I found this academic piece set to youtube, wherein (1) a clearly labeled and despised character such as Gaston is touted as a positive role model for boys in order to cram him into the thesis, and (2) worrying about body type portrayal in Hercules, for shit's sale, slightly overblown.

However, one would be a fool to doubt the underlying points he's making (without access to any Disney movie made before 1992, apparently), as anxious masculinity pervades all popular culture and advertising.

I remember this from when I was little. It made me just as mad then.

This is a good video and a needed look at the other side of sexism.

That being said, I have to say the Gaston parts I kind of disagree with. He's the braggart soldier, he's not supposed to be a role model. In fact, if anything, the movie asking you to laugh at and pity the man whose identity is based on beating people and being chiseled? Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of sexism in Beauty and the Beast, but it's male protagonist is one of the few portrayed that has to abandon brute strength and dominance for gentleness and compassion.

While I generally agree with the sentiment, the author also took a bit of creative editing license with some of the clips, intentionally subverting the meaning that was/would be obvious to anyone who had seen the whole film:

Emperor's New Groove: He's a total dick at the beginning of the film, hence his demeaning objectification of the women's appearance. He is such an obvious asshole that any trait he displays is clearly done to demonstrate that trait as a negative. He undergoes a transformative (pun slightly intended) event during the course of the film and becomes a nice guy.

Beauty & The Beast: Same argument. Gaston is the bad guy, by placing the offensive remarks in his mouth the writer is making a clear statement as to the negative nature of those statements. And again when Gaston mocks The Beast for not fighting back, same thing. It's a villain saying it.

Mulan: The comments made by the soldiers are meant to set them up for the big reveal that Mulan is, in fact, a female and a competent soldier not an object to be possessed or fought over. See "12th Knight". "Masculinity and physical prowess": It's the army, and not the Army with guns and jeeps. It's the army where climbing a pole and lifting heavy shit actually was relevant to judging your fitness to serve. She also demonstrates that perseverance and skill and quick wits make her more than a match for the challenge (as well as most of her male peers). The song "Be A Man" comes off as clear irony.

Hercules: Body type argument. He should have left Herc out of it. It's the demigod of strength, his physical prowess is predetermined by the nature of his mythos.

The Lion King: The author does a good job of looking at how violence is portrayed as a central necessity to a positive resolution, but he fails when he implies that females play no role in it. The lioness group in the film are actually the one's who save Simba at the end of the film.

Clearly the author had a point he wanted to make, and I agree with the point. However I think that using exclusionary argument, or even presenting things through editing and voiceover that were not present in the original material is a poor way to make one's point. I believe intellectual dishonesty like this does more harm than good.

Great videos; both hit on harmful stereotypes. That racism in that video is AWFUL; I've always known Disney is horrible on the racism front but I don't think I've ever cringed/looked away so much. I do think they kind of gave Mulan the shaft in the sexism video though. "A Girl Worth Fighting For" is there to depict how sexist and ridiculous men's attitudes towards women are, just as Gaston's character is anything but a role model for men.

Great arguments against the video, however I have to agree with the creator of the video that these images are harmful to a child's self-esteem and world view- an average child doesn't have the critical thinking skills to intellectually dissect a character's role in a carton. Gaston may be a villain, and a toad- but he is popular in the pub, with men and women. He's supposed to be bad, but he is rewarded?

Didn't the author get his wish in "Wall-E"? Wall-E meets none of the stereo types. And the other big heroes in there as well seem to be out of step with his other points.

It's hard to argue against his points, but it seems that Disney has larger issues than the ones cited. Disney uses standard tropes that have changed little from "Brothers Grimm" days. Still, I don't see the 'evil/bad' men in Disney as 'role models'. And Aladin doesn't have the body build he defines. The more I think about it, the more sketchy the whole thing gets.

A few other additions on how the creator of this conveniently ignored context and opposing examples.

Aladdin: Jasmine makes a point that she is not a prize to be won and the story is ultimately about how women should have a choice of partners and not be treated as property in addition to the commentary on class.

Hunchback of Notre Dame: Quasimodo is in many ways a hero that lacks the masculine ideals.

Pochahantos: John Smith ultimately tries to prevent violence and conflict with the Native Americans.

