Making Boy Dolls....Boys! [~Small Edit~]

I have all boys, and people who see them for the first time always seem to think that they're girls for some reason. I can understand a bit with non-BJD people. BJD people can always tell they're male right off the bat.

What does annoy me is when they keep calling them girls after I correct them the first time.

...Or after I even take off their pants to prove that yes, they are boys. - -

 

The only way I can generally tell if a boy doll is a boy is because they don't (usually) have breasts. However, I have noticed that some sculpts are very flat-chested girls.

As a result of the androgynous/girly tendency in the BJD hobby I can't even begin to say how often people have said about my girl dolls (all but one of whom are fairly busty, but all of them have chin-length hair) "aww, he's so cute!"

Now, this doesn't offend me because it's funny, I just laugh and say "it's a girl", but what does upset me is the fact that the people who usually make this mistake tend to go on to explain that the reason they assumed she was a boy is because male doll owners have bitten their heads off for mistaking their effeminate boy clothed in a lolita dress with hair down to their butts as female. This just seems... wrong to me. If you put a dress on your boy doll, then who's to say it's not a flat-chested girl? Why be offended when people get it wrong? It just doesn't make any sense - you're making your boy look like a girl then getting angry when people mistake him for a girl? Please tell me I'm not the only one who sees the madness in this

I don't mind people mistaking my boys for girls and vice versa, I think it's funny that they can't always tell the difference (in fact quite possibly my girliest doll is a boy, though he doesn't wear girly clothes) and I certainly wouldn't be annoyed by it... I kind of get that if you have a boy you want people to know it's a boy but if you make them look like a girl you can hardly fault them I don't like this mentality of assuming male all the time, it just seems a bit silly to me... I can sort of understand being upset by the error if your boy doll is really rugged and has a beard and is wearing really figure-hugging masculine clothes, but even then it's still just a simple mistake usually made by someone who doesn't know an awful lot about the hobby and not something to get mad over ><

I didn't mean to go on like this for so long >.>;; Sorry Did that make sense, or did I just waffle?

 

My friends make fun of Kuroyami all the time xD
Things like:
Gaylord, He's gay and GIRLY!! come by every evening I take him with me..
And they're not wrong xD
he IS my gaylord and I'm kind of proud of his androgene look ^^
Almost every clothing suites him (yes even dresses =___=;; )
And I'm okey with that ^^ because I agree with the fact that he is sometimes a bit gay/girly ^^ xD

(also Dutch btw )

 

There's been loads of threads on this :Sweat, and I always have the same response:

Androgyny is big in the doll world, and no matter how much you know your boy is a boy or how masculine your doll is in the BJD WORLD, you have to understand that people outside the hobby will probably mistake your doll for something it's not every now and then.

I also have a problem with people who put their boys in dresses and then complain that they are getting mistaken for a girl. I'm not talking kimonos or kilts or whatever, FRILLY DRESSES, NO MATTER HOW OFTEN USED ON BOY DOLLS, WERE MADE FOR GIRLS. END OF STORY. Don't get upset your boy is wearing a dress. People will mistake it for a female.

Just overall, boy dolls DO look a lot like girls, even the more 'masculine' molds are mistaken for girls to non-dollie owners. Just accept it, don't get offended, there are a lot worse things in life to complain about :p

 

To be honest, I wouldn't know Fable was a boy JUST by looking at him. But, I DO try to wait till I A) notice the body shape and/or B) hear the owner say the gender before assuming. I went to a doll meet a couple weeks ago and had to take a pause for a moment because I thought this doll was just a very pretty boy at first glance but then realized, hey! She's a girl! So, yeah. I mean, obviously, if you put a dress on a boy doll, I'm going to assume "girl" until otherwise told. But, if it's nowhere near that obvious, I do try my best to be very careful.

In answer to the question, though, I just have to face facts. I haven't received my doll yet but I've already bought him a fluffy pink sweater and a pink bunny hat. Plus, to be perfectly honest, Wing's face has a feminity to it and that's partly why I chose him. So, if anyone mistakes him for a girl, I won't blame them. But I will kindly say it's a boy, he's just girly. No need to be offended by my boy being so beautiful.

 

One of my boy dolls (Ereyia, AoD An) is meant to be a transvestite, and a damn good one at that! So I just grin whenever someone says, "Oh! What a pretty girl!" It means my doll has succeeded in fooling them, muahahaha. I'd be shocked if someone looked at him and said he was a boy, especially if they didn't know about BJDs.

 

This post says everything that I want to say. ~

 

I searched around for a bit, but if this thread exists, please feel free to move it!

While searching for my first doll, I've been showing a friend of mine different molds to help me make that first step. But recently, I've been showing him mostly male dolls (I showed him Migidoll's website, for example) and his response was "All of these girls are so pretty!"

Which brings me to my point--Do owners of male dolls sometimes have to convince others around them that your doll is, in fact, male?
Do you get tired of people asking?

Any response would be lovely!

 

Ahaha, yes, sometimes you do have to convince people!

