Pediophobia

All I can say in response to the last few pages is:

I have been to several wakes.

I have also sat by the bedsides of several people as they died, to comfort them into the next world, or to aid and comfort their grieving relatives.

Death is not scary. It is often peaceful. The earthly shell left behind after the soul has flown is not scary either.

As far as I'm concerned, BJDs definitely do not resemble "little dead people". They have "life", and we give it to them - if we're not "creepy", they aren't either.

 

please pardon the dim-ness of this post, I'm not awake yet, no caffiene yet...

I think that they are facinating obviously... but you guys might enjoy looking up some info on Japanese older dolls (ball jointed some of them, and some cloth jointed) Some of them are life-size children. My friend owns some, and her children asked her to put it away because it scared them (her children are highschool/college aged.)
I think they are really cool! (but maybe I wouldnt want to see one at night in the shadows. hahaha)
Anyway, a lot of these dolls, people believed that the doll, if they treated it well, and took care of it, would grant their wish to have children. So they were positive dolls. (though there probably are a few stories of dolls who were treated BADLY....)
Also, I can't remember exactly which dolls these were, but they wouldnt throw them away in Japan, they'd set them under a special tree instead.

anyway, a quick look in Japanese folklore about dolls and you can probably find out the whole story. like I said, I'm a little fuzzy this morning.

 

RubyD, one of my LJ friends, drew a fanart for Yami no Matsuei. Yami has a few dolls in it because of Muraki, and so in this fanart she had one character with a doll and a quote to the side:

"Dolls are beautiful and also very frightening, because when we look at them, we see death." ~ Simon Yoshida

Further, people used to take pictures of dead people for memories and they look like dolls because of the blank stare. Some people probably think along the same lines with dolls. They're a reminder of death.

Fearing small children...I can't really understand that. Unless of course someone was tramautized as a child and fears reminder of that. I know I love children, but if I have to interact with them on their level, I'm a bit fearful. I don't know why, but I think it has to do with how I fear hurting them like I was hurt.

Dolls, whether or not they look like small children, are reminders of them because people automatically make a connection between the two.

Or at least that's my two cents on it. ops:

I think in a nutshell people are reminded of death and innocence in dolls and small children, and are reminded of their own mortality and corruption and fear that, but since it's not a concious fear, they project it onto the object/child.

 

There are often cultural things in the western world that inspire the fear of dolls in many people. This can be traced back to early Abrihamic religions that condemned the use of idols or painted images of any types. For example, the Amish give their daughters dolls to play with, but the dolls do not have faces. In some Eastern cultures it is accepted that dolls and lifelike figures have a supernatural presence but not necessarily in a bad way.

To go with a simple theory, people may fear art dolls because of their relationship to the adult world. In the US dolls are thought of as an icon of childhood. To see them made with an adult aesthetic and involved in an adult world may be off-putting to the more pedestrian intellect.

I work for a doll company, I think their product is a little on the creepy side. On the other hand, I am a fan of art dolls starting with my Sasha dolls right up to my Azone 60cm. I also sculpt One-offs so I've seen the reactions people have first hand. Often people who go to my website after seeing my illustration or pop-art toy work feel that the dolls are "Heavy" or even "scary" which is interesting because it was all created by the same artist.

 

BJDs do look more mature than other dolls. The ever-popular 18" porcelain dolls hold little appeal to me because they just look like children trying really hard to be grown-up, and it just seems... Wrong.

I'm scared of lots of dolls, and think others are ugly. It all depends on the doll itself. A lot of dolls are just drop-dead beautiful, like most BJDs. However, my stepmother has a collection of dolls and a lot of hers are creepy. There's a clown doll she has that stares at you at night, and its head falls off randomly in the night... Ugh, scares me. 'Course, I'm afraid of clowns, too.

I think it all depends on the doll and what a person associates with dolls and children themselves. I watched a program once where a girl's babysitter played a trick on her when she was young, and her boyfriend came over in a clown mask and she pretended to be dead, and the boyfriend scared the little girl to death... And all through her life, that woman had been afraid of clowns because of that. (Don't blame her.)

Definitely something that affects people on a very personal level. Although I'm sure there are those who say "It's creepy" or "It's ugly" just to be rude and hurt us.

 

Okay for school I had to choose a topic to write a feature article on and I decided to write about the reason why some people are afraid of dolls. And yet some of us are afraid of dolls but are not afraid of our BJDs. So I ask members of DOA what their take on this subject is. (I need actual personal reasons behind them when you comment not just "Because I'm Afraid of them..". Or you can just vote on the poll). And if some people could let me quote them on my paper with their consent, I would be totally grateful (Just tell me if you want to).

