Boyfriend Bears
December 29, 2012 4:51 AM   Subscribe

Boyfriend Bears (SFW)

It's not quite what I thought it would be.
posted by Blazecock Pileon (42 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: This seems pretty thin and point-and-laugh in a way that's not great for Metafilter. -- LobsterMitten



 
It's like Japanese body pillow girlfriends, but not as creepy, because it's pure.
posted by twoleftfeet at 4:59 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


lol @ confused girls growing up in religious households
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 5:03 AM on December 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


Also, I object to the SFW designation, because it stands for "So Fucking What", which is a bad message to send to teenage girls.
posted by twoleftfeet at 5:04 AM on December 29, 2012


I think you meant, "So what, fucking."
posted by taff at 5:16 AM on December 29, 2012


....Which is a perfect message for teenage girls. Fucking is: so fucking what.
posted by taff at 5:17 AM on December 29, 2012


This is what killed Timothy Treadwell.
posted by twoleftfeet at 5:21 AM on December 29, 2012 [6 favorites]


They'd do better to hand out vibrators.
posted by NoraReed at 5:26 AM on December 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


I appreciate how, on the founder's bio page, she describes herself as "crazy" with quotation marks, just so we don't get the wrong idea.
posted by Bromius at 5:30 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


What better way to infantilize and desexualize your daughter than by giving them a teddy bear? Also, why don't they show boys getting these? Oh, right, because boys have to become MEN. We can't be infantilizing them, now, can we?
posted by Philosopher Dirtbike at 5:30 AM on December 29, 2012 [7 favorites]


What better way to infantilize and desexualize your daughter than by giving them a teddy bear?

I saw that as infantilizing young women without desexualizing them, which I suppose is why I find this kind of thing both aggressively misogynist and super-creepy.
posted by mhoye at 5:34 AM on December 29, 2012 [6 favorites]


Wow, that part about writing letters to your future husband, tucking it into a special pocket in the teddy bear and then giving them to him on your wedding day...that squicked me out.
posted by meinvt at 5:35 AM on December 29, 2012 [11 favorites]


flagrant false advertising!
posted by The Whelk at 5:44 AM on December 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


I don't see anything wrong with encouraging young girls not to jump in the sack with the first guy they see. You know, teach them to be SELECTIVE. But this? No. Creepy.
posted by caution live frogs at 5:46 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


Does this mean the purity rings are not working?
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 5:51 AM on December 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


I have learned that when your children come to you and share that God is leading them to "do something" you PRAY like crazy and then encourage and support them in any way that you can.

-Alesha Wiese
Madison's Mom and Executive Director of Boyfriend Bears


I wish I'd have had this sort of enlightened parenting when I was fifteen and God was 'leading' me to masturbate compulsively over anything lacking a Y chromosome.
posted by R. Schlock at 6:06 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


Remember, purity doesn’t happen overnight

Not unless you've got a Boyfriend Bear in bed to kill the mood.
posted by dismitree at 6:06 AM on December 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


I was expecting pictures of grizzly bears holding paws. I'm a little dissappointed.
posted by windykites at 6:11 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


Oh, I get it, this is the Saturday Morning Hate Session. Well, I suppose it's better than watching the shopping channel.
posted by HuronBob at 6:12 AM on December 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


I don't know is relevant to anything, but I haven't seen so much white on a website, like, ever. White people, white bear, white background, white-blonde hair. It's like a pigment-lacking doofiness.
posted by angrycat at 6:17 AM on December 29, 2012


I know you think you love him. But now is time to take paws, and reconsider.
posted by Benny Andajetz at 6:18 AM on December 29, 2012 [5 favorites]


I appreciate how, on the founder's bio page, she describes herself as "crazy" with quotation marks, just so we don't get the wrong idea.

and I also find that people who self-describe with words like "crazy", generally are not anywhere near being that. More likely they are better described as "self-absorbed".
posted by lampshade at 6:18 AM on December 29, 2012


Oh no hate is down the hall. These are pity lulz
posted by device55 at 6:29 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


She is fifteen. You are really mocking the business idea of a fifteen year old? Let's not.
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 6:30 AM on December 29, 2012 [5 favorites]


Where's the Girlfriend Bear?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 6:33 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


She is fifteen. You are really mocking the business idea of a fifteen year old? Let's not.

One that's internalized the patriarchal let's-police-the-sex-lives-of-others schtick that's screwed up so many lives?

Let's do.
posted by sebastienbailard at 6:34 AM on December 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


I was expecting pictures of grizzly bears holding paws.
Either this or galleries of adorable, hirsute male couples and my disappointment knows no bounds. I'm pretty sure my face when I arrived at the actual site was a farcical caricature of it, like Linus once more facing the cold reality of soggy cereal.

Seriously, expecting something cute and getting creepy misogyny instead?

=(

On preview:

Although I didn't actually look into the site at all. So there's a silver lining in that (however unsavory I might find the expression), this does appear to be launched by several (albeit very white and privileged) teen girls. So, good for them! Kind of! I just wish their energies had gone into something better.

