eNewMexican

Disney moves spark conservative backlash

Anti-racism, tattoos among topics theme park giant addresses with new policies

By Hannah Sampson

The “wench auction” was among the first to go in the exodus of classic-but-problematic Disney scenes. In 2018, the popular Pirates of the Caribbean ride got an overhaul when a redhead who had once been sold as a bride became a pirate instead.

Two years later, the theme park giant announced it was overhauling the Splash Mountain flume ride to lose its story line inspired by Song of the South

— an outdated Disney film that the company no longer makes available to view because of its rosy view of post-Civil War plantation life. More recently, the company announced updates to the classic Jungle Cruise ride to remove “negative depictions of ‘natives’ ” and add new elements, just in time for a new movie out this summer.

“We want to make sure everybody has the best time — that guests from all over the world can connect with the stories we share and that how we bring those to life are respectful of the diverse world we live in,” Chris Beatty, Walt Disney Imagineering creative portfolio executive, told D23, the official Disney fan club.

Those are not likely to be the last changes at the parks as Disney examines its history with a more critical eye — and looks to the future with a bigger emphasis on inclusion. That initiative has even grown to include the way employees, known as cast members, present themselves on the job: They now have more flexibility around costume choices, nail styles, jewelry, visible tattoos and gender-inclusive hairstyles, Josh D’Amaro, chairman of Disney parks, experiences and products, said in a blog post.

“We want our guests to see their own backgrounds and traditions reflected in the stories, experiences and products they encounter in their interactions with Disney,” he wrote. “And we want our cast members — and future cast members — to feel a sense of belonging at work.”

But these changes aren’t taking place without pushback. Fans created a petition to “save” Splash Mountain from the new theme. Disney-focused sites are full of users who decry what they see as a progressive agenda in the parks, and announcements about updates are typically greeted with threats of a boycott. People who vocally advocate for revisions are often subjected to abusive messages.

This past month, a guest column in the Orlando Sentinel went viral when the writer, North Las Vegas, Nev., resident Jonathan VanBoskerck, complained that “wokeness” was ruining his Disney experience.

“The next time I ride Jungle Cruise I will not be thinking about the gloriously entertaining puns of the skippers, I will be thinking about Disney’s political agenda,” he wrote in one of the most-cited lines. “That’s a mood killer.”

The most recent tempest came in response to a write-up about an updated ride — not a “woke” change on Disney’s part. An SFGate review of Snow White’s Enchanted Wish, which debuted when Disneyland reopened last week, was largely positive but noted that the ride’s new ending includes a moment where the prince kisses Snow White while she is asleep — a scene that surprised the writers in an era where conversations about consent have become more urgent.

“It’s hard to understand why the Disneyland of 2021 would choose to add a scene with such old-fashioned ideas of what a man is allowed to do to a woman, especially given the company’s current emphasis on removing problematic scenes from rides like Jungle Cruise and Splash Mountain,” Julie Tremaine and Katie Dowd wrote.

THE WEATHER

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2021-05-08T07:00:00.0000000Z

2021-05-08T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://enewmexican.com/article/281947430724779

Santa Fe New Mexican