
“When I get out of this thing, you’d better sleep with one eye open. You’re dead, you hear me? DEAD.”
Vicious, volatile lap dog with no impulse control whatsoever? No I don’t mean you, dear reader, although if the shoe fits you can certainly wear it. What I meant is: does your precious fur baby need a muzzle sometimes, but every time you put it on him you can’t help thinking about that BDSM website you “accidentally” clicked on at work last month? Japan has the answer to many problems, including a great many problems that aren’t really problems. Thus, behold the OPPO Quack. Muzzle your dog while also humiliating them by making it appear they’re wearing a duck’s bill: Bobu’s your weird Japanese uncle and his duck-billed dachshund.
It also comes in a chocolate colour which is fine because some dog’s faces are roughly this colour, and in a disturbing fleshy pink that’s actually a bit too much like a dog’s erect penis, always a nightmarish sight. Definitely not something anybody wants to be reminded of at all, let alone colour-coordinating accessories with them.

“As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods. They make us wear duck faces for their sport.”
While we’re in this psychosexual territory, we could also speculate that the apparent Japanese propensity to cartoonise, minimise and kawaii-ify the mouth (along with its obsessive shadow siblings in Japanese anime, manga and porn: the gag and the tentacle or tube in the mouth) perhaps erupts from the national subconscious in some way that’s related to the prevailing cultural norm of honne (本音, true feelings or wishes) being firmly subordinate to tatemae (建前, the façade enforced for the sake of society’s harmony); that one should only open one’s mouth to say something nice– or at least, say something non-confrontational– or metaphorically gag oneself and say nothing at all.
Or you could just look at more pictures of little dogs looking ridiculous at the gallery on OPPO’s site and here, below. Continue Reading
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