Documentary Analysis: Guys And Dolls

In today’s world we tend to be caught up in our own personal bubbles. We don’t realize what goes on outside of our world and the myriad of subcultures that exist. The main problem with this is, once we become aware of the people that live outside of our culture and our norms, we tend to not understand their lifestyle and think that they are abnormal or psychotic. Through the various documentaries that we have explored this semester, I have experienced a change in emotion and thought. Every documentary we watched did not make sense to me. However, I realized that once you really dig deep and try to understand these people and their motives, you can uncover the way they affect our society.

Guys and Dolls

In the documentary Guys and Dolls, we

explore the world of many lonely men who have reached the end of the road and given up with trying to have normal relationships. The men claim that women are rude and critical of them - so therefore they will never date them because they will not be accepted. These women look for good looking guys and cannot get past their appearance in order to uncover the personalities of these men - as they claim. In my eyes, the reason the men turn to these silicone dolls is because they have lost all hope and do not wish to look further or harder for someone who will love them. The dolls provide the men with a sense of power, control, company, and comfort.
I will admit that it is difficult for some people to find partners - so they must seek other means to keep them company.

Regardless, I don’t know that dolls are the answer. When looking at it from a vague perspective - the dolls are harmless. The men are happy and they are not hurting anyone. But is this really true? By looking at it from a sociological perspective, perhaps this is more harmful than it is helpful to both the men and society.

Most people watch this documentary and assume that it is women who we must blame for the suffering of these men. Perhaps if they weren’t so “shallow,” and they were more accepting of all kinds of men, this wouldn’t be the problem. In contrast, I seem to think that women are not at fault. A few bad apples do not poison the rest of the group. The men have themselves and their lack of self esteem to blame.

When looking at the innocent side of things, it makes it easy for people to build sympathy for these men. They are lonely and just want a companion who they can love. They have faced constant rejection and ridicule for their looks. It is society that has forced them to live this way. If real women cannot provide them companionship and love, then dolls are the way to appease them

temporarily.
On the contrary, these men are not as innocent as they seem. Sociologically speaking, I think underlying motives for these men exist. Particularly with the man, Gordon, who has multiple sex dolls. When you watch the documentary, and see his method of storing the dolls - on the shelves in his garage and underneath his bed - it is easy to become disgusted. It is a sad sight to see the dolls mangled and twisted - shoved where they belong until they are needed for sexual use. However, not all of the men are like this. On the opposite side of the spectrum we have Davecat who is in love with his doll and takes excellent care of her. Either way it is a bit disturbing to watch and the idea of being in love with something so fake creates a hard pill to swallow.
The dolls also provide the men with a sense of control and power. They are able to customize the doll in order to make her the perfect reality. They can choose her hair color, skin color, breast size, waist size, eye color, and so on. This makes it easy to say that if you want the woman of your dreams, you can create her. Unfortunately, this is not how life works and women in real life do not look like this. The harmful aspect of this is that it just gives the average woman another reason to hate herself and her body. Women face enough disparity trying to look like the photoshopped models in magazines and the beautiful celebrities of the world. A woman may look at these dolls and think, “Wow is this really what men want? I can never look like that!” The reason they will think this is because a doll that is perfectly molded and crafted is unrealistic and undermines the true beauty of real women who are not this way.
In the end, these dolls seem to be harmless, but they are quite degrading to women and keep the men from pursuing normal, healthy lives.

Now that they have discovered a way to escape reality and find comfort, they will never again seek a normal relationship and they will continue to pierce women with this idea that they must be perfect.

15 Stone Babies

In 15 Stone Babies, we are introduced to the world of adult babies. This world is very much hidden from the public, as these adults are embarrassed of their lives. To the public, these seem to be normally functioning adults, but behind closed doors, they are forced to find comfort in secrecy through regression by reverting to an earlier stage in life.

When they are in their “baby stage” they do not have to worry about dealing with reality and the stress that innately comes with it. They can escape this reality if only momentarily. This is a form of negative reinforcement. In their heads, the adult babies have such anxiety about dealing with the pressures of the real world that they will do anything in their power to escape it - even if it means having someone dress them and change their diapers. The satisfaction they get from this temporary moment makes it all worth it in the end and creates a pattern of behavior that will never end until they learn to face their fears and deal with their problems in a healthy

way.