A Male Dominated Dollfie World?

Hmm... I've actually never noticed this, but probably it's because I seem to only collect girls so I only ever notice the girls. lol I have noticed that a lot of people love male dolls and that initially surprised me about the BJD community, but now it seems normal to me.

 

I'm one of those who seem more drawn to female dolls. A lot of my original characters happen to be female, and the men in my imagination... they look like men. Not boys, not really effeminate anime characters. There are a few dolls out there with the strong masculine features I personally like in a male doll, but to be perfectly honest a 70cm might be too big for me. Even so, the EID male sculpts remind me more of those men you see on the covers of romance novels... half-naked, long hair whipping in the wind, with a frail-looking woman hanging around their perfect abs. I don't want a Fabio. And I don't want to have to buy MNMs to get masculine faces. I guess I look at a lot of the boy dolls on the market and go, "Huh, does it come with a girl body?" because to me, they're more on the side of feminine than masculine. Even my Angelheim Venetio head makes a pretty girl when I stick him on a Soom SG girl body.

 

I just only recently bought my first doll (a girl). I had noticed that a lot more boy dolls had fantasy parts that I particularly liked, or any of the girls that did, were permanently sold out. So now I have resided to buying a normal human doll, and needing to buy extra fantasy parts to fit on her. I hope to see more girls out there in the future though!

 

I think that is just because it is more unusual to have boy dolls, thats whats sets BJD's apart from other collectible dolls, there are some really nice girls (mine are girls), but I can see why there are more boys for sale.

 

I think most male sculpts are made to be somewhat gender-neutral. After all, the more neutral they are, the more creative the owners can get with them. Though if they're going for neutral, you'd think there'd be some more masculine-looking girls out there, right...? Or there might be, if the idea that "girls MUST be as pretty as possible or she's not a real girl!" wasn't so thoroughly ingrained into people's minds. Non-traditional female beauty is simply rejected more often than girly men, making pretty-boys the only "safe" choice for a company that wants a neutral sculpt.

 

Im mostly interested in only male dolls so i tend to look the other way on this subject.....however i do notice that yes, most companies mainly feature a larger selection of males than females. Think of it as payback for stores, markets and general merchandising mainly focused on female shoppers....come on! Girls have a huge shoe selection compared to mens when you visit ANY retail store!!!!

 

I love the girl dolls. I just never thought about getting a male doll for my first, but now that I've been shopping around everywhere for my first BJD, I have seen some males that I might get for a second or third doll. And that Venetio--he is a really beautiful doll. And not so much fem.

 

For me, I just tend to like boy sculpts more. It's weird, but when I look for girls I look for a more masculine face sculpt. The fact that the hobby is dominated by really feminine sculpts is probably the reason why I don't have any girls yet.

 

Maybe it's just me. As a long-time collector of only boy dolls, but I am actually frustrated by the number of companies that ONLY have female sculpts. While there is many males out there, and many of them come with cool fullsets, I have yet to see a company that does ONLY male sculpts. Whereas I have seen several companies produce ONLY female sculpts.

 

I like female dolls more, so when I'm window shopping, pretty much all I see is girls, I barely notice the boys xD When it comes to parts though, does tick off that boys seem to have all kinds of different things, like hands, hands with guns and what not D: and girls considerably less. I do want a boy doll as well, but the faces and bodies are either too boyish or too mature for my taste D:
does depend on company, but still.
as to why? popular demand, sculptors' preferences... and I don't know..

 

I agree with the first part. If dolls weren't somewhat anatomically correct (aka, Ken) I wouldn't be opposed to buying them. In fact, I think I'd be more inclined to buy them because there wouldn't be the worry of having that semi-uncomfortable conversation. Some people can get a kick out of the anatomy conversation, but not everyone.

I agree that male dolls of any kind tend to take a backseat to female dolls, at least when we were kids. You never really saw a Barbie-like doll with a male main character - sure, G.I. Joe used to have something similar to Barbie in the 90's (I had one, and he was about 2ins taller than they were) but boy dolls always took a back seat.

I had a lot of different kinds of dolls when I was a kid - Barbie, Bratz, My Scene... - and I always thought it was cool when they introduced boy dolls into the line. But there weren't a lot of them; if you had four or five different female dolls, you usually only had two males. Boy dolls, for me, were a very unique concept.

Knowing that, in the BJD world, boy and girl dolls are equally available (at least when compared to children's dolls) is refreshing to most people. It might not be the fact that male dolls are more prevalent - though I've never noticed - it might be because there are just as many various boy dolls as there are girls.

