Fickle Owners?

How do you guys feel when you see a seller sell away their doll just to get another one?
I buy and sell a lot. It doesn’t bother me to see others do the same. In all honesty, I think the concept of "bonding" is overrated and too much emphasis is put on it. To some people, it IS a big deal and they treat every doll they receive like they have an obligation to love it, and that to sell it would be hurtful to them and/or the doll even if things aren’t working out like they wanted. But to some of us, it’s not. I have never considered my dolls to be anything other than dolls. And though I am attached to some of them way more than others, at the end of the day, they’re just things.
　
If I receive a doll that’s not what I thought it would be (because all the sales and owner photos are still profoundly different than having the real thing in your hands), I’m not going hang onto it and try to "bond" or otherwise make things work when it is obvious to me that they aren’t going to. Why hang on to something that isn’t what I wanted it to be in hopes that one day I might like it? That kind of logic makes no sense to me. Better to keep searching for The One, and to let the other doll to go someone who will love it more than I do. Everybody wins.
　
And, like a lot of folks in the hobby, my disposable income is limited so to be able to afford a new doll, I often have to sell a doll. So, if something comes along that I want, I’ll be posting a doll or two up for sale to make that other purchase happen.


If you've done this, have you ever felt like...guilty at all?

No. These aren’t kids or pets or living beings. They’re expensive toys.They’re not going to get their feelings hurt. I would feel more guilty about hanging on to something that didn’t live up to my expectations and pouring time and money into it to try to make it into something better…than I would about simply selling and moving on.


What are your own personal reasons for letting one go for another?

#1: money. It would be nice to keep All The Dolls, finances dictate that one must be sold for me to afford another. Clothes that didn’t work are sold to raise money for more clothes. The same with eyes, wig, etc.#2: I didn’t like the doll as much as I thought I would. I am a very hands-on person when it comes to the hobby. Photos are nice, but I have to see the doll in person with my own two eyes before I know whether I have made a good decision or not. I also know myself well enough to be able to recognize when something is not going to work for me more or less right out of the box. If it doesn’t work, I am not going to pour *more* money into new eyes, wigs or faceups to try to make it work. That is a waste of time and money to me. I would much rather just re-sell the doll and try again. ​

 

You obviously don't understand the meaning of my words from a psychological standpoint, then.
Its pretty much on the same page as people who fall in love with someone purely based on a first impression (whether it be looks or their social front) and then discover too quickly that they grow tired of them and toss them aside in favor of someone new.

Fickle people are generally just as fickle with their real life relationships as they are with their personal possessions. This is what I meant.
Anyone who can't admit that is basically just fooling themselves.

 

How do you guys feel when you see a seller sell away their doll just to get another one?
I'm so glad some people do this, because it allows me to get limited dolls (especially ones from years ago). As for people who buy dolls just to turn around & sell them, making a profit - well, I only get irritated at the ones who seem to dissemble about it. I mean, what's wrong w/admitting that you are getting this really limited doll in order to check it out then turn around & sell it? Although jacking up the price really high is annoying, if there's no demand, it's not selling so no problems LOL

If you've done this, have you ever felt like...guilty at all?
I've not done it, & I probably won't. Not because I think it's bad or anything, but because I just get attached to things. I have my mother's baby doll, & my own. Not because they are worth $$$ but for sentimental reasons. I have my grandmother's school text books (ok, those are neat). I have to force myself to send stuff to Goodwill or our semi-annual yardsale.

What are your own personal reasons for letting one go for another?
See above. I did think that it would be cost-effective to buy several of the limited dolls I really wanted for some of my characters, do a bunch of photo-shoots for the photo stories, then sell them & get new ones. What a lovely thought. Not ever going to happen in my HH of course because I just CAN'T imagine selling any of my babies....
I am really glad not everybody is like this or the 2nd hand market would dry up LOL

 

I guess because most of us have only seen these dolls in pictures and don't go to meetups - we change our minds. I got into this hobby in 2008. Ive changed a LOT since then and so has my taste in dolls.

I had a vampire Shiwoo I saved up for the longest time. But I found that I didn't like white resin after all.
And I wanted a doll with normal skin. Still to this day I avoid white resin. Its just my personal taste.
Well, I felt bad but I decided to sell him. Because at the time I didn't have funds to buy another doll and decided it would be for the best. I actually ended up trading him for an EL and I was happy about that.

It's better to let go of something and get something you'll be happier with.
That happens in this hobby all the time. Lots of people have dolls that are 2nd hand.
I'm actually glad people buy them that way and they can continue to be enjoyed rather than collecting dust because someone lost interest.

