Brilio.net/en - Lego has just launched the new collection of disabled minifigure in response to the growing campaign of Toys Like Me (link to: https://www.facebook.com/toylikeme/?fref=nf) that called major toy makers including LEGO to start featuring more characters & toys that reflect real life a little more.
For number of months, the people behind social media campaign called Toys Like Me has called upon major toy companies to have more diversity in its offerings and specifically to include disabled or rather, diffable differently abled character into their line.
The petition (link to https://www.change.org/p/lego-please-positively-represent-disability-in-your-toys) instantly drew overwhelming positive supports, with more than 20,000 people have signed to call on Lego to use its toys to positively represents disability and to "help generations of kids, (both with and without disabilities), grow up with a more positive attitude to human difference!".
And LEGO responded positively! The company has confirmed that its going to launch its first-ever minifigure that uses a wheelchair, this coming summer. The collection has first been spotted during International Toy Fair in Nuremberg, Germany, last Wednesday.
Included in LEGO's upcoming Fun at the Park set, is the wheelchair being used by a youth wearing a beanie cap and a hoodie. The wheelchair is part of LEGO's City line and will go on sale in June.
LEGO has previously received backlash from its LEGO Duplo range that features elderly man in a wheelchair. The collection was said to perpetuate the stereotypes about wheelchairs only being for the elderly, with disabled kids & youngsters are still left unrepresented.
"We are beyond happy right now," Rebecca Atkinson of Toy Like Me says in a statement posted online. "Lego have just rocked our brick built world and made 150 million disabled kids, their mums, dads, pet dogs and hamsters very very happy.
Atkinson, a journalist and disability consultant, says Lego's move "will speak volumes to children, disabled or otherwise, the world over."
(Reported by: Nadia Bintoro)
(brl/tis)
