The Mouse That Roared: Disney And The End Of Innocence

Since the 1930’s, the Walt Disney Company is known for producing characters, images, as well as stories which have created happiness for audiences around the world. This corporation has grown from a small cartoon studio run by famous Walt and Roy Disney to a million dollar business. In Janet Wasko’s novel, “Understanding Disney”, Wasko explains Disney as corporation calling it “The Disney Empire”. Throughout her novel, Wasko argues that Disney is set up like a typical profit seeking corporation, as well as creates and manufactures fantasy, and lastly re-invents folk tales by “Americanising” them.

Disney movies have been the leading outlets for child education and social learning. Due to such power of influence controversies have been raised which include the following, but not limited to, gender roles and stereotypes, issues of independence, and misrepresentation. Many people argue that despite the morals and messages that occur within such films there are still underlying messages that deal with beauty standards and norms. However, others may argue that Disney is evolutionary and evolved the imagery of male/female standards. The controversy then becomes: are Disney films doing more harm than they are good? Due to certain themes brought on by such movies, it has left younger audiences with both positive and

For most of society, the word Disney elicits warm feelings: memories of early Saturday mornings with family watching cartoons, family trips to Disney World, or a movie that was so encapsulating it was watched over and over again. Disney achieves a high level of regard from most of society unparalleled by other companies. Penn State education professor, Henry A. Giroux, accompanied by Grace Pollock, argues in his book The Mouse That Roared: Disney and the End of Innocence that society is blinded by Disney’s façade of “childhood innocence” and that Disney’s marketing tactics are far from innocent at all.

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

What images come to mind as one reflects upon his or her childhood? Playgrounds, blackboards, and soccer balls may be among the fondest of memories. Yet, for many, mermaids swim their thoughts, princesses get swept off their feet, and lions roar to their royal place in the animal kingdom. Disney films have captivated the American culture for years and have become a pivotal part of popular culture as well as a form of education. However, these films have devoured the youth of America and, in the process; have perpetuated an institutionally racist society based on harsh stereotypes. Minorities are often underrepresented, and even completely left out, of many Disney films such as Dumbo (1941), The Lion King (1994), Aladdin (1992), and

During the last several decades, the media has become a strong agent in directing and controlling social beliefs and behaviors. Children, by nature, can be particularly susceptible to the influencing powers of the media, opening an avenue where media created especially for children can indoctrinate entire generations. Disney movies, like all other media “are powerful vehicles for certain notions about our culture,” such as racism. (Giroux 32). Racist scenes in Disney movies are often identified as simply being “symbols of the time” when the films were produced. Furthermore, Disney racism is often passed over as simple humor, or as a simple guide to

As suburban America witnesses urban violence invading it’s schools, homes, and neighborhoods, Disney becomes a symbol for the security and romance of the small-town America of yesteryear- a pristine never-never land in which children’s fantasies come true, happiness reigns, and innocence is kept safe through the magic of pixie dust.

The Disney Corporation has had both positive and negative effects on American society. Disney has majorly affected both the youth and adults in America by way they interact with each other, what they expect from each other, and how parents bring up their youth in harsh and unrealistic expectations according to Disney. Disney has fostered a strong sense of imagination in the past, present and future youth of America. This sense of imagination is necessary to the development of children when it comes to success in life and self-confidence. The Disney Corporation knows how to work it’s audience for a profit and mastering that skill has allowed Disney to accumulated billions by advertising and selling fantasies to young children and their parents. It’s also these very ideas that influence what Americans believe our government and policies should be founded on. In “The Mouse That Roared” the author states “Education is never innocent, because it always presupposes a particular view of citizenship, culture, and society. And yet it is this very appeal to innocence, bleached of any semblance of politics, that has become a defining feature in Disney culture and pedagogy” (Giroux 31) This quote defines Disney at large. Disney has created the idea of ‘imagination’ in American society and perpetuates it in everything America does and influences everything America stands. In everyday American life, politics and business, The Disney Corporation has a hand in it.

