My daughter (also Charlotte, 7) loves the Lego Friends sets. We mix them up with 30 year old Lego from when I was a kid … the Friends minifigs may be slim and girly, but they can still hold a sword when the Vikings threaten to invade the hot tub … and the long hair really suits the Vikings’ garage metal band.
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Dear Lego,
Please start making boy minifigs like the Friends line you make for girls. We like shopping and having a quite day around the house now and then. I’m tired of fighting the dark-side, swimming with sharks, and putting out fires. Why can’t boys be domestic too?
Thanks,
Timmy
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Some seven-year-olds have been reading for three years already. And some seven-year-olds know how to ask for help when they want to do things right. I know a five- (and five months) year-old who’s learning to read and write… though he’d rather play lego city.
But yeah, smart girl. Can we please have more stuff for girls that isn’t inherently girly? Or stuff for people that’s not made assuming people are boys? I’m over the pink, the shoes, the horses, and female characters being divided between eye candy and SFCs. Even though I love my SFCs.
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Sorry if this feels like derailing, but I thought I’d go on about how people inside a business can be blind to the problems they face.
Just saw a story on Reddit talking about how In-App Purchasing was destroying gaming, and the comment section is overrun with people from the industry reassuring everyone that there’s absolutely nothing wrong with IAP. Yeah…it’s not like it’s getting out of control or anything.
Or the former business I was in. It was amazing the mental gymnastics that newspaper business management would go through to prove to themselves that they were entirely blameless in the death of the industry, and that they were entirely blameless in bungling the transition from print to Web, or the notion that the answer to failing ad revenue was just to milk more and more ad revenue from the remaining advertisers in the form of special sections. I…honestly, before I was laid off in 2011, every issue I helped put together had at least one special section. And sure, revenue was up, but so were print costs and advertisers were complaining loudly about all the crap we were cranking out.
If people outside your business are telling you, “Hey, we’re getting tired of this crap,” especially if it’s customers, sometimes it’s a good idea to listen even if things seem to be going okay right now.
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What???!? Where’s Olivia’s shopping bags? I was told that LEGO Friends only like to go shopping.
By the way, if those are a little too themed and not creativity-inspiring for you, they have the buckets in pink:
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It wounds my pride to be wrong about this. I guess I’ll have to learn to lego my ego.
Shall we call this the “efficient marketing” hypothesis?
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Sigh.
Let’s try this one more time.
Generally speaking, little girls do not buy or ask for “gender-neutral” Lego. No, they don’t. Yes, I know your totally awesome little cousin with the progressive parents loves Technic and Space Lego. The huge majority of little girls do not, and Lego has a whole lot more marketing data than you to back it up. Yes, it’s a reflection of our fucked-up and gender-role-obsessed society and I wish it were different. Unfortunately, righteously bloviating about how little girls should want regular Legos does not actually make them want regular Legos. Lego would like to be able to sell products to (the parents of) little girls, and until they figure out how to make a global mind control machine, the only way to do that is to make Legos-for-girls. And personally, I want little girls to want cool, mind-expanding construction toys, so…whatever it takes.
You should know this, BTW, because Lego said it when the “Friends” flap first blew up and it gets repeated in every. single. thread. and nobody ever pays attention.
Also, regarding the standard “it’s all just ponies and hairbrushes” complaint: the “Friends” line includes a martial arts dojo; a science lab with power tools, chemical beakers, and a robot; and a bedroom dominated by a giant drum kit. At least one set includes a bearded man in the same style as the other Friends minifigs.
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I think the problem Lego has brought on to itself is it changed its marketing from a purely building/imagination toy, to an action toy. The licensing has only helped to continue into a more male-centric adventure/action toy. It used to be, at least to me, that you got Lego and built the coolest -whatever- you could. Now it’s more like " buy an X-Wing, put it together, and either look at it like a model, or proceed to partake in space battles. YMMV, and different kids play in different ways, but that is one angle I see.
