Seven year old girl tells Lego off for gender stereotyping in toys: "make more Lego girl people and let them go on adventures and have fun ok!?!"

So your point is what? That Lego shouldn’t put girls on their boxes? Or that Lego is responsible for centuries of inherited acculturation against boys playing with female figures?

or… that lego didn’t have to perpetuate it, and nether did you.

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Me? What did I do?

I dunno about multiple drafts, but my six-year-old daughter could have written this letter (in slightly better penmanship) with the same absence of spelling mistakes. She’s no advanced genius, just a first-grader in a public school who learned to read at three (as I did) and happens to enjoy reading and writing enough to practice it.

This may be a tad more advanced than you might expect from grade-level in your area, but it’s neither the work of some freakish savant nor is it likely fake. It’s just an admirable note from a clever and passionate girl who knows how to express herself.

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Yeah, well my one year old son could eat this letter.

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You got me there. Mine would’ve turned up his nose if it wasn’t served with American cheese.

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True true. The wee ones do seem to like all manner of sparkly and shiny regardless of gender. And I do agree that, unfortunately, cultural gender “norms” get rather forcefully enforced at some point in a child’s life. My point wasn’t to disagree that society, again, unfortunately, shoe horns people into expected roles, but to note that kids (or at least mine) definitely has her own strong willed ideas about what colors etc… are acceptable, and these more often than not mesh with what society would expect for her anatomy.

That being said, she’s 3, and kind of pissed that I won’t let her use the bandsaw or other power tools yet. Maybe I’ll get lucky and end up with a cool little maker-child :slight_smile: .

Aside from presenting a false dichotomy for unknown reasons?

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I’m completely with you on the idea of making non-gender marketed sets of differing color palettes and activities without specifying who should be playing with them.

I do like the idea of space robot sets for all, but why not pink space adventure robot sets (for boys and girls who happen to prefer pink?). “adventure” doesn’t necessarily have to be associated with the color palette generally associated with “boys”, and the (absolutely horrible IMHO) “let’s go shopping at the mall” toys don’t necessarily need to come only in garish pastel hues.

And thanks for the accusation of “casual victim blaming”, when my entire point was simply to note that my experience has been that my little girl (again, much to our chagrin) seems to fit neatly in the box of what color preferences she would be expected to have for her anatomical gender. Actually, I have no idea where you got the quote about boys sneering at other boys, because it certainly didn’t come from anything I posted. So perhaps a bit of disingenuous editing/implying that someone else’s words are mine to justify your worldview? Or perhaps a bit of misdirected anger at something posted by some entirely different user?

If you’re a maker, she’ll be a maker.

If it helps, I can tell you as someone with older daughters that even the ones who go through a pink and/or princess phase grow out of it, often very quickly. Don’t panic!

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I like your idea about pink space robot trucks. I think we’re on the same page there.

I definitely misparsed a comment, as that was not you but @PhasmaFelis who I was quoting and I am going to go fix that attribution. My bad on that point. Thanks for pointing it out. Though, why are you sarcastically thanking me for somethng you clearly understand is a misquote? Is that some high road I am unfamilair with? Excellent way to be a victim while having a go at me, though. Classic internet.

It was a mistake on my part. Though yes, I am hostile towards the ideas presented by @PhasmaFelis

Whatever point I had for discussing the two in the same comment is lost, and I think highlights the problems with the ‘suggestion’ by the forum software that we even try to do that. Sometimes chaos ensues. This alone is why I prefer threaded conversation formats.

Phew… Then there’s hope!

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Sorry about the sarcasm. It’s difficult on the internet to definitively discern a pointed and hostile accusation that was directed at me by accident from one done with malicious intent. That being said, if you’re going to be hostile to folks, you’re going to have to learn to accept that they may respond in sarcastic or even hostile ways in return. Yeah, it’s not the most enlightened behavior, but unfortunately a very common human behavior pattern.

One could potentially argue that the best way to handle it would be to not get hostile in the first place when someone presents ideas that you don’t like, and simply discuss them constructively…

It was addressed to you, and incorrectly. Was not a situation you created. The hostility was towards the fallacies being presented by another user. I have nothing agains sarcasm, i have an issue with people who want to return an insult AND get an apology. One cannot have cake one ate. Sorry about the misattribution and the misunderstanding.

You were a LEGO minifig, too?

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Ha ha. I’d argue that the only reason I’d have a cake was to eat it. What else does one do with cake? Wait, this is the internet. Don’t answer that…

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Now, this is a parental pissing contest I can get behind. :slight_smile:

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I like pie. :wink:

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