I like the ability, with some companies, to choose how detailed you want the body to be. Fairyland, if I can remember, offers two or three styles of bodies in their A La Carte section. It's pretty cool to know that your doll doesn't have to be like the next one, even down to body type. BJDs aren't cookie cutter in that respect; doll A doesn't have to be like doll B or C - they could all have the same head, but different bodies.

Blue Blood dolls, as far as I know, have only male dolls; they're not my taste, but all they seem to have are guys.

 

I can't exactly speak for males and female characters portrayed in all countries, but in response to some people's observation that male sculpts will have a variety of features, "hands with guns" etc., maybe because its part of media? I'm trying not to go all borderline sexist but what I've seen from media like TV shows, movies, and some novels is the male being dominant in that they have many more roles than the females.
I don't really see gender-reversal going on with say, a badass sheriff protecting his old dusty town and his love interest which looks all pretty, worries about him, and essentially does nothing but be kidnapped. Times have changed of course, but still there's a lot of male protagonists in stories. Because there's so many roles that are given to males in popular media maybe that's why there's a lot of variety and limited themes in the male dolls we see? I mean with Barbie the idea was to make adventure but still a doll is a doll and there will always be people who simply want female doll to dress up and sit there and look pretty.
Okay I think I'm going OT and not making a whole lot of sense but I digress, there will probably be more doll owners looking for a knight in shining armor or a badass sheriff theme that will fit a male doll, not a female. Of course some people want female dolls to do the same.

And even if a company releases more male sculpts, imo, it is just a head. ._. If you don't like it being on a male body, just take it off and put it on a female. BUT OF COURSE I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT MANLY MAN FACES. LIKE A TEDROS OR SOMETHING. Now that would be "manly face" female doll. LOL

 

Ever since I first got into BJDs, I gravitated towards the boys (always SD, slightly more mature-looking). I guess it's because I like the boys more, especially in my other hobbies. I love writing them, drawing them (certainly surprised me when a friend pointed out I hadn't drawn a girl in months/nearly a year ). So you know I was all set to get a boy as my first doll.. but nope! I found a girl (MSD, too!) who would be perfect for one little girl character of mine. She's the rare gem in my mind- haven't had a female character I've liked more.

I'm currently saving up for her, but I know my next doll will definitely be a boy (she'll probably be the odd "man" out in my future collection ). I don't know why I love them more.. I guess I can just relate easier than I can with girls, even though I'm a girl myself!

 

I only have one boy in my collection for a reason, other boy dolls either don't grab me or are prohibitively expensive. I like looking at other people's pictures of their boys and I can definitely see the attraction of some male dolls, but I'm firmly in Camp Girl and I don't really expect to change direction.

I don't think the hobby is dominated by male BJDs though. If you look at clothes, shoes and accessories, these things are still heavily weighted towards female dolls, which can be really annoying if your male doll isn't in touch with his feminine side at all! If the hobby was really weighted towards the guys, there would be more clothing for them This can be frustrating for me as an owner of a female doll who likes to wear male clothing; as she's an SD10, Volks can be relied upon to make clothing that will pretty much fit their dolls of either gender, so I'm blessed in that respect, but if she was an EID girl I would find it so difficult to find male clothing that would fit her and look like she was meant to be wearing it. More masculine clothes please doll companies and seamstresses!

 

I love the look of a female who can pull off the tomboy look! In fact, I would love to have a doll like that! One who would look fierce in a camo jacket holding a gun! Some suggestions of molds that would lend well to this character?

 

I love tomboys and drag kings too. I really like girls in masculine clothing

Suggesting sculpts isn't really the focus of the Debates subforum, but you could try asking your question in the new Visual Concepts subforum.

 

Mano was the first male doll I fell in love with. I thought his body was nicely masculine, but with a bit of androgyny. One day i will have one. And I don't care for Limwha's tiny girls at all-upper lips are too long. But her tiny boy is adorable, as is her MSD boy.

My tastes are variable and I can always find some doll from someone to suit. There may be specific companies who don't release the sex people want, but across the hobby as a whole, I happen to think things are pretty even-handed. To me, if there's an overemphasis on anything in the hobby, it's the slender, early-adolescent, bishy male. Most companies do them and they're sort of interchangeable as far as I'm concerned. Though I've got a bishy Elfdoll boy and a Dollshe on the way, I like resin beefcake-one day, an Iplehouse boy will be mine! And as others have said, it would be nice to see a hard-bodied, athletic female doll. The Mecha Angel girls sort of come close (Deneb fan here-she's gorgeous!). The big Iple girls don't look particularly athletic, though they are resoundingly feminine. Though people gender switch Soom all the time, I just don't see a lot of Iple Jessica boys or Arvid girls out there-Iple doesn't do androgyny.

