Comments on Hmm.

Yes, they are. But so am I, i guess, for lusting after the Croatian water polo team.

They are uber creepy. I worked as an escort for a while and lots of the men on the "hobby" sites would talk about trying to hook up with the baristas. These are 35+ y.o. men for the most part lusting after high schoolers. They're creepy.

As a male in the 40+ age range, I would definitely call them creepy.

Now, if these were 30+ year old sexy baristas, I'd be all for it - provided of course they're not being coerced into dressing scantily, and have the option to not do so, should they so choose.

"When Ryan Reed pulled up to Best Friend Espresso for his usual, a 24-ounce iced vanilla latte"

Seriously can you even consider this place a coffee stand. They sell you candy flavored milk. No wonder we're all such fat asses.

Hooray! Yet another entirely valid reason to avoid the suburbs.

Wow, this whole article is really creepy - as is the "objective" tone that doesn't point out how truly creepy this trend is.

That Times editorial yesterday was the absolute worst.

Yes, the Times has hit a new low, not just with the edgy redesign but with the edgy justification for it's supreme edginess.

The baristas? I'm a skeevy middle-aged creep-o who finds female baristas hot, hot, hot, but it's not stimulating; it's embarrassing. I just want a black coffee, and here I am looking directly down the crack of your ass while you do something with the dish rack down below. Why? I don't want to look at it. I don't want a pervy thrill in line; I want a black coffee. But there it is. Anyplace specially trying to turn me on is going to scare me away instead.

Half the gay baristas I've ever known have been in the job so they could pick up guys. Let's have an article on them and make them more scantily clad.

see also: recent BoingBoing post about photos of Taiwan's Betel Nut girls. Similar sales tactic, different product.

sex sells, film at fucking eleven.

The guy in the stalker article is 20.


So it's still creepy, just not "middle-aged dad staring at his daughter's friends" creepy, like the man in the photograph accompanying the Times article.


It's more like "itinerant, unfocused, undereducated dude who really needs a fucking job in a factory working 12-hour-a-day shifts so he stays out of trouble" creepy. Which is, um, well, like the man in the photograph accompanying the Times article.

ECB does ANOTHER flog spot on her faux feminism outrage? Color me S-H-O-C-K-E-D.

Where's the outrage in this post? Nowhere. Get over it StrangerDanger. Do you post anything other than criticisms of ECB?

keshmeshi,
Silly girl. No matter how tingley ECB makes your girly parts you, and she, shall always appear ridicules in your faux feminist outrage. But it is cute to see you make so much noise in her defense. I will say though that while ECB fills her posts with trifle, it's presentation is pretty enough (if feeble), and your attentive support, at best, detracts from it.

Just because the 40-something guys "getting off" on this are drooling over 16 to 17 year old girls doesn't make it creepy.

...

Oops, sorry, caught me in Bush-mode, lying. Sorry, it's major creepy. Me, I prefer them 26 to 50 ...

Food service in g-strings is creepy. Labeling "older" men creepy for finding "younger" women attractive is ageist.

Creepy starts with Bono.

In the meantime, keep making 'em beautiful, parents of the world. This flame of optimism must never go out.

It's creepy because it's creepy. Who cares about the age.

"Sorry, it's major creepy. Me, I prefer them 26 to 50 ..."

BS. We're not talking about having deep conversations with 16 or 17 year old hotties. 99% of straight men--young, middle-aged, or old--will look and lust. It's in our makeup. It's the part of the brain that hasn't evolved from the caveman days. Any guy who denies it is full of shit.

But, Man,
The Femminest doctern requiers that we "change" (or atleast pretend to have changed). Otherwise we risk offending.

Well, it should be acknowledged that not all of those guys are mentally deranged stalkers; some are likely just average guys who need to learn to talk to a woman who isn't paid to be nice to them. But yeah, there's certainly a threshold where one goes from pathetic to actively disturbing.

Tsm,

You put your finger on the crux of the problem. For 6,000 years women have been trying to get men to talk with them, and for 6,000 years men have had no interest in talking with women. This of course pisses women off to no end. But the fact is, most men don’t even want to talk to other men, much less women, if they can avoid it. While women are looking for stimulating conversation to reassure them that they are alive, men are looking for something stimulating (but not conversation) to reassure them that they are alive. Unfortunately, women seem hell-bent to feminize men into good conversationalists, and your average man will go along with this as far as it takes to get laid, which gives women the false impression that men are interested in what they have to say, leading to all sorts of confusion and hurt feelings when men behave more naturally as permitted by a few limited institutions. (Strip clubs and now, apparently, drive up coffee windows.)

That is such a boring generalization. I know lots of men who are good conversationalists, and lots of woman who are not. Can we please stop quoting from Men Are From Mars?

That being said, yes it's totally natural for men to be attracted to younger women (or younger guys, as the case may be...) What IS creepy is the fact that these girls are asked/required to "dress sexy" for their jobs.

You really mean that it's creepy that these girls choose/keep (maybe enjoy?) jobs that ask/require them to "dress sexy" don't you? I mean that’s the real issue here isn’t it? That these women are complicit in their own objectification? That’s what drives most feminists so far past the point of distraction that they must convince themselves that the women who take these jobs have no other choices, suffer horribly through unfathomable degradations, and are helpless victims of a mans world. (Why it’s tantamount to human trafficking isn’t it?)

I don't get what you're trying to say...Lots of people don't enjoy heavy manual labor, but many do it in order to make a living.

Also, and more to the point, the fact that the world is full of people who are willing to be objectified/degraded to make a living does not make it a positive phenomenon.

Just another symptom that american men don't get laid enough, and have to get turned on by "sexy baristas"! Pathetic. And women who find this "creepy"? More pathetic. Shows how little you know about men. We're not shallow, we're just in tune with our inner lust. Deal with it. We'll talk later.

I will object to the notion that all men don't like to talk. Find the right subject -- e.g. with my boyfriend, Guitar Hero, Jack Bauer, the latest incarnation of Metroid or Zelda -- and they will jabber your fucking ear off. This usually leads to me goddamn begging for sex.

Huh. Well, maybe he's got it all figured out.

Dave,

Sure, lots of people don’t enjoy heavy manual labor (and lots of people don’t enjoy mundane office labor) but some do, and part of the labor equation is that you are paid to do things you may not enjoy. (Few people are lucky enough to do what they enjoy for a living.) So I guess I miss your point. But I will observe that, from the information available in the article, it could be reasonable to assume that these women may actually enjoy their jobs.

To say that the world being full of people who are willing to be objectified/degraded (to make a living or otherwise) does not make such objectification a positive phenomenon may be factually true, but is equally true to say that it does not make it a negative phenomenon. In fact, the world being “full” of such people who are “willing” to be objectified/degraded suggests otherwise. Some people (yes even women) are more than willing, and in fact actually enjoy, to be objectified/degraded. Is it unreasonable to assume that such persons may gravitate toward these employment opportunities at least to the same extent that persons who are repulsed by the same would avoid them?

I wonder what the headlines would be if establishments began catering to the sexual fantasies of women instead of men...

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