I know some people are boycotting US businesses during the current administration, but the same mindset has ripple effects here in the EU. In other words: stay vigilant!
Fucking cowards.
There’s 2 things in this world that I hate. Intolerance for other people and the Danes.
Why does Thorfinn speak in broken English while Sasappis doesn’t? Neither encountered it in their lifetimes, and both have been exposed to it for hundreds of years now.
You can spend 200 years listening to a language, but if you don’t try to understand it you never will
Mm, good point. Thorfinn’s not the brightest bulb, despite his power.
Also some people no matter how intelligent just can’t fully grasp a new language. They can become functionally fluent but never academically perfect
God I love Austin Powers.
Took me a minute
😂
The Dutch. The Danes have enough having to speak Danish, no need to pile on them!
But we’re talking about Lego, which is from Denmark. Correcting the quote is at expanse of the joke/relevance.
Fair enough!
deleted by creator
Not buying from companies that bow to MAGA racism.
Also, I’m still waiting for bricks made from recycled plastic rather than new oil.
I am not trying to invalidate your comment, but saying that is like trying to boycott goods and services from China.
I haven’t heard of China having DEI programs, so I doubt MAGA racism is part of US-China trade talks.
Accenture is an Irish consultancy firm that did the same.
Is it actually an Irish company, or just one of those Irish companies in the same way Apple is an Irish company?
It’s a global conglomerate
You’re right: https://diversity.com/post/accenture-dei-rollback-2025
It’s a similar timeline too (~2025). I honestly think it’s very pathetic of them to stoop so low for the “Yankee dollar” (or any other trade relationship).
Profits before ethics.
Shame, I expected better of them.
LEGO: No guns
STAR WARS: These are blasters
LEGO: OK. Give us the money.
Oriental Expedition had guns. Pistols and rifles.
The Pirate theme had guns.
Exo-Force was literally riddled with guns.
Indians Jones…
The “No Guns!” rule is more like a loose suggestion.
My understanding was that it was a “no modern weapons” thing. That is, pre-1900 weapons were “acceptable”, hence why the pirates and wild west sets could have guns, but the police sets do not. To my (absolutely non-expert) knowledge, Indiana Jones sets only had revolvers, a pre-1900 technology. As I recall, there was a bit of controversy when they released the Sopwith Camel (a WWI-era fighter plane, i.e. post-1900) set with machine guns on it.
The Star Wars sets have fantasy weapons, not real modern weapons. Why that or a revolver should be seen as meaningfully different from a modern gun is, evidently, left as an exercise for the consumer. In any case, clearly the stricture has been relaxed over the years.
They also release DC and Marvel sets with guns. Sure, the super villains have fantasy weapons, but the goons have pistols and uzis.
It’s a weird and arbitrary line to draw anyways, if they really do at the 1900s. Bullet go swoosh and person dead. Doesn’t matter if it’s a cowboy rifle.
It’s also weird they’re fine with swords, maces, warhammers, spears, crossbows, and pole-arms since they’re literal weapons made for murder, dismemberment, gutting, and otherwise turning a human into human’t.
It’s funny with Bionicle back in 2001 because you have this warrior of fire with a flaming sword that is described as being able to lay waste and cause devastation at an impressive scale, but nope. Oh no. That’s not a weapon, that’s a “Toa tool”.
Then 2006 came along and even Bionicles were given straight up guns.
Lego’s had guns and other weapons since waaaay before they started making Star Wars sets.
I think they’ve reached the point of being a huge corporation where they no longer have any morals beyond whatever makes them money. They sell pride sets when acceptance is profitable, and now they’re cool with giving JK Rowling money to hurt trans people if it means they’ll see a few bucks from it.
Really Denmark?
Everyone needs to remember regardless where they are based out of a multinational corporation is just that multinational. So they will do what they have to do to curry favor with a powerful government for corporate kick backs.
Plus regardless of how wrong it is the the people of the United States told the world what they want when the majority elected these clowns not only by the electrical college but also the popular vote. So companies are going to respond to what they perceive is what their markets want.
I hate it as much as the next human with even a little empathy but it’s how the world works right now. Just like with countries, companies don’t have morals they have interests. So there is no good or bad companies only whats in their interest at the moment.
