Sense of Entitlement to Dolls?

I think that the term "entitled" has become imbued into our popular culture and has taken on a connotation quite different from the original meaning of the word entitled. As in "I'm entitled to buy as many dolls as my particular budget allows me, and if any silly immature cry baby doesn't like it, they are entitled to feel sorry for themselves for no reason." Entitled now as a pop culture term refers to those who feel they deserve to reap perhaps what they have not sown. Just because. Let's all go watch "My Super Sweet Sixteen" and "You're Cut Off" together.
The thing that makes me weary on this forum are when I am made to feel guilty because I have more dolls than someone else. Or a doll they might want. Or when anyone else is, or when say people who take amazing photographs are made to feel guilty because they might have a nice camera, please reference the Moaning Over Gallery Plus thread.

 

Not related to the original discussion, but I'd like to add that talented customisers did indeed not one day wake up with magical customising skills. They had to learn their skills, but I dare say that most of them learned those skills partially through non-doll related activities. I'd advise anyone without any painting or sculpting experience to not buy a practice head, but to take a sculpting course or go to a painting workshop before taking on a big mod project.
Having an eye for how things work in three dimensions, knowledge of colour theory, depth perception, and anatomy, being able to analyse what you see, criticise your own work, finding solutions to improve your own work, and making choices are a handful of skills useful for customising BJDs, but can be learned in a multitude of ways. A lot of cheaper ways too. For $100 I could get a practice head or 5 to 8 painting lessons. Personally I'd take the lessons, waste a lot of paper, have some hours of fun, and go home with a nice painting or two and new, and useful skills. It does remain a personal choice, though. I can imagine that someone who is eager to make a three eyed, purple ogre doll is not jumping at the prospect of painting landscapes or making crooked pottery.

This is my first mod project. I already had several years of experience with painting and sculpting which came very handing during this project. If someone would have told me to get a practice head first, I'd have told them to get lost. I did not want to learn skills. I wanted to work on a certain concept and work it into something tangible with a BJD. I didn't need to learn basis skills, but during this project I did learned new skills that came in handy while working on other customising projects.
If I had have no basic skills when starting this project, I'd imagine the head would have ended up looking like crooked pottery and some practice would have been handy.

So how did those talented customisers learn their skills? My bet is by practising the basics and then use those skills on their dolls and meanwhile acquire new skills by working on their dolls. I personally believe that you don't need to practise on a BJD to learn the basics. If you already know the basics, apply those to your customising projects.

 

Taking up Muisje's theme that acquiring basic skills is a good idea before going on to specialize, which I wholeheartedly agree with, I'd like to share an example from my own experience of someone displaying a sense of entitlement in the negative. I used to tutor an art class revolving around "cartoon illustration". That's a pretty broad subject and involved looking at lots of different styles. I expected my students to have reasonable drawing skills and the majority did, those who didn't were eager to try out different things and so all was well. Except for one particularly sullen youth who didn't display any aptitude for drawing at all and pretty much refused to do any of the set exercises or join in with discussions, he also blanked me whenever I attempted to engage him one to one. After about 3 sessions he cornered me as I was leaving and demanded to know why I hadn't taught him to draw "anime", he was adamant that anime was the only form of "cartoon" he found worthy and was not interested in drawing anything else. He had determined to become a professional Anime Artist (presumably he is now aggressing some unfortunate animation tutor?). He also thought the other students in the class irrelevant, learning any art skills other than "anime" (or whatever warped view he had of it) to be a waste of time and went into a full blown "I want!!!!" foot stamping rage.

That to me was a very scary (at the time) display of someone thinking they are entitled to have the rest of the world conform to whatever goes on in their head. There was no mention of "anime" on the course outline. He had no respect for the art skills and years of practice of the anime artist either, to my mind, and expected to be given some magic formula that would suddenly make him an expert draftsman. It's what I presume the original question is about - whether we see this attitude displayed on the forums in relation to BJDs? Of course we do, there are those who think if they "want" then they should "have" and hugely resent anyone else who has if they can't. As I said in my earlier comment though, there has to be room for everyone, and we all need to be tolerant* of each others ideas, odd though they may seem to us. As long as you are just ranting on my keyboard rather than standing towering above me and screaming into my face, it's all water off a ducks back. Whatever, do with your dolls as you will* and I'll do whatever* I want with mine.

