"Those Anime Dolls"- Does the connection bother you?

That's the issue. Asian aesthetics do not necessarily equate to anime. Not everyone will automatically see BJDs as the equivalent of anime because they're from Asia. It has absolutely nothing to do with being high and mighty, elitist, whatever you'd like to call it. Like I said in my previous post, it's all based on subjectivity.

We all don't see it as "anime" when anime, realism, and western comic book styles can be combined and the prominent features of all three styles can easily be lost. With BJDs, there really is no cut-and-dry way of explaining or interpreting their appearance. I showed one of my friends a Minifee photo and he saw it as an action figure, and I know he used to watch anime back in the day.

Sure, there are lots of people who do see it as an anime style. I'm not one of those people. I also don't like generalizations and try to avoid them if I can. Does that make me some kind of elitist jerk? Naaaah.

 

Okay understand this for most people Asian esthetic IS anime... and that's the bottomline for them. Sorry but even if you don't think it's true. Regular Joe and Jane that's the tag you're going to have and you can't change them.

I am not talking about a lot of people in particular when I speak of elitism but I have seen people with dolls give a higher than thou attitude to people who approached them. I'm not saying it's the case for most people here, but I've seen that attitude enough to make me uncomfortable saying I collect ABJD.

I had a lot of people approach me with my doll and ask me questions. I am all to glad to answer and if they say stuff like: boy, it's ugly or anything else, I just brush them off. It's their opinion, I couldn't care less about their opinion because my dolls make me happy and that's the bottomline with me. I can't change people's perceptions about the dolls. And talking to them as if they are idiots or morons isn't going to win you points either.

Yes there is not cut and dry way to explain to people what BJD are... but unless we educate them or if they do want to be educated. I mean some people will think Anime doll and that's it for them and no reason to have a looksee about changing their minds. You have to accept that.

Just like you accept people staring at you if you go around holding dolls. Some people will be rude, some will be nice. But you can't expect each and everyone to have the same POV as you.

 

I don't expect people to have the same POV as me. On the other hand, disliking generalisation doesn't automatically give you a "high and mighty" attitude. Calling all BJDs "those anime dolls" in general is like calling all Asian-looking people "those Chinese". That's just as incorrect. As I said in my other post, I don't know if that's a bigger problem in the States than it is in Germany ... Personally, no one has referred to my dolls as "those anime dolls", so far ...

 

My Opinion.

Ok I really see no huge connection between the two. Anime is a peice of the culture of Japan, BJDs come from Japan, and some of the other Aisan countries, so I guess people see that in there. The dolls are usually flawless and so are anime characters. But It does annoy me when I talk to people about them as Anime dolls/characters.

 

Just to note, I'm not a massive Anime fan. I'm probably one of the pickiest in the world. I usually read the back of series DVDs, scrunch up my nose at the blurb and grunt before putting it back down and shuffling a few paces to the side to observe the selection of foreign horror films.
I do have quite a few manga and manhwa, and I draw in similar styles, but I'm still not a massive fan. Again, I'm really picky.
I like some Japanese music, but it usually has to compete with Mexican, Finnish, French and German language music to fit into my Mp3. And usually it's the rest of them that win that race.

I didn't find out about BJDs through anime and manga. I found out about them through animation/art/videogame customising sites, forums and blogs.

Interestingly, the whole design for BJDs precedes the creation of super dollfies. The basic modern structure already existed for at least 100 years. And started out in Europe and the Middle East. And if you look at the 1930s design work of artist Hans Bellmer there's a strong likeness between his larger-scale dolls with similar joint mechanisms (That had been around for even longer, mind you.) and a slightly more realistic aesthetic.
Just because a company from Japan that made anime figure kits decided to slap a different style of head on a smaller scale version of a design that has been around for what might be millenia according to some sources, doesn't make the idea exclusively Japanese or anime based.

 

I don't mind the connection at all. Lot's of people find BJD's through anime, so we should be greatful to it. If people say things like "Those Anime Dolls", let them. You can't change people's minds, so I don't see why it's a big deal

 

I don't see a very prominent connection between the two actually. I've never met anyone that categorized them together either. I can see why someone would think of them as related because of their asian origins however. It doesn't bother me though to be honest xD I mean, I think people are free to think as they please :3

 

I guess it goes both ways. In all honesty, I don't care to go to meets anymore and I'm starting to not like taking my dolls to cons. Besides the hassle and storage problem, I don't care for the new stigma relating to bjd owners at cons. It's kinda like the J-Rock issue 5 or 6 years ago, anime fan con goers think you're crashing their party.

 

actually the connection to "OMG huge barbie!!!" bothers me more XP

 

I didn't find out about BJDs through Anime, but I can see why people might make the connection. They do have Asian features and with the Animehype going around the world, I guess that's what a lot of people associate with Asia. (That's what I figured from people around here, heck, they even think I'M Japanese!)

It doesn't bother me that much, but it gets a bit annoying when you try to explain that your doll isn't from Japan and Anime is from Japan and they start argueing...
What bothers me more is the association with Barbies (huge Barbie, like Mimi-Chan said), which I don't understand how people make that connection.

