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Things that annoy you... *Rant Thread*

Dec 11, 2014

    1. I just went to get my dolls out of their boxes after a move and their stringing is kaput. I don't know if it's the heat or the humidity that killed the elastic but they're both super floppy and all the tightening in the world isn't going to fix it. And there isn't any room in the budget for new elastic for at least a month. :(
       
    2. I'm waiting on a doll. He's gotten as far as Greensboro NC from where I am, which is about 4 to 5 hours away if I drive it. He shipped last week. Now I figured he'd be here yesterday or even today as he left Greensboro Monday night at 11pm. However, that's all it's said. No new updates. I know they stop at other post offices to drop off and pick up mail but come on...is he riding all over the state?
       
    3. The USPS is crazy right now, to say the least. I've had a doll coming from Finland that was shipped on Feb 17th that still hasn't updated as being in the country, but my roomie had a doll shipped from Switzerland on Monday that has already passed through New York. Some packages are taking days to go cross-state, others have tracking that isn't updating until after they arrive... it's one big mess at the moment. You're not alone in this!
       
    4. So I moved last year, but I was on dolly hiatus and didn't take much care packing my things....and now I've lost a large portion of my doll stuff. Half of it is at my parents' house, I'm sure. But a lot of it just didn't survive the move: wigs got mussed, outfits separated, eyeballs ROLLED AWAY.

      And did I mention that I'm broke now?
       
    5. When I have money and can't find anything I really like but once I've spent my hobby money for the month, I find all the clothes and wigs I want for my dolls. This happens to me so much.
       
    6. ALL the things that can (and do) go wrong when doing face-ups -_____- I spend so much time on them and though I enjoy most of it, there are a few things in the process that are just annoying to me! An example is spraying the MSC and trying to get the consistency just right/waiting for the right weather. I know it's a choice to do a faceup and I want to do it but like I said, some of the process annoys me. And since I'm new at doing them still, I get very frustrated with myself when I make mistakes.

      Re-stringing is pretty annoying, I'm so thankful I don't have to do it often.

      Trying to find the perfect "....". Wig, clothes, shoes, etc... Sometimes the hunt is fun but other times it's just frustrating.

      When I go to look for owner pictures of a doll I'm curious about and I can't find any.

      That for the most part, you can't try before you by. Unless it's a Volks store or maybe a retailer, you can't walk into a store and handle/examine/compare a doll before buying. Holding it in your hands and seeing it in real life before deciding would be very convienient. This is just a small peeve though, because there are many photos and videos that really help in getting a "feel" for a doll even when it's not in your hands.
       
    7. You're not alone on this one! I'm using Purity Seal instead, which is more forgiving, but of course I had a doll all washed and prepped and even base-sprayed... and then I got too busy, and it suddenly got too cold again. It's warming up this weekend, at least, so hopefully I can duck out and give her another spray after work Friday. I'm hoping to get as many done as I can during the little window of time between "too cold" and "too humid," and possibly going to test humidity levels later on this year, too...
       
    8. One thing that irks me which maybe is a little petty is when someone has an entire BJD family where all of the dolls have the same snow white or light skin tone. It's a little boring to look at especially when there are dark and fantasy colors available... I think having representation in your characters is important.
       
    9. Well, it's their doll family - and not all people like dark or fantasy colours. I for example don't like most fantasy colours except for maybe grey because I just find most fantasy colours ugly. And dark resin - I'm wary to give it a try because I don't know how much it'll yellow and what it'll look like when it yellows. I have my dolls sitting around all over my room, in the open, getting plenty of sunlight. A dark tan doll definitely wouldn't be kept in the box since I'm not buying dolls to keep them boxed up. However, if I bought a dark tan doll, I'd want for it to stay dark tan and not turn into the Increcible Hulk over time (colour-wise).

      And besides, I'm not collecting dolls to display some kind of political correctness ...
       
      • x 1
    10. He finally arrived! I think he took a tour of North Carolina.

      All of my dolls but one are normal and white skin with normal being the norm. I have one tan and he was a Grail. Hopefully he'll stay as dark as he is now.

      What irks me is how sometimes their heads won't face you straight! They want to look up or down! Not sure if it's the stringing.
       
    11. I mean I understand that dark resin is tricky but all resin yellows at some point tbh? I just feel like there's so much potential for dark dolls that so many people don't take advantage of. Also I don't think that having a single non white or light doll in a whole family of white dolls is a matter of political correctness :v

      I guess I'm just irked because I see little representation in media, movies, comics, etc and seeing that reflected in the bjd community is disappointing? You have the potential to create so many diverse characters but you stick to having every single one of them be white or light skinned...
       
      • x 1
    12. Whatever might be missing in the community at large, everyone of us is free to try and create it themselves. And by setting a good example I'm sure others will follow. Still, nobody is obliged to do so. If people have a personal preference for white skinned dolls and this is a reflection of society, then probably the field to start a change of consciousness is politics. There is a point in this observation and yet personally, I do not own any darker resin yet and for the characters I have in mind, I do not want one right now. And this, I am sure, is totally okay. Edit: I feel I have to add that I was very, VERY tempted to get a Soom centaur in tan (but in the end, didn't). So it might happen again...
       
