Dolls and feminism

I've seen enough talk here about certain dolls being sexy and certain parts needed to be bigger and more attractive. Talk that made me think the dolls were reduced to slabs of (resin) meat, objects of lust and nothing more while the drool was almost oozing out of the computer screen. Talk from women about male dolls, mind you.
Are wel then all sex crazy old ladies who care nothing about the personalities and feelings of men? I don't think so and I hope people agree with me that a subset of a group is just that. A subset and not the whole group. Not all BJDs out there are sexualising women like Bratz dolls are thought to do (although I don't think they are). Dollmore has non-standard pretty faces like Noal and Maunier, although in Dollmore's world all the dolls are models. To me that sounds like that even non-standard girls can be pretty.
Bodies take a lot more time and money to develop and you take a bigger risk when you try to sell something non-standard. It may be a big hit and others will follow, but you may also fail and take a financial hit. I can't blame small companies trying to play it safe.

 

I found a link I wanted to add to my point The Sharmistha Doll

 

I agree, I have also felt this from the feminism movement.
Sorry for the double post.

 

I don't think my girls are "perfect" by any means. I have two MSD RS girls and I actually think the bodies are pretty typical. They have somewhat large butts compared to their thin waist and somewhat small boobs. Pretty average for a thin girl. I am getting a large bust AoD girl, but I don't think big boobs are unrealistic at all. I'm actually pretty tired of hearing about how terrible large busted dolls are for being unrealistic, when I am a naturally large busted woman. I'm not skinny by any means, but even when I was, as a teen, 5'4", 115 lbs, size 3, I wore a 36D bra. It's not impossible to be thin with large breasts and if anything, I think that saying so can result in the opposite effect...girls that DO naturally have that figure get passed off as fake, when we are not.

In my opinion, femininity has nothing to do with being perfect or trying to look like a piece of plastic. It has to do with being a sexually appealing female, regardless of size, hair length or "perfection". A natural looking heavier girl with chin length hair can be every bit as pretty and feminine as a thin girl with long curls and plumped up lips.

 

I will third this I think that the feminist movement has matured sufficiently to the point that it is OK for girls to like 'girlie things' without being stereotyped as an airheaded slave to fashion and all things shallow.

The first abjd was a 10 year old little girl with a flat, straight, and not terribly slender body. Now there are a lot of different shapes, sizes and ages to choose from... just about everything, if you look (except for maybe the middle aged man with a pot belly... haven't seen one of those yet.)

I do not agree with this, I don't think that the main focus of this hobby is realism, that has only come into play recently: abjd started out as sweet adopted children with big eyes, and cute fairy/angel children.

There is a selection of girls with big thighs if that is what you want. If you are not seeing a lot of these on the boards or at meets, it just means that they are more difficult to come by or less popular in that particular crowd/on that particular board, but they are available if you want them.

 

Do the pretty female dolls out there affect how you feel about yourself, if you're a woman?

It is difficult to look upon something from the outside if you are inside it - with this I mean my perception system - but I tend to think they don't affect me much in my self-esteem or my view on my own body shape, but that they do affect my perception of the world. I often find myself attracted to the look of the doll body and face. And the problem is, all these dolls, even with more unusual body shapes, are still beautiful by our modern cultural standards. So even though the female dolls don't make me feel bad about myself, they still reinforce my perception of female beauty as it is preached to us by the media.


And do you think your ideas of feminity have led you to feel differently about female dolls? What do you consider feminine in a doll?

Personally, if talking about body shape, I would say that a curved or rounded bodyshape with a more female-specific body fat distribution (hips, behind, breasts, legs, face as opposed to stomach area only) is generally more feminine. But I could perceive ANY female doll, no matter what bodyshape, to be „feminine“, if she is dressed in traditional feminine attire... even if the doll is, in fact a boy with an androgynous look. I am a product of my world, and I am not free from the influence of media, education and social environment.


Do you think BJDs impact on your ideas of feminism?

It is the exact opposite - my ideas of feminism had an impact on my approach to the BJD hobby for a long time. I had fallen into the trap of "feminism = getting rid of anything traditionally feminine" . Because of this misconception, "feminist" sounds like a pejorative term to many young women! And because of this misconception, I stayed away from dolls (though loving them) for many years.

