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Bic pens "for her"

Aerojoe

Practically Family
Messages
587
Location
Basque Country
Bic pens "for her" here :eusa_doh:

http://www.amazon.com/BIC-Cristal-1...F8&qid=1346095534&sr=8-3&keywords=bic+for+her

Some of the customers reviews, 348 so far, are hilarious;

FINALLY! August 24, 2012
By Tracy Hamilton


Someone has answered my gentle prayers and FINALLY designed a pen that I can use all month long! I use it when I'm swimming, riding a horse, walking on the beach and doing yoga. It's comfortable, leak-proof, non-slip and it makes me feel so feminine and pretty! Since I've begun using these pens, men have found me more attractive and approchable. It has given me soft skin and manageable hair and it has really given me the self-esteem I needed to start a book club and flirt with the bag-boy at my local market. My drawings of kittens and ponies have improved, and now that I'm writing my last name hyphenated with the Robert Pattinson's last name, I really believe he may some day marry me! I'm positively giddy. Those smart men in marketing have come up with a pen that my lady parts can really identify with.

Where has this pen been all my life???

The pens don't work for Math!, August 27, 2012
By KAV (Massachusetts)


I am a female AP and Multivariable Calculus teacher and I prefer to use ink when solving problems. I guess, not surprisingly, these pens cannot be used to do math problems more complicated than 5th grade level. When trying to find a derivative or definite integral, the ball point simply stopped working. I went back and added some numbers and it was fine. I progressed up to solving quadratic equations and the ball point started to "stick" so that I couldn't solve the problem completely. Imaginary numbers? HA! It was as if I had a pen with imaginary ink! As I moved into problems with Taylor Series, the pen started to get uncomfortably warm. By the time I tried to find the integral of a polar curve the pen burst into flames! I couldn't believe it! Luckily, I had on asbestos gloves by that time so there were no injuries. I couldn't even try it with a Multivariable problem!

I have decided to go back to using "man" ink for all future Calculus problems.
I did notice that the the purchase suggestion that comes with these pens is the recalled Talking Barbie that says, "Math class is tough!". Search for a video of that excellent product!

Misleading reviews, August 28, 2012
By bicGirl


I don't understand all the 5 star reviews- this is the WORST eyeliner I have ever used! I can't get it off for the life of me.

:D
 

Flicka

One Too Many
Messages
1,165
Location
Sweden
And you are posting this why? Because you agree that it's dead silly to have his & her pens or...?
 

Miss Golightly

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,312
Location
Dublin, Ireland
Wow, scathing. I guess it's not ok to be feminine or like feminine things anymore - equality is all about how much like a man you can be.

I wonder what those reviewers would have thought of the 1955-56 Dodge LaFemme??

What a honey of a car - I would have no problem driving it whatsoever!

But back to your previous comment, I can't count the amount of times I have read womens scathing comments on forums about being "lady-like" - like it was something awful, a weakness and to be avoided at all costs. [huh]
 

Shangas

I'll Lock Up
Messages
6,116
Location
Melbourne, Australia
While this is obviously a joke, it does bear remembering that back in the 1900s-1940s, several major manufacturers (Parker, Sheaffer, Conklin, Waterman, Wahl-Eversharp etc), did produce gender-specific fountain pens. And pencils, come to that.
 

Undertow

My Mail is Forwarded Here
Messages
3,126
Location
Des Moines, IA, US
I don't know what all the hub-bub is about. I guess it's "sexist" to have a "For Her" product. I get it.
This is just a stupid marketing gimmick that obviously worked. I don't know what's wrong with women having pastel colored pens "just for them". I guess it could be taken as a condescending or presumptive statement, but meh. [huh] Women can still buy regular Bic pens.

And Bic is getting plenty of free advertising with this "flub" or theirs.
 

Aerojoe

Practically Family
Messages
587
Location
Basque Country
When something like this happens with an Amazon product, the best part is the reviews and comments :p Previously, there had been already an hilarious review of a Bic pen, but this time it is massive. 367 reviews now and some of them are quite elaborated. Here an ode to Bic pen;

Oh how I love a bit of sparkle!, August 28, 2012
By Angelami

Aren't these Bic For Her just a big ol' cup of lovely? These little pink and purple morsels from heaven are just divine. Divine, I tell you! The sparkles brighten a girl's day like a refreshing cup of pink lemonade after a long day of shopping for just the right sponge rollers. Can I get you a cup of pink lemonade ((((bats eyelashes)))?