      • x 1
    13. When you really like a doll's promo shots but it's an unpopular sculpt so nobody in the world has owner photos, and you're really scared you're going to buy it and it'll turn out to be ugly in person :...(
       
    14. Well, everyone's different. You might see potential in tan dolls - others might not. So why buy a doll that you don't see any potential in, that you don't even like? That would be a waste of money, tbh, because in the end, you'll sell that doll again, and most likely at a loss. Would you, personally, buy e.g. a green doll if you thought the colour of the resin was hideous, you didn't like the sculpt, you didn't have ANY idea whatsoever what to do with that doll - just for the sake of adding variety to your doll family by having a green doll? Maybe you would. I wouldn't because - *shrugs* waste of money. I wouldn't keep it.
       
      • x 2
    15. Sellers that do not respond.

      Though I know there are cases when you just can't (e.g. soldiers on away missions). This may happen very quickly, and maybe there was no time to go into all forums and make an announcement that you cannot respond any longer.

      Though I had this twice now on the marketplace and am a bit sad.
       
    16. I'm waiting on package that left DDE on Wednesday, was supposed to be here today - and hasn't updated since it left Aurora, CO. :( It's probably (no) thanks to the winter storm that just nailed three-quarters of the country, though. Probably won't see my dolls until next week, though.
       
    17. Honestly, it can be as simple as not liking the sculpts that are available in darker skin tones. Compared to how many doll companies there are out there, not a lot actually offer various resin tones, and if you don't like the dolls that are offered then you might just be out of luck unless you're willing to do some pretty scary modifications.

      When I accumulated a majority of my collection over 5 years ago, dark resin was VERY limited and pretty much only offered by Iplehouse and Bobobie (and every so often another company or two). I do have two characters who should have brown resin, but after jumping through hoops to get my one doll with gray resin his proper color...ugh, I'm not exactly excited to do it again. He's very fragile to hold now because I'm afraid of the color chipping and if he fades or something it will be pricey to recolor him. I checked out Iple and Bobobie, but didn't like the very realistic and simplistic sculpts they offered. So I went with white dolls that suited the characters looks the best. One doll will probably never be his proper skin tone, as it wasn't until a long while after the doll already had his face-up was I finally able to fully develop his character and likewise figure out where he came from. He is no longer made anymore (the company went under) and I've never seen one sold second hand so I am loathe to try any heavy mods on him and thus consider his character more separate from his doll form than my other dolls. The second, well, he's been blank for years as I'm still determined to get him his proper shade of brown before he gets a face-up, but the cost and work is so intense I've put it off for fear of permanently damaging him. It's not that I don't CARE, it's because I already have one dyed doll who I can barely even handle anymore and I'm not really excited about having a second one in that same position.

      So be the change you want to see. Have a diverse family! That's awesome! But sometimes dolls in dark resin simply aren't offered by a company or only offered for extremely high LE prices, so I don't think it's fair to point fingers at other collectors for only having one resin color when other offered colors are still a relatively new thing, and still quite limited with many, many companies.
       
    18. Yup. That's me. Or, sometimes I do like a sculpt that also comes in tan, but I prefer it in NS (Volks Cecile Scarface is softer looking in NS than he is in sunlight, and I prefer that for his mold). But since I prefer old-school sculpts for my collection, and dolls with dark tan skin wasn't available then, I'm most likely not going to own one.

      Also, some doll stories just aren't that suited for all colors. In my crew there is one person with Chinese heritage and one is a Jew, but a black person in the time my story sets in, and with the theme 'side shows', would most likely be part of either the Human Zoo, or the freak show ... And I'd rather not go there.
       
    19. Heh.
      Sure... people can create very diverse collections if they want to. A fair few do. But do you know what tends to happen as a result?
      That collector will find themselves open to accusations of "appropriation", bias, being racists or worse. Particularly if they aren't a member of the ethnic, cultural or social group they've tried to include.

      Simply "doing your research" and approaching the topic with due respect and sensitivity isn't enough to keep it from happening, and frankly it's easier to just avoid the potential conflicts than try to convince some very earnest, but very shrill group of Tumblr kids that no, in fact, your sari-wearing tan doll with the Hindi name *isn't* an indication that you're a horrible Imperialist trying to marginalize non-Eurocentric ethnicities. :doh
       
      • x 1
    20. I feel like the readiness of this community to jump on frustrations about lack of diversity and nitpick them is kind of indicative of what mermaids was saying, you know? It's a rant thread. Most of the other rants haven't gotten this much backlash. I don't mean to accuse individuals, but I sense a certain defensiveness in these discussions whenever they pop up. Yeah, tan skin is more expensive, but the deeper issue is one of how our casts of characters look. Be honest, if you had a darker character, wouldn't you buy a darker doll? And for people who buy the doll first, why does "normal" skin and white skin usually seem to equal white, and not Asian or other light-skinned people? This carries on to other groups, like disabled people and queer people. Representation matters, you know? And I don't think someone has to feel pressured to reconstruct their own imagination to fit into a political checklist, but I do think that people are allowed to feel frustrated or disappointed when they see the bjd hobby being just as problematic representationally as their mainstream media. There's my rant lol

      Also repositioning eyes without stems. Like, wow.
       
      • x 2