Five Stars for Amazon Reviewers: Real People Hilariously Take “Bic For Her” to Task

Ali’s Team Pick:

What a funny looking tampon. via Amazon UK

Oh my God you guys, now that Bic makes pens I can use, I can finally write! Which means I can tell you all about the hilarious crowd-sourced comedy happening on Amazon UK. Real people displayed some of the best feminist humor I’ve seen, thus winning the internet for the entire year of 2012. The reviews of Bic for Her pens capture the shock and awe of all the women who have never used a pen before now, the women who are using them as vibrators and tampons because that is the only reason why the name would make even a modicum of sense, and the wonder of men as they transform into delicate little daisies just by touching these cutesy purple pens. I almost couldn’t finish writing you all about it because I couldn’t stop reading these amazing reviews. Apart from them being funnier than all of mainstream sitcoms ever in the world, they also give me faith that humans can spot gendered bullshit in marketing. In a world where people are constantly mansplaining technology, plumbing, photography and writing to us like we don’t already know, it’s nice to see that there are people out there who understand the tropes and stereotypes levied against women well enough to write some funnies without even being asked to. Here are just a few screenshots (and here are a few more), but the treasure is endless. Head on over and watch the side-splitting hilarity parade march all over this crappy gendered marketing.

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A.E. Osworth

A.E. Osworth is part-time Faculty at The New School, where they teach undergraduates the art of digital storytelling. Their novel, We Are Watching Eliza Bright, about a game developer dealing with harassment (and narrated collectively by a fictional subreddit), is forthcoming from Grand Central Publishing (April 2021) and is available for pre-order now. They have an eight-year freelancing career and you can find their work on Autostraddle (where they used to be the Geekery Editor), Guernica, Quartz, Electric Lit, Paper Darts, Mashable, and drDoctor, among others.

A.E. has written 542 articles for us.

58 Comments

  1. As a petite female your article leaves me thinking this must have been written by an amazon who sees no difference between her hands and a man’s.

    Like seriously, if my hands were the same as a man’s I could see a reason to make fun of these pens. They are not however. I also don’t wear men’s shoes, shave with men’s razors or use men’s moisturizer – why? BECAUSE I DON’T HAVE A PENIS AND NONE OF THESE PRODUCTS FIT MY NEEDS.

    So a tiny pen with a cushy grip designed especially for my tiny hands? I’ll take it.

    I think you’re just pissed there are flowers on it and it’s almost pink.

    • …Really? I have average-sized girlhands and have never found a regular Bic pen to be particularly unwieldy. If anything, I’ve seen more men complain about how small most pens are than the opposite.

    • Are you seriously defending this misogynist POS? Some PEOPLE have small hands. The trend falls to women, but there are plenty of men with small hands. Also, plenty of men like pink and purple, I see them, straight and gay, wearing it all the time. This was not designed for women, it was designed for what they think women should be.

      Your small hand can hold a standard pen just fine. This is a useless product, solidifying the ideal of femininity that society says we should all follow.

      Also, you’re an idiot.

        • No, it didn’t.

          Also, I think it’s highly likely Kristin’s comment was sarcastic. “written by an amazon” had me in stitches.

        • I have no case, I have only vehement feelings and rage, I do slightly regret the idiot part, but no apologies, I stick by my life decisions.

        • Also, there should really be a typing style for sarcasm. So many people have gotten on websites and been bigots, it’s hard to tell when someone is serious. That person may be kidding, but I’ve heard women with basically those exact views.

      • They’re also about three times the price and identical except for the colour.

        I’m pretty sure that no one here is suggesting that pink and purple are or should be exclusively female colours.

    • Yeah, because prior to this pens were so big and manly our dainty little hands couldn’t hold them

      • This image accurately depicts what happens when women try to hold men’s pens with their dainty little fingers:

        • Writing with those really actually sucks. Or at least, with pencils that size, I’ve never used a giant pen. But I used a giant pencil on my 7th grade Latin final because it was my birthday and gave up halfway through because it hurt my hand.

          …that was barely relevant. but it is 3:30 am, so.

          • 7th and 8th! Mandatory at my (wonderfully bizarre) school, on top of your Spanish or French. I loved it, but I don’t remember too much now.

    • “BECAUSE I DON’T HAVE A PENIS AND NONE OF THESE PRODUCTS FIT MY NEEDS.”

