Is Disney Racist?

I read a story today about the new "princess" movie being filmed by Disney. In the past, Disney has had white princesses, Asian "princesses" (Mulan) and even an Indian princess (Pocahontas). Now, they've added their first black princess to the division.

Yes, they have a princess division at Disney.

The newest addition is "Tiana" - although her name was originally "Maddy". That name drew criticism because, as usual, people thought too much into the name and thought it was too close to the name "Mammy" - a word previously used to refer to female slaves.

The next thing people criticized was that she was a chambermaid. Apparently, maids are too much like slaves. Does that mean Cinderella was a racist story? She was treated like a slave but I don't see anyone criticizing that. Now Tiana's occupation is as a 'restaurant entrepreneur'.

People even have been complaining that the story is being set in New Orleans! How dare they have a story of love and romance set in New Orleans! Before Katrina, no one would have complained that the setting was racist on the part of Disney.

Lastly, they have criticized the decision to cast a Brazilian actor as the prince. Many bloggers have asked if that means that black men are not good enough to be a prince. I remember when people would have been up in arms over the fact that the two people weren't of the same race. It is a love story - not a movie push some political agenda!

How come when they did a remake of Cinderella with a black Cinderella and queen, Hispanic prince and a white king, no one had a problem with it. But now, it's an issue. Oh, and OPRAH is going to play her mother. I'm surprised no one has an issue with that considering she has been criticized by the black community at times as well.

I just want to know when a FAIRY TALE became the embodiment of racism.

This entry was posted on Sunday, April 26, 2009 and is filed under . You can leave a response and follow any responses to this entry through the Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom) .

3 comments

Anonymous  

I dont know. but I think disney should've just kept it the way they originally planned and screwed everyone else. seriously. it's a cartoon. it doesn't promote anything, but it seems to me ever since obama became president, the african american community have started to get even more defensive and all that crap.

Lisa  

This is ridiculous! It's just a cartoon....."so much to do about nothing"!!!

Media Studys Student  

The reason it's such a big deal is because it's directed at children. In media studys were dissussing wether or not disney is any better than porn, that's right. All Disney films have the same message that every woman needs a man, fat people are funny idiots and the strong mascuelin figure is allways just that and disney wouldn't dream of makingthem look feminin (in mulan the captian is the only male not wearing women's clothing).

Disney bases characters off steriotypes (the arabs in Aladin perhaps?).

Cinderella was a huge tool. She didn't do one thing to help herself, everyone else had to help her.

Do we want all these messages put toward children?

Quite simply porn just says that women should be passive, everyone's perverted and everyone loves sex.