting! I have been plagued for years by men telling me to smile, because what did I look so upset about?? and I also have social anxiety. I have often felt that my resting bitch face was a protective mechanism, a way for me to walk down the street without feeling afraid of men.
posted by sutel at 6:10 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


It used to be called having a dignified or handsome face, and it could be a social asset (at least, if you held the right position on the social hierarchy). Now it seems to be a huge social liability and invites speculation on everything from what it says about your sexual identity to whether or not you're secretly judging everybody else.
posted by saulgoodman at 6:14 AM on August 5, 2015


Is there an equivalent term for this for speaking? I've been leaning on irony for basically my entire life, and now apparently the more sincere I am about something, the more likely the person to whom I'm talking is to interpret whatever I'm saying as some sort of excessively dry joke.
posted by logicpunk at 6:14 AM on August 5, 2015 [10 favorites]



Try being fat and having RBF. It's like having an Invisibility Cloak. I don't really see this as a bad thing, though...


RBF and visibly queer/gender-non-conforming? Also invisibility cloak! I've realized recently that people are usually a lot nicer to [what I think of as] the normals than they are to me in terms of casual conversation and minor social stuff. My nice-enough calibration was basically set in high school and it's "not actually making fun of me to my face or threatening to hurt me", so for years I had just thought that things were fine, because by my standard they were.

At the same time, I get spared a lot of garbage in terms of being told to smile, creepy hitting on, etc, and my men friends really, basically do like me. I know I've lost out on some work, which worries me sometimes, but with the exception of that it's been pretty much a win.
posted by Frowner at 6:17 AM on August 5, 2015 [5 favorites]


The first time I ever heard this phrase, it was used to describe Kobe Bryant.

That is simply an anecdote and is not meant to be instructive in any way.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 6:17 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I have this thing where I think I'm smiling, but there is no visible difference. It kind of freaks me out, like I'm not in control of my face.

I apparently do "the eyebrow thing" a lot though.
posted by Foosnark at 6:18 AM on August 5, 2015


Too-Ticky: Yes? I don't think I said otherwise.
posted by jzb at 6:19 AM on August 5, 2015


One reason why I don't smile that much is because I feel like I have a garbage mouth full of disgusting teeth. Even though I know they're not that bad, they're not *great* and in the last few years I've become very conscious of people who have very good teeth and how easily they show them off when smiling. I am very self-conscious about them and when I smile I keep my lips closed and so the effect is that I seem to give a little smirk instead of the hearty "I am so happy I am showing you my beautiful chompers!!" smile that I'd like to make.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 6:25 AM on August 5, 2015 [12 favorites]


Is there an equivalent term for this for speaking?

I think of this as Daria voice.
posted by Metroid Baby at 6:32 AM on August 5, 2015 [6 favorites]


I have Resting Bitch Face, or more accurately, Gender Neutral I Don't Fucking Care What You Think of My Face Face. I also have social anxiety. They're not related.

I also have Resting Serial Killer Face and social anxiety, but I think they are partially related. I also have a seriously low rate of blinking* and reasonably bad (when not wearing my glasses, e.g. in most ID-photo situations) esotropia.

As far as I can tell from other folks' anecdotes, this state of affairs has very few social consequences of one type mostly, I think, because I am a dude, and few social consequences of another type partly, I think, because I am white. (I think being a small dude also has something to do with it -- my Resting Serial Killer Face and furtive nature do not read, to many people, as threatening because I'm short and slightly-built, I suspect.)

*Possibly due to what my dad named my "muppet eyebrows". I guess I don't need to blink so often because dust and stuff that would ordinarily be falling into my eyes is getting caught in my outsized eyebrows. Seriously: half of the moustaches on LookAtThisFuckinHipster.com are smaller than my eyebrows.
posted by busted_crayons at 6:33 AM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


The other thing is that I have a comparatively small mouth and, given the shape of my face, smiling to show my teeth is more of a terrible gurning grimace than anything else. I really have to consciously peel my lips back from my teeth and strain my cheeks - perhaps you might usefully think of a smaller, fatter Magneto fantasizing about killing Sebastian Shaw. Even as a small child, I was puzzled by how catalog models smiled with all the teeth showing.