I'm going to give Disney the benefit of the doubt here.

"Gaston may be a villain, and a toad- but he is popular in the pub, with men and women. He's supposed to be bad, but he is rewarded?"

He dies. He's popular in the pub with men who make fun of Maurice and who are willing to storm the castle and kill someone who has never been a threat, and with women who are *clearly* more interested in Gaston because he is strong and powerful and who look down on Belle for recognizing that there is more to life than marriage and children and rubbing your husband's feet. And yes, I've seen Beauty and the Beast more than was probably healthy.

I had the same problem with the clip show that Logrus did -and Bondo makes some good points as well.

The Incredibles clip from the beginning? Mr. Incredible succeeds because he learns how to work within the framework of a team; the movie was able to demonstrate two things: that everyone should acknowledge their strengths and *not* just try to be like everyone else, and that a marriage was failing because the husband was too wrapped up in his glory days to acknowledge what he had -plus the lying. Both Helen and Bob were shown to have been wrong about certain things, and right about others. And yes, I've seen The Incredibles more times than is healthy as well.

I google words like that too! It is amazing what you come across....

I wrote about this exact video in November:
http://popfeminist.blogspot.com/2007/11/masculinity-and-disney-movies.html

I had the same basic critiques as the commenters (Gaston is an example of how NOT to be etc.), also I jotted down off the top of my head the a large number of characters that contradict the thesis:

Pinoccio
The Prince in Snow White
Dumbo (if he's going to use the Lion King, I can use animals too)
The Tramp (Lady and the Tramp)
Bambi(!)
Peter Pan
Mogli
Robin Hood
Winnie the Pooh(!)
The mice from The Rescuers
Aladdin
The Beast (Beauty and the Beast- when he's a human too actually)
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Kuzco (the Emperor's New Groove)
The lead guy in Atlantis....
the list goes on.

Nevertheless, this video brings more traffic to my blog than any other entry. People LOVE disney and gender critiques!

beauty & the beast and mulan have TOTALLY kick-ass feminist heroines, and therefore are the best disney movies of all time.

Elegantly stated Logrus. I don't think I could've said it better myself.

To me, this comes off as a thesis that was written with data collected to support the idea - instead of the other way around.

The video on racism surprised me. Not because of the examples they did cite, or how well done it was (it was quite good), but more because they produced a video about racism and Disney, and neglected to mention The Song of the South.

I think you may have missed my point, petpluto- I know that it's bad, you know that it's bad, but does a 5 year old with no critical thinking skills readily identify that it's bad?
Of course the video twisted things to fit their theory, we all do that, but perhaps Disney should own up to using negative stereotypes that influence young children (considering that's their target audience).
Be a fan of Disney, feel free, but liking the institution doesn't make the institution right.

Though, of course, the irony about the Song of the South is that the first live action actor in the history of Disney was a black man.

bittergradstudent: The commentary also left out that Disney was just reflecting the feelings of the time.

In that video they use the example of Aladin's "Where they cut off your ear if they don't like your face. It's barbaric, but hey, it's home." and neglected to mention that they altered it because of public dissent.

I'm generally not one to defend large corporations - but they're that way because they have found a way to efficiently (read: in bulk) service a demand created by it's customers.

Which is largely why I compare sexism in media to chicken and the egg.

Maybe they should turn My Dinner With Andre into a cartoon, but with Andre's ruminations on women excised; that should break a few records.

Halo: Your critique, using the fundamental unknowability of a 5-year-old's psyche, is about as persuasive as that of the "Teletubbies turn kids gay" or "Mighty Mouse is snorting cocaine and Sebastian has a boner" crowd.

James:

I still remember seeing most of those examples (and Song of the South) on the Disney Channel/VHS when I was a child in the 80s. Rather than repudiating this past (not to mention Walt Disney's Nazi sympathies), they just try to whitewash it and pretend that it never happened. And they were happy to repackage all of this until it started pissing too many people off.

James_: thanks, that's really nice of you to say. IRL I'm the antithesis of "elegant", I'm kind of a giant hairy clod, like Schreck w/o the cool vest.

I think he entirely misses the point by citing Gustav over and over, the point of Beauty and the Beast is that being uber-masculine does not make somebody a good person, in his case it made him a complete asshole and the antagonist of the film.

