Girls Can Play With Legos, Too

     While spending far too much time on Buzzfeed, once again, I stumbled upon this article. It shows a letter written by a seven year-old girl named Charlotte to the Lego Company. In the letter, Charlotte voices her opinion regarding the imbalance of male and female Lego characters. She says she dislikes that there are "barely any Lego girls." To me, this suggests that the Lego Company views their product as one solely intended for boys. I never played with Legos as a child, but it is clear that there are girls out there who have played and are currently playing with this toy. Furthermore, Charlotte says that the girls only "sit at home, go to the beach, and shop, and they had no jobs" while the boys had all the fun and adventure. She ends the letter by asking Lego to "let them go on adventures and have fun ok!?!"
     The response in the comments' section is highly supportive of Charlotte's letter. Men and women alike are calling out the Lego Company for this gender bias. As I said, I never played with Legos, simply because I was never interested. I have three older sisters, and all we cared about were Barbies, baby dolls, and anything and everything pink. However, there are girls who like Legos just as much as boys do. So, why does the Lego Company continue to market their toy as a boy's toy? People have said a few different things about this.
     One man named Jimmy Schulte bluntly says it is for economic reasons. Simply put, there are still more boys than girls who are playing with Legos, so the Lego Company will not receive a profit by putting an equal amount of girl Lego characters on the market. I cannot be sure that this is true, and I feel that the commenter who made this statement cannot be either. It would require one to look deep into the business actions of the Lego Company to justify this idea.
     Another guy named Adam Frey supports the previous claim, but also said that there ARE, in fact, just as many Legos for girls as there are for boys, and that Charlotte is "just not looking" for them. Then he lists examples of where you can find the girl characters. However, he only gives a few examples, and it seems as though those few are the only ones out there. Thus, there is still an imbalance.
     The flaw in this argument is that the Lego toys designed for girls are still feeding into the traditional gender roles. They are still pink and as girly as possible. So, Lego is acknowledging that girls are interested in their product, as well, but not realizing that girls can be interested in action and adventure and colors other than pink. Hence, Lego is still defining what is an acceptable toy for boys and what is an acceptable toy for girls (see image below).

http://dadvsspawn.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/03/GirlLego.jpg

     But most importantly, Adam Frey, and also I, believes that imagination is what is lacking here. Yes, Lego puts a male character in the adventure-filled packaging, but that does not mean that you must only use that specific character in that specific scenario which has been determined by Lego. Imagination is key. When I played with Barbies as a child, I used them in all kinds of situations. I kid you not, I had near 100 Barbies when I was younger, and they all came in specific packaging. I had Barbies that were intended to go to the beach, be a baby-sitter, be a rock star, be a gymnast, drive the Barbie Jeep, et cetera, and I am pretty sure that I never kept my Barbies restricted to the roles assigned to them by their boxes. Their predetermined activities were irrelevant to me; my Barbies were going to be whatever I wanted them to be.
     As such, Charlotte should think outside the box and break down the gender roles that the Lego Company has given to her Lego people. It is just like the real world: girls do not have to do what girls have traditionally done. If that were the case, women would not be pursuing careers that are traditionally considered to be for men. Charlotte is already fiddling with the traditional gender roles by playing with Legos, so when she asks the Lego Company to let the girls have fun, she needs to realize that she herself can do that, not just wait for the Lego Company to do it. If women had waited for a larger system to allow them to do something, there would never have been any progress in the gender equality movement.