A female owner of male dolls unable to connect with female dolls

Like Daikini and Kimaeril, I find myself playing mostly male characters. Unfortunately in many games I find the female characters annoying, too weak, or not suited to my play style. But when I DO find a female character that I like, I latch on for dear life. That also shows in my dolls. Mostly males, but the few females I have are quite spoiled. Other than Chulyen, my first doll, and Leo, my grail, I interact with Hannah and Charlotte more often.

When I first got into the hobby, I only had male dolls, because at that time the cutesy, youthful aesthetic for female dolls prevailed. I like a stronger feminine look, more striking and beautiful than baby-faced and cute. I'm thrilled that companies like Iplehouse are bringing out more mature sculpts. Now that the companies are branching out I can find more girls I like and my gender ratio is leveling out. Still have a ways to go, but more girl dolls are finding their way on my wish list to the point where there's more female sculpts than male ones there.

The reasons to have dolls are different, and that is what drives us to get one gender or another. If you're attracted to men, then the male form is going to get more attention from you, even though you don't think of your dolls in a sexual way. It's just the way you're wired. However, for those that love fashion, fashion tends to skew towards women, so you might skew more towards female dolls to display that. There's probably a million different reasons, which leads to the diversity of collections. It's fun to see the results. I've seen gorgeous female and male dolls, and it is always a pleasure to me to see a well-put-together doll, regardless of gender.

 

It happens. The doll heart wants what the doll heart wants. I love my boys (I have four) but my girls outnumber then since I tend to gravitate to the girl dolls more. Counting my Off Topic dolls here, I have eight girls including my first doll who is a girl. I just gravitate more to girls. It's hard for me to find boys that I MUST have... Avalon, Riven, Kaname and Yuichi being the only ones to ever jump out at me.

 

I used to feel that way, and then I got my first girl and realized that a big part of me really enjoys tricking her out in all sorts of cute outfits. I'm at about a 50-50 girls/boys collection right now, but I do still find that I'm harder on the girls than I am on the boys I've kept. I'm more likely to nitpick their flaws, and to move them on in search of something better. I wonder if there's some internalized sexism in that.

 

Funnily enough, I always expected to own mostly boys, but right now I'm way more excited about my two girls. I think, for me, the fashion is a draw - that and the male dolls I have planned are supposed to represent very specific (not so fashionable) characters in very hard to clothe sizes, haha. Granted, the only boy I have was an impulse buy for the purpose of just being a clothes horse, but I still don't pay him as much attention.


I think one of the greatest things about this hobby - especially in the last few years - is that you can figure out how to cater it to you however you like. It's gotten a lot easier for me to find cute casual clothes, for instance, and the insurgence of fantasy dolls helps me find those items as well. Enjoy your boys!

 

I am female, and for years, I only connected to male dolls. Now, I have 16 boys, 3 girls and another girl on the way. I tried several girls before and the connection just wasn't there. When I finally got Hailey, my Mystic Kids Miri, it was love. Oddly enough, I tend to go for boys from the more expensive companies, and trying girls from the same ones just didn't click. I tend to like the cheaper girls for some reason! I think another big difference is that hailey was a role play character first, whom I had no intention of shelling, but as I played her, I fell more and more in love with her. The Miri sculpt was perfect for her. So the combination of a character I bonded to before even owning the doll and the perfect sculpt made bonding easy. I like my other girls, but none come close to my love for Hailey.

 

I am a female collector and have mostly males. I just find their faces more interesting and have more ideas for their characters than I do female dolls. Female dolls have never really sparked my interest, even when I was young. The only female I've bonded with was a Soom Amber, and no other female doll has really been able to compare to her in my eyes. I find male dolls to be more badass in general, and that's what I'm looking for when I create their characters. Not saying that female dolls aren't or can't be tough, I know they can be, I just find it easier to pick male dolls and immediately start building their character.

Edit: Since I first posted, I found another female doll that I put on order and really adore. While males still dominate my collection, I do love my female dolls just as much even though I don't have as many

 

I think some of it is the same reason why people in real life prefer men over women in non-sexual ways. Sexism.
People seem to think men just are more ~interesting, complex and deep~ even though gender is a funny thing, and humans are not that vastly different from each other based on gender. I once read, there can be a lot more differences between women as a group, than between a random man and a random woman.
I believe we've all learned sexism while we've grown up, so naturally we let it into everything we do. In this case, dolls.
That doesn't mean that girls owning boy dolls are wrong. It's just an explanation, not an accusation.

Also I think some of it may be yaoi. Straight girls fantasizing about gay men. I have a complicated relationship with this. It ranges all the way from innocence to down-right homophobia, so it's depends on the actual person rather than judging all straight yaoi fans.

 

Yeah, I saw your post I'm just wondering if it's the same way with a large percentage as it seems to be with straight females.

 

Another female collector here. I too, have found myself unable to bond, or love female dolls as much as I do the males.

I really want at least a female doll that I can play dress up with since all of my boys are always dressed in suits or some other kind of manly clothing. I've tried purchasing several female dolls over the years, and each time, I will buy a bunch of dresses and wigs in preparation. There is just so much more clothing and hairstyles to choose from! Unfortunately, all of them have gone to better homes after a month or so because they just didn't feel right.

I'm still looking for one I'd stick with, but I really doubt it's gonna happen.

 

XD Owner's heart... And close. I used to be a big fan of it but my interest's waned down... But I've kept the username I hung around since I like my usernames to sound like a penname.

