FP Little People and diversity

[ethansmom]

I'm starting to really like these LP (and so is DS) but I would love to have more ethnic diversity. We do have the African-American Michael from Easter, but what about other non-whites? Latino? Asian? Native American? My Guatemalan aunt is going to check when she next visits Guat., but is there anything available in the US?

Heehee....I was super excited when I opened the Noah's ark and saw what I at first thought was a Native American. Oops, nope! That's Noah's wife!

TIA,

[AngelaS]

We have an Asian girl who came with the town, I think? The older town that doesn't make noise is what we have. :D

[stillplayswithbarbies]

if you get a Happy Meal at McDonalds and ask for the toy for kids under age 3, you get a Little People in a McDonald's uniform holding a milkshake, and she is Asian.

...Karen
Jacob Nathaniel Feb 91
Logan Elizabeth Mar 03

[August Mom]

I think that's Sonya Lee.

[DDowning]

That's funny. The toy I got was a LP dalmation.

[Momof3Labs]

They have different toys all the time - there are a ton of different toddler toys at McD's!

[Karenn]

There's a woman who came with our airport who has darker skin. It's impossible to tell what ethnicity they were aiming for (IMO) but she's clearly diverse.

[cinrein]

The bus driver that comes with the FP school bus and the guy that comes with the FP zoo is the same guy in a different outfit. I think his name is Carlos and he appears to be Hispanic. You also get another Michael with the school bus.

I wish they had more characters too. We don't have much in LP but I swear we must have like 5 Maggies floating around. We also have a ton of Eddies and they are all holding a frog?!

Cindy and Anna February 2003

[brubeck]

Eddie's frog is Freddy. It's his THING, LOL.

We have no Maggies. Wanna trade for a Sarah Lynn? :)

One of the mechanics (you can get him with the car wash set) is African-American. His name is either Carl or Walter.

[pritchettzoo]

I saw a LP Dora and a little boy (Dora's friend? Not familiar with the show...) at Wally World. They're Latino.

So far we have minority bus drivers, zoo keepers, and McDonald's employees? YIKES!

Anna

[stillplayswithbarbies]

well, that's certainly diverse! LOL

...Karen
Jacob Nathaniel Feb 91
Logan Elizabeth Mar 03

[stillplayswithbarbies]

we have that one! Logan likes to put him in the stroller LOL. I don't know why, but he is the only one she puts in the stroller. (from the minivan set)

...Karen
Jacob Nathaniel Feb 91
Logan Elizabeth Mar 03

[egoldber]

I'm glad you sais this. And I am the only one who noticed that many of the "diverse" LP are in service positions???

Are you sure the Dora figures at Walmart were LP? There is a Dora Duplo set too... And that's her friend Diego. We are ALL about Dora right now.

[stillplayswithbarbies]

Surely that can't be true. In this day and age, FP can't be that stupid.

There is an asian girl that comes with the travel set that has the car, cat and girl and boy. And there are caucasians that come with the garage and zoo and other sets too, right?

...Karen
Jacob Nathaniel Feb 91
Logan Elizabeth Mar 03

[egoldber]

Yes, there are at least an Asian little girl and an African American boy. But all the ADULT LP I can think of that are non-Causcasian are in service positions. It may just be that those are the only adult figures that LP makes, but it definitely struck ME that is was the bus driver that was Latino...

We don't have a lot of sets, so I can't really speak for them all.

[cinrein]

The bus came with: Carlos the driver, Maggie, and Michael in a wheelchair.

The Zoo came with Carlos the zookeeper and I think another Michael.

The Ferris Wheel came with Eddie, who is operating the Wheel, Maggie, and whoever the blond twin girl to Eddie is.

The Circus train came with Sonya Lee in a safari hat as driver.

The only other set we have is the Ark, which just has Noah and Mrs. Noah (what is her name anyway?). We have some accessory sets, but none of those came with an adult LP dude.

Cindy and Anna February 2003

[hjdong]

The rock quarry set (yes, a rock quarry set - whatever) has a fairly diverse crew - hispanic, caucasian, possibly african american? It's kind of hard to tell. The zookeeper is hispanic (I think) and the zoo comes with Michael. Jamie's favorite is Sonya Lee, by far. We got her with a set to the farm (Sonya Lee, a dog, car, and apple cart).

I think all of their adults are in service positions. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't think they have a LP lawyer or doctor or even teacher. Again, I could be wrong, but all the sets I've seen seem to be service oriented.

[egoldber]

OK, so I scanned the LP website looking for "adult" people. The farmer, the airline pilot, firemen, lots of construction workers and the Mommy and Daddy in the house are all caucasian. The bus driver, the auto mechanic, and 2 musicians (in the Discovery Village) are non-causasian. I couldn't tell from the website with some of the figures. The castle set is not on the web right now, but from what I recall all of the figures are caucasian.

