Alright, so as promissed here is a blog about Disney and the way their movies relate and or contribute to sexism and racism. To all those who emailed me, all I will say to you is to open your eyes...there's more out there than what meets the eye. Subliminal messaging and brainwashing both exist in our society and in today's world. An unfortunate truth, but think of how many times a commercials song or campaign gets stuck in your head (That was Easy) or think of how many times you've thought of the singing bunny for the skittles commercial or Silly Rabbit! Trix are for kids! Why do companies do this? To get the product in your mind. What is it called? To some, brainwashing, to other subliminal messaging. So onto Disney.
*Gender representations: The female characters in Disney movies present a distorted version of femininity?highly sexualized bodies, coy seductiveness, always needing to be rescued by a male. Snow White cleans the dwarfs' cottage to ingratiate herself; Ariel gives up her voice in order to win the prince with her body in The Little Mermaid; Mulan almost single-handedly wins the war only to return home to be romanced; and Beauty and the Beast's Belle endures an abusive and violent Beast in order to redeem him.
*Representations of race and ethnicity: Representations of race and ethnicity in Disney animated features are notable for their general scarcity, and when they do appear, they tend to reinforce cultural stereotypes about these groups (for example, Latinos as irresponsible chihuahuas in Lady and the Tramp and Oliver and Company; African-Americans as jive crows in Dumbo, as human-wannabe orangutans in Jungle Book, and totally absent in Tarzan's Africa; Latinos and African-Americans as street-gang thugs in The Lion King; Asians as treacherous Siamese cats in Lady and the Tramp; Arabs as barbarians in Aladdin; and Native Americans as savages in Peter Pan and Pocahontas).
this informational clip taken from: http://www.mediaed.org/videos/CommercialismPoliticsAndMedia/MickeyMouseMonopoly/studyguide/html
Now go ahead and think about the Lion King. One of my favorite movies of my childhood. The villain is Scar, who is noticably darker skinned. Has a scare presumably from a fight. He also has a noticably "black voice" and believe me my friends, studies were done, and kids do pick up on it. Now think of the Heinas involved. One stupid as anything, one that talks back, and one that fights authority. The two that talk have noticably "black voices" and use "black slang"...
Ok now lets think of the Little Mermaid. One of my favorite movies now. Ursula is the villain. She is noticably darker than all the other sea creatures besides who two helpers. (They are darker than everyone) Even when Ursula becomes a human girl she is darker than anyone else except possibly the cook (who tries to kill the lovely little crab we all hate to love, sebastian). The two helpers act on orders. Dont have minds of their own and though they seem smart they pull some VERY stupid moves that inevitably get them killed by being shot with king tritans tritan.
Ok now lets go to (last one for tonight) Toy story. Oh yes folks, we're branching out to disney pixar. Zurg the evil mastermind was OBVIOUSLY very dark...skinned if thats what you can call him. He talked with an odd voice. Buzz and Woody, the good guys in the movie were both very light skinned and talked with what most kids identify as a "normal voice".
Now I am not saying Disney is a bad evil corporation that must be destroyed, but I am saying we need to pay attention to and read inbetween the lines of what our nations youth see. Disney has gotten better and the movies are getting more balanced out. but we do need to be careful because these movies leave a HUGE impression on our children. We need to explain to them that not all white people are good and not all people of color are bad. We need to realize exactly what they may be getting from something whether consciously or subconsciously. Little known fact: Disney owns ABC which means it controls what ABC news puts on air. Disney is said to own about 60% of todays news brodcasting and airings. Think we get to know everything about whats going on? Wrong. We are given whatever information the government sees fit. We aren't given the whole story because then we'd see our nation for exactly what it is and not what they want it to seem...the GREAT NATION of the world... http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/disney.asp a list pf some )[ossibly all) of the things Disney owns and has control over. Need more info? contact me or read up. there's a ton out there. you just gotta find it.
this is interesting. I always thought that Disney had a sick mind because they put out ual refrences in their movies which are meant for children. Look closely at any of the movies. There are little hints.
Also, another thing I have noticed is that a lot of the main characters have lost their mother. There is Nemo, Snow White, Beauty in the Beauty and the Beast, bambi, the little mermaid...
