13 
Feminism has had some wondrous accomplishments in the past, and workplace equality is one of them, except for one small detail. That’s right, those damn manly pens are just too big and hard to use! Enter Bic, who has provided an ingenious solution: Biros made especially for women.
OK, sarcasm aside, the idea of men and women having to use separate styles of pen is pretty damn ridiculous. It’s not just me that thinks that too; the good customers at Amazon have jumped into action, continuing the age old tradition of fantastic reviews of seriously stupid products. Here are a few of the best:
“I have to say that I am appalled by this product. Overtly encouraging women to write will contribute to the end of civilised society as we know it. We all know that women are silly, empty-headed creatures, whose main function is to look pretty and to look after the home. What next? Women doctors? Women scientists? Women politicians? This product is surely a symbol of the declining moral standards that Britain has experiences since the misguided decision to give women the vote.”
“You know, I was so excited when I saw these pens on the market. “Hurrah” I thought. While they have enabled me to write after 36 years of wistfully watching the men in my life put pen to paper, I feel that they could be improved somewhat. Yes, they fit comfortably in my dainty female hand and the pretty colours are a joy to behold. However, as a woman, I naturally find it difficult to hold two things at once, so may I suggest that they be made into a kind of Swiss Army Pen, with perfume atomiser, a lipstick holder, tweezers and mirror. Only then will my daily tasks be truly accomplished and perhaps I will have more time for cooking, child rearing and looking nice for my husband.”
“I allowed my wife to write the grocery list with one of my pens. Shortly thereafter she went out and bought a bunch of flannel shirts, cut the sleeves off and grew a mullet. While she was writing her feminist manifesto, I secretly switched out the man pen with a BiC For Her. She’s now back to baking apple pies, vacuuming in heels, and popping bennies in order to keep her girlish figure… like a proper American gal.
Thank you BiC!”
“I bought this pen (in error, evidently) to write my reports of each day’s tree felling activities in my job as a lumberjack. It is no good. It slips from between my calloused, gnarly fingers like a gossamer thread gently descending to earth between two giant redwood trunks.”
Not only that, but they’ve even been kind enough to include some helpful tags to allow misogynists to find the product with ease. The funniest include: Delicate flowers; soft lady hands and soft brained women. Nice.
So if you’re struggling to find a birthday/anniversary/christmas present for your favourite lady companion, you can buy her these special female pens, so she can finally write things down! Just don’t blame us when you spend the next six months sleeping on the sofa. [Amazon via io9]
This one’s great too:
“I never did very well at school. I wanted to learn and it felt like all the words I needed were right there in my head, but I just couldn’t get them onto the paper in front of me. If I really pushed myself, I could sometimes manage to draw pretty flowers in the margins but this didn’t please Sir and I was soon in all the bottom sets. What really confused me is that I had no problems in cookery or textiles. At the time I didn’t understand why I could grip and use a wooden spoon or sewing needle but couldn’t properly hold my black-coloured pen for more than 45 seconds without dropping it on the floor and weeping.
Things were a bit better when I left school to go and work sweeping up hair at the local salon – yet again, the broom seemed to just fit into my grip as if it was meant to be there – and I saved up to buy a pink laptop. I still had trouble writing for a long time because, although the case was pink, the keys weren’t designed for female eyes which, as we all know, struggle to discern between shades of black and grey. I could write for about 4 minutes at a time, though, and that’s how I found out about these wonderful pens for girls like me.
As soon as they arrived, I was soothed by the pink packaging – I’d been feeling stressed after driving back from work because my hands just won’t stay on the black, leather-effect steering wheel in my cute mini. Anyway, I quickly found a piece of notepaper with pictures of kittens round the edges and had a go at writing my name. It was amazing! The pen just stayed in place between my fingers, just like it always had for the boys in my class at school. Well, in no time I’d filled a whole notepad and had to go and get another one!
Now I’ve gone back to night school and hope to realise my ambition of enrolling on a childcare course next year. I’m also halfway through writing an erotic novel set in Victorian times – but with vampires!
My only criticism of these wonderful pens is that I get a bit bored with all 12 looking the same. I get around this my customising each pack. At the moment, the pen I have in use is covered in stripes of glitter and I glued a pink pompom and one of those diamanté charms you get on mobile phones (I couldn’t fit any more on my phone) onto the top. I think BIC should start adding pens like this to their range because some women find it difficult to hold tubes of superglue properly – I asked the 6 year old boy who lives next door to help me.”
However, I’m slightly worried – the review was written by a Miss M Holloway, who I’m pretty sure is my English teacher… She must have been employing that 6 year old boy to do the marking for her!
The best tag is the “horses need pens too” one.
so their target audience is sarah jessica parker?