One of my early memories is of an uncle trying to make me smile enough for a photo, and me trying to tell him that I was smiling, and this was as smiley as it got.
posted by Frowner at 6:33 AM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


I've always gotten "What's wrong?" or "Are you angry?" comments when at-rest. For a long time now, I've consciously tried to affect a more "amiable" look to my resting face. I think, though, it often comes off more like "befuddled".
posted by Thorzdad at 6:42 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


lucky you, busted_crayons. I'm 6'4". I've had clients call my boss worried and half in tears because they were terrified of me.

Hysterical calls up hierarchial skype chains, etc. I was tired, I forgot to like make small talk or something and spent a meeting silently staring out a window. People thought I was like ominously pondering the death of their terabyte-scale clusters or something.

Life is suffering for us all, in different faces, etc.
posted by mrdaneri at 6:53 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


The comedy video that coined the term (written and acted entirely by women) rang pretty clearly as anti-misogynistic to me.

Perhaps it was intended that way, but it didn't read that way to me, at least not clearly. (Also, the video seems to have been received by an audience that's like, "yep, bitchy resting face is definitely a thing that exists!" rather than, "yep, that's a good example of banal, suffocating sexism in action.") Rather than choosing the term bitchy to highlight the inherent misogyny in the complaint, I really felt like the descriptor bitchy resting face was chosen simply because it's funny, especially the juxtaposition of the casual adjective bitchy next to the more clinical-sounding diagnosis of resting face. It sort of rubbed me the wrong way because, you know, gendered insult, but whatever. Just a joke, OK.

I am intrigued by how, since I first heard of it, the phrase has changed from "bitchy resting face" to "resting bitch face." I think the former is more descriptively accurate.

Yeah, me too. Whether you read the original video as misogynist or antimisogynist, I feel like bitchy resting face is actually a funny turn of phrase. But resting bitch face comes across as a lot more hostile, probably because bitch face by itself sounds like a routine gendered insult. I guess it's good that there's some discussion of the idea, and maybe thoughtful people are now a little more reflective on snap judgments they might be making about others for no good reason. But I'd be pretty happy if both of the terms faded from public discourse sooner rather than later.
posted by Mothlight at 6:53 AM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


A lot of the original noise around the RBF thing was 'diagnosing' celebrity sufferers like Mila Kunis, who as far as I could see were then held in greater affection by the public as a result.
posted by colie at 6:59 AM on August 5, 2015


I wonder if being an introvert has anything to do with the perception of RBF? As an introvert, unless I'm actively interacting with someone currently (in which case, my face isn't 'resting'), my current facial expression is determined by what I'm thinking about, and if someone, for instance, greets me in the hallway at work, I'll greet them back, but due to being an introvert, my facial expression probably doesn't change for such a short, superficial interaction. In other words, I don't automatically change my expression just because another person comes into my perception or because I realize someone else is looking at me.
posted by tippiedog at 7:03 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


My facial expression is no one's fucking business and I resent when I'm told it is.
posted by agregoli at 7:07 AM on August 5, 2015 [12 favorites]


I wonder if there are fat queer women with RBF, and if we could see them if there were. They could get so much stuff done, what with nobody bothering them... I think I'd try to secretly rule the world without anybody noticing if I hit that trifecta. (Hey, at least I doubt I could do much worse than the people ruling the world now)
posted by Anne Neville at 7:09 AM on August 5, 2015 [6 favorites]


It used to puzzle me that people would tell me I looked "angry" or "scary" when at the time in question, I was actually panicky and afraid due to social anxiety or just general wimpyness and struggling not to show it.

I also come from a long line of bullshitter/good 'ol boy types, though, so when I need to be friendly/nonthreatening I can turn that on and put people at ease. I have found that wearing somewhat quirky glasses also helps; people see the glasses, not my expression, whatever it happens to be. And getting older also means I care less if you find me scary and will use it to my advantage if I need to.

Glasses and beards can also make a man look more severe, which is why my husband, who is a soppy, sentimental, peace-loving pussycat, scares people sometimes. I mean, he catches spiders and puts them back outside rather than stomp them. All cats love him. But with his glasses on and his beard hiding his smile, he can be scary-looking.