And im not completely sure if I should have started this thread here, but Mods feel free to move it to the appropriate place.

Thanks so much ahead of time if you do leave your opinion!

 

Personally I find BJ more grownup looking than porcelain dolls. BJD are...more streamlined, thinner, and have a child look to them without looking like a chubby toddler.
The body, I think, is more visually appealing, and very different from most porcelain dolls/american girl dolls/etc.

 

I can't imagine why people would fear dolls or even department store mannequins (notice how the "scary mannequin come to life" features in so many movies?) A doll is like a little moveable statue. Are people scared of statues? In ancient times, statues were often brightly painted to look 'real'.

Fear of clowns I can intellectually understand, since some of the makeup designs can look bizarre and possibly malevolent to children...

(Haven't seen "Chucky", but I've seen "Barbarella", and the robot dolls with gnashing metal teeth didn't scare me either.)

 

I used to sleep in my Grandmother's doll room as a child. I honestly was a very scared child in general, and all those blank eyes staring at me did not help. I have never been a doll person, more likely choosing stuffed animals over anything that looked like a person. When I found BJD, I was amazed that I wasn't afraid of them.

I think a great deal of it has to do with how *real* they seem. That should make them more scary, but I think it's the thought of an inanimate object being animate that scares us more. So thinking of a BJD as an animate or more life-like thing to begin with doesn't make it nearly as scary. That, and their eyes seem to have more life. They seem to have individual personality to them, instead of mass-made porcelain dolls. These have been made and cared for by human hands, and we love them. Thus, that love makes them real, and we are not afraid.

 

Hm... I wouldn't say I'm *afraid* of other dolls, but I don't find them appealing. At all. o__o I've never been a "doll person". I think it's that BJDs are so lifelike and convey so much emotion. It's more like having a little buddy by your side than a doll on your shelf. Porcelain dolls don't possess that lifelike quality IMO. They might have a realistic sculpt, but when you look them in the eye they look dead.

 

I'm also not a fan of dolls other than BJD, but that probably has more to do with the fact that I don't really find them attractive. In any case, many dolls, some BJDs included, can still scare me sometimes. (Usually a momentary sort of "whoa!" scare. XD) I think mostly it has to do with the angle at which I see their faces, and in which direction they're looking. Of course, if I look too closely at any inanimate object's eyes (stuffed animals included), I tend to creep myself out. I also find eyes where you can't see much of the white of the eye kind of startling.

 

Ahh, for me, I find only some other dolls creepy. Depends on how their face looks, (how it is painted) if it looks unrealistic or like.. those weird life-like new born babies; they creep me out because even if they do look like newborns... They have an overall; omg, you could sooo mistake it for a real baby.. I dunno, overall they are just sort of creepy.

but also some people have those dolls that have the eyes that look weird with the doll; like normal colors but when put in the dolls, they look almost insane D:

 

I'm not exactly afraid of other dolls... more like I just don't like other dolls (seriously, I never played with Barbies or any other doll when I was a kid) I'm just generally not a doll person, aside from ABJDs.

But I do work in a porcelain doll shop, and I can state a few things that I know would probably make people fear Porcelain dolls instead of BJDs (in my opinion, anyway).

Porcelain dolls have a serious lack of emotion, and life, in them. Their face sculpts tend to be almost deathlike. They look like little dead babies, or something. I know that creeps me out a little bit. Also, their eyes have a tendency of following you around a room, and they stare like there's no tomorrow. (at the end of the day, after having all those horrible dolls stare at me for hours and hours, I tend to get a little creeped out) But then, I'm inherently paranoid, and keep thinking the dolls are actually alive (like, undead alive) and watching me.... but thats something different. Back to dolls.

ABJDs, on the other hand, seem a lot more full of life and emotion, and personality. They don't seem dead. And it may be because the only doll I have so far has lidded eyes, but I haven't noticed his eyes following me around the room. And while some of the larger-eyed (usually more anime-ish) sculpts look to me like they might have that staring thing going on.... well, I'll never buy that kind, so I don't have to worry about them watching me.

Also the breakable aspect. BJDs are meant to be played with, thus making them more human and comforting. Porcelain dolls are breakable, and therefore have that whole "Stay away and don't touch" thing going on, which makes them seem more foreign or alien, and less pleasing. That could actually stem from a childhood fear, you know, the whole "don't touch" mentality. "Don't touch the stove, you'll burn yourself." "Don't touch the dog, he might bite you."

"Don't touch the doll."

I wonder if I'm making any sense?

