Do you have a right to feel offended?

Ehhh I know my boy is girly so I am never offended when someone thinks he is a girl ^^; I just politely correct them!! But, if they taunt me about it or they contenuously call him a girl then i do get kind of ticked! If it is an accident than I deffinatly do not mind! But if they are being mean ablout the fact that Dakota is girly than I do stand up for my boy! I have only dressed Dakota in a dress one time and the rest of the time he is wearing jeans and a t-shirt but people still call him a girl but truthfully, the people that call him that on accident I really can't get mad at because they arn't used to these dolls and truthfully, most BJD boys are very female looking!! So, in a nutshell, I do not get mad at someone who thinks Dakota is a girl if it is unintentional!

 

About half my boy's wardrobe is skirts and dresses, and his 'default' wig is long, and his face sculpt is female... so I really can't get offended when someone mistakes him for a girl. I don't usually even bother to correct people who are just commenting in passing. Where it gets a little irritating is people calling him "she" while he's wearing jeans and no shirt- they assume I keep a flat-chested, topless girl doll hanging around? Also, people on the forum calling him a cute girl, in response to some post where I refer to him as 'my boy,' (and he's listed as male in my sig), annoy me a bit; it just shows that poster was paying very little attention to what I was saying.

And then there are those people who want to insist he's female after I correct them. I actually like those people; they get the nicest expression when I pull his pants down (or lift his skirt) to prove that he is, in fact, a guy.

 

One has the right to feel how ever they want. I can't say, "well, you don't have the right to feel that way because everyone else thinks he is a girl". If you want to feel offended then you have the right to do so.

That said, I DO think it's childish to be offended about someone mistaking your boy for a girl, because you are in fact dressing them to look like a girl. It's only natural for someone unknowing to assume that your doll that looks like a girl IS a girl. Also, when someone assumes this they don't mean it offensively or to hurt anyone's feelings. It's just a easy mistake!

To anyone who gets offended about this mistake I woud say: Lighten up. :P

 

I spy a Minoru in your icon! >___>

My Aiden (A Volks Minoru) gets mistaken as a girl despite having a scruffy boy wig, boy clothes, boy face, and boy sculpt. Like others have said, I usually just correct them that he's a boy, but I understand the confusion because of the pretty faces most BJD boys have. When I get impatient/annoyed is when they continue to insist it looks like a girl. I mean, you voiced your observation, I voiced mine, why are you still going on about it? I don't really think the Volks Graffiti body looks girly at all, but a couple non-BJD people have been confused by him, so...I have no idea. I'm a pretty mellow person, though, so it's hard to get me angry or feeling offended by what's said about my doll. I get annoyed by the persistence that my doll is what they say. I usually just give them the "Okay, whatever..." and leave the conversation.

I feel like I might just be unlucky in some of my interactions. XD

 

If people call Masato a girl I don't usually fret about it, and correct them politely.

It's the ones who go on about it that irritate me. I get frustrated when they insist "no, you have to admit that he looks like a girl", because honestly I don't see it. I understand that he's very pretty as opposed to "masculine" but still. If I've made a polite correction and you disregard it, that's totally a different thing. I have people trying to convince me that I'm wrong about the gender of my doll and one of these days we may just have him drop his pants for them and prove it. He wears jeans and shirts, and just because his shirt is a little tight fitting with a breast-bone length vneck, (he dresses in casual gyaru-o style, like the super stylish boys in Japan) people are like "Well his clothes are kind of girly..."

some people just make me cranky...

 

Agree. If it doesn't look like a boy doll, it gets called a girl. No need to get bent out of shape over it, especially if you put a boy in girl's clothing.

 

I agree with your sister, personally I preffer a boy as boy and girl as girl not crossdress, i think this is by society, dress = girl, pants = boy.

 

Sorry, but if "girl = dress and boy = pants", then a LOT of females are crossdressing in the real world.

But on topic.
I wouldn't be offended, but simply correct them. Now, mine haven't been mistaken for a girl yet, because I don't take them out often, but if I ever take my WS Aphan somewhere, I can totally understand it if people think he's a girl. He's dressed quite girly.

I don't blame anyone on getting annoyed when the other person insists it's a girl, as if they know your doll better than you do.

 

I think that the world we live in likes to sort things into categories for the sake of understanding. So yes, for hundreds of years women have been the one in the skirt, so the mind instantly classifies something in a skirt as feminine. But I think that this line is obviously blurring. Women have finally made it the norm to wear pants, so perhaps men will win the right to wear skirts. I think gender assumptions based on clothing is ridiculous and sad. I would like to see the line blur a little faster.

 

If you put a boy doll in a frilly dress and long pink wig, you're obviously kind of trying to make him look feminine, so wouldn't that be a compliment if someone thinks it's a girl? >___> However, if he's in normal clothes like jeans and a t-shirt and people INSIST that it's a girl, then I'd be offended. YOUR doll is what YOU say it is.
Also, of "But if he looks like a girl he must be gay"... I have several guy friends that have long hair, paint their nails, and wear skinny jeans but are for the most part quite straight. :P None of them have ever been mistaken for girls either, haha.

