Disney’s “Peter Pan” is in the can after executives from its streaming service Disney+ decided the classic film will no longer be available on kids profiles, alongside a string of other films deemed “inappropriate” for today’s younger generation.
If you thought cancel culture was reserved for the human incarnations of scuzziness, including Harvey Weinstein and R Kelly, think again.
Peter Pan and his Lost Boys were recently called inappropriate for children because of “insensitive imagery,” according to a
March 22 article from entertainment news website Distractify.com.
“Peter Pan” faced online outrage because its characters are depicted dancing with feather headdresses and referring to Native Americans in a derogatory manner.
Disney’s philosophical pursuit to only provide programs it thinks would be appropriate for children in today’s social climate, partly shaped by the company itself, is contradictory at best.
If Disney is hell-bent on depriving children of hallmark films such as “Peter Pan” which is timelessly captured in a physical Disneyland attraction, there will soon be a scarce selection available for kids.
Disney’s newfound philosophy is extremely conflicting given the hoards of ill-suited contexts and dialogue other films have that Disney is leaving alone, for now.
Another Disney classic, “The Lion King” includes a sequence in which the character Scar watches an army of hyenas march modeled after “The Triumph of the Will,” a 1935 Nazi propaganda film, according to a July 1, 2014 BusinessInsider.com article.
From cat-calling in “A Bug’s Life” to the character Anna’s suggestive joke about Hans’ foot size in “Frozen,” appropriate content seems to be far from Disney’s concerns.
The ’90s Halloween hit “Hocus Pocus” includes a joke about insemination when three witches tell a bus driver they desire children and he replies, “Hey, it may take me a couple of tries but I don’t think that’d be a problem.”
Where is the cancel culture outrage when it comes to the ages of Disney princesses?
To name a few, Ariel and Aurora are both 16 and Snow White is 14, but their charming suitors are over 18, as confirmed in an Aug. 17, 2018 HuffPost article.
Somehow, Peter Pan’s gang wearing feathers on their heads and dancing in mock Native American dances outweighs the inappropriate nature of underage relationships and numerous sexual innuendos between Disney characters. This include Mr. Potato Head when he said “Hey! Nobody takes my wife’s lips, but me,” among other suggestive content.
If you thought Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head’s marriage was a little rocky, don’t be surprised when you hear they’ve dropped their marital titles.
Hasbro executives, the company that owns the toys, decided to drop the honorific titles and rename the cartoon veggies to the gender-neutral “Potato Head,” according to a Feb. 26 CNN Business article.
The outrage and canceling is not evenly spread. It doesn’t seem as though even and fair is the intention.
The fact that “Peter Pan,” “Pepe Le Pew,” “Dumbo” and “The Aristocats” are taking more heat for “negative cultural depictions” than the sexually-motivated content hidden in plain sight is a problem.
It proves this new wave of cancel culture among animation is not a Don Quixote endeavor to alleviate children’s exposure to inappropriate content, much like Quixote’s mission to revive a culture of chivalry.
This “cleansing” of content is a calculated effort to appease specific racial and cultural subjects and kill the hashtags on Twitter as soon as possible.
Peter Pan and his disgraced animated colleagues don’t deserve the axe.
While many of these films are still on adult profiles, they should remain available for kids because there is no logical need to deprive children of films that don’t align with one generation’s new standards.
Like other efforts within cancel culture, such as the recent figurative burning of Dr. Seuss books, parents must be the one to decide what is appropriate for their child to watch or read.
What is suitable for one child may not be for another. A blanket approach to redefine what is appropriate, woven with blurry and contradictory threads, is foolish.