*Sadly I believe I will have to add the tiresome disclaimer that non of the words or phrases followed by the * are an incitement to use your doll to lure children, inappropriately post pornography, abuse trees and kittens, etc... despite that pretty much being a given for the majority of potential readers, my apologies to you for having to insult your intelligence.

 

I hope I'm not dragging this too OT...

muisje and vonbonbob, sometimes the skills used in doing things like faceups really are different. My background is in art, but the first time I tried a faceup, well, the outcome wasn't great. Drawing on the contours of a doll's face is very different from working on paper, and resin has it's own texture and feel. Now of course, if you use the appropriate resin friendly supplies, a faceup can easily be removed. But some skills do carry over better than others. I could see where previous sculpting experience could be a big plus if you're dealing with major additive modifications, for instance (and everyone is different in terms of what they're comfortable with). But, depending on the mod job, there can be a lot that's fairly bjd specific -- dealing with subtracting resin, the shape and nature of the surface of a doll, possible differences in materials and tools etc -- those are learning experiences you aren't going to get anywhere but on a doll. Now I'm not knocking the idea of people going out and expanding their artistic horizons if they want to -- that can be a very worthwhile and fulfilling activity on it's own, but if you have a medium you are particularly interested in, then you have to practice in that medium. In this case it happens to be dolls. If someone feels that their previous background is of help to them, that's great -- however, that's not a universal experience.

I think there was an interesting discussion about this in GD awhile back, actually.

 

Yeah, that's the bit I don't get. This IS a doll forum, and inside its galleries, you are SUPPOSED to show off your dolls. This is a place for sharing them. If somebody doesn't like to look at pictures or enter discussions about dolls they don't have, because it might make them feel bad, then I don't understand why they would join such a community in the first place.

Besides, if you let yourself be swayed by the imagined insecurities of others, you'd be trapped eternally between those two refrains: "You have a rare doll, you should show pictures of it, otherwise it means you don't care about it & don't deserve to own it" and "You have a rare doll, you shouldn't show pictures of it, because some non-owner might get jealous". And then you'd never get anything done-- except staring at your dolls at home & fretting about what some stranger on the internet might think of you. I personally have better things to do.

 

I find it especially odd as someone who used to be in anime/fanfic communities online, where sharing is absolutely vital, really. O_O

Heh, I solve the problem by never being able to win in-demand LEs *L*. Naw, it doesn't usually occur to me that other people might be jealous of my collection, so this hasn't caused me any personal trouble. A lot of the entitlement tantrum-type stuff seems aimed more at the companies than anywhere else.

 

I'm in the same position here. I've been drawing since I was a small child, have training, and even learned some sculpture over the years. It didn't save me when it comes to working on a doll head. (Admittedly, one of my main failings is my teensy tiny hands -- a lot of tools, like the average airbrush, or even a flex-shaft dremel, are built for a more average sized hand, and they're extra difficult to manage. That's tangenting off the tangent, though, so I'll hush on it.) Sometimes the differences are really subtle, and you pick up the necessary skills in unexpected places -- for instance, working with a graphics tablet? Hard, even though I have great hand-eye coordination (most of the time), because it's actually hand-eye-screen coordination instead. All my friends who spent their childhood on video games rather than with a sketchbook use it better than I do, since that's closer to the skill they developed as a result.

To tie this back in to the entitlement issue, however...

A lot of times, when I see 'bad entitlement behavior', it comes with the battle cry of, "THAT'S NOT FAIR!" I see it crop up often around issues of aesthetics services, actually. (See, I'm trying to circle back around to the point! )

"They should have more slots open! It's not fair!"
"They should take any brand of doll, and not state a preference or only take dolls from certain companies!"
"They have no business charging that much! Pastels and paint and MSC aren't that expensive!"
"They said they were closed but they did a doll for a friend! That's not fair!"
"They did a gift head for a friend, but I have to pay for what they do! If they can do it free for them, it should be free for me, too, even if I don't know them!"

All of these things fail to take into account that the artist in question really does have every right to take or refuse what business they do, or don't want to do, and that none of us are entitled to demand their time, skill, or services just because we want them. Similarly, an artist can and should set their own price point. If it's too high, they just won't be getting any business -- it's pretty simple.

