'Protect the Dolls' - doesn't that just say it all?

[Lottapianos]

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2025/apr/25/pedro-pascal-calls-jk-rowling-harry-potter-supreme-court-gender-ruling www.theguardian.com/film/2025/apr/25/pedro-pascal-calls-jk-rowling-harry-potter-supreme-court-gender-ruling]]]]

Pedro Pascal has called JK Rowling a 'heinous loser' - lovely. She can add that to 'bitch', 'fascist' and all the other offensive thoughtless nonsense that has been thrown at her

He was recently photographed wearing a t shirt that says 'Protect The Dolls'. Apparently 'dolls' is an 'affectionate' term for men who identify as trans within some parts of the LGBTQetc community

If ever we had any doubt that trans women were a sexualized fantasy version of what a woman actually is, doubt no more. How utterly grim

Actually, terms like “twink” are pretty denigrating and lots of gay people don’t like them at all (and think they’re homophobic when used by straight people).

But you’re missing the point re “dolls”. Women have historically been compared to dolls or deliberately put down with the term “doll” for much longer than it’s ever been used in any LGBT context. It’s a pejorative, sexist term that women object to. It isn’t an innocent word with a blank history: it was co-opted precisely because it was sexist and misogynistic and objectifying.

It’s also a term that was connected with drugs in the 70s. The term doll has always been used as a sexist, demeaning pejorative designed to belittle and diminish women. If transwomen like it, it’s probably because it fits the feminine stereotype we’re all trying to escape. From a female perspective it’s an outdated, regressive term. Hope that helps.

lots of words can be reclaimed....... you could do a similar etymology for "gay"

and as i said originally - this isnt used by the whole community

the whole gay community doesn't have to accept "twink" in order for us to accept that it does have a specific meaning in that community and that not every gay man uses it as a pejorative...

But women - who were the subjects of the term “doll” - aren’t reclaiming it, are they? Someone else is.

If straight men started calling each other the word “faggot” affectionately, they’d just be using an offensive word that gay people found objectionable, wouldn’t they? They wouldn’t be “reclaiming” it. It was never applied to them in the first place.

Men making use of - not “reclaiming” - a sexist term about women is just men appropriating a sexist term.

yeah - good point.

I think this is the crux of the issue - I believe some trans women have claimed that word, but equally some will recoil from it. I also think some biological women have claimed that word, and some recoil from it.

I suppose it depends on whether you extend the word to apply to all aspects of socialised "women" or whether you believe it only applies to biological women.

I think its been used pejoratively towards anyone socialised/recognised as women (including some gay men!) so im happy for it be reclaimed by other communities... i don think i have sole "ownership" of it

Pedro Pascal voices and often acts as Din Djarin in The Mandalorian.

I'd rather lose the Potterverse than Star Wars if forced to pick.

I don't know why people in the creative arts are so involved in politics nowadays.

The reason why it’s pejorative is that the connotations are plastic, vacant, mindless, pretty but silent, fake, an object to be owned or broken, etc. etc. How do those connotations get “reclaimed” in a positive way for anyone? What are the positive connotations of being a “doll”? I don’t think many women want to “reclaim” the word. Surely the entire point of it for transwomen is the unflattering sexualised connotations: in the same way that Andrea Long Chu and Julia Serano write about how transwomen identify with the idea that women are “blank eyes” or degraded sexual objects.

The sexism is precisely part of the (sissy, forced feminisation) fetish. It’s not a positive use of the word any more than when drag queens call each other “fishy”: they’ve not somehow reclaimed the sexist idea that women smell of fish, they’re making use of it.

I think some celebrities were targeted with t shirts to take images of themselves on social media.

Tilda Swinton has one too.

