Glenhaven's Emotional Transparency Act Forces Residents to Wear Real-Time Mood Badges

Glenhaven’s City Council, long celebrated for its ambitious pothole repair schedules, stunned residents at last week’s session by approving the Emotional Transparency Act. Under the new law, everyone in the city limits must prominently display a mood badge-an enamel pin bearing a color and icon that corresponds to their current emotional state. Any failure to update or properly wear the badge carries fines that escalate with the severity of the mood misrepresentation.

The badges come in six official categories: serene green, contentment blue, mild irritation yellow, existential dread orange, catastrophic panic purple and transient bliss pink. Residents received an instructional pamphlet clarifying that only one badge may be worn, and that badge changes must be logged within ten minutes of a mood shift. To enforce the ordinance, the City Council has opened a Mood Registry Office in the old library annex, complete with badge-printing kiosks and an emotional swipe card system.

Registration requires a one-time application fee of twelve tokens-local currency converted to ‘civic credit’-plus a monthly dynamic surcharge based on the holder’s emotional volatility index. According to municipal projections, the program will generate revenue to fund public art installations depicting synchronized yawning sequences in the town square. Council members argue that open heartedness reduces community tension, though many citizens remain skeptical that forced transparency counts as trust.

Local businesses have wasted no time adapting. Caffeinated Corner now offers a “Badge Blend” coffee whose strength adjusts to your color: mild irritation orders get extra cream, catastrophic panic orders are served with a side of earplugs. Burrito Republic displays a neon sign reading “No Purple Badges Beyond This Point,” prompting nightly debates over whether existential dread merits extra guacamole. Etiquette shops have begun offering “Badge Diplomacy Workshops,” training patrons on how to apologize for wearing the wrong hue in mixed company.

Among the more enterprising is pastry chef Marianne Tanaka, who has launched “Mood-Muffins.” A contentment blueberry muffin sports a calming aroma, while the panic-purple variant packs an unexpected pinch of chili pepper. “It’s a fast way to tip someone’s badge,” she admits, though health inspectors question whether artificially spiking emotions counts as assault with a baked good.

Not everyone is embracing the movement. A clandestine group styling themselves as the Free Feelings Coalition has created MoodShield sleeves-fabric pouches that slip over badges to conceal their color. Counterfeiters have flooded the underground market with knockoff “BlissBadges” in glow-in-the-dark plastic, leading to a fivefold increase in emotional misreporting citations during the first week.

In response, the council deployed fifteen “Patrol Empaths,” unlicensed volunteers granted the power to approach suspicious badge wearers, place a comforting hand on their shoulder and demand a live recalibration. Patrol Empaths tote clipboards, dispense free tissues stamped with the city seal, and keep a running tally of citizens in desperate need of a mood update.

Tensions peaked at Tuesday’s impromptu Mood Tribunal, held in the community center’s multipurpose room. Local librarian Sofia Ortega faced charges of “unlawful mood inflation” after a surprise mood scan captured her smiling too broadly at the self-checkout machine. Witnesses testified that her grin caused a line of disgruntled readers to break out in spontaneous laughter, which the prosecution described as an illegal emotional contagion.

Data released by the council’s Department of Emotional Affairs reveals startling figures: during week one of mandatory badges, 78 percent of the population sampled registered mild embarrassment about wearing the badge at all, while 12 percent confessed to severe panic about being watched. Only 3 percent reported genuine bliss. Officials hailed the rollout as a “qualified success,” noting that awkward transparency still beats anonymous resentment.

Still, organized resistance is growing. The newly formed Mask Your Mood Coalition urges participants to choose one neutral badge and never change it-even if their inner turmoil spirals into public sobs. Fines have already been issued to three members for posting “emotionally deceptive” selfies online. Meanwhile, the equestrian therapy center has launched a “Silent Support Stallion” program promising wordless companionship for the emotionally fatigued.

Amid the chaos, Mayor Caldwell remains unwavering. After a public breakdown that left her standard badge inexplicably blank-meaning no recognized mood-she declared an emergency “Empathy Drill” in which residents must recite each other’s emotional states on demand. Critics argue this drill crosses into performance art. Supporters counter that art has always been about feelings, so why not measure them too?

Looking ahead, Glenhaven plans its first Annual Mood Parade, complete with color-coded floats and marching bands that play tunes matched to peak emotional wavelengths. Council staffers are busily drafting a follow-up ordinance: an Empathy Tax rewarding towns whose citizens maintain a balanced emotional ledger. Whether the parade will unite the city or deepen its collective anxiety remains to be seen.

Between the tears and the spectrum, Glenhaven’s experiment might just reveal the true colors of bureaucracy-and of ourselves.