One of the reasons we hit it off is that he never found me scary, which a surprising number of men had.
posted by emjaybee at 7:22 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


Is there an equivalent term for this for speaking?

I don't know but I'd love to have a label for the fact that a lot of people* have absolutely no idea when I'm joking.

*men
posted by everybody had matching towels at 7:26 AM on August 5, 2015 [6 favorites]


I have very, very small scar on my upper lip, basically my lip is just ever so slightly thinner on one side than the other, but this has a couple of times garnered accusations of walking around "smirking." It's really upsetting to me because smug or conceited is the farthest thing from the way I walk around feeling. As with neutral serious face (NSF, come on guys, let's take this back!) the only cure is to consciously make my face pleasant, but this is more frustrating, I feel, because with NSF, you mostly do actually feel neutral and serious, but this is just a straight up lie my face is telling.
posted by HotToddy at 7:29 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


I wonder if being an introvert has anything to do with the perception of RBF?

I do think there's a possible connection, come to think of it. I'm quite introverted, and being alone with my thoughts is my default setting even in public. I like being social, but I have trouble switching my brain to social mode on the fly; I have to let it run for a bit to warm up, like a car. When I'm at rest, I'm not prepared for social interaction, so it makes sense that my resting face would be the same.

This article might be making the common error of conflating social anxiety and introversion. I have both. They're often found together, but they're not the same thing.
posted by Metroid Baby at 7:35 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


On a note slightly different from the gender angle - I've often thought that there should be a simple good-manners course available online or preferably in grade school which taught certain basic principles like "don't comment on people's appearance, especially things they obviously can't easily help, but also All The Things".

Only a couple of years ago I accidentally told a friend that she looked tired and asked if she was feeling all right, and it turned out that she just wasn't wearing her usual make-up. ("Everyone asks that," she said.) And me a feminist and a grown adult! Obviously I never make this type of remark anymore but I think that it could have been forestalled if I had scaffolded the whole thing - "I am going to be prepared for minor changes in people's appearance and not make remarks on them, and I will be aware that minor changes may be the result of make-up or not make-up". Scaffolding won't help with malice or structural bias, but at least it will clear out the problem of people of good will who just aren't thinking and don't have good habits.

Similarly with all this resting face nonsense. You could easily do some simple scaffolding about demeanor.
posted by Frowner at 7:37 AM on August 5, 2015 [6 favorites]


I mean, we all know, sort of, not to comment on stuff. But it makes a difference to put it clearly in words as a principle to abide by.
posted by Frowner at 7:38 AM on August 5, 2015


Heh - so, the first time I heard of "resting face" was on vacation with my kids ,I was pumping gas and had noticed a dent on the van...

Meanwhile, inside the vehicle, the conversation went something like this:
Kid 1: "OMG, what's wrong with him, he looks like he is going to murder someone!"
Kid 2: "Naw, that's just his resting face."

Many laughs were enjoyed.
posted by jkaczor at 7:57 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


logicpunk described my experience perfectly -- I rely on irony and also have a fairly expressionless face. Very often, when I tell someone they've done a good job they act very uncomfortable and say they don't know whether to believe me or not.

It's really hard for me to smile for social convention. It feels like everyone is thinking I'm faking it.
posted by alpheus at 7:59 AM on August 5, 2015


"Don't say anything about someone's appearance/face" is definitely a good rule of thumb to live by but "don't ever try to figure out what someone's thinking by their facial expressions" is probably going to be a losing battle since a not insignificant amount of our entire genetic makeup and cultural programming is trying to figure out what people are thinking based on facial expressions. Expressing things non-verbally is a hugely important part of human relationship and communication. I think some of what makes the RBF phenomenon interesting is that it's people flipping out and labeling and shaming people over a slight incongruity between the expression someone wears on their face and how they're feeling internally. It's shitty to do, but it's also an insight, I think, into how much we rely on facial cues from others, and how we'd like to hammer everybody into expressing/reading cues in the same way that we do.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 8:00 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


I have bored resting face, I have to constantly assure people that I am actually interested in what they have to say.
posted by numaner at 8:03 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