Edit:

There you go with that pesky logic again!

I agree, though. I wouldn't walk into a designer boutique and be offended if some people there were wearing something more expensive than my Target tee shirt and jeans, then accuse them of showing off and trying to do me harm or make me feel bad. What they're doing has no bearing on me unless they actively get in my face about the difference and say something directly -- them walking around shopping or chatting is not getting in my face. It isn't about me and is not my business unless I choose to make it so, but then that's on me, not them. (That 'it's all about me' attitude, I suspect, is one of the principle seeds of the negative entitlement issues.)

 

Surreality, you are right, I'd completely forgotten about a thread I read a while back where more than a handful of people were stating their opinion that various face-up artists should remove any restrictions. There was a lot of petulant foot stamping, and you are right, really OTT displays of that "sense of entitlement" issue. That is one area where there is a real black and white, a person (a face-up artist for instance) offers a service, you either pay them to carry out that service or go elsewhere.

I was totally mystified by the attitude that any artist has some sort of duty to do the face-up I demand on my doll when they don't want to offer that service. There was a lot of talk of how they weren't running their business correctly by refusing to work on every doll sculpt out there and for a very reduced cost, even sometimes at a loss, because I WANT!!!

Yeah, my whole inclusive, there's room for everyone even the "entitled" vibe hits a brick wall there. No time for that attitude at all, if a face-up artist wants to set up shop ONLY painting Soom Sabik heads and they all have to have green eyebrows, well, that's the service they are offering, take it or leave it.

PS: Just to clarify, what I said about learning curves and those of us, you included by the sounds of it Taco and Surreality, who have been drawing, sculpting, etc, since we were small and can't resist the urge to tamper with everything that comes into our possession, well we have honed our basic skills to a pretty good starting point to go tackle a specialist thing like working on resin... or with a wacom tablet, it's just a case of adapting and refining the skills you are already adept with. I applaud the b*lls of someone who takes a £300 doll head as their jumping off point in acquiring those skills from scratch, who knows, they may actually pull it off, but maybe they should have tried mastering drawing faces on paper, then on an apple or something 3d first? They can do what they like, this hypothetical person but most of us find it easier to work our way up to something like this.

 

I feel you pointing at me, Sensei

Ah well. I *love* sharing my dolls, I just don't *love* all the work that I have to do to actually get them shared
(iz lazybutt).

 

I think a better term might be 'unwarranted feelings of entitlement', rather than just 'entitlement'. It's not the feeling that people have an entitlement to certain things that is a problem, but feeling entitled to things that they actually have no entitlement to.

I definitely feel that there are people who display unwarranted feelings of entitlement in this hobby; I think it's compounded with the fact that this is such a money-sink type hobby. I feel that these people are the same type that are terribly demanding customers in public that shout and scream at staff abut their rights and whatever.

 

This is exactly how I feel, to be honest, but it was far too much fun playing devils advocate.

And the reason why I played the devil's advocate and suggested all those things... It's been established that that anything against the law is "wrong", but would it be "wrong" if there were no laws in place? I mean, "anything" means "anything".

In Japan, there are people who treat their dolls better than their pets. Animals - by law - are property. So, although in countries like the UK which have strict animal laws may have legal avenues to explore for mistreated animals there is NO recourse in Japan. Some people do lack the "common sense" that many attribute to humankind. Abandoned animals found by the city? They are killed and it's not done humanely. Limits. Rules. These are created to keep humanity "in order" and to keep the world a good place and it is rules that protect animals in other countries. Sometimes rules fail. But, sometimes they work when people are unable to monitor their own behavior.

Now, knowing that animals are property in Japan and can be legally mishandled by the owner, how does that affect your perceptions of the country? Have your perceptions changed about Japan? Mine sure did. Particularly when I saw the device that was used to kill them by the city.