So there is no good or bad companies only whats in their interest at the moment.
That’s absolutely not true. Just because a company doesn’t “have morals” doesn’t mean a company isn’t immoral. No different than a psychopath not having morals, but us as society being able to judge them for that. You, as a consumer, have a choice on companies you interact with (somewhat, of course). Companies generally seek profit, so yes, capitalism is at fault it the core. But there are companies like:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LifeStraw
vs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_(drinkware_company)
Which one is more ethical?
These companies could have broken ties:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_collaboration_with_Nazi_Germany
That being said there’s currently a pretty strong rise globally in support for nationalism / fascism / racism / anti-science / religious domination of government and media / genocide. So even companies that seem more local can immediately change their culture to adopt to a shift in power, belief, etc.
Just because interests align with the wellbeing of the public doesnt make a company moral. You back a few years ago and Tesla started by Martin Eberhard and Marc Tarpenning to push Electric cars and battery tech and thus would get us off fossil fuels. We all for the most part think of that as a good thing and look at them now.
The problem is companies by design eventually get big enough that the people in them don’t truly care of the mission of the company. Most people do what they need to do to keep their job and when you have enough people doing that in the micro where they dont see it as immoral, but it adds up at the maco to some really immoral stuff.
It could be currying favor with Trump. However I also think a lot of companies were only doing this inclusion stuff in the first place behavior it was fashionable or assumed to be a good thing. With that removed, they’re just dropping the pretense.
Another company that doesn’t need to, cow-towing to the cowardly cunt in the White House. Or is it the kitsch Gold House now?
Omg 😂😂😂 ive been calling it the gold leaf house recently
The oligarchy transcends borders
That’s what they are doing. I am amazed that no one from outside has yet pointed finger and warned about Heritage Foundation’s attempt to influence Europe. They want to see the world burn, literally.
Heritage Foundation is a terrorist organisation and should be treated as such.
money is fungible
They didn’t change. They just don’t pretend any more.
This sucks, my daughter just got into Lego. I guess it’s just another evil company I’ll be boycotting.
If my daughter wants more Lego, I’ll just buy it second hand
Good news: their patent expired, and offbrand lego now fits on Lego, at a third of the price.
The official bricks have a better feel than any of the off-brand versions I’ve encountered, though. Every other brand is usually too tight, or sometimes too loose. Lego spent a lot of time perfecting the clasping power, and it shows.
When have you last tried? The competition has changed immensely during the last couple of years, and there are brands now that have it dialed in just as well as Lego. I highly recommend checking out Lumibricks or Pantasy, those are best in class at the moment, and actually better than Lego in many ways, imo. Or maybe Cada, if you’re more into the Technic side of things
OK, I haven’t tried those. I am currently building the Pikachu from Mega Bloks with my young children, and they are having a noticeably harder time putting the pieces together than with similar complexity Lego sets. That being said, I love the design of the set, and the assembly instructions are arguably at least as good as Lego.
I don’t have any experience with Mega/Mattel stuff so far, so can’t really compare those. From what I hear, the quality of pieces is okay, but not on the same level as Lego and gobricks (the manufacturer that provides the bricks for both Lumibricks and Pantasy, among others).
If you actually want to give them a shot, just make sure you get relatively recent-ish sets (released within the last 2 years or so), as especially Lumibricks has very rapidly been refining the quality of their set designs, instructions etc, and gobricks pieces from before that time also tend to have quite strong clutch power which they’ve softened up by now. It’s really cool to see how quickly things are improving at the high end currently
Do those companies have DEI policies, or are we just indirectly dinging Lego for having had one in the first place?
I get mine from weird Chinese sites, soooo…
Care to share some of these offbrand 1/3 the price lego brands?
My recommendation is Lumibricks or Pantasy. They’re not quite 1/3 of the price of Lego, more around 1/2 on average I think, but both offer the best brick quality that you’re going to get from any company at the moment (they use the same supplier, gobricks). They’re also both offering exclusively original designs, so no copied sets or anything like that, and doing a lot of stuff setting them apart from Lego. Lumibricks has light kits integrated seamlessly into every set and goes hard on printed pieces, no stickers anywhere. Pantasy likes using lots of metallic painted pieces, bigger custom molded pieces, and has a few interesting IPs.