By now I see through the illusion and know that feminism doesn't have ANYTHING to do with liking or not liking dolls. Feminism is also not about becoming masculine, except it is what you like. Feminism is about having a choice how you want to be, if you are female - a choice that was denied women for a very long time.

To be honest, I think we can – and SHOULD - question the gender roles that society gives us, but we cannot simply escape from our learning experience, so even if we are feminists, we will still look at a Barbie in pink ballerina attire and put her into the „feminine“ box in our head. And as long as it doesn't make us feel bad, I don't think it is a big problem. We can just rewrite the label on the box into „feminine as our culture sees it today“ - and still buy the Ballerina Barbie. Or our female BJD. This doesn't make us bad feminists.

 

Do the pretty female dolls out there affect how you feel about yourself, if you're a woman?

Dolls do not negatively influence how I feel about myself. If anything, collecting dolls has made me appreciate the diverse, real, imperfect beauty of real women even more! To me, dolls are stylized pieces of art, and I view them as such, not as a mirror of myself or of any other woman.

And do you think your ideas of feminity have led you to feel differently about female dolls? What do you consider feminine in a doll?

Harmony of features is what I consider feminine in a doll. For example, I find CP's original Delf girl bodies - both "mature" and "girl" - to be very feminine. But, I also find Volks' SD10 girl body feminine as well, with it's little fat folds and small chest size. These three bodies are very different, yet they all have a certain harmony of features that I find very feminine and endearing.

Do you think BJDs impact on your ideas of feminism?

I find that some women/girls who call themselves feminists are very quick to reject anything that is considered "too girly". I am a mixed bag when it comes to femininity - I am the girl who has a ton of make-up (which I use regularly!), likes pretty dresses and jewelry, collects dolls and coos over kitties; but, I'm also the girl who is a big aviation enthusiast, fixes computers (both hardware and software) and other electronics, puts together furniture and is quite good at plumbing. My view on feminism? Be what you are and don't stifle parts of yourself that may not conform to either the stereotypical "feminist" ideal or to the stereotypical "girly girl" ideal; to me, this is what feminism is all about.

 

I have opinions on what looks feminine, but my female dolls don't reach those heights. Neither do many female dolls that I see. The dolls are a mockery of the female.

The feminine is a predominantly male invention that women see as a path to acceptance and desirability. Call me cynical, but I do believe women accept these terms out of fear. On a more cynical note - concepts of femininity are enshrined by a male victory in the battle of the sexes.

 

THIS. Oh my goodness THIS.

 

I think that in a lot of ways femininity is being reclaimed to have nothing to do with the male gaze or expectations. Take Lolita fashion for example, it's girls and women dressing in the most feminine clothing possible, with lots of frills and big poofy, girly skirts, looking doll-like in a lot of ways but it's done purely out of a love for the style, it has nothing to do with attracting the male gaze.

Could you perhaps elaborate on your point about it being 'a victory in the battle of the sexes'? Because while it obviously has different meanings and connotations at it's heart femininity is about the female, it's about the qualities associated with the female body and gender, some of which do arise from traditional gender roles and stereotypes but aren't in and of themselves bad things. If anything the idea that being feminine means we have to be weak, feeble or delicate are constructs of society and by actively and automatically rejecting anything and everything feminine because they are 'bad' we are buying into those constructs. Just because I might choose to wear a skirt on occasion doesn't mean I'm afraid of anything, it doesn't mean I'm pandering to a male gaze, if someone decides to judge me based on the fact I'm wearing a skirt and not by some aspect of my actual personality, my attitude or what I have to say then really that's their problem because all it really means is that I happened to feel like wearing a skirt that day.

 

Like dollblue, I think my feminist views have impacted my collection, but in a different way. I believe that feminism is more about the empowerment of self rather than the physical image one projects, so I like to think that I have a wide variety of female dolls, the majority of which are empowered and strong women.

I also think there is a variety of body types, which I enjoy. They may be stylised, or as Kim said a fantasy, and it's certainly no different for the male dolls out there too, but I still feel that I've managed to collect a reasonable variety. Dolls have probably improved my self image if anything, in that I am able to experiment with fashions and styles I like which really don't suit my own body type.

 

Honestly, if all the female dolls out there weren't so unrealistically pretty or adorable I'm not sure anyone would be buying them. I don't know about the rest of you, but I would never spend that much money on a doll that looked an average, everyday normal girl. I'd want something spectacular and gorgeous. So yes, they might look like a stereotype or be sexist, but that's what sells.