 

I think you have a point with this!
I started by liking feminin skinny guy dolls with semi-stylised features, then moved on to more mature and realistic.
I used to think, the taller the doll the better. but now I want to get rid of all my big ones and get only 50cm- dolls! which is why I recently sold my precious soom migma and bought a MNF head.

 

Sho-Chan: "Fickle people are generally just as fickle with their real life relationships as they are with their personal possessions"

I think that's a bit too simple and sweeping to ring true. I'm sure some people we may all deem fickle behave just as you say but far from all of them. There is a big difference between a persons real life constantly evolving relationships with other human beings and their feelings, or lack of, for inanimate objects which come into their possession. I don't see much connection between the two.

Friendships, loves and family, even pets to some extent, these relationships are a two way thing. They take mutual commitment to maintain and the emotional attachment is huge. The break up of any one of those relationships is devastating, the emotional fall-out can go on for years... I don't really see any connection between that and buying and selling material objects? I, and many other people who have answered this thread, have no problem at all with parting with our dolls, but I imagine I am not alone in still having friendships that date back to childhood. I'm not fooling myself and neither are they.

 

I feel like people can do what they want. Sometimes a doll you like in pictures isn't anything like you expected in reality and sometimes you just plain don't like the thing anymore. That's life and that's okay. I think my only gulity feelings would come from the financial aspect of buying a doll I didn't love and having to sell it for less than I paid for it.

 

I would change the word "some" to "most." in that sense, I agree with you.

But my opinions are based on my experiences. So to each their own.

 

Well, despite my occasional idiotic compulsion to post . . . I've never seen much point in Dolly Debate, except to test how well my blood-pressure medication is working. I agree with you 100%; in my experience, most threads in Dolly Debate do indeed "precisely question people's motives," generally from a position of judgment, assumption, and accusation (either explicit or implicit). I don't think that's a good thing, and from time to time I say so. For example, the word "fickle" doesn't convey a spirit of inquiry and observation; it contains a judgment of character, along the lines of "capricious," "treacherous," "unfaithful," "untrustworthy." I believe strongly that no one has the right to pass judgment on anyone else's use of their own possessions, as long as that use doesn't cause harm to others.

Inquiring is great. Observing is great. And there are neutral ways to frame questions, as well as ways of owning your assumptions directly. It would have been much easier to understand that you intended to ask an open-ended question--"how do you feel when you sell a doll, and what have been your reasons for selling?"--if the opening post hadn't been mined with assumptions about the way BJD owners (all) view their dolls. It would have been much easier to understand that you were trying to understand the range of viewpoints among other BJD owners, if you had said up front that you have only seen or experienced deep emotional investment in dolls, but that you were curious to know whether other perspectives exist. Instead, you labeled owners who sell dolls as "fickle," and loaded your questions with implicit moral judgments, thanks to such words as "guilt." That's not inquiry or observation; that's a debating position, from which other people debated back at you. Exactly what Dolly Debate is supposed to do!

And I've just contradicted myself. Dangit, I guess I do see a point in Dolly Debate.

 

How do you guys feel when you see a seller sell away their doll just to get another one?
I think that the expensive nature of the hobby means that if you don't want/like a doll any more, then there's not much point in keeping it when selling it could go into buying the doll you DO like. So I don't see anything unreasonable about the actions of a seller selling their brand new doll to get a different one.

If you've done this, have you ever felt like...guilty at all?
I felt slightly guilty because no-one bought her for a long time, and it sort of felt like "I don't love her, no-one else will either", but that's just the whole emotional attachment thing.

What are your own personal reasons for letting one go for another?
The only reason I would let one doll go for another is if I didn't bond with her in the first place.

 

It's wrong to state something as fact when it's only based on your own opinion. For example, I know plenty of revolving-door-type friends who have changed their hair/clothing style/home decor/dolls tons of times, but keep their friends for years & years & years. So whose experiences carry more weight? I would never make a sweeping statement of fact that applies to all humanity just based on my own friends. You cannot even claim that "most people do [X]", because you simply do not know. It's folly to think you can judge a person based on their toy sales. I don't see a connection between the two either.

And with specific regards to sellers: I don't CARE if that person is fickle with their friends or lovers or family at home. As long as it's a solid non-flaky seller, with good Marketplace feedback, who is selling something I want, at a good price, and who doesn't try to rip me off.... then I don't care if they've been through six husbands or just ditched their BFF yesterday. It's none of my business and has no bearing on commerce.

 

THIS

When you, Ephemeral Dream, use words like "fickle" and "shallow" there is a judgment being made in your inquiry and it is one I don't agree with.