And Alia, while I sympathize with your feelings here, my emphasis is really more on my genuine reaction. Stuff like this makes me sad, when I was expecting to see stuff that made me happy. I'm not really mocking it, personally, just expressing my dismay.
posted by kavasa at 6:38 AM on December 29, 2012


To me it's interesting in light of stuff like the Love Consent thing (and specifically, in terms of the topic of this post, Dr. Mew's comment there). Kids have to negotiate a lot of pretty heavy choices during a time of raging hormones, general confusion and self-doubt, super heavy peer pressure, and often with a dearth of facts on the ground ... and all in a really aggressively hypersexualized world. Different groups approach that challenge differently.

I would never, ever choose this approach personally, and it seems both coercive and naive (in addition to being sexist and hetero-normative), but hopefully we can discuss it a little bit more sensitively than just doing a point-and-laugh session.
posted by taz at 6:41 AM on December 29, 2012 [4 favorites]


Schedule a session? So it is like one of those sex toy tupperware parties but for evangelical teens?
posted by ian1977 at 6:51 AM on December 29, 2012


Put a strap-on on one of those little guys and you've got a real boyfriend.
posted by CarlRossi at 6:51 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


or galleries of adorable, hirsute male couples

That's what I came here for, too! Here's a NSFW (there's a butt), but pretty tame "Shit Bears Say" video, instead.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 6:51 AM on December 29, 2012 [3 favorites]


Wow... this whole thread is getting creepy as hell as far as I'm concerned...
posted by HuronBob at 6:52 AM on December 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


"My top three spiritual gifts are Missionary, Faith, and Encouragement."

woah
posted by ian1977 at 6:52 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


During the summit I heard an inspirational message from a young pastor Steven Furtick who had started a church at age 16. I also heard Seth Godin, the author of the book “Poke the Box“, speak about encouraging people to “stop talking” and “to take action.”

No! Don't poke the box!!!! Get a bear darnit!
posted by ian1977 at 6:54 AM on December 29, 2012


She is fifteen. You are really mocking the business idea of a fifteen year old? Let's not.

Let's be honest: Nobody is mocking this purely because she's young. Some people have an issue because of the ideology behind her business idea.

You're defending her because you agree with where she's coming from. If she was 15 and promoting something contrary to your beliefs, would you give her a pass because of her age?
posted by dubold at 6:58 AM on December 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


My reading of this website is as follows: It's important for teenage girls to remain pure so they have something of value to offer during negotiations with potential living situation providers once they have completed finishing school, so you should purchase this white teddy bear.
posted by seanmpuckett at 7:01 AM on December 29, 2012 [2 favorites]


"so you should purchase this white teddy bear"

They give the bears away to participants....
posted by HuronBob at 7:05 AM on December 29, 2012


See, this is what comes from naming children Madison. Tom Hanks was right.
posted by Etrigan at 7:06 AM on December 29, 2012


If she was 15 and promoting something contrary to your beliefs, would you give her a pass because of her age?

Yes?
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 7:09 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


This is just more street corner evangelism on the information superhighway....or maybe an off ramp. If she wants to do this, she can have at it – it is her call (more likely her parents’). But when I see this, I have just as much right to grumble.

They give the bears away to participants....

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Maybe this would work better in the MeFi Mall. Whatever.
posted by lampshade at 7:12 AM on December 29, 2012


Honestly y'all we can be a little more charitable and understanding even if we disagree or dislike this thing at a really basic level.

Take seanmpuckett's reading, which I think is wrong. There's historical precedent for it, but really I think that at root, the girls running the site and the venture want to be Good.

And you know what? So do I. I want to be Good. I'm a gay man 16 years her senior, but I want that same thing. You know, just look at the still of the video here. It's pretty tough to be all "THOSE MONSTERS!"

But when I see stuff like this, I think of the narrative that's occurred around the victim in this recent case and how it was All Her Fault.

And that's why I would have preferred to have seen cute cartoon bears or bearish couples being cute.
posted by kavasa at 7:17 AM on December 29, 2012 [1 favorite]


I also heard Seth Godin, the author of the book “Poke the Box“, speak about encouraging people to “stop talking” and “to take action.”
Me: Aww, I thought this was going to involve a funny pot-smoking story. Seth Grodin, he's the pothead, right?

Google: Did you mean Seth Rogin?

Me: Ohh, I see. But no, I was actually looking for Seth Rogin. Hmm, how about just 'Grodin'?

Google: Charles Grodin?

Me: Aww, Charles Grodin! I should watch Midnight Run again. But anyway, let's try Seth...

Google: macfarlane? green? rogen?

Me: ROGAN! Yes! Okay so, Seth Rogan p...

Google: Seth Rogan pothead?

Me: Yes, Phew. Wait, this isn't Dayquil, it's Nyquil!
MeFi fever dreams are the best.
posted by Room 641-A at 7:17 AM on December 29, 2012 [4 favorites]


There's historical precedent for it, but really I think that at root, the girls running the site and the venture want to be Good.

Well, the wording of the site says they want to Pure, which implies that others are impure, so there's an implicit judgement occurring.

Few would argue that there's anything wrong with a young girl choosing to remain a virgin. But that doesn't mean those who don't make the same choice are wrong, impure or any less of a human being worthy of respect.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:25 AM on December 29, 2012 [6 favorites]


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