After I spotted these dear pens at the corner store, I threw down my parasol, smoothed my petticoat and declared that someone finally understood want a lady needs! My need for sparkles. My need for sugar-soft pastels. My need to write special thank you cards to the nice man who pumps my gas and helps me to avoid unsightly grease stains on my poodle skirt. (((gasps)))

Bic is just the mostest. Tonight, when I open the lid on my hope chest and gently remove my flowered diary--I will include a poem that will soar off the pages with glittery purple words. A tribute to you, dear Bic--for loving us females enough to create a pen just for us! (((curtseys)))

**Ode to Bic** (((((double curtseys with a half turn and a giggle)))))
My meatloaf recipes
were dull and sage
now your glitter
lifts them off the page!

My menstral journal
was penciled gray
Now pink sparkles
chart the days!

Oh my butterfly doodles
were boring and stark
Now my I's are dotted
with little pink hearts!

Thank you dear Bic
for the sea foam and peach
as I write a potential suitor
a note at the beach!

Smooches and hugs to you, Bic! We gals owe our newfound glitter power to you! In response, I offer you a pastel rainbow of thanks--sincere and wondrous just like your pens! (((twirls parasol)))

rofl.gif
 

Flicka

One Too Many
Messages
1,165
Location
Sweden
Pfft, who cares about pens. I've got a drain to ream out tonite, and you'd think a gal could get a nice pink plumbers-helper, complete with sparkles, but noooooo.....

I've actually seen tool kits that were pink and flowery. Flimsy-looking things of course because we all know girls don't really use hammers.
 

Miss Golightly

Call Me a Cab
Messages
2,312
Location
Dublin, Ireland
I've actually seen tool kits that were pink and flowery. Flimsy-looking things of course because we all know girls don't really use hammers.

Not unlike the ultra-thin polka dot "Ladies Gardening Gloves" that I got the other week - super flimsy and no good whatsoever for tacking brambles - some of us ladies like to get stuck into the gardening as much as the fellas do you know!
 

sheeplady

I'll Lock Up
Bartender
Messages
4,479
Location
Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, USA
I have mixed feelings on this, to be honest. I have no problem with a bunch of sparkly pens in a nice pink package. I don't even have a problem with marketing them directly to women or girls. I do have a problem with the suggestion that they are "only" for girls and not appropriate for boys; which is a much larger message that society is pushing. Young boys have a lot of pressure in today's society and have the strictest gender conformity rules- a girl can wear a boy's pants but not vice versa, and that's a powerful message against men. I don't think society is saying so much "These pens are the only ones women should use" so much as "These pens are ONLY for women. Men don't get to touch them. Ever."

It seems today that there is an increasing trend to make toys gender specific that I remember from my childhood as *not* being gender specific. Even the toy aisles are color coded so that adults don't get lost. For instance, the little kitchens were not pink when I was a kid; they were green, white, and yellow. Now they are pink- totally pink. Apparently this is a message to parents that every girl needs a kitchen toy, but boys shouldn't be allowed to play in the kitchen?
 

LizzieMaine

Bartender
Messages
33,771
Location
Where The Tourists Meet The Sea
It seems today that there is an increasing trend to make toys gender specific that I remember from my childhood as *not* being gender specific. Even the toy aisles are color coded so that adults don't get lost. For instance, the little kitchens were not pink when I was a kid; they were green, white, and yellow. Now they are pink- totally pink. Apparently this is a message to parents that every girl needs a kitchen toy, but boys shouldn't be allowed to play in the kitchen?

This rigid gender-coding bothers me a lot -- I really noticed it about a year ago when I noticed that our local Wal Mart had installed signs specifically designating certain toy aisles as being for BOYS and GIRLS, like they were the bathrooms in a grammar school. We never had anything like that when I was a kid -- there were "girl toys"
and "boy toys," sure, but the demarcation wasn't drawn as specifically and rigidly as it is now. I had a Suzy Homemaker light-bulb stove -- which looked exactly like a real stove, no poofy rounded edges or whimsical moldings, and was turquoise-green, not pink. It looked like a functional tool, not like a marketing consultant's idea of what a girl was supposed to like. And I also had an Erector set and a set of Lincoln Logs, because I liked to build things as much as I liked to cook things, and nobody ever told me I couldn't have them because I was in the "wrong aisle."