I'm not ashamed of the fact I sell dolls when I don't want them anymore or if they are not what I expected/hoped and I don't see it as a moral failing on my part either. Even if I had mountains of money, I still would sell dolls when they don't work out.

 

How do you guys feel when you see a seller sell away their doll just to get another one?
I find it odd only if said person has been ranting and raving about them until that point. Then again it's their doll and they can do whatever they'd like to it. ^.^

If you've done this, have you ever felt like...guilty at all?
Yes, I have and I don't feel guilty in the least since I know that they went home to someone that would give them more attention than I would.

What are your own personal reasons for letting one go for another?
I let go of three of my dolls because I a. couldn't really bond well b. couldn't afford to spoil them. The first was a LittleFee Elf Ante, I let her go because at the time I didn't really have the funds to spoil her as much as I wanted to. The second was a DoC Petsha, even though she was my first doll and I loved her there was something about her that always bugged me. Don't get me wrong, she was super cute but there was something about her that I just didn't really like and it bothered me. The third was a DoT E-An basically it was the same thing that happened with Petsha. There was just something about her that didn't allow me to bond with her.

 

Dolls are items, products. They are not a neccesity, they are something pretty to look at. Who cares if some random person on the internet buys and sells their dolls all the time?

 

They bought it. They can take a sledgehammer to it for all I care. There are worse things they could do to it than sell it because they want a prettier doll or a doll they find more suiting to their needs.

Personally, I don't think I'll ever sell a doll unless I absolutely need the money. The prospective dolls I have went on my wishlist after loads of consideration, since I am using them to shell out characters of mine. Plus... I tend to bond with certain inanimate objects... dolls and stuffed animals to be exact, so... even if I find a better doll for a character, I'd likely find a place for the "old doll."

 

No, not necessarily fanatical or too serious either. I'm one of those people that does place emphasis on bonding (for myself, that is), though I will still sell a doll if I need to. Sometimes it just doesn't work out. People approach dolls in different ways, and a lot of people do have a pretty strong emotional investment in their dolls. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. When people get into trouble is when they sit back and start judging other hobbyists, because they don't play with their dolls the same way. That might mean being judgmental because someone decided to turn around and sell a doll, or it could mean being judgmental because someone does put stock in 'bonding.' The thing to remember with abjds is that there is no right or wrong way to go about the hobby (except the obvious, don't scam people ). People tend to spend waaay too much time worrying about what other people do with their dolls.

 

Taco, I love the way you expressed that!

Before I joined DOA I had never heard of a person "bonding" with an inanimate object, I assumed it was just a figure of speech and so I was really interested in any thread where other members discussed their feelings toward their dolls, how they felt they had souls or whatever. The fact that people have completely different beliefs and ways of going about things is what makes life so interesting, surely? In the debate threads people can come at things from totally different stand points and express their views and defend them quite vehemently, it's often educational! I am totally happy with arguing the toss with anyone who has a completely opposite view to me as long as they are not making these sweeping judgements. If no-one is breaking the law then there is no right or wrong way to approach things. Mutual respect is always a good starting point!

 

[paragraph]I know a man who's owned as many cars as he is years old. I'm not sure I see how the dolls are different from that. People name their cars, and if it's got a habit of X or Y error (say, a finicky starter), they'll say, "Aw c'mon Jenny, you can do it..." Their cars can have personality too. I don't really judge him as being fickle: trading cars so often he's never really had increases on car payments. Just because I was raised to be the kind of person who's now got a 13 year old car that just got a brand new engine so I'll probably hold onto it for another 10 years... Doesn't mean everyone's gotta be.[/paragraph][paragraph]Their money, their stuff. I've changed my mind about a shirt shortly after I've bought it. It happens. As a rule, things change, opinions change. Therefore, stuff changes.[/paragraph]

 

How do you guys feel when you see a seller sell away their doll just to get another one?

Well, that depends. I understand if the doll wasn't the kind owner wanted but I feel little bit confused if someone sells the brand new doll before they've even give it a chance. Then again I understand that this is hobby is quite a money-eater but still... I don't think it's wrong because these thing aren't really alive after all but it would kinda feel nicer if the owner would have tried to like the current doll.
But it's their choice so it doesn't really bother since it isn't really my business.

If you've done this, have you ever felt like...guilty at all?

I don't do this but if I did... well, I don't see any reason to feel guilt. It's better to sell the doll for someone who''ll play with them rather than keep it in the closet and never pay any attention to it. :3

What are your own personal reasons for letting one go for another?

Change of style, character, own taste and lately the change of size. And of course the main reason is the lack of money D8