In recent days, it has been heartening to hear sentiments that I have held for many decades.
Disney is evil.
I don't blame anyone for not realizing it for a long time, since Disney is perhaps the ultimate in PR. And I have had some unique exposures in my life that helped me along the path.
to the Flipmobile!
As a small child, I was scared silly of the Wicked Queen in
Snow White and the Seven Drawfs. I'm not even saying it was a bad thing; it was extraordinary animation and very effective. But it made me approach Disney movies warily in the future.
As an omnivorous reader, I quickly moved from the Disney movies to the books that were source material. I was upset, even at the age of eight or nine, to see how distorted the Disney version was. Instinctively I felt Disney had violated the "spirit" of the original work. Jungle Book, Bambi, Pinocchio, and especially Alice in Wonderland, were so much better in the original.
This attitude was helped along by my taking far greater pleasure in Looney Tunes than in Disney's offerings. I didn't find Disney's cartoons funny; I thought they were disturbing.
On the cusp of adolescence I managed to codify some of the things that bothered me about Disney. There was the glaring mis-treatment of women, for instance.
Beyond the mouse-ear gates: the wonderful world of Disney studies: "''Eighty-Six the Mother': Murder, Matricide, and Good Mothers,' by Haas, traces a Disney legacy of missing mothers (Aladdin), mothers that get killed off (Bambi, 1942, by David Hand), ineffectual mothers (the socialite/suffragette of Mary Poppins), and evil stepmothers (Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs),(21) that predate The Good Mother (1988, by Leonard Nimoy). Produced by Touchstone and based on Sue Miller's novel, The Good Mother stars Diane Keaton as a divorced woman who loses custody of her child because of a passionate relationship with a man other than her former husband. According to Haas, 'The sheer fact that the mother is in the spotlight contests filmic norms'(22): what happens to her in this morality tale does not. Haas also pursues related themes in Stella (Touchstone, 1990, by John Erman) and The Joy Luck Club (Hollywood Pictures, 1993, by Wayne Wang). Most writers, from Richard Schickel on, have tended to explain the patterns of motherlessness and 'bad' mothering as a reflection of Walt Disney's difficult childhood and unsatisfactory adult relationships with both of his parents, as well as discrepancies in legal documents that led to speculation that he was born to a mistress of his father.(23) That Haas examines this theme as a sociocultural issue rather than as the expression of an individual's neurosis is a significant contribution to the body of criticism on these films."
As a writer, I understand the necessity of "killing off Mom." It creates an underlying anxiety in the reader/viewer. It promotes the desire to protect the hero/orphan. And in practical terms, such as in Nancy Drew or the Hardy Boys, it creates a situation where a young protagonist is able to get into trouble so readily, and rely upon themselves. Would Nancy Drew have been able to hare off in her convertible and get imprisoned so easily if she'd had a mother who constantly wanted to know where she was going and what for? I think not.
Yet Disney liked this device a little too Freudian much, I think.
So I was in a skeptical frame of mind in the seventies, when Disney began building its mega-park in my backyard, the wilderness of the inland Florida palmetto jungle. This was long before Carl Hiaasen published Team Rodent : How Disney Devours the World.
But I had friends who worked at Disney. Some of what they dealt with was plausible in a corporation who prided itself on a squeaky clean image. No tattoos, facial hair, or dangling earrings. Ever. Even if you toiled in the Morlock tunnels beneath the park and never saw daylight.
Some people were turned down even for wearing the character suits, because, they were told later as the truth came out, they were not considered "attractive enough." Even though the suit never came off anywhere in public. Ever. Even in the heat of Florida in August, and the suit was inadequately ventilated. Tales were told of people fainting, or throwing up in their suits, and the standard procedure was to prop the character against some vertical object and call the Mouse Police, who would whip the person out of sight.
As a visitor to the park, I saw I was monitored at all times. Part of it was being a teenager and thus suspect, I'm sure. But part of it is that relentless monitoring of "the image," to the point that in the early eighties, in my last visit to the park, my New York City-raised companion pointed out that any disparaging comments brought the Mouse Police closer.
Thus, when the time came to raise children, they grew up in a Disney restricted zone. I wasn't militant about it. If a group of their friends went to see Peter Pan, I went along as chaperone. And led the over-pizza discussion of "what the movie is trying to tell us." I didn't buy any Disney movies, but I wasn't lobbied to do so. At that time Disney hadn't yet gone into full-blown brainwashing.
As it is now.
When did it become an American right of passage to take your children to Disney? Something not negotiable? Something you HAD to do?
When did an expensive trip to Disney become the benchmark of Good Parenthood? Worth saving for, worth sacrificing for, worth going into debt for?
When did criticizing Disney become verboten? When did Disney support become unquestioning? How long has Disney BEEN America AND apple pie?
When all along it hasn't been about "the faces of happy children." It has been about PRODUCT.
Uncle Walt bringing HUAC to Hollywood was about product. Crushing his nascent animator's union was about product. Filming in national parks and refusing to clean up afterward was about product. Launching the TV shows, and later, entire channels, virtually inventing cross-promotion to drive kids into going to the parks, was about product. Manipulating copyright law was about product.
Always, always, behind the smiling face of Mickey, there has been this drive. To rope in children with promises of love, all to empty their parents' wallets.
Why are classic Disney movies manipulated in and out of the "vaults"? How many times have you heard it's the "last chance" to get that childhood classic? How many times have you sat in front of that DVD that is a favorite of your children, only to have to wait to get to the movie?
"Tarzan" DVD forces viewers through a jungle of previews | CNET News.com: "One parent wrote: 'Loved 'Tarzan.' But the DVD forces you to sit through several trailers before allowing you to actually see the movie. This is no fun when your 2-year-old is screaming for Tarzan!'
A Disney executive, who asked to remain anonymous, acknowledged that the film didn't include a menu option for the ads and that the company has received complaints about it. However, the executive defended the ads as a benefit for consumers.
Tell that to Joseph Lee.
'The reason I bought my DVD player is so my kids don't have to wait for a movie to start,' Lee told CNET News.com. 'I have to let Disney know just how offensive this is that they would shove this material down my throat every single time my kids want to watch.' "
Ah, yes. Your children "love Disney." And how is this love being repaid? We must ask ourselves that.
Do we want to teach our children that love always comes with a price tag?