SOME LEGO WEAPONS
And yet we are surprised when little kids bring real weapons to school to show their friends.
Update (from a comment): Just to be clear, I'm not blaming LEGO, or any toymaker, as the cause of kids bringing weapons to school. In my mind, this is just a clear reflection of a violence-obsessed culture. When toys designed for 7-year-olds incorporate this much violence on purpose -- this isn't the case where kids are taking generic rods and using them as swords...these are specifically, and can really only be viewed as, weapons -- it strikes me that we shouldn't be so surprised that a certain percentage of children are going to internalize that message in ways that create potentially dangerous situations for others.
This is so weird. I can understand the mediaeval weapons, but some of these are just ridiculous.
ReplyDeleteAlso, +1 for your words.
What's the red thing between the whip and the light saber?
ReplyDeleteJoseph Moosman - Unless I am wrong, I think it is dynamite.
ReplyDeletePatrik Hanson that might explain why it isn't labelled. Too dangerous. 😀
ReplyDeleteJoseph Moosman - It is rather interesting, though. When I was young, LEGO dynamite looked like this: http://goo.gl/DNPiRH
ReplyDeletePatrik Hanson kul bild. Svenska upplagan? Fick inte leka med riktigt lego sprängmedel? 😁
ReplyDeleteJoseph Moosman - Jag vet faktiskt inte. Jag tror inte att den andra (mer fysiska) sortens dynamit fanns då. Lego var inte riktigt lika avancerat då som det är idag.
ReplyDeleteNothing compared to my full arsenal of Transformer G1 and GI Joe toys back in the day, I'm sure. Still never took a weapon to school. (Not even the toy ones, as they were too small and easy to lose on the playground!!)
ReplyDeleteI remain unconvinced. Many kids I know, including my own, developed a very crisp distinction between toys/fantasy and reality, at a very young age. I know that that's just anecdotal, but it's what I've got handy.
ReplyDeleteAnd that includes the over 6500 18-22 yr olds I've taught so far.
I suspect that those children who confuse reality and play would do so regardless of the mechanism.
Apologies for not labeling the dynamite. :-[
ReplyDeleteJust to be clear, I'm not blaming LEGO, or any toymaker, as the cause of kids bringing weapons to school. In my mind, this is just a clear reflection of a violence-obsessed culture. When toys designed for 7-year-olds incorporate this much violence on purpose -- this isn't the case where kids are taking generic rods and using them as swords...these are specifically, and can really only be viewed as, weapons -- it strikes me that we shouldn't be so surprised that a certain percentage of children are going to internalize that message in ways that create potentially dangerous situations for others.
I'm always armed with not one but two item 12s.
ReplyDeleteGet it? :-p
Craig Froehle I'm seeking clarity. If these violent lego bits are a "reflection of a violence-obsessed culture" (and I'm assuming you mean the US here), then how is it that they are (I'm pretty sure) just as popular in other countries that aren't as violent?
ReplyDeletePlease note that I have no sales figures for specific, "weaponized" lego sets in, say, Scandinavia; I'm just surmising that there's a certain consistency to sales. If anyone has data on that, I'd love to see it.
Filippo Salustri Thanks for the question. I'm speaking mostly about the US, but I think most Western societies romanticize violence more than we realize. Yes, LEGO comes from Denmark, but the US is LEGO's single largest market, so I suspect that a lot of the sets/themes are designed with that in mind. So, my belief is that the US' special fixation on violence and guns influences the company's global products to certain extent.
ReplyDeleteI was a huuuge LEGO fan when I was a kid. From the mid-1970s to the early 1980s, they were probably my most-played-with toy. While there were medieval weapons (spears, swords) in the castle sets, I don't recall a single gun. If you wanted a LEGO gun, you had to build one, and it sure wasn't going to fit in a minifig's hand.
Lest I be mocked for playing the "back in my day" old man, we had lots of weapons in toys then, too. The "Guns of Navarone" army guy play set was one of my faves. But LEGO's gradual change over these last 30 or so years looks to me like a sign of an expansion of gun culture (especially noteworthy since LEGO is a company HQ'ed in a country with a very low gun ownership rate), and that makes me a little sad.