      Four for you, Kristin!

    • HOLY SHIT, IT’S ALL SO CLEAR TO ME NOW! The fact I don’t have a penis means that shoes which are labelled men’s, despite being the same size that I take in women’s shoes, are OBVIOUSLY no use to me!!

      • Wait you can use things that don’t say “Women’s” on them? This opens so many possibilities!

    • If you can’t use razors, shoes or moisturiser aimed at men without your lack of penis getting in the way, I think you’re probably using them wrong.

    • I have a serious complaint about this pen. I used one despite the fact that it was clearly labelled “for her” and barely fit in my amazonian man-hands. Now I am a transsexual woman! I mean I barely managed to write one sentence and my penis just FELL OFF! Maybe if I dump a bottle of Axe body spray over myself it will grow back?

  2. I refuse to buy one until there is a giant pen for lesbians like me with man hands and penis envy.

  3. I just want to know who came up with and/or approved this marketing fail so that I can write “IDIOT” on their faces with my giant-ass sharpie.
    maybe they were actually trying to label their ladies’ razors and mispackaged? there’s still hope for humanity, right?

  5. Correct me if i’m wrong but isnt there special “lady Panadol (Tylenol)” too, and from what I can tell, it’s just the same as the man version, as regards ingredients per pill? Perhaps the pills themselves are smaller, so that they fit better in our delicate feminine hands, or maybe they have a slight pink tinge, so we feel more comfortable whilst consuming them in public…i’m not sure!

    • And their pain relieving properties go straight to the womb, don’t forget that. No other painkiller is specifically designed to target womb pain.

  6. My favorite review so far, “Love this pen, but the color choices seem to be lacking. Really wish it came in 50 shades of grey.”

  8. loved this one

    “I was only twelve and it was a cold spring morning when I cam upon those bear cubs. I can still remember the damp smell of leaf mold as my face was pressed into the earth under the weight of a momma grizzly. I escaped the attack with my life, but lost both hands, although I suppose I must count myself lucky to be the recipient of the first fully functioning hand transplant.

    It was difficult at first, especially since the only hands that were a genetic match were the giant hands of a recently decent New York construction worker named Victor. On my slender girlish arms they looked like paws–truly I thought the irony would be too much to bea…..handle.

    Against the odds I persevered only to be stopped in my tracks by these….pens….and hands that will not clasp their delicate shape.

    It makes me question the very nature of who I am.

    Can I fully be a woman with hands such as these?

    Or am I the freak of nature that nature never intended?

    Would it have been better that my life be snuffed out that chill March day when dew and blood did soak the earth?

    I can only answer, “yes,” and pray that someone come and take these pens from me for I have no hands to hold them.”

  9. I saw Bic and immediately thought lighters.

    But I realized that women don’t smoke; this isn’t the Roaring Twenties.

  10. Freud would have a field day. All those women with their own phallic objects. It’s just a step to far. All was good when they just borrowed one from their fathers or husbands.

  12. My favourite of the Amazon comments:

    “Interestingly enough, this is what I get if searching for “Bic for him”.
    Stylish Refillable Lighter
    Because we manly men don’t really need ink. We write with blood and fire.”

    Blood and fire: my two favourite things.

  13. “plees brng outa womeans keybrd i kanot coap withis 1 itis to compleakatd fr mi littul hanz an plys hovac witmy fronch manikewr thnkq thnkq thnkq”

    Well at least now I know why I autocorrect-fail so much.

  15. Came across the Amazon page earlier this week and nearly wet myself. And now Autostraddle writes about it and I get to read all the comments too :0)

  16. holy shit – after AS, amazon and amazon.uk may now be my new favorite sites;

    having been literally crying laughing over this stuff. had to stop reading b/c I want to wait and read more w/ the gf later on.

  18. The packaging looks like a box for tampons… so clearly it’s for ladies! At last! x

  19. My company does this. (Note: My company is not BIC.) We actually have a range that’s “made for women” (and even uses the moniker “___ for Her”) but is actually just pink and sometimes smaller.

    I… kind of want to anonymously forward this to certain people.

  21. I saw a box of pink colored earplugs for women at Target the other day that cost $0.80 more and protected ears 1 point less than their “manly” counterpart. I almost started yelling in the store. But that would have defeated the purpose of buying earplugs to protect my ears from the urban noise made by men in their noisy cars whilst getting my beauty sleep.

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