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K people, simmer down. I have an actual specimen of which you speak. Yes! The fabled 7 yo girl in her natural habitat. Said child has been playing non stop today with the HORRIBLE, SEXIST engendered Lego with a male friend. I count on my living room floor rite now
- one fishing pond with all girl cast of anglers
- one mad scientist lair and scientist with wheels
- doggies playing
- various jungle scenes with horse vet
- beach barbecue
All of these little scenes are filled with a level of crazy and wonderful mind boggling minutiae too involved to describe with the precious time I have left on this earth. I think it is fair to say that my 7yo specimen would not interpret these scenes as a lot of Lego people doing nothing (or clearly the child wouldn’t have spent 5 hours creating and playing with them). So here’s what I think. The perception of the “girl” Lego people “doing” nothing, or “doing” less is in itself a gender biased interpretation of the state of affairs in Lego world. My kid couldn’t care less about making a rocket, she’s already on the moon. Catch up.
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There is one degree of separation between myself, and this girl. I have not met her, but a good friend vouched for her to me as a remarkable young lady.
I think it is far lamer to insinuate things about ladies you do not know because you lack tolerance, then it is for children to have their own opinion.
I am not insinuating anything about you, but I can state factually that you are incorrect, and out of line, and that you just insulted a little girl.
So you can please just shut up now.
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but Lego is well aware that girls aren’t as interested in their products,
But they do seem to have missed the mark entirely when it comes to the why.
It’s never been about a shortage of softer edges and mini-figs with hips. It’s about girls being coached to make robot pets or ponies, and boys trucks and space shuttles. Still today. Still now.
LEGO, just make more hairstyles for the current figs, and maybe some gender specific faces, market in girl markets, and call it a day.
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I think people might be jumping on this comment a bit harshly. I’m not a fan of Lego’s decision to make explicitly gendered toys, or their excessive branding in recent years, for that matter. But I had a similar gut reaction to the OP. I felt the same way as when video surfaced during the last election cycle of a clearly barely-verbal child asking Michelle Bachmann an obviously coached “gotcha” question about gay rights at a book signing: a delicious moment – and a much-deserved surprise for Ms. B – but probably not something said kid would have cared much about, on their own.
When I was a little kid, I hated Ronald Reagan. Was this because my eight-year-old brain could make sophisticated assessments of his policies and their effects? No, it was mostly because my parents vocally disliked him (and perhaps because I had a child’s instinctual grasp of his… plasticity). As an adult, I still profoundly detest the guy and his legacy, but I consider that opinion to have been earned rather than simply imparted.
I wouldn’t rule out the idea that this girl is – at least partly – acting in a way that will please her parents. We’ve all done this, haven’t we?
That young person should write you a letter to remind you that the properly gendered word is “brava”.
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I have no idea if the letter and its contents were drafted in their final form by the kid on her own. But even if they weren´t, suppose she wanted to express her sentiment to Lego, wrote a letter including the errors a typical seven year old might make, then went to her parents and asked them to correct the letter with her because she wanted it to formally reflect her sincere intentions. Would that be too far-fetched to consider, or would it make the letter “fake”?
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In English the word is “Bravo” irrespective of the sex of the subject. Our language has no truck with this sexist attribution of gender to words. 
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With a horsey and a mirror 
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Scottish Funding Council? System File Checker? Southampton Football Club? What is an SFC in this context?
Good point. The truth is often in the middle. I surmise the attitude of being at least partially influenced by parents would be more prevalent if the letter had instead been about believing in Jesus.
I have a 7 year old and I repeatedly see her care or put more weight on things because her mother does as well.
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I once met someone who was a representative for LEGO (he did trade shows, presentations, etc) and that’s pretty much what he said. According to him, Walmart and Toys R Us are the biggest distributors of LEGO in North America and they are the ones putting pressure on in favour of gendered toys. Basically, if the big 2 want something, they have all the weight to toss around.
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