(I've often been attracted to and shuffled into relationships with women who have this because I still think of it as looking dignified and consequential and just find it kind of sexy. The tendency to interpret these expressions as reflecting your partner's mood is sometimes still overpowering, and can cause emotional confusion, even when you consciously know better.)
posted by saulgoodman at 8:10 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I tend to identify with Worf, whom Quark on DS9 once described as "a walking frown."
posted by Halloween Jack at 8:11 AM on August 5, 2015


I've always been in the camp that uses the phrase "bitchy resting face", but only because the syllables match up so nicely with "fizzy lifting drinks".
posted by Brackish at 8:24 AM on August 5, 2015


According to my best friend I travel with a sign over my head that says, "Fuck off and die."
posted by Gwynarra at 8:37 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


I've got it in spades, but I don't think it correlates with my anxiety, because when I'm anxious I tend to look like I'm about to cry or I get a worried, sycophantic smile plastered on my face that I can't really control. (And as a side note: my superpower is to be asked for directions. I have been asked for directions in five countries on three continents, only one of which I was familiar with. I think I just have an air of someone who knows where she is, RBF or no.)

My husband has it, too, and between the squinty eyes he inherited from his mother and his tendency to tilt his head backwards and refuse to smile whenever a camera is pointed his way, his driver's license photo looks like the picture you see on the news next to the map of where the bodies were found.
posted by telophase at 9:03 AM on August 5, 2015


This bit of internet-discussed culture directly relates to my lived experience! Joy!

I had the most serious of RBFs that I knew of until I read about that study that says (paraphrasing here) - hey, smile, it might make you feel better. Amazingly, no joke, simply smiling made me feel better: if I had a rough time reving up the brights, I remembered that the night before I slept on 1800 threadcount sheets with two amazing cats, one of which was fished out of a dumpster, and that was usually enough to get a full-on toothy going. So I tried that for awhile until people actually told me to stop smiling. Various reasons were given from 'You don't look good that way' and 'You look a little stupid/silly' all the way to 'You look like the Joker' and 'You look like you're going to kill someone'. So I developed a little half-grin that didn't cause so much concern among others. Unfortunately, a half-grin is also known as a smirk, and the above comments were soon replaced with distrust 'What're you smiling about' and 'It makes me nervous when you smile like that' and etc.

That's when I quit caring about whether someone thought I might murder them based on the presence or lack of a smile. My cats don't care.
posted by eclectist at 9:12 AM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


That's when I quit caring about whether someone thought I might murder them based on the presence or lack of a smile. My cats don't care.

That's probably because cats are murderers too.
posted by srboisvert at 9:24 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


Just yesterday I was at a local board gaming night at a Dairy Queen, and while I was waiting for players a group invited me to join their game of Munchkin. Munchkin is not "my scene," so I politely declined. I over heard shortly after from the people who asked that I looked "really stressed." Apparently my neutral face radiates anxiety. (Which makes sense, considering my default mental state.)
posted by JHarris at 9:34 AM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


And as a side note: my superpower is to be asked for directions.

Back in college, mine was to be asked if I had accepted Jesus into my heart as my personal savior.
posted by JHarris at 9:40 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


My husband (who is a totally nice guy) is six and a half feet tall, bald, and has RBF as well as very severe looking eyebrows. I have a Pleasantly Helpful Librarian Face that I cannot shake. When the two of us walk together, we must look like I'm a bit drugged and he's taken me hostage.
posted by Elly Vortex at 9:43 AM on August 5, 2015 [5 favorites]


This article describes my life.

I'm on the extreme end of the introvert scale, and I'm shy, and I have social anxiety and anxiety in general. (But I'm a nice person. Really!)

People started telling me to smile in middle school, which is when the social stuff got really hard for me. (Because Lord of the Flies was actually a parable about middle-school-aged girls.) Someone would walk by and say "Smile!" And my brain wheels would start turning, leading to an internal dialogue of "Why? Am I not smiling? Am I frowning? What face am I making? Do I look funny? Should I look different than I do? How? How should I look? Should I look like that girl over there? Her? I don't even like her. Other people like her. People don't like me. They think I'm weird. But I'm a nice person. Really! Maybe I should smile more."