As for the darkness of the evil characters. I dont think it is necissarily the color of the skin. It has been a trend that the evil character is dar, or dressed in dark colors, and the hero is lighter, in shining armor or white clothes. Dark is related with evil. I don't know if it has ties to racial skin tones, but I think it mainly has to do with god, or holy individuals being in white garments. And the devil, being from the dark underworld, makes evil portrayed as a dark color.
you have to look at the symoblism in years past too, good = white and evil= black, disney plays along with age old symbols. but yes the use of minority groups as 'bad guys' is old fasioned, but a majority of these movies were made back in the 90's and back then people (i hate to say this) they didn't care. and you need to remember that these are kid movies and little kids need a clear cut idea of good and bad what better way then make all bad guys darker. you have to look at both sides of the issue, but i must agree with you, disney and pixar and all others need to broden their horizons and try somthing new.
Part of the problem with pointing to demeaning female characters in some of those old Disney films is that their stories are based on old fairytales. I would agree that they're highly sexualized but in terms of the old stories the Little Mermaid -did- lose her voice in order to gain the prince's love, and I gotta say that the Disney version gave her a far happier ending than the old Anderson story did, where she basically dies at the end and can never reach Heaven if children behave badly. For Disney's version I personally never took it as Ariel having to rely solely on her body to attract the prince, it was more of a test to see whether or not the prince would still love her when he was already infatuated with a vision of a mysterious girl and Ariel being unable to easily communicate. I think if it had been about her using her body, it might have been -more- like the old story, with her mermaid dancing while the prince watched her and other more physical scenes.
I would say Disney's version of Mulan also gave her a much happier ending, since in the old story the Emperor of China eventually learns that his general is actually a woman, and invites her to be his concubine. Mulan refuses and hangs herself instead. This is tied into Confucian virtues about family loyalty and chastity, but I don't really see how coming home after a war to be with the people you love is so terrible.
On Pocahontas, I know that the character John Smith did come right out and say that Native Americans were considered savages by Europe at that time, but it was true. I don't see why history should be covered up for the sake of being PC, and if anything it was the English who were portrayed as being the really savage ones in the movie. The plot really drives home that most of the English cast were invading the Powhatan's land for nothing more than money, and that Pocahontas and her people are human beings and should be treated as such.
For your comments on the Lion King, I would like to see links to these studies about the kids thinking about "black voices", because it really makes no sense to me where Scar is concerned, since he was voiced by an English actor. There's probably issues of children getting confused with accents, because Jeremy Irons's delivery did not sound anything like a stereotypical black voice to me when I was younger, and this is actually the first time I've heard of this.
Out of curiosity, for the hyenas' voices, what would you have preferred to hear instead? The only actual black voice actor out of the three of them was Whoopi Goldberg, and is it really right to ask her to try to -not- have a "black accent" when she delivers her lines? If kids are identifying any foreign accent as being black, is that really an issue of Disney brainwashing them, or is it just a problem with children not being exposed to enough cultural diversity? Or heck, maybe they say they sound black because they know the movie was set in Africa.
I agree that our media doesn't give us everything, and I agree that racial stereotyping in movies should be a thing of the past. But I also think that in trying to avoid stereotyping, we're running into new issues, like the token minority characters in a cast of majorities, and it's going to take a lot more than just being PC to fix things.
I agree with you on quite a bit...it's going to take a lot to fix things...in regards to your comments on my comments, mostly this was just a class discussion. most info was taken from MICKEY MOUSE MONOPOLY. some of the views dont fully match up to mine, but I wasnt really doing an opinion piece. Just a class discussion about how Disney related and or contributes to racism and sexism.
in reply to all your comments...i just promised to include what we've been talking about in class. my personal views dont all align with this..i was just presenting what was talked about in class and the facts a documentary brought up. you wanna fight for disney and write a counterpoint..go for it. I might one day but as for right now I am not going to.thank you for the comments though. they were interesting to read and think on. ill be checkin you all out.
I see where you are coming from and all. But the main reason the villans are darker is because they are bad. It has been known for generations that evil is the dark side and good is the light side. I mean what is next, attacking christians for what color satan is?
ok..once again...presenting facts from a documentary...not all of these line up with my opinion. My question is why is evil always dark? who determined that piece of bs? and btw...satan has a color? im not attacking anyone...just presenting something to think about. Just wait till i post my blog on what color jesus is..you should love that one. (all in good fun. not trying to offend you.) dont get too worked up. im just presenting an in class topic the way it was presented to me.
