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Being a lolita, or being out in public in lolita I should say, tends to draw quite a bit of attention from the "mundanes" of the world. People always ask what the occasion is, or whether I'm [or, if I'm with my friends, we're] promoting something. Often, we're mistaken for dance troupes, performers, actors, or any other number of things because the fashion looks so much like a costume to other people.

One of my friends jokes that we ought to make a bunch of t-shirt style cutsew "blanks" that we could screenprint logos and the like onto in order to promote businesses for a small fee. Another time, a gentleman stopped us and asked if we'd ever thought to use the fashion to get attention for political causes [most particularly, he encouraged us to act as mascots for fringe voters wanting to support Obama]. Also, Japan created their "Ambassadors of Cute" [Kawaii Taishi] to promote Japanese culture internationally, one of whom is a sweet lolita.

Lately, I've been thinking about this and have begun to wonder if it wouldn't be a good idea to actually try it. The thing is, I think that it would really require a lot of thought in terms of what would be promoted. While thinking about it, I decided that women's rights issues would be a good topic on which to build. This is partly because I know many lolitas have very strong feelings one way or the other when it comes to feminism, but also because the style itself is so drastically feminine that it could easily become a play on the issues through the clothing.

So here are my questions for you today:

Do you think that using lolita to promote a political or social cause is a good idea?
If you do, what sort of cause do you think you'd fine most appropriate to support?
Would using lolita to promote a business be an acceptable use of visibility, or does it somehow conflict with your personal aesthetic of the style?

Do you think that using lolita to promote a political or social cause is a good idea?
I think it's a great idea, especially for social causes. Not extremely keen on political ones since everyone has different views, but I'm not totally opposed either.

If you do, what sort of cause do you think you'd fine most appropriate to support?
Anything nice smile Animal shelters or protection agencies, clothing stores, jewellery stores, cosmetic stores, domestic violence appeals etc. Anti smoking is a campaign I would join, but I know that a lot of lolis smoke and I wouldn't want to be associated with anti-abortion or anti-homosexual campaigns, so once you get political it gets a bit tricky. But I'm in a different country to you, so I don't mind what you people use your frills for biggrin

Would using lolita to promote a business be an acceptable use of visibility, or does it somehow conflict with your personal aesthetic of the style?
May as well do it biggrin Lots of people come up to me and ask if I'm selling something anyway biggrin If you are creative enough you can do it in a pretty way, even if the logo is only on a basket that you carry to hand out promo materials/goods.

Honestly, my views towards things like that are kind of mixed, speaking that I was one of those turned victim by corporations that try to take advantage of the style for their own profit.


Do you think that using lolita to promote a political or social cause is a good idea? If you do, what sort of cause do you think you'd fine most appropriate to support?

Would using lolita to promote a business be an acceptable use of visibility, or does it somehow conflict with your personal aesthetic of the style?

Political, honestly, I don't see Lolita ever taken seriously for ANY kind of political fight. Japan is trying to spread cultural influence with the style, not promoting political ideals. Social causes seem more appropriate since like it has been said before, there are family-orientated things like animal shelters and the endangerment to the animals inside a BUNCH of them, homeless shelters, expressing the freedom within feminism, the whole "going green" (without being ******** annoying and obvious about going green, i.e. the cloth bags that scream I'M GOING GREEN YAAAAAYYY), things like that. Of course while a lot of today's youth are raised in a place where modesty and freedom of style isn't all what it's supposed to be, but touching some of them will get them to be more into whatever cause you're going for, and if they become totally dedicated with it, influence families and friends and other people to do the same.

While those are social and environmental causes, obviously it also plays into the economic/business type field. Even then, things like jewelry, you can always try to advertise and promote conflict-free jewelry and items, (though honestly, lol wearing brand for things things like non-sweatshop items would contradict the whole point xD).


Making Lolita events to spread the fashion style and then from there, making events to help the community are also a very good idea, though with events I would:
1) Highly advise against actual events within anime cons. Anime conventions makes money-making a priority, so if you ever intend on getting people like brands and stuff to come and present themselves, unless you actually pay for those people to come, you'll pretty much get ******** over despite the fact that you're hosting the event. But cons in general are unreliable in terms of trying to get the space and sources you need that they can provide for free. Lolita panels and things, ok, but it's best not to go any further than that, at all.

2) Make sure you set up a group of DEDICATED people, who won't drop out on you at last minute or will back out of important payments and things like that. If you're going to do events at places like shelters or hospitals, i.e. Christmas event for children or Thanksgiving events for homeless families, you need to either have the money to do that, or be sponsored in some way to ease the costs of holding such an event. And then along that you can always gain partnerships with those who run certain venues and places, so that if you ever want an event such as the Cosplay Oneesan events in California, you'll know what to do and where to go to. But yeah, having a general idea and knowledge of event planning will help a hell of a lot with things like that.


And of course, never mention the name "Lolita". Even though, yes, we knows it's a fashion style and yes, it has nothing to do with Nabokov, the people you're working with or the families or people you're doing it for will beg to differ. Those who are sensitive with the "Nabokov definition" of Lolita will push away from you and feel really iffed. Unless you're getting some sort of highlight in an article to help support you, or you have put together an actual small company/organization to represent the fashion and whatever cause with a website to go with, people are going to assume or say the wrong things about you despite the fact that you told them. Otherwise you can just simply say "it's a Japanese fashion style" or something simple like that, if you're asked. The clothing probably won't have any type of significance to your cause other than identification.

At the same time, other fashions and subcultures have done likewise, even from the very beginning of things, and not just in Japan. Hippies had a very particular style of clothing, and it made them very visible in promoting peace and protesting against the war [it also made them very visible in terms of their less desirable actions, however]. Likewise, the British punk movement eventually became incredibly visible in terms of their 'anti-style' and they acted as the first major youth-based revolution in the world, standing against social and political biases which affected their lives. Both counter cultures ended up spawning fashion styles that mimicked their signature looks, some of which were equally cause-conscious.

I understand your point about not wanting to treat lolita as a costume, but the reality is that the rest of the world is going to view us as silly little costumed girls [if not worse] regardless of what we tell them, simply because lolita will never [and I would argue can never] become a more mainstream style.

I don't think it's hypocritical to capitalize on that fact, particularly if you yourself aren't treating it as a costume and aren't adding the sort of elements associated with costumes by lolitas [animal ears, wings, poor quality material, etc.]. It's because everyone else thinks that it's a costume that you are going to draw a lot of attention, so my idea is basically asking what someone can do with the attention that they would normally receive on a daily basis to affect a positive change rather than just blowing the people off, or one-by-one explaining 'oh, it's just a style from Japan'.

The style is very decadent, very luxurious, but at times I almost feel like it's inherently selfish as well and wondered that there may be a way to use it to promote something better than that.

-C'est la lune qui conduit la danse...-

She's not trying to say that everyone into Lolita should do it/needs to do it. If you want to see if local lolitas want to get into it, ok, but no one is forcing you to make a blood oath when it comes to things like that.

-...quand le soleil sera couché dans ton âme froide.-

There aren't any other Lolita in our japanime club. And I'm the mascot....
so I have to be polite all the time.