 

I've never really been afraid of any sort of doll, in general... One specific one that belonged to a cousin freaked me a little because it had beady black eyes and a very wicked expression. You just *knew* that jester was up to no good... But on the whole? Nope. No heebie jeebies at all, even if they're realistic enough to fall in to the Uncanny Valley.

That said... I wouldn't classify myself as a "doll person". I only own one aside from Nameless... A Merlin doll I've had since I was in highschool.

(Well, there are also a couple of Barbies that my mother bought for me hanging around... Merlin & Morganna, and the LotR series... For some reason she thinks I'll like Barbies if they're in fantasy costumes. Nope. 'Still think they're dull. Just like I did when I was a kid... But they've never been out of thier boxes and are stuffed in the back of the closet, so I don't think they count.)

 

I'm not necessarily scared of dolls, but porcelain dolls do creep me out sometimes. I used to sleep over at a friend's house often when I was a child, and this particular friend had a whole line of porcelain dolls on the shelf by the bed. Waking up at night or in the early morning, their pale faces and the glint in their eyes was all I could see of them and THAT was a very scary ordeal for me as a child. XD Like others have mentioned, I think it's the "blank stare" that porcelain dolls give you that's scary.

Also, I know a lot of people, me included, get BJDs to represent their characters - that makes them someone "familiar" instead of a nameless random baby that sits around and stares at you, removing a lot of the potential to scare someone.

 

ooh...i can rant and rave for hours on this topic.
for one, my mother and sister are avid doll collectors...and i've seen lots of dolls out there. Mainly the little baby ones. Not only are some of them scary...they are just plain ugly. They make them fat and wrinkly with gaping mouths and tiny eyes. And then most doll faces....there is always something drastically wrong. The nose usually looks like someone pushed it up and kept their finger there, or their mouth is just BLEH. i don't know, its hard to describe, but the dolls i have seen look oogly. I mean no offense to doll collectors in general, but seeing as a good deal of them end up around my house, lets jsut say i gave up on dolls a while ago.

Bjds on the other hand are maturer, and more proportional. Unlike barbies, or those little fat wrinkly babies, they are elegant. And their allure lies in a) they are poseable b)they are utterly customizeable, c)they have a unique style not found in your updgy nosed curly top plastic or wooden dolls. Yes, i have seen somne descent and cute dolls out there, but the rest just make me shudder. Alos, the ones available to genearl public are soo massed produced tha they look rushed and deformed. You can see that time was spent on these BJD's.

 

I'm afraid of all dolls. But... not BJDs. XD

My fear of dolls stemmed from watching the movie "Child's Play" when I was about 3 or 4. I wasn't supposed to watch it, but the adults were watching it at my grandma's house one night and I snuck a peak. I kept having nightmares about Chuckie... u_u There was actually a poster of him at the local video store, and everytime I went their with my parents, I would avoid looking at it. If I happened to see a picture of him, I would start screaming and crying. n_n; Even now, when I go to a video rental store with my boyfriend, when I see any movie with Chuckie in it, I will just freeze... My heart will start thumping really hard and I'll start to cry.

Anyway, I had a lot of those infant baby dolls as a child as well as Barbies. I wasn't very afraid of Barbies, because they just somehow didn't seem "real" to me. But I would take VERY good care of the baby dolls. But only because I thought that if I was mean to them, they would somehow hurt me when I slept. One day I just went nuts and took a pencil to ALL of their faces. After looking at them again, I was frightened!!! I threw them into my closet, and never took them out again until my mom saw and threw them away. To this day I don't sleep with my closet open, even though there are no dolls in there.

I absolutely love BJDs though. I think it's the more artistic aspect that appeals to me, since I am an artist. n_n;

 

i forgot to add that my bjd scares the hell out of my guy friends XD. their reactions are worth taping....its the eyes. I was scared by them too. They look soo realistic!! And they ahve a nasty tendancy to follow you like big paintings in old houses (the eys i mean).

 

I've never been afraid of dolls.
But I have this one friend who is extremely afraid of porceline dolls but not ball jointed dolls. In her mind they are plotting against her. They look at her with wanting, hungry eyes. Desireing her body for their own. She thinks they house the souls of lost children.

On the other hand, she thinks BJDs are "preety", creepy but pretty.

My other friend who I've introduced to ball jointed dolls is really scared of all dolls in general. She thinks they look too much like real people. She's also been scared to death by hearing stories of them killing people.

 

there are some dolls that are just..evil. i have come across some antique ones and they have the worst vibe to them. Like they were sitting in the room while thier owners tortured children.
twisted..but true.