I'm not a fan of the big-breasted dolls myself, but it's not a "slut-shaming" thing, it's an aesthetic one. Most of the time they simply don't look realistic or attractive to me. I look at them and think that their little resin spines must be creaking under all that weight! The Iple girls are the only ones I know of who are realistically proportioned to carry that much up front. The take-two-big-ping-pong-balls-of-resin-and-stick-them-on-your-regular-skinny-girl-body-to-make-instant-sexy look seems freakish to me. And yes, I've seen real-life skinny women with what are obviously huge breast augmentations and they don't look realistic or attractive either! But then, resin breasts in general are a bit problematic-the sculptor obviously has to make a choice to make breasts look good naked or breasts that will look good under clothing-the push-up bra look.

There are companies that do primarily male dolls and then attempt a token female-it usually doesn't work well, you can tell their hearts weren't in it. With the exception of Raurencio Stella, I can't say I've cared for girl dolls from the "boys first" companies. I like a feminine womanly doll as well as a girly lolita look. I've got no trouble finding what I want. Elfdoll does all sorts of nice girls and I adore Sarina's Oasisdolls. Definitely Limwha is on my list, as well as Supia. As for little lolita girls, I've got an Everpurple Iris hybrid and am making an Aria Narvy one. I want an Iple Lahela when they put her out in basic-the most stunning girl I've seen in a while. The strong faces are out there and she's one to me, as well as Iple Carina, who looks full of sly character. I thought that Soom Cass had a most interesting female face, sort of like an ancient female statue full of mystery. Ended up getting a Galena for a character I was shelling-she looks more thoughtful than some of the more vapid Soom girls, and I've come to appreciate her statuesque nose.

 

I'm all for boobs too - I've got a pair, and they're a little small, but I have a small-ish frame, so they fit nicely. What irritates the pancakes out of me is when you get these dolls with watermelon knockers that hover in midair, and they don't have a corresponding body type. There are next-to-no chunky dolls out there, and I feel like if these poor resin girls with crazy funbags suddenly fleshed out, they'd all need back surgery within a week!

I think in conjunction with the fact that a few years ago, there were so few males to choose from, this over-stuffing issue is turning a lot of collectors over to the men-folk. And since that's what's selling, that's the direction that the sculptors are leaning. It's easy to give a girl a set of huge hooters, but I don't think we're going to see a sudden rash of boys with peckers the size of prize pickles. Because so many male sculpts have feminine features, they can appeal to a larger audience, who may like the softer look, but don't want to deal with the curves on the girls.

I am not a collector of primarily one type or another - I have male and female dolls, and I plan to expand in both directions. But I'm looking for sculpts that aren't overly stuffed, either in the chest or the arms. I like my women soft, but not fall-apart pansy-ish. I like my men strong, but not Hulk-ish.

 

I always assumed male dolls were more popular because the majority of BJD owners are female and girls do like to create our idealised fantasy men. Just look at ladies and boyslove manga - female authors and audiences tend to prefer the feminine bishonen type - much like the majority of male dolls I see being somewhat feminine.

Hmm, interesting point. I suppose there is a bias toward pretty frilly dresses. However, I also find a lot of the boys clothes available are too girly for my tastes, or rather my male characters.

Personally, I do see a slight bias toward physically male dolls in the hobby but overall in the aesthetics of the hobby theres a strong bias toward femininity.
I like both boys and girls. I love realistic mature manly-man sculpts and sweet Kodona boys. I've got a tomboy girl and now I'm looking for a classy lady to justify me buying more feminine outfits. I think it's great how th variety of sculpts from different companies has exploded in recent years. However, I still feel I have less choice when searching for a realistic manly-man doll even though there are plenty of more stylised, idealised girly boys out there.

 

I think it's dominated by whichever gender you happen to not prefer. Boy-only owners get frustrated by the constant offerings of frills and high heels and slutwear, and think that the entire scene is Girl World... girl-only collectors are offended by the constant offerings of muscles, and think that the entire scene is Boys Town. It all depends on which window you're looking through.

Iplehouse was one of those companies, BTW. They used to make furniture. And then they made 1 type of doll (60cm male). Later, they made 2 types of doll (skinny 63cm male, muscular 63cm male). Then they exploded. All the Iplehouse women are recent things!-- and they also all looked vapid as hell until Carina and Ashanti. Maybe they're just now finally hitting their stride with femaleness. Not everybody is good at sculpting/breathing life into both genders.

(And by god, there are some companies who I wish would only stick to the gender that they're good at, because they can sure churn out some fug.)