 

Personally I'm old enough now that I realize societal expectations and how I defy them but I am not alienated or threatened by this arrangement for 1 reason: men are just as trapped if not more so than we are by these expectations.

Women can be tough, rough and tumble, braggarts, or any other cliche in the book and it's tolerated but "boys will be boys" is still the dominant attitude. A girl can get an action figure but a boy still can't get a doll, and sure there are still some major inequities (from many industries being run like "old boy's clubs") but women seem to be making more progress than men.

In court men find it difficult to get custody even when they're the better parent. Women get special grants to attend college and added protection through biased harassment programs. men are still an enormous percent of the prison population compared to women, and have higher conviction rates and sentences for the same crimes. Men in many families are expected to enlist in armed services and many die whereas women are not pressured to join up.

Just think, there are pear-shaped and unusual girl dolls but are there comparable male dolls? Most male dolls are in much the same boat of being skinny and ideal or muscly eye-candy. so no, I don't really worry about it. Honestly I don't really collect female dolls anyway, but if I did I'd probable dress them more like real people than frilly foo foo or sexy styles. If someone else wants to dress them like that it's their right, just like if they dress their boys that way. XD Pushing boundaries is the easiest way to change society.

 

Wow? Really? Is your assumption that the child has had no say in choosing her toys, then? And that wanting to copy her mother is somehow a bad thing? What if it's a boy pushing the pram? Is that automatically okay? And if so, why is it wrong for the girl?


As a parent, I am having a really hard time understanding your statement. Our son had access to both "girl" and "boy" toys. He played with both. But by your logic, him choosing the boy toys must also have been "creepy" because he was being forced into a male stereotype.

Thank you for putting this so eloquently. As someone who came of age in the eighties, my first bosses were female baby boomers who had been on the vanguard of women breaking into male dominated fields. I earned a PhD in a male dominated scientific field, but after rotating through two labs run by women, I chose a man as my dissertation advisor. Why? Because he treated me fairly. The females I worked under tried to outdo their male colleagues in stereotypical masculine traits-- i.e., smoking cigars, getting drunk nightly on bourbon, dressing like men, cussing like a longshoreman, etc. But at the same time, they reveled in being the token female-- so much so that they blocked the path of the women coming up after them. So instead of taking on the good traits stereotypical to men, they took on the superficial ones, and kept all of the negative female stereotypes (like backstabbing female coworkers).

So to me, an argument that dolls give girls and women a negative view of themselves is superficial. The problem is much more in the way women treat each other and how they respond to men. If a parent wants her child to grow up to be an assertive woman, she needs to model assertive behavior. Can she do that while wearing a skirt and makeup? Absolutely. Parents are the most important figures in a child's early life. The behavior they model in how they treat the same and opposite sex, and in how they filter and help their child interpret things they see on TV/internet/the outside world is what will give their child a negative or positive self image.

 

BJDs are not going to be in the same category (regarding sexism etc) as Bratz or Barbie dolls. The diversity of sculpts, the ability to personalize them, but most importantly, the MEN (pretty boys, the hunks, etc etc) make a huge difference.
I remember being so upset that the only decent boyfriend for Barbie was GI Joe (I realize this really dates me LOL) - that Ken was such a wimp. It was so one-sided - Barbie, her friends then maybe a boy or two. Of course, the way I'm wired, this translated to 'women are the important ones' LOL
Anyway, I think the demonization of feminity by feminists is insane. I have no problem w/pretty dolls (although I'm very partial to the male ones)

 

While I do think that we need to focus more on men's issues, I do hate how they are always brought up as if there is some sort of "competition" between which gender has more problems with sexism.

Maybe I am biased since I only like male bodies, and mainly female heads. But I do not think it is correct to say that the male bodies look as similar to each other as the female ones do. While all female bodies aren't exactly alike, from my limited gaze through, they look VERY similar to each other at the end of the day. There is the really skinny male body, the slightly more muscley male body, to the extremely muscely male body. I don't really consider having different bust sizes to really be "different."

Besides the infamous Puns and Mikalia bodies (and some others like Sharmistha and so on), there really isn't that much difference from one female body to the next. Not like the male ones.