 

I don't actually own any dolls yet so feel free to ignore me.. I have, however, done a LOT of 'window' shopping and filled up many-a-wishlist while I save my pennies and I ALWAYS choose female dolls. I have of course seen a lot of great, awesome, bad-ass looking male dolls, but I never get that feeling in my heart that makes me want to click the "Add to Cart" button like I get with females. Also as a gamer, I only choose female characters if I'm given the choice (not that I will turn down a game if the protagonist is male, I just prefer female.) I'm obviously not a psychologist, though I'm sure there is some under-lying reason why people choose the dolls they choose, but when it comes down to it, when you're spending hundreds of dollars on something, you should truly like it, right?

 

It's really interesting how people connect with dolls. There are a lot of times I find dolls (both male and female) beautiful, cute, impressive, or just really well sculpted, and yet I do not feel attracted to them and have no desire to have them be part of my collection. Personally I'm not worried about diversity in my dolls, I would rather have a few variations of the same look if I know it's what I love the most. My only BJD at the moment is a boy, I haven't found a girl I like enough to want to acquire yet. But I have other OT dolls that are girls and I like them just fine.

 

All of this ^

for me, the whole 'bonding-with-one's-doll' thing comes with being able to identify with the doll and character in question - not as much their attractiveness to me as being an object of desire. I had trouble connecting/identifying with female characters and dolls before because I had internalised the general portrayal of women as shallow and one-dimensional. (Heck, I used to have trouble with taking myself serious as a woman, and had to perceive myself as a 'tomboy', 'non-gender', 'boyish' character in order to give value to my existence, feelings and thoughtpatterns @_@)

That said, not all people base their collection on characters they identify with. I know some rather collect and create dolls and characters that are considerably different from them, ones that make them curious and/or are plain attractive to them ( aka external objects of desire/interest- I am only recently starting to collect in this fashion too). I wonder about the dynamics of 'preference' in this case.

 

I am a female collector and at present I only own female dolls. I don't interact well with females IRL, no idea why I just find it difficult. I have always mainly had male friends too so the gender of my dolls doesn't reflect anything from my personal life. I have owned one male doll in the past (a delf shiwoo who I adored) and I am considering owning one or two in the future. I have no preference for the gender of my dolls, if I like a sculpt I purchase it

 

As a guy I have an all male resin crew. Sure the girls are pretty but what puts me off most are those resin boobs. Never been able to take most of them serious so didn't even bother to pay much attention in that area all the years I've been in the hobby. I do have a bunch of female characters but based on the body-issue of mine they probably will never be anything but someone purely existing in writing.

 

I have the opposite problem! I'm a girl, and I love girl dolls, but I can't seem to REALLY want any boys. I would love to have some boys in my doll family, and I see cute ones all the time, but I can't find any that I would really love to have, so right now, I've only got a small 27cm Obitsu boy, and I'm still having trouble bonding with the little guy.

I theorize that it has something to do with this. Almost all of my favorite anime/tv show characters are girls. I always play as a girl in MMOs. Most of my anime figures are girls as well, although there are 2 boy figures I REALLY have my eyes on. I don't know why I prefer girls. I guess I just like girly things? I love long hair that's styled cutely, and frilly dresses and all that jazz. Not that boys can't wear those things, but I wouldn't want my boys to.

At the last meetup I went to, someone had a BlueFairy Robin boy whom I really admired. I wouldn't mind owning him. But right now my priorities are on girls.

 

I have only boys too.I did have a girl here and there but always ended up selling them but now when I buy a girl I dont like leaving her alone in my room full of boys...men are dogs..ha..ha.
I do tend to fem up my boys thogh..beautiful kimonos and such.
for me personaly I think its because im an older woman now and I dont like being reminded of how I once looked to now..some of these girls are really beautiful.
buuuut anyway. I just like the boys right now

 

I prefer male dolls too.

Let me clarify...I get along equally with females and males in real life. I have 2 best friends (one male and one female) and I babysat little girls and little boys during my high school. I love them both.

So, my love for one gender over another doesn't really have anything to do with attraction, friendships or "I like girls more or boys more" in real life. I think it goes back to my childhood when I hated dolls, my mom used to give me like 20 barbies and american dolls each year, I never liked them. I always ended up playing with my brother's cars and video games.

Then when I was 18 I saw MALE dolls and that has been something I have never seen before (except Ken) I was smitten by male BJDs instantly. I was that kind of person who always said "I don't like female dolls, I don't see the appeal" until I got puki puki Sugar by accident...I didn't really want her but long story short, in order to get the Puki Piki I wanted (a male doll) I had to buy her too. However, when they both came in, I FELL IN LOVE WITH HER! (even more so than with the little guy) it was like fresh air this cute little girl doll made lose my dislike for female dolls so I don't discard the possibility of getting female dolls anymore, they are just hard to get me interested though so I don't have a lot of girls in my collection yet.

Out of my 14 dolls only 2 are girls (whom I really like and have completely bonded with) and all the dolls in my wishlist are male. I think I needed to include the females little by little but right now I feel content with the 2 girls I have, I don't really want more (unlike the boys....I want like 30 boys more XD) I love more boy dolls because I enjoy male fashion and the fact that there are cute/hot/sexy/elegant male dolls still intrigue me a lot. Also, when I see a doll with no gender ( Soom teenies) I usually feel the urge to make them boys just because it is my preference^^