Controversial Locations - Where do YOU draw the line?

Has anyone thought of any other controversial places besides graveyards, yet?

:p

 

cemetaries are for the living, just dont take pictures if there are living nearby to get offended

 

right, i've not read the whole thread, but tbh, after the first 8 pages I was finding a lot of it repetative. Ok, the cemetaries thing: I can see some people's points on both sides of the argument.

Good art makes you think and encourages debate. Look at Banksy if you want a bit of controversy. Graffiti as art? Or Hans Bellmer, who had his controversial doll based photography. Or many other brilliant people to be over looked.

I personally look forward to visiting more "controversial" locations to photograph one day. I would love to get photos of my dolls dressed in 40's attire heading to an airraid shelter, near a big sign for example pointing the way. I'd like to get photos of my dolls standing outside of St. Paul's Cathedral next time im in london, although not inside as they request you to not take pictures there. I would like to make a tourist photodiary for a doll of mine. I'd like to take a doll to highgate too.

I have taken photos in cemetaries, mostly at graves so old they;ve fallen down as i think of it this way: no one has remembered them, and no one gives a single thought for that grave marker, and yeah i took a pic of a doll ON it, looking like she was CRYING because it is sad that it has been so badly neglected. Stoke the fires and tie me to a stake if you like but i think my photo showed a level of sadness that at one time, someone cared enough to maintain this grave although it no longer happens. Did I post the pic on a doll forum? No, I knew I'd get too many flames for it from those who only saw a doll on a slab of carved granite.

As for what if it was your family? When my mother one day passes I plan to take a pic of her doll named Emma visiting the grave. I also plan for genealogical purposes to do various photos of my deceased ancestors graves one day, but first i gotta locate them. I want to build a scrap book about it. My dolls may or may not be in the photos.

 

People could do much worse than pose their doll next to a grave.

For example, jump over them like they're gym equipment. Or pee on them. It does happen. I think it's REALLY disrespectful, and in the latter case downright disgusting, but posing a doll there is definitely the lesser evil.

To me, cemetaries are part of our culture, and many people go there to take pictures. If gothic-style marriages can take pictures of bride and groom next to a tomb-stone, then I don't see why our dolls couldn't do the same.

And I totally agree with what vonbonbon said. Besides, the person's grave is immortalised in the picture, when our government will happily tear down these people's graves a couple of years later.

As for other controversial places... I dunno... pictures of your doll shopping in a sex shop? A picture of a christian doll spraying graffiti on a mosque? A picture of a doll underneath graffiti of offensive text? Next to dead animals? Hmmm... can't really think of anything, really?

Breaking into someone's house and then taking pictures of your doll? Now that's just plain silly!

~*Mystaia

 

I think the grave thing is kinda on a case by case basis. I am speaking from the fact that we have a family lot & I would be upset if I went to visit & someone was doing that w/out talking to me first. I would say yes if I was ok with the persons pictorial/personal intent. These are my family & it would hurt me if someone did something offensive/disrespectful. Mystaia & Starrybright I think you both brought up great points.

 

It's probably not very kosher to take a picture of a doll during mass. Now that makes me wonder if people take their dolls to church with them. I hope not.

The other case where it would be very inappropriate would be ...
There are some temples here in Japan where photography inside is not permitted because the statue is considered to be an embodiment of a god and therefore you shouldn't take a picture. (I remember once I was in a temple and there were signs EVERYWHERE saying "no photos" and this girl I was with dragged out her camera. I was all, "Hey, no pictures." But she wouldn't listen to me. Then her host mom was all, "Hey, no pictures!" and she wanted to know why. Dude, just don't do it.) Anyway, I would guess it would be tempting to prop up a doll and take a pic somewhere like that. But obviously, anywhere where photography is forbidden should be forbidden, no matter how cool it is.

Cemeteries ... obviously you should be respectful if there are mourners about, and don't go playing in open graves. But otherwise ... if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to see it, does anyone give a crap? That would be my view on cemeteries.

