Zombie Tinies - Bad Taste?

My only suggestion is you try to find a shade of blue eyes and blonde hair that aren't so JBR-esque... And hopefully a style that's not JBR-esque either. That way you could stick with your original concept of the doll without making things uncomfortable to those who know of your vague connection with the girl in question.

Without the JBR angle at all, I'd say, "No, of course there's nothing wrong with them. It sounds rather fun, actually!"

But I'm someone who made a zombunny plushie, so... (And I'm not actually someone who's a fan of zombies at all.)

 

I don't know... I'm pretty sensitive to things done in bad taste, and think it's too common and easy to do for the most part. But I'm going to say that on some level you are trying to work through some feelings about this girl and her awful circumstances. Personally I felt she had an awful life and and awful death. It's heartbreaking, and how could someone who knew her (on whatever level) not respond to that somehow?

I have some shady dolly characters, but I sure wouldn't go about sharing their secrets with the unworthy. You do what you feel you need to do artistically, but don't feel compelled to share it with us if it matters to you that your creation(s) or you yourself not be denigrated in the process.

You've kind of exposed yourself on this one, perhaps, but in the future... make up some "acceptable" story for your child zombie (how is it different from Child ghosts or vampires or whatnot superficially at least) and leave it at that.

Raven

 

Personally, I am not really into zombies or vampires or undead dolls of any sort. I think liking that stuff is weird. I think having a doll character who is an undead child is kinda weird, and yes, it does bring up unfortunate implications if you think about it to much. But you know what? It's not my doll. I like things other people would find kinda weird. You obviously were thinking "cute zombie character" and not "dead child based on real person" when you came up with the concept. As long as you post gore warnings and such, I am not going to be offended. Just because people think dead/undead characters or even death itself is interesting doesn't mean they are mass murders or evil cultists or psycologically unbalanced or anything stupid like that. My mom likes vampire books, for goodness sakes. It's your doll; have fun with it.

(Also, you should totally get Bobobie/ResinSoul tiny in green resin. Or grey. Or get a white doll and blush it green. Or if you want her to be really bloody, get a red one. And she should totally be a princess, because that's just adorable.)

 

I think it's a really interesting idea. I'd love to see the pictures when you're done.

 

Comments about "she looks like..." aside I dont care for Gore mods I do find them distatefull but in the end so long as its not a limited its your doll have at I will just be avoiding any pictures of said doll cause its "not my thing" and I have no interest though I am sure you wil find many suporters here. Good luck

 

I think that as long as mods of that nature are done well,
then it's not in bad taste!
I'm sure a little zombie girl could turn out very cute!

Also, with every doll there will be people who either love it, or hate it.
So go for it with some temporary mods, and then decide for yourself!

 

To be completely honest, the JonBenet crime was so long ago that I'm surprised anyone would draw that parallel. I mean, when I think baby pageant queens, I think of just... generic little girls in heavy makeup and eighties hair. You've admitted yourself that you didn't know her well - her life and death shouldn't shadow you. It was a tragedy, yes, but it wasn't a look you were going for, so if other people want to see it, then that is, frankly, their own issue to deal with.

Zombie tinies do have a rather ugly implication - a dead child who's life has ended for whatever reason (murder, zombifiying disease that's wiped out the whole planet, sickness, etc.). Some people will think of nothing but the reason behind their... undeadness. Some people will take it at face value ("oh cute lil' zombie princess"). I don't believe either are wrong, it's just how humans are, you just have to be prepared to take both polar reactions (if you can't handle the heat...).

I'm not a big fan of editing yourself and your work for others' comfort, or having to explain yourself to others on the net, but I do believe it's good manners to realize that sometimes, your stuff isn't going to suit the majority and that it's best to give the bare minimum - enough of an explanation to show that it isn't JonBenet, for example, but a completely different character.

Saying that, I am a complete zombie nerd, so undead portrayals of anything don't really bother me. I hope that your friends unfortunate conclusion hasn't spolit the idea for you - because, ultimately, this is your doll, as everyone is echoing, and the only thing that should matter is what you're comfortable with.

 

Vampires are weird? Wow, who knew. What I think is so much more weird is the rampant laziness in the language usage around here at times. Totally.
Do I think zombies are "in bad taste"? No. Do I find your concept? No. What I find not so much as in bad taste but just bad judgment is as Raven said, trying to explain your concept to folks who were clearly not getting it. Next time, just save it. I think their inferences were the bad taste really.
Don't cast your pearls before swine. You know?
BTW, I find those horrid fake tan pagent babies so much more terrifying than the G. Romero armies. And in so much more bad taste.
Make your zombie girl.

 

I think a zombie pageant queen would be a most excellent commentary on little girls in beauty contests. If you do carry out such a mod, though, I'd be careful who you show it to. Some people's initial reaction to anything involving dead kids is strongly negative (in the OH MY GOD YOU ARE NOT THE PERSON I THOUGHT I KNEW GET OUT OF MY HOUSE AND NEVER SPEAK TO ME AGAIN way.)

Personally, I can't stand zombie mods, but it will be your doll and I trust that you will exercise good taste in the displaying of the doll, since someone who didn't probably wouldn't be bothered by the thought in the first place. If you need a hundred people to tell you it's OK to do the doll before you feel comfortable, I'm not going to hold out on you.

I'd like to see the sketches of your doll, though, out of morbid curiosity. I wonder how much of the "resemblance" to JonBenet remains when it's shown to people who aren't in your area and don't remember it as well.

 

I think it is slightly tasteless despite your clarifications, simply because the idea of a decaying wounded undead child is gross, IMO. I love supernatural things like zombis and vampires and so on. In fact I'm actually planning a zombi doll right now- but he will be a traditional authentic Haitian zombi rather than a Hollywood "zombie" with seething wounds and a general air of psychotic pestilence. The similarity to the JBR case, although inadvertent, just makes it even more tasteless to me.

