LEGO unveils its first LGBTQ set

“IT IS A branding message that fits into the moral confusion of our time,” thundered Albert Mohler, the high-profile president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, in one of his daily podcasts at the end of May. Christian evangelical leaders and pundits at Fox News, a conservative cable network, are up in arms about the international launch on June 1st, the first day of Pride month, of LEGO’s lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual and anyone who is not included ( LGBTQIA+) set. Will Cain, a conservative Fox News host, joked that the colour-coded segregation of the new diversity toy could have been designed by David Duke, a former Grand Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan.

Marketing gay-themed products can be a boon for consumer-goods companies—or a humiliating embarrassment. In the early 1980s Sweden’s Absolut vodka was one of the first consumer brands to go after the gay consumer (considered a trendsetter) by advertising in LGBTQ media outlets, sponsoring events such as the Pride parade and donating to charities. LEGO, which is Danish, waited another four decades to launch “Everyone is Awesome”, a 346-piece set of 11 monochrome mini-figurines in the colours of the Progress Pride Flag. Brown and black figures represent ethnic diversity; pale blue, white and pink reflect the transgender...