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I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

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Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#211

Post by mkramlich »

nostromo wrote: post #53

When I see these stories taking companies to task over why they sell what they do, I always wonder why nobody holds consumers to task. For example: why doesn't Lego sell to girls? Why doesn't Barbie have more realistic features? Why don't car manufacturers offer an electric vehicle? Why doesn't McDonalds sell salads instead of fries? Why do record labels offer such crappy music? It's easy to blame the companies -- bu…

> For example: why doesn't Lego sell to girls?

LEGO has and has long had a line of sets that are focused on girls and traditionally feminine fantasies/archetypes. pink and ponies and kitties and hair brushes, etc. and if anyone wanted to buy them they can, and if not, they don't. a guy could get a "pink" set and a girl could buy/get a guns/trucks/cops/ships set. there's no evil conspiracy or gun pointed at anybody's head, honest.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#212

Post by einhverfr »

maximusprime wrote: post #114
sunahsuh wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I take massive issue with this. We start the training with regard to gender so early that it's hard to tell what's "nature" and what's "nurture". I'm watching the choices my sister makes during her pregnancy with fascination. Gender is the earliest thing we bombard them with -- painting rooms pink, buying gendered clothes, choosing certain toys.. we don't even thinking about it because it's so normal until, for insta…

I expected people would take issue with it. Unfortunately some people really really want it to be the case that girls and boys are only different because of their environment. Given the way evolution works, doesn't that seem ridiculously unlikely? Given the way we evolved to have clearly defined roles, and how we have obvious physical differences to enable that, doesn't it seem pretty obvious that we evolved our brai…

One interesting experiment is to try HARD to create a realistic person of the other gender in an environment like Second Life. It's remarkably difficult but once you do, it's quite an interesting experience to see how socially conditioned so many things are.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#213

Post by pyre »

zokier wrote: post #61
javanix wrote: post #2

Look: I will fully admit that these sets are really, really cool. My son is getting a gigantic Millenium Falcon set from Santa this year (DON’T TELL) and both my wife and I are excited to play with it too. But it’s a model kit. We will put it together once and we will play with it a lot and that will be that. It won’t get remixed, won’t get hacked. Eventually it’ll come apart and be put away and not rebuilt because 1…

One problem (afaik) is that the pieces are more and more specialised. A single regular lego piece can be anything . Look at the old ad; almost all pieces shown are regular rectangular pieces. And it even says Universal Building Set. But now you just get 1000 distinctly "millenium falcon" pieces.

When I was a kid, I would have loved all of the specific sets that they have now. Why? Because it increases the possibilities of what you can build. Those 'specific pieces' are mix-and-match with other Lego blocks.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#215

Post by uiri »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #198
sunahsuh wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"why do girls feel a stigma about playing with Legos?" What about marketing and the outsize influence it has on culture? Companies don't just passively follow markets, the biggest ones use advertising to actively create them. Girls feel a stigma about playing with Legos because Lego has clearly signaled it's a "boys' toy" with their marketing. edit: typos

What possible reason would the Lego corporation have for discouraging 50% of their potential market from buying their products?

By discouraging one 50%, they are encouraging the other 50%. If the increase by encouraging the latter 50% offset the decrease by discouraging the former 50%, they get a net increase in profits. It is a lot easier to market to either boys or girls than to market to boys and girls, so marketing to one half or the other tends to be more profitable than marketing to both.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#216

Post by rue »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #198
sunahsuh wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>"why do girls feel a stigma about playing with Legos?" What about marketing and the outsize influence it has on culture? Companies don't just passively follow markets, the biggest ones use advertising to actively create them. Girls feel a stigma about playing with Legos because Lego has clearly signaled it's a "boys' toy" with their marketing. edit: typos

What possible reason would the Lego corporation have for discouraging 50% of their potential market from buying their products?

A possible reason is that they believe they'd be less successful if they actively tried to broaden their consumer base.

Whether that's correct, I couldn't say, but it's certainly not an impossible scenario.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#217

Post by einhverfr »

cstross wrote: post #26

s/LEGO/toy manufacturers/ (There, I fixed it for you!) The trend towards highly gendered media-tie in toys that are designed to generate follow-on sales opportunities for accessories rather than to encourage kids to develop their imagination through semi-structured but open-ended play nauseates me. I am doubtless betraying my personal bias here, but the corporate discovery that the quickest way to a parent's wallet i…

I think one has to see toy manufacturers as a conservative (in a politically neutral sense) cultural force. Let's take this a step further and look at the way heterosexual relationships are sold to kids. We can't see lesbian Barby & Kendra sets because that would be sexual, but Barby and Ken are evidently not.

So here we are selling a specific model of sexuality to young girls as normal. And this is a major aspect of our cultural heteronormality.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#219

Post by brc »

jkeel wrote: post #91

My daughter loves legos and seems to really love the Harry Potter legos. I do agree that getting generic legos instead of boy centric seems more challenging but they are out there. What I really connected with more in this article was the advent calendar with the cops and robbers. My wife told me a while back, "I got this cool lego advent calendar online". I was like, "cool!". Then I saw this cops and robbers theme a…

The cops and robbers theme is really just a play on the good v. evil theme that permeates most childrens books, stories, movies, etc.

I think it's pretty benign and just part of the process of helping kids make sense of the world through play and storytelling.

Re: I'm starting to think LEGO is evil

#220

Post by brc »

tombell wrote: post #118

I feel the need to point out the obvious. It's LEGO not LEGOS or legos.

Pet peeve number 1 for me.

There is no plural. 'Mum gave me a LEGO set' 'I want to go and play with my LEGO' 'I have a big tub full of LEGO pieces'

This was the official statement by the company: "LEGO® is a brand name that is very special to all of us in the LEGO Group Companies. We would sincerely appreciate your help in keeping it special by referring to our bricks as "LEGO Bricks or Toys" and not just "LEGOS". By doing so, you will be helping to protect and preserve a brand that stands for quality the world over."

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