RE: "Song of the South"

I don't get how this is a racist film (or at least not any more racist than "Soul Plane"), I'm not saying it isn't, but could someone explain to to me without referring to the use of a Southern black man who speaks with a stereotypical Southern manner? This makes a lot more sense to me than the way in which every ancient Greek or Roman speaks with a British accent.

Other than the "Magical Negro" aspect I don't really understand how Uncle Remus is intrinsically racist. He's a nice guy who shares some wisdom with a troubled little kid. He's probably an ex-slave, so is the deal that he should ignore kill this little white kid in retribution for slavery and in being nice to a little kid he's some kind of "Tom" sellout?

The songs to have a minstrel show air to them, but the songs are still in use while the film is relegated to the black market.

IF one does not think that a 5 year old has the critical thinking skills to understand the not so subtle irony in Mulan or Beauty and the Beast then they are too young to be watching the movie. Why encourage a child to watch something they don't understand?

Oh man! Soph year of college i wrote a 10 pg paper that covered racism in The Little Mermaid (my fav movie as a kid - im a redhead.. i wanted to be Ariel).

I compared the Hans Christian Anderson story to the Disney bastardization. On a side note I think it would be cool to discuss how Disney changes classic stories.

Anyways this was a important moment i focused on in my paper: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wzrIBut8Fo8

Watch it with a critical eye, and notice even how the fish are drawn.

Like a lot of disney movies main "human-like" characters are white and the animals or "entertainment" represent all other races.

" think you may have missed my point, petpluto- I know that it's bad, you know that it's bad, but does a 5 year old with no critical thinking skills readily identify that it's bad?"

I think that you're underestimating the 5 year old. Gaston is seen right away as the villain. The heroine doesn't like him, he tries to kill the beast, he sings about Belle as an object and not as an independent individual with wants and needs and her own opinions, and he is at various times humiliated. He physically attacks the castle and harms friendly and good objects, and then tries to kill the Beast because he is different. And then he dies. I wasn't much older than 5 when I saw Beauty and the Beast for the first time, and I can tell you that I didn't like Gaston and knew he and his behavior were codified as "bad".

bittergradstudent
Note: I'm using what I think your definition of 'whitewashing' is - if that's wrong then I'll adjust what I'm saying. So if you see me using your word wrong, correct me - but be prepared to ignore this next paragraph.

For good or bad, Disney is part of the American (if not the world's) identity. I'm curious what you would have them do? Children are going to hear about Bambi from their parents. Parents are going to want their kids to watch it. If by 'whitewashing' - they are cleaning up the mistakes they made, so parents today can present them to their children now. I'd call that progress.

(this paragraph still stands though)
My point is that supply is demand driven. They wouldn't change it if there wasn't an outcry. They wouldn't have produced it if they didn't see a demand. We are the ones who change how the world works.

I don't expect a public apology from them - but maybe that's because I see them as an entity that exists to make money, not to make a point.

Logrus:
I was listening to an analysis of Uncle Tom's Cabin and they were commenting on how it was unusual to have an 'Uncle Tom' as a negative symbol. In the novel, Uncle Tom, refused to give up the location of two runaway slave girls who had been abused - knowing that it would cost him his life.

I'm not sure about you guys, but I don't have anything but respect for that Uncle Tom.

James_: Hey, thanks for pointing that out. I'm going to try and avoid furthering that association from now on.

@ Kurt Schwind:
I don't know, I saw a lot of stereotypes in Wall-E. Wall-E was clearly more masculine than Eve, based on pitch of their "voices" and their names and appearances. They do take turns being heroic, I'll grant you, but you can't ignore the long sequence where Wall-E is taking care of Eve while she's catatonic and waiting to be picked up. There's also a bizarre (to me, anyway) element of social class contrast between the two. Wall-E is working class- literally working, every day, with garbage. He's low tech, he's physically dirty, earthy, grounded. Eve is sleeker, technologically advanced, clean, white, never touches the ground, doesn't have "street smarts" or know what to do when there's a storm. Somebody with more technological talent than I have could totally take footage from that movie and redo the video for "Uptown Girl" without stretching very much.

And that's without even getting into the whole fat=lazy=non-environmentally friendly deal.

