Disney Double Standards in a nutshell.

For starters, I would like to thank K at the Movies for the term that inspired this mini-rant.

If someone likes Disney movies as an adult that’s okay, but if I tell people I like anime, I get made fun of.

If someone old enough to be my parents or grandparents rocks Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, etc on a short or jacket, no one says anything. I wear a shirt with Kimba the White Lion, then I’m supposedly weird.

Whenever the creators say or do bad things, they are easily forgiven. When I point out any unfortunate implications in these movies, then I’m over-analyzing or even called a racist or hateful for pointing them out.

Whenever Disney buys out a major company, it’s supposedly star spangled awesome. Any other conglomerate, then they are the evil empire.

Whenever Disney makes a new animated movie, it’s instantly awesome no matter what. When it’s any other company, it’s automatically garbage.

Whenever someone else uses princesses or fairy tales, they get called rip offs, but if you point out that Disney has plagiarized things (see: Kimba or Nadia: Secret of Blue Water), then it’s just coincidence or “everyone rips off something”.

Whenever someone says they hate Don Bluth or Dreamworks, it’s cool. When someone doesn’t like Disney, they are seen as villains!

Whenever Disney gives lip service to nonwhite ethnic groups, it’s progressive. When someone gets racebent, then it’s instantly Armageddon (See: the #NotMyAriel backlash).

Watch any cartoon with lots of anthropomorphic animal characters, and you get called a furry. Watch a Disney movie or cartoon with the same kinds of characters, and supposedly that’s exempt.

When an IP has a bunch of sequels or remakes, and that’s franchise milking. Disney does the same thing (especially their remakes currently), and that’s okay.

When some artist does horrible things, then they get shunned and blacklisted. When a Disney employee does horrible things, then they separate the art from the artist because their childhoods and fandom mean more than justice.

Those are examples I can think of at the moment. Anything of more double standards?

17 thoughts on “Disney Double Standards in a nutshell.

  1. Disney Double Standard sounds interesting I should talk about that sometime… wait. Thanks for the shout out, honestly a little flattered it seems like we’re scholarly journals coining phrases to define large concepts and interpreting, expanding upon and analyzing the legitimacy of those phrases.

    I definitely think you came up with a lot of good examples, it was interesting seeing you run with this idea.

    Liked by 3 people

    • Hahaha! I certainly give credit where credit is due. It certainly does feel like we have some academic terms for these things, but I’m not complaining about it. Some terms I’ve come up with recently involve the Shonen Jump Breakfast Club (Shonen Jump characters that ALWAYS get featured and promoted) and The Pride Lands Effect (the unfortunate implication of showing an African “utopia” that shows animals and not the people who would be from the continent.) Both are certainly patent pending.

      Thanks, K. I’m glad you liked those examples.

      Liked by 3 people

  2. What I especially dislike about these double standards is that they probably discourage creativity. Artists aren’t going to want to experiment if traveling off the beaten path earns them nothing but scorn or snide remarks. Disney may have a lot of good films under their belt, but they shouldn’t be given special treatment over other artists. Their fans really need to have a lot more self-awareness than what they’ve been displaying.

    Liked by 3 people

    • THANK YOU!

      You bring up such a good point when people don’t even try to make original things. If you look at the Disney Animated Canon, the number of adaptations greatly outrank the original screenplays. For every Moana, Lilo & Stitch, or even Zootopia, there’s a bazillion public domain works, bought adaptations, and two cases of plagiarism for everything else. I can’t stand when people who want to do create things get laughed at and I’m not just talking about myself. I make music, stories, and have even done some film work.

      It is aggravating seeing a segment of Disney fans get so bent out of shape about these things and to be more self-aware.

      Liked by 4 people

      • Lilo & Stitch might be my favorite Disney movie. Unique. Beautiful. Hand-drawn.

        I don’t deny the appeal of a franchise.

        What’s wearing me down is the ever increasing price of formula. Like Red Metal said, it stifles creativity. And without creativity, what’s the point?

        I’d rather see a movie strive for something great and amazing but fail rather than sit through another movie movie that stays within the guard rails.

        Have you ever seen a bowling alley setup a lane for toddlers? They cover the gutters with a pad that bounces the bowling ball back into the lane. That’s how I feel too often watching movies nowadays.

        Liked by 3 people

      • Even though I’m not a Disney fan, I do give credit to them for Lilo & Stitch. Sure, it’s not the best movie in the world, but I appreciate how it’s an original screenplay, has POC characters that aren’t racial stereotypes, and the characters are surprisingly realistic.

        Thank you, and I’m glad I’m not the only one who sees that. There’s no effort in originality or doing anything creative. It’s like one giant safe bet for the studios.

        That’s an opinion I hold when it comes to original movies actually trying. I may not always like it, but I will applaud the attempts.

        You mean bumper bowling? Yeah, that’s a great metaphor for the current state of so many movies in the mainstream today. I totally feel the same.

        Liked by 2 people

      • Honestly, Disney needs to stay with adaptations, or the formula, or straight plagiarism because after seeing Frozen II I’m convinced they don’t even know how to tell a story anymore. Its a movie completely missing a second act it just sets things up and then they get paid off with nothing happening in the middle. It’s just a toy commercial, everything on screen literally feels like it has a barcode hovering over it. Honestly, it was a trip.

        Liked by 2 people

      • Frozen II was that bad? WOW! One can certainly make an argument that multiple movies of theirs are glorified commercials, but if they’re being that blatant, then that’s quite facepalm-worthy.

        Going to the first part of your comment, I’d argue that 2019 is the year where Disney did ALL of that with the remakes and sequels they released if you really think about it. It’s super obvious at this point with everything they came out with and even bloggers and critics are saying these new releases are money grabs even by Mickey Mouse standards.

        Liked by 3 people

  3. Pingback: Once Again Tagged by AK of Everything is Bad for You | Extra Life

  4. Yeah, seriously. I wish there weren’t double standards to that issue.

    I have never seen this, but that was hilarious. The plot twist at the end had me laughing and that is true about the “I own this whole series.” line since Maker Studios would eventually be bought out, too. Talk about self-aware humor.

    Liked by 1 person

    • Oh, yeah. It gets quite mind-blowing. Most of their animated works are based on something else. There’s nothing wrong with public domain or buying the rights to adapt something, but it’s become overkill and gets crazier when you consider some of the plagiarism issues.

      You and some other bloggers know this about me, but the biggest example of blatant ripping off is The Lion King. That movie wouldn’t exist without Kimba the White Lion despite their denial of it, they trademarked the phrase “Hakuna Matata” (cultural appropriation!), never crediting or paying royalties to the Linda family for “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” which was plagiarized from the South African song “Mbube” (see the documentary The Lion’s Share on Netflix), and you might remember Beyonce stealing scenes and imagery from Petite Noir’s “La Maison Noir” music video for “Spirit” in the remake of that movie.

      Good question. It certainly raises awareness about multiple things and can inform, but I haven’t seen as much of an antidote most of the time with the exception of maybe calling Disney out for even thinking about making that movie “The Princess of North Sudan” which involved the real life story of a white family in Virginia fulfilling their daughter’s wish to be a princess by going to the Sudan/Egypt border, sticking a flag in the desert, and claiming it’s their kingdom. Colonization, much? Wow…[facepalm].

      Liked by 1 person

Leave a Reply


WordPress.com Logo


Google photo


Twitter picture


Facebook photo


Connecting to %s