Man-Child

When Neil Armstrong first stepped on the moon, his footprint was made with silicone boots. The development of flexible, thin-film silicone in the 1970’s paved the way for cell phones, PDA’s, and laptop computers. In the restoration of the Statue of Liberty in the 1980’s, silicone sealants were used to preserve one of our nation’s most cherished possessions. Car airbag protection was increased in the 1990’s thanks to silicone rubber coatings, saving thousands of lives. And today, at this moment, a man is having his most intense orgasm inside the mouth of a life-sized silicone doll. The Real Doll is an anatomically correct mannequin used for a lonely man’s masturbation habits. It’s not quite Kim Cattrall from the movie Mannequin, or Kirstie Swanson from Mannequin: On the Move, but it’s still a giant leap in sex doll evolution. Before the Real Doll came along, forsaken masturbators had to waste valuable erection time and energy breathing life into what was nothing more than a reinforced rubber balloon in the crude shape of a woman. Their hands were merely cupped paws with no individual digits and if they needed to live a happy long life, the relationship would have to go strictly platonic after a few romps in the sack; just another night with T.V dinners and sitcoms. Her penetrable skin would not be able to sustain the rigors of a sex-based relationship. I had heard about the Real Doll a few years ago on the radio and never thought that something so silly would ever be a successful business venture. “Imagine,” I thought to myself, “how pathetic you must be in order to have sex with a doll that can cost upwards of $10,000.” Yes, the Real Doll can cost anywhere from $6,000-$10,000, depending on which features you would like, such as extra pubic hair, special wigs, an option for a shemale body type (which leads into all sorts of vagaries concerning penile form and detachable testicles), larger breasts, et cetera. (Don’t worry, as of 2008, the new ultra-realistic labia will come standard with your Real Doll at no extra cost to you!) It’s been fifteen years since the entrance of the Real Doll onto the masturbation scene, and I watched a documentary of its effects on three men who had purchased such an item. The show profiled three men: one from Britain and two from the States. It’s strange how something can evolve due to human interaction. The Real Doll was of course initially used for sexual purposes, but the longer a product stays around, the more varied the usage becomes. For example, the Frisbee Pie Company accidentally created the flying disk. And to stay true to the silicone theme, Silly Putty was originally a rubber substitute, but ended up as what many consider to be one of the most innovative toys of the 20th century. Much like Frisbee Pie tins and Silly Putty, the Real Doll was offered as one thing but soon evolved into another. To some men, their feelings towards the doll quickly surpassed the realm of strict sexual release and spilled over into an emotional attachment that gave these dolls more life than anyone would care to know. “I think she might be upstairs sleeping it off,” says Edgar, a 50 year old computer technician from Southern England. The camera follows Edgar upstairs to the bedroom, where indeed, his doll Claudia is wasting the day away. “Yeah, she’s still asleep,” he confirms. If he wants to wake her, he has to pry her face off and replace it with one that has opened eyes. Wakey wakey, eggs and bakey! “She just lies there, she’s very static.” Claudia, of course, likes to sleep in the buff, and does not get shy in the face of the camera (her nipples even stay erect, despite the boom mic and camera lights around her.) Edgar says that Claudia’s companionship is still better than no female companionship at all. Edgar likes to hang-glide. He feels as though it impresses his girlfriend, and well, all women really. He’ll bring Claudia with him when he ventures off a hillside. She doesn’t hang-glide with him, though. Instead, she sits in the car and watches Edgar’s brave antics with a sign on her shirt that reads, “Do not try to rescue me. I am a Real Doll.” The introduction of the Real Doll into Edgar’s life has gotten him interested in photography. He enjoys taking a couple of his dolls into alleyways and posing them in certain nonchalant positions, like sitting on a bench or reading a magazine. In order to make one stand up on its own, he has to attach a hook to her back and hang her from a pipe or a gate, but in a natural-looking way. Edgar says that there are plenty of attractive women in his area, but they have absolutely no interest in him. According to Edgar, all women find him repulsive, and the Real Doll takes away the loneliness he would normally feel in such a judgmental world. In Edgar’s spare bedroom are his mother’s possessions, exactly how they were when she died a few years ago. All clocks are set to proper time, and everything is properly dusted to make the room as fresh as it was on the last day she was alive. Even the rubbish bins have held the same waste his mother wanted gone many moons ago. This sounds eerily familiar, I thought: A person who everyone finds disgusting, who has no friends, no sympathizers, and is completely obsessed with his dead mother. “It’s Jason Vorhees,” I shouted from my recliner. “That’s the same background as Jason fuckin’ Voorhees!” “Who?” My girlfriend, Tina, asked from the couch next to me. “Jason Voorhees! He killed 154 people, not including Friday the 13th Part 5: A New Beginning, and the first movie, where his mother did all the killing.” “Oh,” she said. “You see, in Friday the 13th: A New Beginning, the actual killer was just an ordinary man dressed as Jason who wanted revenge on these kids who…” I trailed off, and turned my attention back to the documentary.