 

By the law you can do this. But as far as sentiments go, I would think in respect of the deceased and their family. Some people are afraid of dolls. I hate clowns, I wouldn't want a bunch of clowns sitting around my grave. If its a family member of yours then by all means go ahead.

 

I cant se the problem the goths have been taking fothos of them self infront of Moseleums and gravstons for almost 20 years so whay not dolls?

 

Well, most of the people here is talking about cementeries, but I think there are more controversial places where I personaly think go there with our dolls and take photos is not polite at all.

For example?

A hospital. I have read a photostory made in a hostital with a bad taste language included and it was surely worse than any cementery.
C'mon, there are ill people there who do not want to see you around taking photos with your Reflex and your 4 dolls.

 

I copy the hospital.
There is nothing romantic as there is in graveyards so I wouldn't want to take pictures there. People are still suffering there. Other as in their graves. And friends and family won't care because you let them pass before taking photos. (they destroy the beauty of the picture, anyway)...
Also I wouldn't take them to any locations that are serious (prisons, police, doctors, shopping malls, ...).

Laoky

 

Hospitals wouldn't bother me really to be honest, as long as you had permission and didn't take pics of patients. If I had a long term stay, I'd be tempted to take a tiny and do pics of her nstuff but I'm odd like that. Not much bothers me like that really.

 

If I'm sick in the hospital, and I want to do a photostory about my doll, dealing with her dressmaker and landlady being sick, I think that might be one thing. Again, as long as I don't do anything like photograph other patients who don't ask to be or something blatantly distasteful, I think its okay.

 

whats wrong with people?
i gues their to lazy to make a scale graveyard
lazy bums!

 

you do have a good point
i gues it really depends on the persons intent
your obviously doing it for artistic purpose while some probably do it for controversy

 

For me it would be out of the question taking pictures and posting or publishing them if the picture also involved people that had not consented to being exposed. Then again I don't mean if my doll was standing in the street with a large group of people in the background. But imagine going into a mental institution and start shooting photos of your dolls, and then publishing pictures with people that do not have the mental capacity to judge if they want to be exposed. That would be highly inappropriate. Or senile elderly people. Or the scene of an accident with injured or dead people. Or any scene involving human tragedies. It's all up to common sense and respect for others, putting yourself into other people's place and asking: is this decent? That being said, somebody could always be offended by whatever you do, and you can't really incapacitate yourself totally by stopping taking pictures altogether...

 

Why, thank you. It's nice to know that I'm a lazy bum because I don't have the artistic skills to recreate a realistic graveyard in 1/3 scale and would rather take photos in an actual gravard that has special meaning to me or that I just like because it has beautiful stones and sculptures.

Personally, I think places where there has been great tragedy are a no-go unless you have a *really* good reason for doing it. Concentration camps, for example, or sites where there have been massacres or murders. It's one thing to take a photo in a graveyard because you like the stones. It's something completely different to take a photo of your doll on the site of a murder to be able to go: "LOLZ lookit my dorrie laying on the spot where somebody died horribly!"

 

I would like to second this! Why are cemetaries the only thing being discussed still? This thread has been going on it seems like for a century with the occasional excursion into other territories lol!

 

I dont know much about it, but for the sake of discussion rather than just graveyards, how about places like religious buildings? Churches, Mosques etc? I dont know if they have been mentioned before, just nipped into this post.

(And for the record, I would rather see doll enthusiasts in graveyards than some of the things in the local ones by me - like syringes we found once :/)

 

Oh wow, that so sad about syringes at the cemetary 1000014...another worst is when you go to the beach and find syringes and everyone is walking around with bare feet! Talk about scary!

I'm a really open-minded person so it's difficult for me to think of many controversial places. If anyone can come up with anything besides a cemetery which has been beaten to death in this thread, I'd love to hear about it! I suppose churches can be controversial since not everyone shares the same religion. I honestly can't think of anything that truly is controversial for me though.

 

Roweena23, I am very open minded too! I feel the same way, I dont think anything is really controversial for me, usually controversy is blown out of proportion anyway, such as how the media does things. But thats for another forum :3