I'm not saying there's some kind of LP conspiracy here, but I think maybe they should have taken a little harder look at the message they were portraying with the adult role model figures.

Obviously, I have WAAAAYYYY too much time on my hands today!!

[boys2enough]

I don't think you have too much time on your hand for asking questions like this. I actually appreciate the fact that you care enough and are even asking this thorny question. We need more parents like you. It is important to make sure that the toy makers and movie makers do not reinforce stereotypes because these are channels through which children learn about people (esp. people they don't often know in real life) in the very beginning. I am ashamed to say that even though I am Chinese, I am sure my half-Chinese 6 yo has some very interesting ideas about Asian people in general just from watching all the movies and TV shows. (Please don't get me started on Sagua the Cat...)

Being Asian, I have to say I am tired of how Asian dolls are "indicated" with the shape of the eyes. My eyes are big and round, not like "almonds" at all. lol. But I don't know how else you can indicate that a doll is Asian if they don't have the "stereotypical" eye shape. Obviously I don't like the option of them always show up wearing "traditional" dresses either.

Cheers, Lin
Mom to 2 wild boys
D 3/98
G 11/02

http://instagiber.net/smiliesdotcom/kao/otn/pnoodles.gif

[californiagirl]

DD and I are both almond-eyed caucasians. I got to provide the ethnic diversity for my elementary school for a while by being teased for being Asian, and my parents once got congratulated for adopting a Chinese baby. (I just get asked if DD's daddy is Asian.) As far as anybody knows this is actually from a long-ago Native American relative, which I think is pretty cool.

Sorry, no insight on the actual topic as at 5 months DD's toy diversity is by species, not race or gender.

[missym]

The figures that come with the castle are all very caucasian. The Happy Woodsman (Robin Hood character - um, thief? - holding a bag of money) looks Hispanic. Nice. I certainly hope it's a coincidence.

Missy, mom to Gwen 03/03

[pritchettzoo]

I think it's kind of creepy. We should email Fisher Price.

I'm pretty sure it was a Dora Little Person. It looked like Dora sans a neck... ;) Do you by chance want me to go snag it for you?

Anna

[Karenn]

The woman that came with the airport is either an airline pilot or control tower operator. She's wearing a headset and looks kind of pilot like to me...

[brubeck]

I have the construction Lift N Load trucks in the closet for DS. I just looked at it and it comes with one African American worker and one Caucasian worker.

I don't think any LP are 'professionals'. We have Caucasian firefighters, a paramedic, a pilot, a mechanic, a construction worker, a farmer and a garbageman. The non-Caucasians are construction workers, mechanics, a zookeeper and a helicopter pilot.

And the SAHM in the pink minivan is Caucasian.

Now who nows what race the clown is? We got one with our Fun Park set but I think the white on him is supposed to be makeup. :)

[miki]

This might be a silly question -- we don't have any Little People -- but how can you tell what ethnicity the little guys are meant to be? I looked at Sonya Lee on the Web. I didn't think she looked especially Asian. Just curious.

[August Mom]

Before we go attacking FP for being discriminatory, can we come up with adult LP characters that aren't in service positions? I'm no LP expert, but there aren't a lot of white collar LP jobs, are there? I think the very nature of LP lends itself to jobs around town that don't require higher education for anyone, regardless of race.

Karen mentioned a pilot. What other LP jobs are out there? I can think of these: Fire Fighter (white male), paramedic (white female), Farmer (white male), Construction Worker (white female with Stack 'n Crash Worksite). I've seen Sonya Lee (Asian) as a vet, but not with a LP set that I know of.

Anyway, I don't disagree that the LP characters seem predominantly white, but I don't think there's a class issue or discrimination going on because there are lots of white LP characters in service positions too.

[pritchettzoo]

Hee hee...I'm picturing the lawyer Little People set with a teensy little judge and jury! Maybe the stockbroker LP set--including handcuffs for rogue insider-trading Peeps... ;)

Anna

[missym]

We have an older LP (probably from the 90's) which is an African-American doctor.

Missy, mom to Gwen 03/03

[August Mom]

That's what I was thinking too - LP Law! LOL Maybe we should suggest this to FP as a marketing idea. I didn't think about stockbrokers. I can see it now: All the LP take the school bus to the NYSE. :)

[teddy]

There is a prince and princess set with a gate and a horse. the princess looks asian to me.