I'm not saying that customizing is bad or that there needs to be laws or limits. However, when someone looks at a "bad" customization - whatever it is - that results in destructive behavior this is how negative perceptions about customizing are born. Granted, I took it a bit far with my "devil's advocate" position, but when customizers use the whole "It's my doll and I can do anything I want to" it doesn't paint the customization hobby in a good light, because sometimes some people visualize destruction as the objective rather than creativity. And that's fine if that's what people want to do, but don't be suprised if there are some individuals who feel negatively about customization as a result. How one customizer approaches customization DOES affect every single customizer because it affects perceptions. In addition, being self-righteous and saying "It's my right" rather than simply saying "I love customizing" also paints the picture of someone who does it because it's possible rather than because it's art. As dorky as it sounds "love" will build bridges and being "me, me, me" focused will simply burn them down. (But, so you know, I love you all for debating with me and ripping my arguments apart, because that was what you are supposed to do in a debate. )

So, is it wrong to feel entitled to do anything you want with your property? Of course not. But, to me, it does seem a little self-righteous to voice it which is why I couldn't resist playing the devil's advocate. I wanted to make people think notsomuch about themselves and their own perspectives but about the affect their words and actions had on the BJD community. Because, it does impact how others perceive customization and it's a shame that customizers aren't more respected by those who don't agree with the concept of customizing.

This hobby would be incredibly boring without customized dolls. There is no need to be defensive about art or about customization even if it is to run over the doll with a car.

 

Despite having drawing and painting skills my first face-up also didn't look great. Part of it is learning to work with a new medium, but I'll just quote the skills I mentioned before:

If you know how to paint realistic portraits, then you know what kind of colour schemes you could use to do face-ups for a healthy (or unhealthy if that's your goal) looking doll. A new skill you would have to learn is for example having a feeling for the interaction between pastel, resin, and MSC. (MSC can make pastel colours darker.) The latter skill has to be learned by working with dolls, but the first skill will tell you that bright orange is not a good colour for realistic looking body blushing. Should you still have used bright orange, then being critical towards your work will help decide if you should improve your work.
Knowledge of anatomy will tell me that men often have less round faces than women and often have deeper eye sockets. Knowledge of colours and depth perception will tell me that a part in a darker colour will look like it's farther away. This knowledge has helped me to use dark, but natural skin tones to blush around the eyes, the sides of the face and under the cheekbones to give a girly head more of a masculine impression. It will also help me avoid turning a cute girly head into half a man with wrongly applied blush, if that's not what I want.

After my first face-up my face-ups got better. Part of it is practice, part of it is the skill of how to improve your own work. See what is wrong, figure out why it doesn't work, and finding a way to fix it. Those are skills that can be learned in many different ways.

 

What on earth does this have to do with BJDs, or with the topic of this debate thread?

 

It has to do with the act of "entitlement" and the association of that entitlement with property and people being able to do "anything" with that "property". In some countries, animals are perceived differently just as BJDs are perceived differently by different people. How one treats their property - and even the definition of said property - impacts how others within the group are perceived.

So, to understand the concept, one needs to first deal with one's personal judgements of the concept that in some countries pets are property. Once one is past that, the idea is similar. Not everyone perceives the value of animals in the same way. Not everyone perceives the value of dolls in the same way. As a result, how one treats that property will be different as will perceptions surrounding that property.

BJDs are NOT animals. Animals are NOT BJDs. However, the concept of "perception" is similar. How a country treats animal rights is reflective of that country's priorities. How one treats dolls is also reflective of that doll community or segment of the community.

So, the argument "One can do anything to one's property unless it is against the law", well, it's flawed and based on one's perceptions of what the law is or should be.

 

But then elphsnt, who would be the judge of what is "improper treatment"? Or are you just saying majority (or mob, there's that perception thing again) rules? I am not being snarky, this is really interesting now. Especially when you say that the perception of how one treats the dolls being reflective of that community. Although DOA is meant to be a warm fuzzy place inclusive of all on topic dolls, what about the rejects? What are the subliminal judgments here? And what about us as individuals? Although I try to be really respectful of everyone here if I comment about their dolls following the old "if you don't have anything nice to say" adage I am not above cringing in horror at some perceived atrocity, and sharing it with my friends. Privately that is. I know that is my prerogative, but it doesn't make me a nice person now, does it? However as an artist I feel entitled to judge.
And what about the flame fests on other forums? Why do those individuals feel entitled to judge, especially so viciously? Is it just the anonymity that the internet offers?