I made phasers out of lego, so....
ReplyDeleteFilippo Salustri I don't even want to get into the huge variety of weapons I crafted out LEGO, wood, pipes, rope, nails, etc. as a kid. The trees in our yard were so often my testing dummies that, well, let's just say I still feel guilty whenever I'm near a silver maple.
ReplyDeleteOh, the humanity! forestry! :)
ReplyDeleteAxis Mundi As I said, I'm not attributing causality from the toys to the kids. If LEGO didn't sell so much in the US (North America is its largest sales region), I suspect it would have far fewer sets/themes with significant weaponry. If you go back to 1980, when LEGO had just recently launched the minifigs, the only sets with weapons involved knights with spears and swords. There were no guns; even the police station at the time only included walkie-talkies. What I'd really like to see is sales by product line by country, but I suspect getting those data would be darned near impossible.
ReplyDeleteCraig Froehle I volunteer to check the pictures on the packaging next time the opportunity presents itself. I'm thinking there must be sets on sale here with guns. Perhaps not as many as in the United States but how to compare.
ReplyDeleteTwo points.
First, the presence of the tiny toy guns will be interpreted completely differently depending on the local gun culture. Extremely few households own guns here. The few guns that are in households are almost entirely hunting weapons. A tiny handful of parents would be ideologically scandalized and refuse to buy a set with guns. Most would not recognize any problem, particularly with such a small object.
Secondly, there's nothing here corresponding to the "zero tolerance" policy. If a kid brings a real weapon to school there will be serious, and proportionate, consequences. Bringing a toy to school will not be seen as a reason to call the police and file criminal charges against a little kid.
This was what I had to use for a gun: http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItemPic.asp?P=3959
ReplyDeleteIf anyone happens to be interested (probably not), here are the most popular LEGO sets in Sweden (according to sales):
ReplyDeletehttp://goo.gl/jlH6W4
Patrik Hanson Interesting! I can't read Swedish, but I can read bar charts (I think).
ReplyDeleteI might have been wrong about equivalent proportional sales of the war toys.
If that's true, and if the underlying assumption that Sweden is not as violent (per population) as US, then the question is: Which came first, a relatively non-violent society to which LEGO caters, or did LEGO for some reason not sell so many weapon-toys thus contributing to creating a non-violent society?
(BTW: In light of the data, and if my assumptions are right, then I think the answer is "both.")
Filippo Salustri - I just think it depends on what the society looks like.
ReplyDeleteIf you have a gun in USA people think you are cool. If you have a gun in Sweden people think you are crazy. But that is a totally different topic.
Darth Frittata has it right. To depict Lego weapons as somehow contributing to America's children bringing weapons to school (and more violent implications) is the smallest potato in the bag to choose as your example. Why not take some actual effort to explore a cause much more significant?
ReplyDeleteIt's also worth noting that at least a third of those weapons have been in Lego sets since the 80's, primarily the medieval weapons, and those Star Wars blasters and light sabers come from movies that started coming out in the late 70's.
TL;DR - Not sure if this thread is serious or well crafted troll.
The thread has been read, and nonetheless there is still an obvious association being made with a collection of Lego weapons and the phenomenon of kids (mainly US kids) bringing weapons to school.
ReplyDeleteGreat - he updated with a disclaimer, which makes this whole discussion even more of a hollow non-sequitur.
The Mega Blocks line has far more realistic looking weapons then what Lego has. Perhaps the example shown should really show by company who has the more realistic looking weapons.
ReplyDeleteDarth Frittata You clearly missed the point of the post. Please go back and read all of the words in the original post. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteI guess I'll say it again: I'm not blaming LEGO for creating a culture that glorifies violence. These toys are merely an example of how that glorification affects things even as innocent as plastic building blocks. Causality has a direction and the one you're deducing is not the one I was suggesting.