I once had someone tell me in person (at a doll meet no less ;w; ) that my boy doll was a girl xX; they pointed to his wig and clothes and went, "girl hair, girl clothes, it's a girl!" or something to that effect. I was really annoyed since I'd already told them he was a boy... so I pushed up his shirt to show his flat chest and said, "BOY."

That's really the only truly negative experience I've had with it, though... my aunt thinks some of the boy sculpts are female (so does my mum), but once I tell them "oh, no, that's a boy!" they get it. They always know whether the dolls I own are male or female, though, even if the boys sometimes dress in drag. xD

Actually, really nicely, my aunt even remembers (usually XD) whether my dolls are boys or girls, even when they're on the "wrong" body-- my AoD Chun Ze was on a girl body for ages, despite being a male character, and my aunt knew him as a boy even before he got a boy body. :3 I thought that was sweet.

 

I have a Migidoll Ryu with a pretty light face up, so yeah, he can look kind of androgynous to people not used to BJDs. When he was just a head I had to tell people that he was a boy, though now that he has a body there seems to be less confusion. I'm not quite sure what it is, since his body's not particularly masculine-looking clothed, but at least it convinces people better than his face does.

 

Surprisingly my doll-savvy friends know exactly who's a boy and who's a girl.
My family and non-doll interested friends need convincing though. I'll admit Fairyland's Minifee boys aren't overly masculine but I think at least the woosoo vampire elf boy shouldn't be confused with a girl. He will be dressed in nothing frilly or in any way effeminate though, so I'll really rage if people continue making the mistake ._.

 

My little guys get mistaken for girls very often, even by doll owners (and when I had my bigger ones, they'd be mistaken too sometimes). I generally have them all wearing short wigs and boyish clothes, but to be honest I can see how people would think of them as girls, so I don't even bother correcting people most of the time, and go on talking about my doll using either female or male pronouns (depending on the situation). I mean, does it really matter? They're representations of my characters and all, but someone (especially if it's a stranger I'll likely never see again) thinking the doll is a girl isn't going to make it any less a boy, and there's no point in sweating it.

Hey, at least they think my "girl" is cute, and wanted to know more about them. That's how I see it anyways.

 

It's usually random members of the public that make the mistake, if I'm out and about with one of my dolls (e.g. on my way to a doll meet, etc.) - it's usually the long hair that throws them, because I prefer long hair on everyone. It's an understandable mistake to make; on the whole, male dolls are fairly rare, so it's only natural that if they see a doll with long hair and a pretty androgynous face (those Cerberus Project sculpts do tend to be very feminine, after all! ), they're going to assume it's female.

I don't let it bother me; I just casually observe that actually, he's a boy and, if necessary, hoist up his shirt to show the lack of boobs. Sometimes they take a pants-down flash of his bits to convince them - but one glance of dollie peen pretty much shuts them up!

 

Part of it is because of a lack of familiarity with the bishonen aesthetic. When I brought a few yaoi manga to my friends to explain BL to them with examples, I kept telling them to "recalibrate" their expectations, because they thought even the semes were feminine-looking -- and I brought manga from Kazuma Kodaka, Naono Bohra and Inariya Fusanosuke, who tend to make their manly men manlier than average for BL XD

When your idea of a guy doll is GI Joe, the average long-haired, j-rocker bishie doll with dramatic makeup, frilly shirt and platform boots is going to look very femmy by comparison...

 

I have a friend at school, she's a good friend but she doesn't really approve of my BJD affection. In fact she finds them creepy and weird. Not only that, she also keeps insisting that my M, by Doll Leaves is a girl, or at least looks like one. I've spent a lot of time convincing her that he's not ;_;

 

Haha I own three guys (2 1/2 actually, one is just a floating head! ^_^) and they do get mistaken to be girls now and then. Oddly the manliest among my group Skye, gets mistaken alot more than my girliest looking guy Alistair whose in my dp XD Mm normally when people ask I'll just tell them that they're indeed guys and like you, points to their flat chest xD

 

Haha! Maybe this is why I used to only collect girl dolls

I'm not surprised about it anymore, I just laugh along with them and agree! The most recent time that happened was my looking at Soom ID51 London, who is preeeeeetty manly, but then I showed it to the Boyfriend and yep! He thought it was a girl XD

So now whenever I refer to London, I either start off with "You know that guy doll that looks like a girl?" or he replies "Oh yeah, the 'girl' doll" and we both laugh.

 

Sometimes, but it's not a big deal, really. A lot of people automatically associate dolls with being female and a lot of male abjds don't fit into the Western stereotype of masculinity. But if it makes you feel any better, I was carrying one of my dolls to a dollmeet in a restaurant and someone thought she was a small dog So it could be worse than someone just confusing their gender

 

Ahahaha....yes!!! My guys get mistaken for girls all the time.

I often take my dolls to school (it's a very laid back college). Once, when I brought my favorite SD, a young woman commented on how pretty "her" shirt was. When I corrected her, she laughed and said that she should have known - he had very developed abs for a girl!

 

Well, I have to admit that I always dress my boys in dresses and said "girls are here". But as long as they are dressed properly (like boys I mean), it is quite clear they are guys because of the body.