I didn't realize any of the hidden meanings in Disney films until your blog pointed them out. But I have not seen many Disney films since I was a kid. Adults read too much into things. I realized this when I saw The Haunted Mansion. The reason that the mansion owner and the girl he loved could not be together is because he was white and she was black(which is not mentioned in the movie). When I pointed this out to my little cousins(one in 3rd and one in 7th grade) they did not even realize it. Many of the things pointed out would be too subtle for a child to get. Also, we grew up with Disney movies and I am sure we all turned out ok.
I agree with you on a lot of the things said. One thing I wanted to point out though, Aladin was set in an Arab country. So it kind of made sense that the bad guy was Arab.
I think that the toy story reference was a bit of a stretch, but besides that, I agree with what you have to say. The disney movies also have alot of sexual references in them, but those typically have been better publicized.
I agree with the people who said that many if not all of the references are to subtle for a child to notice or even understand in many instances. Most of them are put in there to provide adults with humor or inadvertantly. I also think that some people read to much into simple fairytales for children.
*~Heidi~*
Well one person's good can be another person's evil. In general, though, darkness/blackness has always been equated with evil and the light, with good. Uhm...that was never really in terms of skin color, though, but in the color of some objects and things. But, when people started traveling to Africa in the 1600s, that idea changed cause of the fear of magic/witchcraft. The whole voodoo culture can be said to emcompass both blackness(skin color) and darkness(I believe this one has to do with black magic while hoodoo has more to do with God/"light").
I fear no man(Nazgul)...i'm no man(Eowyn) -LoTR
To be honest I loved all of these movies as a child and to this day. I have two kids of my own now. I never thought anything about the things you mentioned when watching these movies. We're a diverse family and I'm now Pagan. So the idea that a child's movie, like The Little Mermaid teaching me to dislike certain people and ideas, is kinda over done. I have no problem with me children watching Disney movies.
if anything your racist, no one cares, if they do they shouldn't. They are wonderful movies. And darker skin tone or voice is the more effective bad guy, like heaven and hell, heaven is suppost to be bright and beautiful, hell is suppost to be dark and frightning. Think of every movie out there, villans are darker, Darth Vader (Star Wars) Jiggsaw (SAW) there suppost to be evil, i'm glad that's what disney taught me, if someone with an evil laugh offers me something i'm not going to take it. I hope you can read your flaws, your making problems that shouldn't exsist, if you want this world to not care about race or sex you shouldn't bring up problems that people don't know about, really your digging up all of this crap that doesn't even make sence, so post a blog that has some real problems, like Iraq, or young women that are being beaten by there boyfriends everyday. Come on...Disney? are you serious, just delete this blog before anyone else reads it.
who ever said the storys are old, they're right. and it could be alot worse, beleive it or not but women were always being rescued by men, not anymore of coarse but you can see what i mean, life has changed since then, don't bring back old movies that kids won't find any problems with, i use to help run a daycare for 15 years, we have every disney movie, and not once being the age i am now have i thought about any racist remarks in the films until now. I'll let my kids watch them, and my grandkids watch them, so if you want to protect your children from storys that aren't harmful in anyway go ahead, this is my opinion, i have no fault in any of the movies, i'm not going to open my eyes, why would i ruin the best memorys i've had, really those movies have opened my mind, showed me how to imagine, that's what there for, and i'd love to work for disney some day and be an animator, make billions of people smile, every sex every race, because none of that matters to me, just the smiles, you put people like me in charge of disney and you'll get nothing but clean humor and everything you look for in movies for your kids, and people like me are probably already there because every movie comming out i wouldn't change, you got to love disney, think of when you were a kid, are you racist? are you sexist? if not then what harm has it done, as long as you rais your child right, they will turn out to be great, love them and talk to them, hold them and cry for them, children make the world.
http://www.progressiveu.org/090204-dont-miss-this-chance
I LOVED your blog. Thanks for putting the truth out.
DISCLAIMER: I am not being rude. I'm stating my opinion. No personal attacks are meant. Please give some leniency on how you take my words. imagine me saying them with a smile. ^__^
Now Disney is taking the sex and race issues in their movies and products and using them as teaching tools in China. They have announced new English schools in which they will "leverage" their movies. http://www.adventcreative.com/disney-to-leverage-products-with-english-s...