I don't mind the "skinny" ideal, since some women really are that skinny naturally. And being skinny isn't necessarily the "male" or "beauty" ideal if you don't have the larger butt and boobs to go with it. Trust me on that one! But the big breasts... I don't know, I honestly REFUSE to buy big-breasted dolls since most big breasts just don't look that that. They sag. They have stretchmarks. Some of them can be more "udder-like" or deflated. Again I loved the Puns body since it had such natural breasts as well as figure (even though the figure isn't really that natural).

I think the thing is that people have to realize it's kinda like porn for females. People say it doesn't sell. But then I see so many women who are into yaoi. Giant conventions, websites dedicated to nothing but, etc. Where I go to buy anime comics, I found more yaoi than any other type of porn. And it was more graphic! I think the problem is that the artists (and even the doll community) assumes certain types of bodies won't sell. But then a body like the art-body of Puns comes out, and suddenly it's all the rage! I think it is riskier going from the stereotypical beauty of femaleness, but it can also be rewarding.

And I think that is the main problem with feminism and dolls. The dolls don't reflect (not only reality) but what people really want, just what people (the doll artists and all of us) think people (us) want.

 

I too believe that feminism is about empowerment, about having the ability to choose. I choose to play with dolls and I think we are beyond the age that girls are told they can't do something because they are a girl. "You can't become a car mechanic, you're a girl!" or "You can't play with dolls, those make you a weak slave to men!"?
I love to pamper my girl dolls. Make them look pretty and adorable. I don't think that weakens my position. I chose to get an MSc degree, I chose to have a job and earn my keep, I have access to birth control so I can choose to have children or not and when I get married I'll take my soon-to-be husband's name by my own choice (and he's taking my name, so we're on pretty equal ground).
Feminism is about women having the same choices as men and not about forcing women to make the same choices as men. There's also a call for a male-feministic movement, so men can have the same choices as women, like Duskkodesh mentioned.

Having girly dolls or sexy girl dolls doesn't hurt my sense of self-worth. They are toys and I have the choice to play with them and dress them the way I want, but they are still toys.

 

Hmm....interesting thought. I have to say when I choose a sculpt, it is not the individual assets I am looking at but how proportional the doll is. The new movement toward tiny upper bodies and larger lower bodies, doesn't appeal to me, because it is not proportional. It is being distorted for an artistic reason.

I am not saying these are bad sculpts, just not what I would want. As a large woman, I can't say I look at dolls and think "I wish I was like that", but I also don't look at large dolls and want one, again , because I have yet to see a 'large' doll that is proportional.

Dolls like Bratz, Barbie, etc....I do believe they leave a bad influence on girls. As a child, I had barbies, but I hardly played with them. I prefered more baby or child like dolls, they seemed more real. No one in my life looked like Barbie, so I didn't want one. People want dolls that look like other people, not some idealized form (at least I would hope so), but in this throw away society, this is what we get. Why? Well with Barbie the reason is simple...Money. They use the same molds for 30 years, and make more money that way.

I myself would prefer someone sexualize their doll in sexy clothes etc, rather than a person. Dolls don't have to worry what other dolls think of them, they are lucky. I am not getting into the debate that we shouldn't care what others think.......we know that, but we rarely do it.

I find that BJDs seem to actually help celebrate the female form more than anything. So many varieties, it is almost endless, just like the human body. I would pay lots for a bjd, that I wouldn't for generic dolls.

 

To me, The Imagination and idea to the BJD owner can make the BJD male or female with a simple thought in direction.
A very girly looking model BJD as many have probably noticed, Can very most likely actually be a Male
BJD in the eyes of who owns said BJD.
A BJD can have elegant long eyelashes but the owning person can have them Male, in mind.

I do agree the common look on beauty is outdated as I have in a previous thread about this topic.
I personally love monster looking dolls and have interest in what common people label "ugly".
Such as goblins and ogres, wicked witches, animalistic monsters. ect.
I can admire and appreciate beautiful fantasy-sculpted dolls, too,
But I have my own BJD interest with monster style BJD.

 

Well, this doesn't so much relate to what the OP was talking about specifically, but on the general topic...

Feminism, to me, is about giving women the choice to do what they want to do and have that choice respected. It's not about making women give up 'girly' things in favor of 'masculine' things, it's about saying that 'girly' things are on equal status with masculine things. Ie, saying that a doll is NOT an inferior toy to a robot or a box of legos, simply because girls like them, for example. It also means letting boys play with dolls with stigmatizing them as 'sissies' or 'gay.'