After the extensive criticism of this film, you would assume that Disney had understood the problem and make an effort to avoid using these stereotypes in the future. However, Cohen points

Background: The history of Walt Disney, and the Disney Corporation, is one shrouded in admiration and accolades for the accomplishment of the American dream. Walt Disney himself is an icon for the American work ethic, i.e., hard work pays off. He is seen as a Horatio Alger, "rags to riches," success story. Beginning his work in animation in the 1920s, Walt Disney gained fame worldwide for his films and theme parks. But Walt Disney created more than films and theme parks. By infusing them with an ideological stance glorifying "the American way of life," his brand of democracy and conservatism, he created a cultural institution. The moralistic stance of his enterprise became common knowledge and it is said that his 1933 version of Three Little Pigs was the last of his cartoons in which the film’s moral messages were open to interpretation [3]

My topic is the colonialism of The Walt Disney Company. When defining colonialism, I will be referring to two general definitions that are applicable to modern day colonialism as seen through cultural appropriation, and cultural commodification of Disney and the tourist industry. Oxford Dictionaries defines colonialism as, “the policy or practice of acquiring full or partial political control over another country, occupying it with settlers, and exploiting it economically,” and Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s defines colonialism as, “a practice of domination, which involves the subjugation of one people to another.”

According to an analysis of Disney’s corporate strategy by Carlos Carillo from the Robins School of Business, the first Disney films were created in 1923. Disney now controls approximately one sixth of America’s media as stated by a Ted Talk by media studies scholar Christopher Bell. As a result, almost every child is exposed to Disney, and values portrayed in the films will affect their development. Disney’s objectives are to be “one of the world leading producers and providers of entertainment and information.” Disney is targeted towards “...girls with the ultimate goal of encouraging children to personally identify with the characters so they will purchase the associated products” (Gender Role Portrayal and the Disney Princesses). Disney’s marketing causes girls to strive to emulate these princesses, affecting relationship development and what qualities they place their value in. As shown

According to an analysis of Disney’s corporate strategy by Carlos Carillo from the Robins School of Business, the first films of the Disney Brothers studio were created in October 1923. Disney now controls approximately one sixth of America’s media as stated by a Ted Talk by media studies scholar Christopher Bell. As a result, almost every child is exposed to Disney, and values portrayed in the films will affect their development. Disney’s objectives are to be “one of the world leading producers and providers of entertainment and information...The company's primary financial goals are to maximize earnings and cash flow...” Disney is particularly targeted towards “...girls with the ultimate goal of

Not many companies can influence the childhood development of many Americans like the Walt Disney Company. Disney, named after their founder, began as just an animation studio called The Walt Disney Studios, which the company describes as “the foundation on which The Walt Disney Company was built”. Today, Disney produces various items targeted at children like toys, clothing, and animation (“Company”). In the paper, Images of Animated Others: The Orientalization of Disney’s Cartoon Heroines From The Little Mermaid To The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Celeste Lacroix of the College of Charleston assesses the portrayal of female heroines from Disney animated films that depicts human main characters, examining the sexualization of non-European or the “exotic” others, and brings to light Disney’s strategy to instill an attitude of consumerism in children. Despite my memorable sentiment with Disney animations as a child, I agree with Lacroix’s assertion that Disney impose consumerism onto children, especially with DVD commercials, tie-in products and “apps” on smartphones and tablets.

These years, many children at a very young age have exposed to Disney movies, and these movies usually convey the Disney ideology to children. However, the Disney ideology in animated films is not completely what people thought it is. Majority of the parents do not know that Disney movies have ruined the thought of many children in some sort of degree; the reason for that is Disney films have shown the racism concept to children, and under subconscious situation. Children are like a sponge; they absorb all of the story tales in the movies and remember them deeply into their heart and head. Those children’s future will be affected without knowing anything else; particularly the questions are related to racism. I am a Malaysian, and I am a Chinese. The population of Malaysia consists of three main ethnic groups that are Malays, Chinese, and Indians. I love to watch Disney animated films since I was a child. Disney films have shown the racism concept under subconscious situation. Disney films have influenced my thinking and behavior deeply towards other races, and I did not realize that my thinking and behavior actually showed that I was racist. In my experience, every time I saw an Indian or Malay on a street, I would become cautious; this is because their skin tone is darker than mine so I think they were bad person, and they would harm me with no reason. Disney usually use color symbolism like black color as evil and white color as goodness to show which characters are bad