Logrus
Nah - no need. If you're aware that's enough. Most conversation / communication is about forming a common dictionary of words to cobble together in an attempt to convey ideas.

So as long as people use the same terms - they can communicate. Being an "Uncle Tom" has a common definition - the common definition just has a twinge of irony to it because, like I said, the real Uncle Tom didn't pander to white people - he fought them.

Perhaps Gaston is a Masculine construction, but i think it is quite a stretch to say that he is a likable character or a "role model" to boys. Personally, when I first watched it as a kid, i hated Gaston simply because he was labeled "the villian"

Syndrome (from the incredibles) is another example of this.

SociologicalMe
And that's without even getting into the whole fat=lazy=non-environmentally friendly deal.

What if you alter that to be Mass Consumption + No Exertion = a group of people more likely to gain weight.

Also: So white collar vs blue collar? What about the more obvious dichotomy of old vs new? If you found a computer now that would last 400 years, and then compared it with one 400 years in the future - the old one would look like a piece of junk.

And apparently the new one would look like an Apple product.

If anyone, at any time, can market a movie with completely androgeneous characters to children - I'll be thoroughly shocked.

I can't find the title, but Isaac Asimov wrote a novel about a pill that will cause your genes to switch to those of the opposite gender. I recommend this as a read for anyone on this board.

not to change the subject, but, uh, i'm going to attempt to change the subject: is anyone else really unhappy about the presence of walmart neighborhood market ads on the mainpage today, considering how notorious walmart is for its borderline mistreatment of low-wage and female employees?

James,
My understanding is that the reason that individuals would gain weight in space over hundreds of years has to do with long term effects of being in space. Not with the typical "people who eat and don't exercise are therefore fat" meme.

Inactivity on earth would not necessarily lead to the same level of weight gain.

Logrus said everything I wanted to say, with one addition: strength is not the only thing valued in Mulan. The critical turning point is when she uses her WITS to figure out that she has to use the weights as tie to climb the pole.

This video is interesting, and I agree with his underlying point, however the clips featured seem to be data to support his point and not the other way around.

An interesting side point: a lot of the Disney sexism and racism comes directly from the story the movie is based off of. Should classic tales be edited for our youth so that they do not think these sexist and racist messages are true, or should you present it letting them know that it's a classic tale that is wrong in some of it's underlying messages? I'd prefer the later, because I think kids are more adapt at spotting things that are right vs. wrong than adults give them credit for.

Destra--

They happily edited one of my five favorite books (the Hunchback of Notre Dame) to remove all the commentary about relationships, sex and replaced the romantic ending with a happy one. They also freely decided to cut up the historical Pocohontas story and replace it with one where Pocohontas doesn't die in London of Western diseases. Hercules ain't doing labors to atone for wife-strangling in the Disney version, either.

They happily edit classic tales when it suits them.

james_:

By 'whitewashing,' I mean that they just let these things disappear, with little public account. They just need to say 'we were going with existing community standards at the time, but what we did was wrong, and we are condemning it today.' We will make the material availible to film schools and historians, and other academcis, but we no longer feel that it should be distributed to children, and we are sorry for any pain that it has caused to minorities over the years.

But rather than owning up to it, they just erase it and pretend that it was never there. It's not taking responsibility, it's just avoiding blame.

Logrus:

The Uncle Remus stories were invented by a white writer in the reconstruction south in an effort to show that slave life was not as hard as it was made out to be in works like 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' (though, in fairness, the latter isn't particularly accurate, either--Harriet Beecher Stowe had never been to the South when she wrote it). "Uncle" was also a derogatory term for older black men.

bittergradstudent: I'm not a big fan of the bastardization of some of the classics by Disney (little mermaid for one). I was commenting on you, yourself, presenting the classics themselves to children, not the Disney movies. I think there is a lot of values in stories from the past, but not necessarily good values in them.

Speaking of Disney and men's attitudes, here's something I posted on Facebook groups:

Stalker robots as pop culture - satire for kids?

Wall-E lives up to Pixar's reputation for animation excellence. Wall-E's a charmer. It's a great cartoon, with a lot of very funny moments. I laughed out loud pretty much all throughout the feature.