If you’re into Technic, there’s also CaDa, and if you want very accurate display models you could look into Cobi. The later is a polish company that designs and produces entirely in Europe, in contrast to any other brand out there, but that also comes with a price tag that’s pretty similar to Lego at this point.
for technic there’s CaDa
Anything “Lego” sold on aliexpress.
I bought a bunch of minifigs off Amazon sold as “cake toppers” to escape notice.
Bad news, their patent expired and they in turn, trademarked the bricks. They sue everyone under trademark now, instead of patent infringement.
If my daughter wants more Lego, I’ll just buy it second hand
That’s where most of the sets my kids had came from.
It’s a durable product that is easy to clean. Buying used is very low risk.
This isn’t a great look, but calling Lego “evil” is a bit of a stretch. This was one report that has no bearing on how they run their company or how they interact with their customers.
They still support and promote diversity in their products, which is where it matters.
No, it’s not. Lego has been bullying local distributors of other brick systems (e. g. CADA) by issuing patent claims, knowing very very well that those claims are false and the patents have expired long ago.
However, customs has to hold and store the shipping containers until the court settles, and they charge for it. A lot. This forces small shops (down to your local mom&pop toy store) to pay for customs storage fees, for weeks, sometimes months. These costs are high enough to force small shops out of business, mind you.
Along with the declining quality of the sets and the increasing cost, Lego is very well a shitty company.
The high cost is an issue, but I don’t know what you’re talking about with declining quality. It’s still fantastic quality.
You might have a point. It’s only one document that they decided not to mention DEI related words in dispite using it 7 times in the same document the previous year.
However, I’ve been on the fence about even buying Lego for my daughter. The fact is that they sell a product entirely made from plastic, it doesn’t matter that they use paper bags now to contain their plastic. This is the modern day equivalent of buying your children toys made with asbestos or lead. These products make our children and planet less healthy in ways we aren’t fully sure yet.
Maybe they aren’t evil. But they also seem to be far from innocent.
I think I’ll still stick to buying second hand if at all.
The plastic used to make Lego is a byproduct of fossil fuels. It won’t stop being added to the environment until we get off of fossil fuels. It’s not like Lego is digging up oil just to make toys.
They’re also actively searching for renewable plastic alternatives. Like, it’s a huge initiative for them.
In the meantime they just recently started a recycling program where they buy back old bricks, with the stated purpose being their concern for what happens to the plastic when it’s no longer being used.
If you’re looking for a toy company that’s conscientious about their impact on the environment, you’d have a hard time finding better than Lego.
Welp, fuck Lego too I guess. I hope at least some of their fans vote with their wallet and choose new hobbies a little less supportive of fascism.
As if I could afford any to begin with.
That would be assuming most corporations care about idealogies.
LEGO would sell their toys in Nazi countries simply to make money. Like any other corp, that’s the one and only thing that matters.
Anyway, knock-off LEGO has become just as good as the real thing these days, but significantly cheaper to buy. Perhaps better, since knock-offs often have colours LEGO doesn’t.
Yes, I’m sure the Chinese companies that create those are much better when it comes to human rights and diversity.
I didn’t say that. When did I say that? XD
deleted by creator
Well, their products were overpriced anyways, also still selling wizard legos…
The wizard lego is very disappointing, and goes completely against their other inclusive language. As for pricing, I’m not sure since quality is top tier. But I suppose the profits will tell us just how much room they have to lower their prices.
The wizard lego is very disappointing, and goes completely against their other inclusive language.
To be fair, they started making those sets long before anyone knew the author was a TERF.
I didn’t know that. However, they have known for quite some time now.
well their patent dropped so you can buy “lego” pieces from china. If you are not a rich collector just go and buy 10k pieces from china for 20 bucks. Your kids won’t mind.
Or 3d print them, it works too but it’s more expensive
Their patents dropped ages ago, I got fake lego 100% compatible with the real one in the nineties, since my parents were poor.
Buy Cobi, they’re a company from Poland producing their bricks in Poland. And they have tanks.
Enough of skin tone mini figures, make everyone yellow again.
