Essay on Media and the Antifeminist Agenda

The first princess Walt Disney’s studio brought to life was none other than Snow White. The eponymous animated film is still a well-known story since it was released in 1937. In many ways the film does not hold up to today’s standards, and it is devoid of any characters’ worth being interested in. ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’ has some of the most overt gender stereotyping, and relies on centuries old tropes to tell a story that was problematic to begin with. While Snow White may not be as popular as Moana, she is still a prominent part of the princess line-up. After eighty years and multiple re-releases, Snow White’s iconic image is practically synonymous with Disney. With Disney’s worldwide influence on children and media, it’s hard not to think of the repercussions of the princess phenomenon.

Disney princesses are fun for all ages, but their target audience is young children and “as children grow and develop, they can be easily influenced by what they see and hear”. Therefore, what they see and hear in Disney movies leaves an impression on them. The first princess, Snow White, was created in a time where each gender and race had a specific role in society. Recently, many believe that Disney has come a long way in regards to gender and race since Snow White, as several multi-cultural protagonists have been introduced subsequently, and gender roles do not appear to be as stereotypical as they once were. However, many of the apparent innocent messages about race and gender in these movies, can be exposed as otherwise. Despite

Disney creates gender roles, racial roles, and white supremacy through socialization within their motion pictures. For example, Walt Disney’s “Snow White”, “Fantasia”, and even “The Little Mermaid” all show females as obscenely beautiful, male dependent and flirtatious creatures who couldn’t save themselves from a Chinese finger trap. Males are the perfectly sculpted rescuers who can be easily wooed by a woman’s body; and these exaggerated roles create a false standard for children and can lead to severely underdeveloped sociological skills. Moving onto the racial roles; in the movie “All dogs go to

Many have criticized Disney for their lack of minority representation in their line of Disney princesses. Disney’s debut of their twelfth princess, Anna of Arendelle from their recent film Frozen, marks their eighth “white” princess, leaving only four as “people of color.” Although she was not the first minority princess Disney debuted, Princess Tiana from The Princess and the Frog was the most anticipated out of the four. African-American moms and children had looked forward to the representation of African-Americans in Disney films for years. Princess Tiana made her debut as the first black princess over 70 years after Disney’s first- Snow White (Cheu). However,

American commercial cinema currently fuels many aspects of society. In the twenty-first century it has become available, active force in the perception of gender relations in the United States. In the earlier part of this century filmmakers, as well as the public, did not necessarily view the female“media image” as an infrastructure of sex inequality. Today, contemporary audiences and critics have become preoccupied with the role the cinema plays in shaping social values, institutions, and attitudes. American cinema has become narrowly focused on images of violent women, female sexuality, the portrayal of the “weaker sex” and subversively portraying women

In 2009, Disney launched their first black princess ever in the movie “The Princess and the Frog”. The black princess, however, spends most of the movie as a frog. She was a poor princess and her mother worked for white people. This enforces the stereotypes that African-Americans are majority poor or part of the lower class. There was also a gender stereotype since the princess was still helpless alone and needed a man to help her launch her dream of opening up a restaurant. “While some critics and audiences may argue that disney made good on eliminating the most overt representations of sexism and racism in the princess and the frog, others may argue that the company likewise failed to counter Micheal claim that disney films and theme parks tender as a norman rockwell painting.” In this article Breaux concentrates on the representations of the historical crossing of race and gender in Disney's The Princess and the Frog and black women in animated film in the USA. It explains more on how Disney and Pixar studio executives and animators to use The Princess and the Frog to respond to its critics claims about the perpetuation of sexism and racism in its animated features. It has three important sections which explains how Disney attempted to answer criticism about the absence of African Americans and mothers in its films, the presence of physically over-sexualized and emotionally prince-dependent, and the representations of animated black women in the history of film and Disney's rewriting or sanitizing of African American history and denial of its and our nation's racist past. In Mulan (1998), she is struggling with the image that her family and society have established on her. She must be presentable as a bride to uphold her family honor. However, when her aging father is called upon to military service when the huns invade, Mulan takes it upon herself to act like a man and take her father’s place. Mulan is trying to make something of herself without obtaining male companionship. Mulan doesn’t adjust with traditional views of feminine behavior. Rather, she challenges these views. Mulan cares more about justifying her duty and saving her father than romantic connections. Mulan definitely had the greatest

According to Cheu (2015), Disney films are criticized for their “reliance on racial tropes and racist representation in both their classic films and more recent attempts to create films that incorporate diversity” (p.92). In the films like Pocahontas (1995), The Little Mermaid (1985), The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996), and Aladdin (1993), there are stereotypical images of each woman’s ethnicity and over-sexualization of women of color which highlights their differences and otherness. The portrayal of race in Disney films not only affect its viewers, but it is also a reflection of how our society views and feels about such topics. We will discuss four Disney films that have caught our attention with their racial remarks, innuendos, and portrayals.

