Racist Blocks...From Hollywood?

While discussing the art for an OKCupid post on the preferences of different races, guest artist, Chris "Powerpig" McVeigh noted, "Almost all non-white faces in Lego are scowling." Uh-oh?

"The yellow-headed minifigure was a conscious choice," said Lego's brand relations manager. "Because of their ethnically neutral skin color, Lego people can be any people—in any story, at any time." And it's been that way since 1978, when Kjeld Kirk Kristiansen invented the Lego "minifig" man.

In 1999, when Lego produced its first Star Wars-themed set, the kits were based on the original trilogy. Though not a central character, Lando Calrissian was not produced, but customers started reading more into his absence. "They asked 'where's Lando?' and saw the yellow-faced Han Solo...and figured that we had omitted Lando because he couldn't sport a yellow head."

Four years later Lego acted and produced the Lego NBA Series, which was bigger for what it represented than the actual impact of the product. In 2004, Lego followed with another set of Star Wars kits featuring characters from the prequels — including black Jedi councilman Mace Windu. According to Joe Brown, the stern looks on their faces are a reflection of the films and Tinseltown:

Hollywood has a well-defined predilection for white protagonists in big-budget films, while most minority roles go to bad guys. One particularly egregious example: Indiana Jones movies, where Indy's globe-trotting exploits bring him into contact with a veritable Rainbow Coalition of ethnically diverse anti-heroes.

That's not to say there aren't mean white dudes in Jones' adventures—Indy kicks plenty of Nazi ass—but McVeigh, who has more than 54,000 bricks and 541 little plastic dudes, estimates that 85-percent of his scowling minorities come from the 15 Indiana Jones sets, which include sour-looking Arabs, fierce-faced Asians and clearly cranky South Americans.

The Prince of Persia kits—based on a movie that's set somewhere in the Middle East but stars white guys who sound distinctly British—don't help much either. There's almost no diversity, with the only non-white head belonging to Prince Whatever's buddy Seso. For some reason, he's frowning.

Nobody has ever bothered to count how many minority minifigs there are, because nobody really cares, but if you counted the global population of little Lego people as an ethnic group, they'd number close to 4.5 billion.