 

I have VERY mixed feelings about the Gallery+ thread...I love the idea of a showcase but I don't love the idea that the mods are the ones that pick the threads and I see the same people in it over and over. That does not mean however that I love to go and look at the amazing work that's been done! No I don't have a lightbox and a DSLR camera but I am still proud of the photos I do take and hope someday to have the equipment and skills necessary.

I don't really feel entitlement to other people's dolls...the worst I've felt is when I miss out on the awesome work of many of our European members who list in the morning, which is very late at night for me here in the Eastern US. Again, I feel the same people over and over get these items but I got lucky...(I believe in luck) and got to own one lovely outfit so for that I'm thankful!!!!!

I feel entitlement to my OWN dolls and no one else's. I do what I please with them because it was my money that paid for them. Whenever my parents buy me something, I respect their rules as to what I'm to do with it and how I am to care for it. If my parents bought me a doll and asked me not to have it customized I won't do it. There was a whole other thread about people who use their disability income to buy dolls/things for their dolls and that I feel entitled to...AFTER my expenses are paid (I can't work on my own so I have disability).

My ideas aren't quite formed for this debate but like Stella mentioned, entitlement has become so woven into our culture...that sometimes the word is overused and used in the wrong way.

 

While it might say something about a country or community if it doesn't respect a living creature's life it does not make that creature any less alive. Dolls are not alive. If someone wants to run over a Bermann with a car it is not going to feel any pain and it will not suffer. It can not and will never be alive. It's not just a matter of laws or property for me, I can do whatever I want to my dolls because they are not alive and can not suffer. If I go away on a trip, I will make sure someone feeds my cats and waters my plants. I don't worry about my dolls at all. They are not alive and have no potential for life.

In terms of entitlement, I agree with Latte about how there are feelings of warranted entitlement and feelings of unwarranted entitlement. If I buy a doll from company A, I am entitled to receive said doll in a timely fashion, for doll A to look like the doll in the company photographs, and for doll A to not be damaged upon receipt. These expectations and entitlements are not out of line.

I also think there is a lot of the bad sort of entitlement as well as lot of jealousy.

 

No, the argument is fine. As has been stated many times previously, it doesn't work to compare the treatment of dolls to the treatment of animals. While an animal is technically property, it's also a living thing which complicates matters and there are laws in place for that reason. If animal welfare laws are not strong enough, then they can be lobbied for with good reason. However, there is no good reason to view dolls the same way, and under law they aren't viewed the same. If a person is not doing anything illegal they can do whatever they want with their doll period, end of story. There is no gray area here at all. Liking something or not is a matter of perception, having the actual right to do something is a matter of fact. How a community treats it's animals and other people is ultimately much more important than how a community treats it's dolls--that's where the priorities need to fall, really. In the case of dolls there are no restrictions so individuals are going to do what they want -- remember, unless an owner is actually doing something illegal, what they choose to do with their dolls is not going to cause harm. As an individual I really don't care if people like or don't like what I do with my dolls -- they're my dolls purchased so I can enjoy them. Same with a lot of other people here. The community tends to support this view as it should.

 

What "rejects" are you talking about? Dolls that are not on topic?

 

The only "entitlement" problem I have ever come across in this hobby is making a few newbie blunders when I was brand new to it and finding established members reacted to me with impatience and accusations. I was accused of having "entitlement issues" when I made a post about finding it difficult to navigate my way around several BJD's company's websites. I came here to ask for advice and was told by several long-term members I was a spoilt little brat who was acting entitled to having all BJD information laid out for me on a silver platter...or something. Never mind that I am a mature woman of 35!

I think these "old hands" got their kicks proving their superior knowledge and boasting of how they had been around since the old days when there were barely any BJD websites at all. They made assumptions about me that were simply incorrect and were insulting and confrontational in their manner. This experience taught me as a newbie that I had to be careful the questions I asked here otherwise I would be accused of acting "entitled". I just found that some members here were very quick to spring up with the "entitled" label for me - something that anyone who knows me would know is simply untrue. So I actually think it is easy to judge and label people and call them "entitled' when maybe they are just very new or very young or very naiive. It's not nice labelling people anyway. I guess I will never forget that my first foray into this hobby was met with hostility and labelling and I admit I have been wary of saying the wrong thing in this community ever since.