[*MamaJen*]

<p>ETA: The official name of the installation, from the designer's website, is "The Mustache Ride."</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I guess the thread title sums it up pretty well, lol. I live in a kind of urban, gentrifying part of east Austin, where you can have a pretty good time playing various iterations of the "spot the hipster" game, but there's also a lot of families and older working class residents. One particularly hipster restaurant, this patio taco stand, recently put up a giant seesaw on the edge of their property, right next to the sidewalk. The seesaw is two sides of a giant mustache, with big eyeglasses on top. It's fairly obviously a sexual joke (if you don't get it, google "mustache rides"). Every day, I walk by and I see little kids climbing all over it and I want to barf.</p>
<p>I just find it so creepy to have this kid's toy take the form of a sexual joke, and have kids physically interacting with it -- you know, to have kids unwittingly be the punchline in this sexual joke. I know it wasn't just meant for kids, it was probably meant for hipsters -- but kids are always playing on it.</p>
<p>I'm seriously not uptight or prudish -- truth be told, I love ribald, raunchy humor. Five years ago, I might have thought it was hilarious. And I think it would still be pretty funny if it were inside a bar or something, rather than on a street corner.</p>
<p>Anyway, I have no issue with their first amendment rights to have the see-saw on their private property. I'm not calling that into question. But I just think it's really, really, uncomfortably creepy and utterly squicks me out. I don't let my kid play on it because it would seriously feel a little bit like he was being molested.</p>
<p>Am I overreacting? How would you feel about having this on your street corner?</p>

 

[Maluhia]

<p>I think you are overreacting to the idea that playing on it would be molested, BUT they are your feelings and your children and avoiding the sexual-pun themed park equipment on the streetcorner is certainly within reason.</p>

 

[blizzard_babe]

<p>I know the term "moustache ride," but never would have put two and two together. So I probably wouldn't think anything other than "weird hipsters."</p>

 

[CherryBombMama]

<p>im mexican american, so i would have thought "mexican stereotype." you know ... taco stand-mexicans-mustache. LOL.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>not the bad kind of stereotype, more like "making fun of themselves" kinda thing. i dont know how to explain what i mean, but i guess i could kind of see it from your point of view, but i dont think they meant it that way.</p>

 

[meemee]

<p><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0teOQYrUwM" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G0teOQYrUwM</a></p>
<p> </p>
<p>i found this video. and found nothing wrong with it. i thought too it was the mexican part. actually i found the seesaw pretty ingenious. not sure why the glasses are up there. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>but then i didnt know the connotation either. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>dunno. i dont see it as the way you see it. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>what makes it moustache rides? the glasses?</p>

 

[*MamaJen*]

<p>It's a mustache ride because you're riding on a mustache. "Mustache ride" is a slang term *edited*. It's an old, common term. There are all these frat boy tee shirts that say "mustache rides -- 25 cents" and stuff like that. </p>

 

[Multimomma]

<p>considering the youtube video talks about growing out mustaches to raise awareness for testicular cancer, I'm going to go with overreaction. I live in a college town and never in my life have i seen or heard of the mustache ride. </p>

 

[Marsupialmom]

<p>I was aware of the expression mustaches rides..</p>
<p> </p>
<p>If they didn't have the glasses you would have not thought of mustaches rides, sexual connotation. You took it there. Now your kids might take it there.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>There is often adult humor in things. Kids miss it and move on. Some times it is intentional other times it is not.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>My dh and I joke about teabaggers.....why? The sexual connotation . My kids have no clue, even my 16-year-old doesn't know the reference. But it is there and my dh and I joke about it.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>This link is funny. Unintentional -- it is adults taking their mind "there" not the kids. They are often non-the wiser.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.cracked.com/article_18494_15-unintentionally-perverted-toys-children.html" target="_blank">http://www.cracked.com/article_18494_15-unintentionally-perverted-toys-children.html</a></p>
<p> </p>
<p>How about massagers? I remember growing up and my grandpa rubbing my back and my grandma's back with a personal massagers...trust me my grandma's personal massager wasn't were many peoples mind goes when you talk about it.  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>Riding the/a bicycle can refer to having sex.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I use to ride bareback all the time growing up...........that is horses if you thought of something else that is your problem not mine.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>Riding jacket means ????? condoms, jacket for horse riding, motorcycle riding?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I was at a wildlife preserve once and they were talking about beavers....the kids and ranger were going on and on....us adults were in the back ground with our minds in the gutter.  We took it there.  It does't make the kids or ranger's actions dirty or perverted.  It does't make the kids molested. </p>