According to amother, her child stated “Mommy, mommy, the hyenas, the hyenas”, and she looked up and saidthere was a group of black children on the carousel and playing (Maloney; Mickey MouseMonopoly, 27). The social roles presented by Disney media embody the gendered stereotypes,which negatively affect how children learn and eventually perform gender (Heather Gutekunst,106). Disney films specifically have been shown to portray some stereotypical depictions ofgender (England, Descartes, Collier-Meek, 92)EvaluationLet’s face it, the Disney Princess movies and product line are completely surrounded bythe idea of gender roles because they want to create a fairytale where boys and girls act the waythey are meant to act. According to a current study on the gender-roles in Disney Princess films,it was expected that the princesses would show more traditionally feminine than masculinecharacteristics, and the princes would show more traditionally masculine than femininecharacteristics (England, Descartes, Collier-Meek, 93). Gendered stereotypes and roles aredesignated by Disney as limited rules of traditional femininity that is reiterated through andmirrored after popular culture (Gutekunst, 105). A quote by Carmen Faught written in theWashington post stated, “We don’t believe that little girls naturally play a certain way or speak acertain way, they’re not born liking a pink dress. At some point we teach them. So a big questionis where girls get their ideas about being girls” (Guo, 121). In Beauty & the Beast, you haveLumiere, the candlestick, and the broom, the feminine broom, acting out these male/femalethemes, where he’s the aggressive and she’s saying ‘oh, no, no, no’ and then by golly, he sweepsher off her feet after she said no, no, no, no (Carolyn Newberger; Mickey Mouse Monopoly,

Disney is a massive media company, from producers and providers of entertainment internationally family and media enterprise with networks, parks and resorts, studio entertainment, and cooperative media. Disney has taken a lot of disparagement for enacting sexist stereotypes in their movies when their main characters being females. This day and age, every moment counts in children’s education and culture. Overall parents want their kids’ entertainment to be not just fun, but also educational. Therefore,when Disneys movies send the wrong meaning or show wrongful images parents push away from the films away from their kids. These female characters who be situated to look for just romance and a rescue from a prince like the other Disney films that typically are focused on the concept of “true love.” By assembling Disney’s records of their past films with female roles it moves toward that Disney only comprehends women as fragile, incapable, and dependent women because of their roles in the movies.

One thousand years go by and an abundant amount of people still view women in a stereotypical type of way. On the opposing view, if women did not overstretch the slightest of things, this wouldn’t be such an enormous issue. Women may be overreacting to what the media has to say about them. It is not affecting everybody but a vast majority of successful women from continuing to moving forward said Marianne Schnall. Important to realize, women are capable of doing jobs men can do. Such jobs as being an engineer, physician, mechanic, lawyer and even top notch business women! Up to the present time there is an ongoing public debate on women suffering from double standards. If it makes a female feel threatened or belittled than it may be

So, how does the gendered image in Disney princesses affect children, especially girls? As the examples of both sexism and racism in Disney princess movies specifically emphasize the princesses’ pale skin tones, narrow waist and full breasts (England et al 2011, 556), the image of princesses represented in Disney movies gives children a false image of the ideal woman, both physically and mentally. Young-Eisendrath argues: “Throughout the centuries of patriarchal art and literature, we find a recurring image of the desire-awakening maiden, who is portrayed as the exact opposite of the

In their article Images of Gender, Race, Age, and Sexual Orientation in Disney Feature-Length Animated Films, Towbin et al. examine portrayal of societal principles of gender, race, age, and sexual orientation in Disney animated films. The results of their study are organized according to themes that emerged in five categories, one of which was “What it means to be a girl/woman” (28). Based on their findings: (a) A woman’s appearance is valued more than her intellect; (b)Women are helpless and in need of protection; (c) Women are domestic and likely to marry; (d) Overweight women are ugly, unpleasant, and unmarried ( 30). Three of these themes have been underlined in characterization of Snow White in Disney’s adaptation of the original tale which will be discussed consequently.

Disney reigns supreme, and part of that supreme reign is an unquestionable privileging of patriarchy, and in particular: whiteness. Beginning with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937, all of Disney’s princesses have been predominantly white. As Walt Disney Company sets its position as a media powerhouse, it places itself the center of controversy with its recent movie The Princess and the Frog. The film is steeped in racial controversy since Disney first announced their plans for the first black princess.

Studies regarding gender roles in media show that the feminine essence tends to be depicted as inferior, with women often being marginalized, disempowered and humiliated through a status that is based on their youth and looks; whilst men tend to be portrayed as superior with higher and longer lasting careers

Many elements of Walt Disney’s film reflect aspects of the society we live in and its ideals. For instance, the Evil Queen’s well-known line, “Magic Mirror, on the wall, who, now, is the fairest one of all?”, is problematic. The diction of the word “fairest”, meaning pale skinned, suggests that light skin is relative to beauty, an issue that is still prevalent and controversial within society today. One of the many examples to support this claim is the lack of inclusiveness of darker skinned individuals