The dolls element of this is very creepy actually. It portrays some female people as being more fragile, dressable and beautiful than the rest. Also, then conversely plastic, unchangeable, fuckable (shall we post the words of Long Chu about blank eyes etc), needing manipulating, needing care, being unable to say no to inappropriate behaviour, no intelligence, needing decisions made for them and on and on and on. I mean, I can see the similarities with what I read about sissy porn. It is not that hard.

Also there is the child element.

I really don’t think the group who started this campaign thought this through. And these celebrities should have stopped and thought too. Rather than unthinkingly donning on this apparel and announcing to the world that they are unable to see boundary issues with this campaign.

This in the Guardian today 🙄

https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2025/apr/25/protect-the-dolls-t-shirt-fashion-symbol-trans-rights

I can’t tell you the rage all this utter performative bollocks this creates in me.

My LinkedIn is full of fucking “male allies” and clueless women with pictures of themselves holding cards up saying “trans women welcome in my space” or some such shit.

I know it is a cheap insult but seriously how can such seemly smart people be so dim witted?

My issue with it is that women who object to women being called 'doll' and are speaking about the relevant history of that in the context of the aforementioned advert are currently being branded transphobic over social media.

What a spitefully stupid post. Most of us don’t rise to the very top of our respective fields. Most of us are therefore in ‘supporting’ roles. So presumably you think 99% of the population are ‘losers’.

I’m 100% GC and I can’t agree at all that slagging people for not rising to be in the top 1% is anything to do with feminism.

We know why they like to be called dolls. It plays into their fetish. I think we should call them sausage rolls.

Classis DARVO? He's describing himself but projecting on her.

That and he encouraged his very young and autistic costar to wear a breast binder for most of a 9 month shoot, and then come out publicly as ‘non-binary’; something she now has said she regrets doing. He’s a wrong’un.

Who did he do this too @PersephoneSeethes ? Absolutely awful but now I've seen him wearing that t shirt and words against JKR, I'm not surprised. It's a sexist, misogynistic movement. Also "ugh" against using the word dolls. Creepy as anything.

I think a lot of them have time and money on their hands between jobs and feel they should use their profile for causes they're interested in. That's not to say they should do it though.

This has really put me off PP, not that I've actually seen him in anything - he was entertaining enough on a chat show I watched. Whatever the history or background, suggesting women are dolls in any way is a sexist trope.

“Protect The Dolls”

It’s still all about the men isn’t it.

Helen Joyce has commented on this, she makes the point better than I can but it boils down to relatives of a transgender person trying to make the world as their relative would want it. As Helen Joyce, and others, don’t go along with this they have to be stopped and punished for not cosplaying in the fantasy.

Tilda Swinton as well FFS

If people need to look up the relevant history to understand that a campaigning slogan isn't just sexist, it's not really a great campaigning slogan.

If we are going to go that deep, feminists, including many lesbians, might start pointing out that some parts of male gay culture actually are quite sexist ('fishy'), and don't really survive exposure to daylight.

Frankly it makes me wonder which one out of Pascal and his sibling is the fetishist.

And, also, if we are all looking things up, Pedro Pascal really should read the 88 page judgement, and understand that UK equality legislation seeks to balance rights.

Bella Ramsay (or to me, she will always be Lyanna Mormont 😍).

Bella has been getting relentlessly trolled and bullied for not looking enough like the video game version of the character she plays in The Last Of Us - mainly by creepy men who clearly have something going on there as the character is 14 years old in the first game/series.

It always seemed to me like Pascal took on a very fucking bizarre 'role model' position but as an older man and a vulnerable young woman being subject to an immense pile on, it always seemed a bit off. That nobody questioned this dynamic is also off.

Bella Ramsey when they were in The Last of Us

It’s a shame, he’s an extremely charismatic actor and is excellent in a number of things I’ve seen him in.

It’s nice that he loves and supports his half brother. It’s shit that he has to be misogynistic while he does do.

If you want to support Luz, Pedro, ask the blokes to budge up. Broaden the bandwidth of what’s acceptable for them to be.