 

It really doesn't bother me because no one's refered to my dolls like that before. But if someone were to do so, I would probably be fairly irritated at the person. I would most likely go on a very long rant that would boil down to my doll is An abjd not some anime doll just because the doll makers decided to base a lot of their designs on the anime aesthetic.
But then the person would probably not get it (or be annoyed) and nothing would be resolved because the reason why they had used that name....
oops missed something... points at the rant above the only reason I connect anime with my dolls is because of the aesthetic they both are based on. As the world that surrounds these two seperate forms of expression changes so to do they change and adapt. "those anime dolls" is just a reference a person, who doesn't really know much about the dolls and might not be interested enough to want to, uses to make a connection to what they know to what you might (or do) know and might be trying to find some common ground.... anyways ignoring my personal reaction needing to train ignorant people, not you guys understand me but the people who don't know what these dolls mean to us, these are just the thoughts the topic dragged up out of the depths of my mind and no offence or confusion is meant to be caused by this post.

 

Only a little...but I connect them with anime. :P so it shouldn't bother me too much. besides i have two that ARE supposed to be completely influenced by anime. One is a wanna be jpop idol! :P her sis has yet to tell me what her anime influenced career is.

 

Um i dont really think i own dolls that arent influenced by anime in one way or another, It doesnt bother me at all unless someone says it who hates anime XD

 

It does bug me a little bit, but I think it bugs me more because I see it as a misconception by people who are uninformed about "asian aesthetics" and the fact that just because it has the asian aesthetic doesn't mean it's in an anime? If that makes sense?

Also, I don't like to think that people who are intensely anti-anime like some people are will look at our dolls and instantly badmouth them just because they think they're "anime" dolls. True, some of them have an "anime" look, and some people make dolls into characters from Anime they love (I'm one of them, don't get me wrong) but that doesn't mean they're the same thing as an anime action figure, which I have quite a few of myself as well.

Mostly, I guess I'm just a little bit of a stickler for them being called what they are: Dolls. I want people to get it right, and if they dislike them, to dislike them for what they are, not to dislike them because they associate them with an animated art form they don't like. But then I came from a very very very small town in rural West Texas that hadn't even HEARD of Asian Ball Jointed dolls, as far as I could tell. Even my mom has been known to spout off about how she dislikes "That anime cr@p" that I "watch so much" just because she refuses to step back and look at art forms she's not used to without placing an assumption onto it from what she perceives with an uninformed opinion. I don't want her doing the same thing to my dolls.

 

I would say it doesnt' so much "Bother" me as some times people equate it with the anime and they start talking about it. And admittedly while I am one of the biggest animation fans you will ever find. I have little to zero interest in Anime (I tried... i failed) So I end up feeling awkward because I can't keep up with the conversation. As far as the association itself goes.... There are far worse things.

 

I think that in a lot of ways the connection is valid; there are a lot of cosplay dolls out there, and more that are historical characters that have also been mentioned in anime or manga. I personally have never really encountered the perception, and if I did I don't think it would be a huge problem. It's something that I don't agree with; these particular dolls are asian, but rarely have much to do with anime. It probably does have a lot to do with these people only seeing dolls at anime conventions just because they have no other connections to the hobby.

 

I'm not bothered at all, but that's maybe because I love everything Japanese. I think manga-wise often and I love Japanese fashion and pop culture so I try to express it through my dolls. I understand that non anime fans may be bothered though...

 

The only time it bothers me is if someone sees one of my dolls and assumes I think that everything japanese/asian is the "Best thing EVAR DDDdesu!!!1!". -_- Just because I like bjd's does not mean I'm a japanophile. Otherwise, I have no problems.

 

It bugs me a little when people try to pretend that, because some aspects of the dolls existed before Volks stepped in, their contribution is somehow inconsequential. Dolls have existed for millenia, in every country and every culture (stop me if I'm wrong, anthropologists). But some particular types of dolls have a strong association with a certain time and culture: Barbie is associated with the latter half of the 20th century and beyond, particularly in North America; Matryoshka (nesting) dolls are associated with Russia; porcelaine and bisque dolls came out of 19th Century Europe. None of those dolls came out of a vacuum--they were all based on ideas that came before them. But that doesn't mean their association with the time and place that made them popular, made them important, or introduced major changes (a.k.a. advances) into the style is imaginary.

Certainly, (A)BJDs as they exist now are, as you say, "not exclusively Japanese or anime based." But at the same time, it's silly to pretend that there is no connection, just because some similar things were in existence before Volks or outside of Japan/East Asia. I strongly suspect that if you were to show someone who knew nothing about dolls one of the turn-of-the-20th-C ball-jointed artist dolls next to a modern, semi-mass-produced doll of the sort we collect, their eye would pick out more difference than similarity, despite the commonality of basic engineering.

 

It really depends on who says it. If someone is not into anime at all, or even has a dislike for it and compares the dolls to anime, I get offended. Hey, they're not drawings!
However, my ex and his best friend were very into anime and manga, and when I showed them my doll and various pics of other dolls and THEY compared them to anime/manga, I knew it was positive and part of why they would find the dolls so cool.