When you're a shy and anxious introvert prone to over-thinking, being told to smile as a kid is damning.

It only continued. My mom told me when I was 13 or 14 that people would think I was a snob because I wasn't outgoing and friendly and smiley. That led to me to constantly worry that people did think I was a snob, when all I was really doing was hanging back and judging a situation -- not the people in it -- before engaging. Which, I don't care, I still think is a pretty wise thing to do in social situations.

A big, tall, acerbic kid told me in high school that I intimidated him. Me! I was 5'2" and didn't weigh 100 lbs. I intimidated him, because I never smiled!

At this point in my life, I accept that I have a face that people misinterpret. Rather, it's not that they misinterpret it, it's that people feel they have to try to interpret it, because it doesn't give much away, and that makes me different from a very large percentage of the masses. It confuses and unnerves people, I guess. It makes them work.

It's not intentional. When my face relaxes, sinks into its resting state, it just looks this way -- "this way" being "no way at all," which people don't know what to do with.

It can work to my benefit, and I certainly use it. I don't get fucked with on the street. If I'm in a situation where being fucked with seems like a possibility, I ramp up my passive nothing face into an active scowl, and it's very effective.

It's also isolating, because I'm the woman at work that people don't ask out to lunch. It's not because they don't like me -- it's because they think I'm not interested. And honestly, I'm usually not, and I'm glad I don't have to deal with a lot of lunch invitations, because I would rather sit at my desk and read. So it's isolating, but it's also enveloping in a very comforting way. It ensures the introvert's requisite force field of personal space.

People don't tell me to smile anymore, not like they used to. But still, every once in a while, I hear a voice in my head, usually my mother's, telling me that I ought to. I ought to look more cheery. It's what people expect.

I even acted on that recently with a coworker -- one of the ladies who lunches. My office is on a hallway that's deserted in the summer (faculty aren't around), and she popped her head in my office and said that it must be lonely down here. A thousand things raced through my mind. "Oh, but it's so quiet, and I love it. Nobody bothers me. It really is kind of nice. But well, yeah, it is kind of lonely. Sometimes it's nice to just hear other people, even if I don't want to talk to them. Makes me feel like I'm not all alone in the building, or in the world." That internal dialogue was out of the stable like a race horse, and I was engaged in the introvert's debate of how much introversion to admit, because admitting to too much ends up sounding like misanthropy.

In the end, I let my guard down. I said "You know what? It is lonely around here during the summer."

And now she won't stop asking me to lunch.

:|

I'm a nice person. Really!
posted by mudpuppie at 9:46 AM on August 5, 2015 [8 favorites]


I've mentioned before how liberating it has been to age out of "the male gaze". It is so fantastic to not have people tell me to smile all the goddamn time.
posted by dejah420 at 10:38 AM on August 5, 2015 [7 favorites]


Yeah, RBF is a sexist description of what was formerly would just be called "poker face". At least, that's how it strikes me.
posted by FJT at 10:54 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I don't have "resting bitch face". I have resting "don't fuck with me face". It works very well and I'm quite happy with it.
posted by dilettante at 10:59 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


I first heard this described as "Chronic bitch face" and I wish that was the one that had stuck. Look, it's chronic, I can't do anything about it, and it makes me look like that mythical creature called "a bitch". As opposed to "resting bitch face" which to me reads like "the face of a bitch at rest" which doesn't work for me.

My case of CBF has made me invisible too, which is great. The worst I ever got was "Why do I never see you smiling?" during baffling situations like gym class and the cafeteria. Um, cause none of my friends are here? Cause maybe I don't have any? Do you want to make me smile? Do you want to be my friend? If not then kindly fuck off.
posted by bleep at 11:08 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


There is no neutral expression when other people won't stop worrying that you're judging them.
posted by amtho at 11:10 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


> The comedy video that coined the term (written and acted entirely by women) rang pretty clearly as anti-misogynistic to me. That is, it took this common frustration—men telling women to smile; people in general policing women's public demeanor—and satirized it by presenting unsmiling women as people with a pathology.