This kind of fanatical gender-coding is a development of the past twenty years -- a product of the very generation that was supposed to have grown up *without* gender coding. "We've come so far."
 

Gingerella72

A-List Customer
Messages
428
Location
Nebraska, USA
I have mixed feelings on this, to be honest. I have no problem with a bunch of sparkly pens in a nice pink package. I don't even have a problem with marketing them directly to women or girls. I do have a problem with the suggestion that they are "only" for girls and not appropriate for boys; which is a much larger message that society is pushing. Young boys have a lot of pressure in today's society and have the strictest gender conformity rules- a girl can wear a boy's pants but not vice versa, and that's a powerful message against men. I don't think society is saying so much "These pens are the only ones women should use" so much as "These pens are ONLY for women. Men don't get to touch them. Ever."

It seems today that there is an increasing trend to make toys gender specific that I remember from my childhood as *not* being gender specific. Even the toy aisles are color coded so that adults don't get lost. For instance, the little kitchens were not pink when I was a kid; they were green, white, and yellow. Now they are pink- totally pink. Apparently this is a message to parents that every girl needs a kitchen toy, but boys shouldn't be allowed to play in the kitchen?

I view the marketing as "pink, sparkly pens are the only kind of pens girls want, so here they are, just for you!" I mean, why not just start making pink sparkly pens without the special label and have it as just another color option? Were they afraid a man would buy them and then discover afterwards he had been tainted by the horrible pink-ness of it all? lol

The reviews are a riot! I love snarky humor. ;)
 

Edward

Bartender
Messages
25,084
Location
London, UK
I view the marketing as "pink, sparkly pens are the only kind of pens girls want, so here they are, just for you!" I mean, why not just start making pink sparkly pens without the special label and have it as just another color option? Were they afraid a man would buy them and then discover afterwards he had been tainted by the horrible pink-ness of it all? lol

The reviews are a riot! I love snarky humor. ;)

Ha.... yes.... I can well understand any lady feeling insulted by such cheap marketing tactics. But hey. Progress happens.... One of the big toy places over here (Hamleys, I think ,from memory) recently removed all gender demarcations from their product.
 

sheeplady

I'll Lock Up
Bartender
Messages
4,479
Location
Shenandoah Valley, Virginia, USA
This rigid gender-coding bothers me a lot -- I really noticed it about a year ago when I noticed that our local Wal Mart had installed signs specifically designating certain toy aisles as being for BOYS and GIRLS, like they were the bathrooms in a grammar school.

Yeah, I was just into our local Walmart the other day and that really bothered me too. I believe our local Target is the same way. When I grew up it wasn't like that at all. Sure, there were pink toys and blue toys, but it wasn't like entire aisles of the store were marked off based upon gender and one could easily find "gender neutral" toys that were just toys. What is really bothersome is the specific toys that end up in one side or the other- the balls go in the boys' blue section, etc. I really don't give a crud about coloring, but lots of parents buy into it and heaven forbid their child touch the "wrong" toy.

I don't even understand it from a marketing perspective, don't you want every parent (regardless of the child's gender) to buy every toy? But I'm pretty sure there are some marketing studies as to how color coding sells more toys.

This so makes me want to dress any future boy children in something pink, at least once. And I am NOT a fan of the color pink.
 

Flicka

One Too Many
Messages
1,165
Location
Sweden
This so makes me want to dress any future boy children in something pink, at least once. And I am NOT a fan of the color pink.

My middle nephew was almost a year before he had anything but pink since he'd inherited his older sister's clothes. I can't say that it seems to have affected him much one or the other -- these days, he mostly wants to play football (or as you would say, soccer) and pretend he's Spiderman. He still likes pink, though. [huh]


ETA: and I'm sure you all know that pink used to be the boys' colour. I read a biography about Queen Astrid of Belgium and when her son was born, they decorated his room in pink, so it must have still been true in the 1930s, at least in Belgium.
 
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Messages
13,470
Location
Orange County, CA
When Mattel first introduced Hot Wheels in 1968 they originally came in several colors, including hot pink. The latter was not used very much because it was thought of as a "girl's color" and that not very many boys would want a pink car. Now the 1968-72 "redliners" in hot pink are most sought after by collectors (including this one!). Go figure! [huh]


One of these pink VW buses reputedly sold for $70,000
pink-beach-bomb.gif


Pat%27s%20HP%20Cord.JPG
 
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