In fact, if you look at it the right way, it stands as a very effective satire of stereotypical assumptions about Hollywood crap encouraging men to "take risks" in romance, when the objects of their affections wants them to *really* go away.

Of course, the one little standout detail is: guys, when a female tries to kill you by blowing craters into you *twice*, that's usually a "no". It's an "I'm not interested. Go away." Yes, it's really funny how that poor, cute, dirty, broken-down loser robot, the machine equivalent of Drew Carey, falls in love with the first female goddess-creature that tries to blow him up. Awwwwww. She doesn't quite succeed in vaporizing him, so he follows her around and won't leave her alone. Because plucky persistence in love pays off! It's adorable, in a much-too-ridiculous, can't-suspend-your-disbelief-so-you-don't-bother kind of way. In a perfect animated fantasy world, it's a given that the first thing a female will do, if you survive her assassination attempts, is to follow you into your hangar and giggle repeatedly, whereupon you can present her with lots of neat stuff to play with. She will eventually melt and give in to your constant attentions, however initially unreciprocated - indeed, however initially rebuffed with a large deadly arsenal - these attentions are. Because after all, you deserve love!

The satire would appear to be palpable, no? The scriptwriters probably meant to convey: how psycho is this, everybody? And it's so darned cute! (ummm, not... we're kidding... this is why it's a comedy...) And if they didn't, and somehow they wanted to portray the opposite: man, are they out of touch with reality. But I will give them the benefit of the doubt.

As satire, Wall-E works in the same way that Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down was a deadpan, over-the-top send-up of macho stereotypical assumptions about how you should conquer the woman you love. As an out gay man, Almodovar had every reason to ridicule macho behaviours. Many didn't see the film in that way. I appear to have been one of the rare self-declared feminists who did.

Unfortunately, likewise, some people might not embrace the satirical implications of Wall-E - much as most people who saw that infamous cover of the Obamas in full terrorist regalia would not necessarily catch the nuance, and many got offended. Obama was the first, apparently. And perhaps most unfortunately, the kids the film is aimed at are not sophisticated enough to grasp the irony and the satirical implications.

The exaggerated carnival of relationship Survivor-on-steroids in Wall-E, at best, comes through as the razor-sharp mockery of a fear of independent women who can, and will, reject you without even giving you a chance, in a cold, nothing-personal, blow-you-up-good kind of way. This is in contrast to the traditional Hollywood plotline that portrays the same genre of female as changing her mind and heart when she finally takes that crucial second (or third, or fourth, or fifth) look at the poor pathetic basement-dwelling, old-sneaker-and-T-shirt-wearing shmo that she tried to crush without mercy the first time around.

I see a Mad TV version of this, starring Bobby Lee, redoing the Monty Python "it's just a flesh wound" skit, saying: "I'm in love! She's so adorable! I love how assertive she is! The way she put me in the garbage compactor was so creative! Wow! I know she'll change her mind when she sees what a good guy I am!" Cut to the woman squirting rotting garbage at his disembodied, optimistic head.

Non-cartoon rom-com scriptwriters are selling a fantasy, so they rewrite - new and improved! - the true-life plotline that happens in most cases in the lives of audience members, namely that the woman in question has other things to do. And will do them. Now that doesn't sell popcorn, no sirreee.

Another interesting image emerges from the film, and this time I'm not sure if it can be read satirically or not. This is the "directive" part of the plot. Eve, the female robot who eventually gives in to the adorable humble Wall-E, is initially prevented from joining him in ultimate romantic bliss by this awful thing: her "directive". In other words: Her job. Her duties. Her responsibilities. Geez, what a mood-killer, n'est-ce pas? She actually has other things to do, besides fall for the male protagonist and go have a double bubble bath. This, of course, is wrong and bad; and eventually, gets "corrected". I suppose we should be thankful it wasn't as blatantly "corrected" as in those stupid Tom Cruise films, where the assertive female realizes the "wrong" of her ways and for all intents and purposes falls on her knees to submit to love.

Over all, I enjoyed Wall-E. I saw its potential for the satirical send-up of male patriarchy - even if that wasn't intended. If it wasn't: we can still subvert male culture by reinterpreting it. Hallelujah. :) Let's just hope the kids can get a good explanation from mom and dad.

bittergradstudent: Well that sucks. There are some really cool stories in there that will probably not get released in a cartoon format because of being associated so heavily with SotS.