Fair enough. The thing is, I simply really, really prefer for women not to be called bitches. I don't like it when it's satire, not when it's ironic, not by women, not in a house, not with a mouse.
posted by Too-Ticky at 11:10 AM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


I too have this condition, and my favorite part of it is that things inside my head are often very silly but my face just does not want to play along.

I mean, there I am, face like a Finnish sniper, and I'm audibly humming Manah Manah. People dodge out of the way.
posted by cmyk at 11:15 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


Do you want to be my friend? If not then kindly fuck off.

It's not RBF if your face looks exactly like how you feel. This might be source of some of the sexism (apart from the bitch word) because it's assumed that women need to keep up a facade all the time, but nobody minds if men don't.
posted by colie at 11:18 AM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


My boyfriend recently told me of a company in China that had an official "mask day" so that people didn't have to fake-smile at each other and just let their damn faces relax.

I was too busy interrogating him thusly: 'Could it be any mask? Darth Vader? One of those Scream movies distorted faces with hoods?' to reflect on the fact that yeah, it would be totally cool to have one of those days, as long as one didn't freak out over the fact that every person is wearing a fucking mask, because one could let one's face just relax.

I would totally use Mask Day to roll my eyes at everything.
posted by angrycat at 11:18 AM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


I'm proud of my resting bitch face/don't fuck with me face. Always had it; I have photographic evidence of it at age 4.

My favorite comeback when random guys told me to smile? "Say something funny." (you gotta deliver that with a deadpan look for maximum effect.)

Anxiety isn't really an issue for me either. I've always attributed "my face issues" to inheriting the gruff German gene from my father ~shrugs~
posted by xena at 11:21 AM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


When I mentioned introversion as a possible factor, I was thinking of a lack of response, but to be honest, I probably also have a learned tendency to hide any reaction, as a defense mechanism against extraverts.
posted by tippiedog at 12:14 PM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


We have a winner, IMO: It's not RBF if your face looks exactly like how you feel. This might be source of some of the sexism (apart from the bitch word) because it's assumed that women need to keep up a facade all the time, but nobody minds if men don't.
posted by tippiedog at 12:16 PM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


I knew I had to do something about my face in public when, one day at an inside teller machine at a branch of my bank, the machine was cycling and not giving back my card, so I turned my head intending to apologize for taking so long to the person I sensed standing behind me, and before I could get a word out the boy in his late teens it turned out to be started screaming and crying that "I'm sorry man! I wasn't trying to steal your PIN, I swear, I swear, God I'm sorry" and etc.

It was all I could do to break in and tell him everything was cool and I was only trying to apologize for taking so long.

As I left, everybody in the bank was staring at me like 'what did you do to that boy?' and it was very embarrassing.
posted by jamjam at 12:22 PM on August 5, 2015


That makes me think that he was actually trying to see your PIN.
posted by Too-Ticky at 12:24 PM on August 5, 2015 [6 favorites]


All of my photo IDs for my Canadian Permanent Resident cards inevitably come out as "yeah, I killed them. I killed them all. I ain't got no regrets."

"An immigration interviewer once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice Chianti ... chchchchchch"
posted by theorique at 12:25 PM on August 5, 2015


I dunno, RBF in others makes me anxious. I steer clear of annoyed looking people until I see them being conversational despite their face.
Because who wants to talk to someone who looks permanently annoyed? I've got enough of my own negative emotions to risk dealing with other people's.
posted by Omnomnom at 12:30 PM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


That sounds like a personal problem. Other people don't know they have to change their facial expressions in unknown ways to relax you.
posted by agregoli at 12:54 PM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


Shouldn't it be BRF (Bitchy Resting Face), as the original video suggested? The phrase should imply that your resting face looks bitchy, not that your bitchy face is just at rest.

/pedant
posted by numaner at 1:07 PM on August 5, 2015


RBF (BRF? Face of Doom?) runs in my entire family. Maybe it is an Eastern European thing?