 

[meemee]

<p>aaaaaaaaah the things i have learnt on MDC non parent related is amazing.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>all these are such new terms for  me. </p>

 

[Marsupialmom]

<p>Oh I just thought of a time my dh, bil, sil, and I about died laughing. My son was grouchy and my mil sarcastically said "Well aren't you Mr. Happy today."   Yes, our mind was in the gutter not mil.  DC wasn't molested.  </p>

 

[marybethorama]

<p>One of the kids asked dh if he used to work at Long John Silvers and I started laughing because dh and I always joke about "Long Dong Silver" (Justice Thomas's favorite porn star)</p>

 

[GuildJenn]

<p>I think you're overthinking it. When we go out to the farm and there's a hay ride "roll in the hay" might come to mind, but it doesn't mean that's the purpose of the fun. Same thing if one of my kids ever rides bareback on a horse, you know?</p>
<p> </p>
<p>I was abused as a kid and it makes me a bit uncomfortable when you equate letting your kids play on a seesaw in public with a feeling of molestation. Obviously if that's your feeling, it is, but it just seems to me to minimize the real thing a bit.</p>

 

[mamalisa]

<p>I don't see it as obviously sexual at all. I think saying that you feel like your child would be being molested if he played on it, is a little over the top and honestly a little offensive to people who have suffered sexual abuse.  It's a see saw, if you see something dirty I think that's on you. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>I think it's a genius way to use otherwise unusable space under the sign.  </p>

 

[mamazee]

<p>No big deal to me and it wouldn't' bother me if my kids played on it.  I don't know why it would have any equivalence at all to molestation.</p>

 

[meemee]

<p>if the eye glasses are what is making the whole scene sexual then yes i agree the glasses need to come off. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>they are too high away from the children who cannot reach it to play on it (or at least that's what i gauge from the video) - so someone is obviously having a laugh. and it is in bad taste.  </p>
<p> </p>
<p>so i feel those glasses need to come off. </p>

 

[VisionaryMom]

<p>You say it's a common term and popular with frat boys, but add me to the list of people who don't know that term. I've lived in 2 college towns, and we live near 2 large universities. I've never once seen or heard any reference to the term. I'd say it's not as common as you imagine. I once had a friend start a business using his last name, and an older man lambasted him for being "offensive" because apparently in the 60s, the word was a drug reference, though this guy had NO IDEA and it was HIS NAME. Still, this older man was seriously pissed about it because of his assumptions, and I think that's what you're doing here. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>If you think it is intentional - or not, but want to let them know - then do it. The Student Services staff at my undergrad university named the winter formal "Snowball," and it took 2 years before anyone on student government had the nerve to tell them that it's a popular sexual term. They changed it and were embarrassed that no one had let them know and just laughed every time they announced it.</p>

 

[CassnBeth]

<p>Hm. Actually, I think  I know what you're talking about. For me it would depend on whether or not part of the hilarity is in the kids playing on this thing none the wiser. I had an uncle who would tell me sexual jokes that went right over my head as a teeny child and I know that the reason he found it funny was because I didn't get it. My innocence was definitely part of the sexual humour. I was very happy when my mother started refusing to have him in our house.</p>

 

[HeliMom]

<p>Add me to the list of people who are unfamiliar with  college kids using  the phrase "mustache rides"  I went to college in a huge metropolitan city, had/ have tons of hipster friends and I've heard a lot of stupid mustache stuff. Mustaches are a huge part of hipster culture. my friends have mustache growing contests, I know a few girls with a  mustache tattooed on the side of their index fingers so they can  stick it across their upper lips and... boom instant mustache.   Is it silly and stupid? You bet.  I just don't think this is about what you think it is about. I think it's stupid self referencing installation art that is interactive and fun.</p>
<p>      </p>
<p>The artists themselves (El Grupo) do not reference the possible sexual correlation in any of their press releases. It's also  a time sensitive installation that  according to the website will only be out there until late Winter so even if it is a sexual joke it should be gone soon enough.</p>

 

[freestylemama]

<p>I would think: Hey, guys we're having tacos for dinner!  That's awesome! </p>

 

[goldenwillow]

<p>When I read your thread title, I knew instantly what it meant. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>I personally wouldn't go there with my child. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>It does seem like a crude pun and I just can't get into that type of humor and I do not consider myself a prude... just aware.  Our society creates so much emphasis on crude sexuality and bills it as ok.  I wouldn't explain it to my child but also wouldn't allow the opportunity for him to play on it due to an unwarranted thought of a possible creep passerby. </p>
<p> </p>