LEGO - Friends...and the Gender debate

LEGO is bringing out a new range of sets next year [2012] targeted at the young female market. The Friends line re-tools the classic LEGO minifigure into a cute young fashionable girl. This coupled with a new range of colours and sets themed towards girls has generated masses of debate in both geek culture and in the toy market itself. I'm not going to review the sets here - I'll do that in another post - here I want to raise two points of contention:

1. Has LEGO stepped over the line by making 'Girls LEGO'?, and

2. Is it really their fault?

First I want to make it clear that I am keen to pick up the LEGO Friends product, from my point of view, it looks cool, and very collectable. Part of this is because LEGO has tried 'Girls LEGO' before, and usually it dies a slow horrible death. The Friends line might be worth a mint within 18 months.

So have the stepped over the line? In short, no. However there is the obvious gender characterisation that is inherent with what the Friends line means, but lets look at LEGO briefly in there history. Going on to 3/4 of a century now, LEGO has been producing generic play toys for a long time. However things started to change significantly in that late 70s and early 80s with the Legoland line of sets that were less of generic groups of blocks with open play, and more restrictive towards building of certain models certain ways. The generic blocks were still available, but the majority of market push was for the Town, Space and Castle sets. Inadvertently they pigeonholed themselves into gender-specific play. It has since then expanded to include each of their ranges as they become more and more targeted towards a male play gender role. And I'm sure as licensing began in the late 90s starting with Star Wars, then the process continues to narrow towards a male target market. Bear in mind that I'm talking about generalisations here - I'm well aware that boys play with girls toys and vice versa, but they are exceptions not mass rules. Marking relies on mass rules, and very little on exceptions. As such to target that other gender of society, they had to do something that was more inline with generally accepted gender roles of play for the fairer sex.

'But the minifigures are not minifigures, and the sets are all ponies and pink n stuff???'. I hear you, part of me dislikes the idea that the Friends minifigs will not sit well in with the rest of my LEGO collection and all of my female minifigs to this point will suddenly look like rather butch ugly dwarves. However we also need to understand that the minifigure is 23 years old, with next to no change in design except for hair and facial expressions and few new accessories. The new Friends minifigs are targeted to the market, and the market as a whole is looking for something...prettier. I believe that we need to recognise that the new line is not meant to be integrated into your LEGO City scape, but an equivalent LEGO capability that is more female targeted.

In short the Friends range is aimed at providing gender role play targeted at girls with equivalent exploration and modification that is provided in the sets that are more gender role orientated to boys. As the ads are saying, its LEGO [models in increasing complexity sets] for girls. If you want to get the generic building blocks, then they are still available.

Is it really all LEGOs fault? It would be so easy to say that LEGO have fallen trap to their own marketing, and are now trying to convince us that its still LEGO, its just designed towards a female market...etc, etc, etc. Easy, but not true. LEGO have finally figured out what humanity has known for millennia, but has tried to stifle in the last century. Boys and girls are not the same.

Now that I have recovered from all the sharp objects thrown in my direction, I'll say something even more thought [and pain] provoking. The sexes are not equal [ducks for cover]. Now I will clarify that. While I believe that the sexes are not equal, I am not saying that they shouldn't have equal opportunity. Biologically, male is different from female, otherwise why have a difference at all in the first place. This means that even from an early age girls and boys approach things differently. This is what LEGO has been researching in the last 4 years and spending reportedly close to $1billion on. We may have enjoyed the equalization of the sexes over the last century, but that densest meant that they both develop the same way or play in the same manner.

Marketing and toy companies have picked up on this in the last 2 decades. Just walk in to any department store and you will find an aisle of pure pink set aside for just the girls [targeted] toys. There will definetly be a generic aisle and then usually a fairly general boys aisle as well. But for me the real indication that the 'generic toy' push had died was when McDonalds started asking you if you wanted a boy toy or a girl toy with the happy meal.

In this type of newly boy / girl marketing environment, could LEGO really keep hoping that they were capturing those girls that like LEGO for LEGO? I think not. In fact the evidence speaks for itself, they have tried before...many times. What they have not tried to do quite as well before is present a wide range of sets that are as difficult and as explorable as the rest of their current range.

In short I think LEGO finally realised that girls like LEGO. But they wanted their own version, not a watered down version, nor a complete digression from what LEGO is [the LEGO Jewelry range for eg.]. So now we all wait and see if all their research means that they got it right. Will LEGO Friends be LEGO...for girls.

Check out the LEGO Friends range when it goes live on 26 Dec 2011 here