Anyway, it was pretty amusing to overhear my 70 year old mother tell her 73 year old brother, "You know what your problem is, Bill? You've got Bitchy Resting Face!"
posted by medeine at 1:12 PM on August 5, 2015 [1 favorite]


I get this because my lower lip is kinda full, so my upper lip has to curve around it. they're good lips, though! Once I was walking to work, and I could see this guy getting all ready to make some sort of pervy comment from like half a block away. I was dreading this so much I must have scowled harder than usual, because once he got close enough to see my actual face, he went "ugh", and I thought, this is awesome!!! I love my RBF
posted by 5_13_23_42_69_666 at 1:18 PM on August 5, 2015


That sounds like a personal problem. Other people don't know they have to change their facial expressions in unknown ways to relax you.


I don't think it's a problem, though. I mean, it's easy enough for me to find people I click with facially, and I'm pretty sure everybody else isn't wasting away for lack of my scintillating conversation.
I'm just saying that this is how I react towards people with grumpy faces. I don't see a point in (like many people are experiencing) telling people they look angry or asking them to change their facial expression, like they owe me something. That's really obnoxious.
posted by Omnomnom at 1:28 PM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


Being a stoic Scandinavian I have a serious case of resting asshole face. To me, people pointing it out, or trying to get me to smile are either trying to marginalize or dominate/control me. And for those situations unfortunately for the other person, I have no expression.

Sucks to be them.
posted by Divest_Abstraction at 1:38 PM on August 5, 2015


This thread is so sad.

It's only natural for people to clue in your emotions based on your expression. If you're walking through life miserable and anxious, it's only natural that people are motivated by their humanity to try to make things better for you. It's the most basic empathy.

Some people will blame themselves for your discomfort. Some people will figure you're having a bad day, and try to make it better. But if every time people see you, they are confronted by a morass of anguish, they are going to avoid you. They'll avoid dating you, avoid hiring you, avoid being around you.

I guess you can get used to anything, but why does it have to be this way?

I work with guy who once told me at the bar "I'm not a cool guy". He is brilliant, but perpetually insecure. People say to him "why are you so angry all of a sudden?" (His explanations reveal a deep-seated rage.) One time he genuinely laughed at someone's joke — and not out of conceit or insecurity — an unexpected belly laugh of pure joy. In that one moment, he was so likeable.
posted by esprit de l'escalier at 1:43 PM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


Making people smile and demanding they smile while offering nothing in return are two different things. You can only read someone's mind on their face if you're already engaged with them. You can't just walk up to someone out of the blue and think you have any idea what's going on in their head. The whole point of this is that peoples' natural faces, when they're just by themselves being neutral or maybe even feeling good, don't match how they feel, because it's just how their face fits together. The whole point is that it's not how they feel.
posted by bleep at 1:58 PM on August 5, 2015 [13 favorites]


But no, I can't stomach the thought of doing the emotional labor of engaging with someone before I judge them and make demands.
posted by bleep at 1:59 PM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


I can't tell, are you talking to me, bleep?
posted by Omnomnom at 2:02 PM on August 5, 2015


Omnomnom, it certainly is sad, if not a problem, that you don't care to meet anyone who might have (to you) a grumpy face. The whole point of this thread is that most of these people are not grumpy. Which is why I would hope those of you with this issue would get over it.
posted by agregoli at 2:05 PM on August 5, 2015 [4 favorites]


"I have also noticed that with many of my socially anxious friends, we all have 'bitchy resting face' and I wonder if that is our 'protection' from the perceived negativity around us," one commenter wrote on the e-therapy blog InnerConflicts.

I was enjoying this article up until RBF-as-coping-mechanism came up, at which point I became infuriated. It is in no way a coping mechanism because it does not do what it says on the tin. In fact, I look uncomfortable because I am uncomfortable. If I could look like I was comfortable and smiling, I would not look vulnerable. If I did not look vulnerable, people would not harrass me or corner me into situations where I feel uncomfortable and can't escape. This happens to me even when others have the very best intent (needy people becoming anxiously attached to me because they see me as a fellow lonely person in need of a new best friend). If this is a coping mechanism it is absolute garbage as a coping mechanism given that it puts me into more of the situations that give me social anxiety in the first place.
posted by capricorn at 3:11 PM on August 5, 2015


The whole point of this thread is that most of these people are not grumpy
Yeah, That was new to me.