 

Honestly - had you stuck with "zombie child" and NOT given emphasis to your friends comments that she looks like JBR - I really dont think you would have had a problem at all, most people wouldnt immediately draw that sort of parallel. So perhaps when it does come time for you to actually "out" the doll in the Gallery - you be absolutely certain to find something else to align it with - something obscure and fictional like a loosely based character from The Nightmare before Christmas or The Corpse Bride or something of the sort, to generalise it and stomp out any denigrating looks your freinds or family potentially could shoot your way....

Oh and I do remember the Garbage Pail Kids - I had a sticker of "Crater Chris" on my maths book before our Catholic teacher caught up with me and got a "Principals Order" to make me remove it.....

 

I don't think it's in bad taste myself. The strong reaction zombie children get proves their effectiveness as creatures of horror. For every person who is offended for whatever reason, there will be many people who aren't. While it has a place in some circumstances, I am not a huge fan of censorship, but I am a huge fan of labelling; if you're decided, just let people know what you have got, and make it their choice whether they look or not.

However, Bunnydots advice about controversy is also worth considering; people love drama and will make drama, and if you just don't want it.......you have to weigh up how much you want to make the little zombie and show her off in the knowledge that there will probably be negative attention. How much would that affect your feelings about the little zombie?

Personally though, I think it sounds cute.

 

If it wasn't your intent for it to represent JB then frankly I don't feel it's in bad taste at all, Ksiezniczka. No one is responsible for what others think, and if that were an issue we would have no art on the planet at all...because someone will always react badly, dislike or be offended by another's art. I have a friend who created a beautiful doll (in the traditional sense of beautiful too) and people still found a need to make her feel like crap because it wasn't what 'they' liked artistically. I appreciate you asked for others opinions about whether it is bad taste and they only gave an opinion. But my opinion is do what brings you happiness regarding your dolls and art. Creativity gets squashed enough in our society.

 

Authentic Haitian zombies are not supernatural. They are real living people who were drugged, sometimes have developed varying degrees of brain damage from the drug and/or oxygen deprivation, and then were forced into slavery doing hard physical labor. I rather find that more disturbing than movie monsters, who while grisly, have at least diverged into the realms of fiction.

As far as the OP's question goes, I think it was just your friends seeing something in your original drawing that doesn't actually exist/was never intended. As I rather enjoy Tim Burton works like Corpse Bride and Nightmare Before Christmas, I'm okay with a zombie child character. I have a ghost girl among my dolls, but she's quite normal looking aside from the white eyes. So I've not had any problems with negative reactions. Zombie characters do get some extreme reactions. Heck, some folks are afraid of dolls, just by virtue of it being a doll. And sometimes a person's friends just need to single someone out to be upset with. It's sad but true about human nature.

 

Meh. Bad taste is in the eye of the beholder. As far as I'm concerned, parading real little girls around in beauty contests is in exceptionally bad taste.

So, yeah...you really can't please all of the people all of the time. You might as well feed your own creativity, because no matter what appeals to you, someone, somewhere, is likely to find something offensive about it - whether intended or not.

 

I see zombies as supernatural because the religion that brings them about is very supernatural. Drug or not, there would be no zombies without their belief in voodoo. "Zombification" is considered by many anthropologists to be a cultural phenomenon, as it's largely due to the victims' belief in voodoo and the powers of the bokor that creates zombis in the first place. If a non-voodoo person were poisoned with fugu, which contains the pufferfish poison that is the main ingredient in zombi powder, they would simply believe that they had been poisoned. Whereas the voodooist will automatically assume they are zombies, now in the bokor's power and behave accordingly. So in a sense it is voodoo that creates the zombi, and I think voodoo is distinctly supernatural. Therefore zombies go in my list of interesting (though definitely scary and disturbing) supernatural things. I'm hoping to portray my zombi boy (who is based on Clairvius Narcisse, a real zombi) as sympathetic rather than scary, and help raise awareness of the existence of the real Haitian zombi, rather than propogate the Hollywood horror.

 

This may be only tangentially related, but there's a recent brouhaha in the art world re this Danish woman who has costumed her baby as various dictators of history: she says she's trying to make a statement about the banality of evil, but the only reaction some people can muster is "poor taste/ nothing but shock value".

The way people receive your work largely depends on their willingness to receive it-- whether they are/aren't willing to even listen to it. There'll always be those two diametrically-opposed camps. Never the twain shall meet. So don't waste your energy trying to convince the automatic naysayers. Do be prepared for them, but don't try to make them like your work.

The best article I found on it was http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1156832.html
(Some interesting discussions about it occur in the User Comments on blogs like here and here... Both camps speak up vividly. But you can tell who did & didn't read the Haaretz article, which is fascinating.)


And celga, I am glad somebody said it first.... I too find baby beauty pageants to be creepy and exploitative in the first place. Total skincrawl. Zombiefication has nothing on pageants.

 

JennyNemesis, thanks for that link, the artist's work is fascinating.
And seriously? I think we need to harken back at some point to the "it's only a doll" and "sometimes a doll is just a doll" (meaning to likenen it to sometimes a cigar is just a cigar Freud quote). It doesn't need to be that deep. You can pretty much make a fascinating back story filled with imagery and psychological connotations out of a ham sandwich.

 

I agree!

Great link JennyNemesis, personally, I thought it was funny.

 

I dont find baby zombies to be in bad taste at all
I mean, the dead attack kids too right? Its obvious you didnt mean for her to look like JBR, and dead little girls need to feel pretty too.