[teddy]

I agree with you on how Asian dolls are "indicated" with the same straight black hair and almond eyes. There is variety within the Asian race (rounder eyes, darker skin, wavy hair, etc...) that is never portrayed anywhere. None of these dolls look like me or my daughter!! Perhaps this is why we stick to animals. She has more stuffed animals than dolls. Despite having the castle, the school bus, the mini van, and a green car, my daughter loves playing with the cat LPerson most of all....

And where are the bi-racial Little People!?!?!

[boys2enough]

>And where are the bi-racial Little People!?!?!

I hear ya! But then it gets even more complicated b/c you can have all sorts of different combination of bi-racial kids from all these great diverse races we have in this country.

Regarding one PP's question of how people can tell that Sonya Lee is supposed to be Asian: I "grilled" my 6 yo today in front of the FP Little People section at Target. (Poor kid). Let me start by saying that he's half Chinese and half caucasian, but I don't think he consciously knows that he's half and half. Kwim? I would say that he identifies with the dominant culture... and yes, it's what some people would say "White." We are still working on that.

Anyway, I picked up the set with Sonya Lee in it and asked him, What do you think this person is? (I was hoping he'd ask me 'What do you mean?') But he got what I was fishing for and said, "She looks like Chinese, or Korean." I said, "Why?" He said, "Well, because she has black hair and white skin like the others." I didn't "correct" him about the skin color. At home we do talk about different skin colors: e.g. how mine has kind of yellow tint (which is not considered to be an insult in Taiwan, where I came from. In fact, most Chinese are proud to call themselves "Yellow People," albeit in Chinese). Anyway, the Simpsons have made it cool to be yellow, no? lol.

Sorry, back to my story: I asked him, "But other people who are not Chinese, Korean, or Japanese have black hair too." He said, "But you always see Chinese people with black hair. They always give them black hair with pale skin..."

And this, my friends, is why we should be paranoid about all the images they show on TV, in the movies, in the picture books, on toys etc etc.

So I held up the doll and asked him, "Do you think she looks like mommy?" He considered for a second, "No. Your skin is darker." lol. "So not all Chinese look like this then? Because mommy happens to be Chinese." He said, "Of course not. Silly. It's just that she has black hair so she is Chinese."

"How about the eyes? Do you think her eyes look different?" He looked at the doll, and then looked at me, pondered some, "Well, everybody's eyes are different." Atta boy! "But the black hair is the same." DOH!

The funny thing is over there nobody has black hair any more. At least not on young people. It seems that everyone dyed their hair some fun colors, even my mom who is almost 70 dyed her hair a tint of red! I wonder whether I can convince DS that Sonya is actually Italian or Irish... :P And I wonder whether I should go dye my hair purple just to break the mold. lol.

Cheers, Lin
Mom to 2 wild boys
D 3/98
G 11/02

http://instagiber.net/smiliesdotcom/kao/otn/pnoodles.gif

[westchicagomom]

Well even if you dye your hair purple, they could still use you as a model for a LP!

Folks, IRL - Lin's a gorgeous mommy!

[suribear]

I thought I was the only one who noticed these things :)

Have you all seen Groovy Girls? They represent different ethnicities. The clothes are a bit racy, but the dolls themselves are really cool!

http://www.manhattantoy.com/product/Product.asp?productline=&age=&ageType=&keyword=&Prod=groovygirls&producttype=Dolls+%96+All&productcollection=&page=1


I just looked at the website and they aren't as diverse as they have been in the past, but still far better than most.

Kris

[boys2enough]

Oh, Pam, you are making me blush. Now I have to buy you dinner, and lunch, and breakfast, and a drink when you are no longer BFing. ;-)

Cheers, Lin
Mom to 2 wild boys
D 3/98
G 11/02

http://instagiber.net/smiliesdotcom/kao/otn/pnoodles.gif

[janeybwild]

Just gotta say that I laughed out loud at this thread, thanks for the chuckle. We only have one LP figure, and I can't tell if its a boy or girl but it's holding a frog or a parrot thing. DH and I actually got quite heated about it's identity :) It is clearly Caucasian though...I smell a FP conspiracy...too funny.

[AngelaS]

We also have an African American female firefighter. (geez, I'm so PC....I was thinking "black girl fireman"....LOL)

[AngelaS]

ROTFL at your discussion with your son.

My dd is 1/4 Japanese. Her eyes are squintier than her 1/2 Jap daddies. Her blond little sister has squintier eyes yet. Go figure.

We had a discussion about how people look different one day. She has friends from church who are African American and Korean and so forth. I asked her who she knew that looked different than she did. She named her friend Amy.

Amy has blonde hair and blue eyes!! I about wet my pants! LOL

[lisams]

Both of the mechanics that came with our garage appear to be caucasian.. Maybe they are diversifying by having a variety out there?!!

Lisa