For clarification, does RBF also mean that if people smile at you (say, in an office setting), you don't smile back?
posted by Omnomnom at 3:34 PM on August 5, 2015


(Just considering a specific thing that happens with specific people in my office and wondering if I've been misinterpreting them.)
posted by Omnomnom at 3:40 PM on August 5, 2015


For clarification, does RBF also mean that if people smile at you (say, in an office setting), you don't smile back?

If a coworker at a meeting smiles at me, I generally smile back (if I'm looking in that direction and notice them), and if I come into a meeting room where some coworkers are before a meeting, I'll usually smile and say hi, etc., because I recognize that a meeting is a social activity.

But if I'm not really actively interacting -- say, if I'm just listening to what someone is saying and taking notes, or if I'm sitting at my desk/computer working (which is in its own office, so I won't see anyone's face there unless someone comes to my doorway) or just sitting or walking somewhere (in a perfectly fine mood) thinking, "Yay, only one more day until the next Hannibal," then my face will apparently tend to be either expressionless or scrunched up -- which is just what it does when I concentrate -- or look zoned out. Because I'm focusing on information rather than interaction.
posted by FelliniBlank at 3:42 PM on August 5, 2015 [3 favorites]


It's really just whatever your face does when you're not consciously doing anything with your face. Like, as you're reading this comment, and you [let's say] don't feel anything about it either way. You're just reading or looking out the window at nothing in particular and not thinking about your face. What default facial expression does your face fall into when you do stuff like that and are in a neutral not-any-real-emotion-at-all frame of mind?

Most of us don't even know what our faces do at those moments, but if yours does something not socially conventional, many people will be happy to interrupt whatever you're doing and tell you. My default expression some of the time is apparently "troubled" or "distressed" or "pissed" (I think it's just large eyes plus heavy brows plus a few years of not wearing my glasses despite being nearsighted back when I was an insecure teen).
posted by FelliniBlank at 4:06 PM on August 5, 2015


I definitely used to have this in my teens and early 20s - felt like "frozen" face, that was all I could do to hold myself together. (I had a diagnosis of GAD with social phobia.) When I'd force myself out of my comfort zone, I'd make an "uncoordinated smile" face. Also had what I can now recognize as an anxious person's posture - head forward and leading when walking, shoulders tight and bunched, arms crossed most of the time - all of which led to muscular tension and pain, especially headaches and neck pain, I had Advil everywhere.

That constant, very physical anxiety eventually left me, with treatment* and time. I now have Resting Nice Face, and feel good, physically - I'm relaxed and in tune with my body, free to spontaneously, authentically, and appropriately express positive emotions. I actually enjoy communicating, and often come across as an extravert. This feels normal. It's strange for me to look back and remember what it felt like to be in my body back then, I can't even imagine feeling that way again. (I still get anxious about particular things sometimes, but not in a physically imprisoning way.)

* have mostly negative feelings about the med part of it, there were tradeoffs. But I think it probably helped with this side of things, and it's good to be reminded of that, so thank you, EG.
posted by cotton dress sock at 5:01 PM on August 5, 2015


I think and feel like I'm smiling graciously occasionally then catch a glimpse of some old angry-looking dude in the mirror. Has nothing whatsoever to do with my actual interior state. My (likely soon to-be ex) wife works the same way. But I can sympathize with the tendency to want to mind-read people based on their facial expressions. It's an instinctual impulse, and like I said, the tendency can still cause confusion and hurt feelings in a relationship even when you should know better.
posted by saulgoodman at 9:12 PM on August 5, 2015 [2 favorites]


I used to have the opposite problem when in my 20s: I had Naive Friendly Person Face. People always stopped me to ask for directions, and beggars would go out of their way to beg for spare change from me. Now that I'm older, my face is a bit more RBF-like, and I get bothered less. I'm okay with this.
posted by tallmiddleagedgeek at 6:37 AM on August 6, 2015


I have bored resting face, I have to constantly assure people that I am actually interested in what they have to say.

I used to work with someone like that! It was very confusing because they did seem interested in the conversation, responded to questions, and asked some of his own, but I could not tell if he was just totally bored by the whole thing! Until I saw his wedding pictures and realized that was just his face.
posted by LizBoBiz at 11:41 AM on August 6, 2015 [1 favorite]


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