In most cultures, girls wear dresses and have long hair and wear pink, and boys don't. If someone accidentally mistakes your feminine boy doll for a girl, can you really get mad at them for going with what they've been taught their entire life?

 

I crossdress my Shao a lot because (a) he looks darn cute in a skirt and pigtails and (b) he would say that an assassin has to be able to work in disguise =). When he's dressed that way (and his skirt is a very girly affair, velvet with lace trim =), I'm the first to agree he looks like a lean, leggy, tomboyish girl; so if someone saw him in that persona and mistook him for female I'd just be amused. If they insisted--even after being corrected--that he really WAS a girl, I might get a little testy, but so far that hasn't happened.

--Skirts and dresses are one thing, but I've got no patience with people who think a long-haired guy in kimono or robes looks feminine. That's just ignorance. Men have worn flowing clothing in other cultures for thousands of years.

 

If it quacks like a duck and waddles like a duck, it's a duck.
Technically speaking none of these resins are sexed; they are unanimated resin.
But if someone is "constantly" being offended by their own personal choices in clothing these dolls, then I think the problem is theirs, not the ones who, making logical assumptions based on clothing choices, call the doll a female.

 

I definitely have to go with the majority on this one and say that you don't have the right to get offended when your intentionally feminine looking doll is called a girl. In fact, i'm surprised people are bothered by this at all, because i assume the reason they dress their dolls that way is because they enjoy pretty frilly girly looking clothes, regardless of anatomy. Therefore, if the look you're going for is GIRL!, why is it offensive for someone who is out of the loop of your personal dolly realm to assume the obvious? I say, you're pretty much asking for it, aren't you?

I'm not trying to offend anyone here, but it seems silly to get upset over this.

When you DO have the right to complain, as others have said, is when someone has been clearly TOLD your doll is one gender or the other, despite looks, and the person insists on calling them the opposite gender.

 

@Xuchivith I would have to agree with you completely.

 

I agree with mod Jessica. Being a guy myself I'm used to seeing girls in skirts and guys not in skirts. (though going to anime cons you see some strange things) If people are gonna' dress their male dolls in girlie outfits then people are naturally gonna' assume that the doll is female. It's the same if one has a small chested female doll and that person dresses her in male clothing, ie a good friend of mine, people will assume that the doll is male. For someone to get upset over people mistaking their dolls gender is rather dumb in my opinion.

 

It is funny that this seems to be the opposite of what is true IRL. If a real guy wears a skirt (and is serious about it), he'd probably prefer to be referred to as a "she". So I can't see why it would be a big deal to call a male doll dressed in a skirt a "girl". In fact, it would be the polite thing to do!

 

@Rileylaurent: laughed so hard with that, but it's so true!

For me, I don't feel offended when somebody calls my doll a 'pretty girl'. It actually happend when I got my doll like two days. My father said to me that she's such a pretty girl with such a lovely face. My doll had his assassin clothes on at the time and his short red furwig (he's a dollzone hid) so I don't even know where that came from! My mother and I started laughing so hard, my poor dad didn't know what he said wrong ^-^

Also my mother told me this a week ago: why don't you make him a dress? Dolls in dresses are so lovely. When I told her he's a male she said: why not, nobody wil notice if you also buy him a girly wig and make him a bust from clay or something to put in the dress or corset. It's not wrong to let him play a female for one day, so you can have two genders. My mom has creative thoughts sometimes, but she was right. It is a doll and a lot of dolls are females (like barbies, plastic dolls etc.) so it's only normal people who don't know BJD's wel will cal them girls.

So I wouldn't feel offended if somebody calls my doll a 'lovely girl' if he wears a dress (actually you should se it as a compliment). It's like Rileylaurent says: in real life, these men want to be called girls!

 

Well I guess people do assume girls wear skirts and boys wear pants. :'D This case kinda reminds me of something lol. Back when I was a sailormoon fan, I asked my sister to guess which character is which sailor on the poster. She said they all look the same. I was kinda offended by her comment. To me, each sailor is unique and easily recognisable. But if you think of it, people who aren't in the same interest as you, probly don't care at all. It's just like your sister keep saying that boy doll is a girl doll just because he wears a dress. She probly can't care less I guess, that's why she's always forgetting his gender. It's ok to be annoyed, but it really isn't a big deal, be happy how you dress up your doll~ :3

 

You have the right to feel however you like. However, in this instance, I also have the right to think you're being more than a bit silly if you're seriously getting keyed up about mistaken gender on a cross-dressed doll.
That said... if I ever get Yorick a body, he'll probably get cross-dressed more often than not...

 

There are so many dolls out there, and a lot of male dolls have feminine features. If people aren't into dolls I can see how confusing it could be to them. If they cant see their bits and call them the opposite sex, I think that should be nothing to get upset over. It is just an easy mistake. It would be far more embarrassing and hurtful if it was something that happened in real life.