The description now simply reads, “Turg looks like an experiment that’s gone very, very wrong! Part frog, part chicken, this Mixel has the longest tongue of them all.”
The toy named “Turg” is part of the Mixels line, and was described as looking like an “experiment that’s gone very, very wrong,” reports the BBC. “Part frog, part chicken, part back-of-the-bus window-licker, this Mixel has the longest tongue of them all.”
We get it, he has a long tongue — but he could’ve easily been licking something else, like ice cream. Or a lollipop.
Those options would’ve gone over much better for the company, as the backlash over the phrase has people calling the company out on social media. For example, here and here.
“It is unacceptable that a toy company like Lego have used a term that offends people with a disability such as this, especially as the toy is aimed at children,” a representative from Mencap, a charity for people diagnosed with learning disabilities told the BBC. “I have a learning disability and I know that it makes me feel different,” she said.
“Hate crime and bullying are a daily reality for many disabled people and the use of language like this only makes it worse.”
LEGO has now pulled the phrase and issued an apology from the company’s vice president for the UK and Ireland.
“Lego Mixels’ aim is to inspire creativity using quirky fictional characters to help children express their imaginations,” Fiona Wright says in the statement. “We have very high expectations of our products. This also includes the text we use to describe them towards consumers. We are sorry that wording which could be considered offensive has been used, as this has not been our intention at all.”
She says the company has looked at its processes “to make sure this does not happen again.”
Lego apologises for ‘window licker’ toy [BBC]
by Mary Beth Quirk via Consumerist
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