Still, I had the album, the book, and I saw the movie as a kid, and I didn't grow up to be a racist (which could prompt someone to tell me that I wouldn't know, or I'm in denial. A discussion I'll opt out of now). I don't even think kids today would know that "uncle" was meant to be a derogatory term; hell I didn't know it 30 years ago, or ten minutes ago for that matter.

Did anyone see the recent Disney movie "Enchanted"? Now there was a film which deserved to be ripped apart for it's stereotypes!
Three key points I took away from it (sorry these are all femalecentric):

1.) Marie Currie is boring and dead (along with a host of other female role models)
2.) Your life's ambition should be to find true love (I know I'm still waiting for my knight to ride in and make my life perfect, seriously! I hold disney partly responsible . . .)
3.) Fashion is a more appropriate career choice for women than the corporate world, in fact, a woman in the corporate world will not find true love.

Did anyone see the recent Disney movie "Enchanted"? Now there was a film which deserved to be ripped apart for it's stereotypes!

Three key points I took away from it (sorry these are all femalecentric):

1.) Marie Currie is boring and dead (along with a host of other female role models)

2.) Your life's ambition should be to find true love (I know I'm still waiting for my knight to ride in and make my life perfect, seriously! I hold disney partly responsible . . .)

3.) Fashion is a more appropriate career choice for women than the corporate world, in fact, a woman can't be part of the corporate world and have true love.

bittergradstudent
No individual in society is held to that standard, why are you holding a collection of individuals (who are out to make money) to something that hardly anyone does as a person. After every argument or screwup on your part do you make a show of 'I'm wrong, you're right - in the future I will not continue with this.'? In business, where I see companies sticking their heads in the sand - even correcting the problem (and taking bad press for doing so, as it's a sign that they obviously did something wrong) is the right outcome.

Secondly, if they point out to society when society is upset, that Disney was in fact just behaving like everyone else - don't you think that would be insulting to the general public.

ycb123
Right now, I would have no qualms listing one of my highest ambitions as finding true love. Unfortunately, I think that whatever notion of 'true love' there is - it takes a lot of preparation on the part of both individuals to be able to attain, and maintain it.

"The Uncle Remus stories were invented by a white writer in the reconstruction south in an effort to show that slave life was not as hard as it was made out to be in works like 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' (though, in fairness, the latter isn't particularly accurate, either--Harriet Beecher Stowe had never been to the South when she wrote it)."

Harriet Beecher Stowe was an abolitionist and wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin in order to inform whites of the cruelty of slavery. Uncle Tom had a hard life followed by a nasty end, and it definitely did not make slave life seem easy.

I liked SoTS as a kid, but I see why Disney would not want it sent out in distribution.

I agree with the other criticisms of this video. I had a WTF reaction to most of it. Using Gaston, who I knew was a villain when I watched it as a kid, as a compass for boys is off base. I dislike Disney for many reasons, but I have to disagree with the actual portrayals in this video.

I laughed when I saw this on feministing, as this exact same video had been used this summer in my recent gender and society class when we were discussing male stereotypes. (Good olde SUNY Albany Women's Studies courses!)

Logrus - I really appreciated your critiques of it, because it definitely challenged the instant assumptions I made when initially seeing the clip (ie, They're so right! Disney does try to try to reconcile their use of stereotypes as a manner of showing a character "improvement" or as part of a bigger, more equal picture; but I also think that while we can look at this and notice the context, the majority of the young target audience might not pick up on that, but still attach meaning to the stereotypes.

One thing we discussed in our class is the distinct difference of the "sidekick" males or antagonistic males in Disney movies, as they are often the opposite of the hegemonic male ideal (tall, strong, muscular, handsome, etc.) Like Maurice in Beauty and the Beast, he was mocked and laughed at and seen as "less of a man" because he was not the rippling example of Manhood that was exemplified in Gaston. Or perhaps Jafar from Aladdin, who was tall and intellectual and, in certain mannerisms, what would come off as somehwat homoseuxal. Aside from the lead male characters who might "grow" as the plot progresses as was already pointed out, alot of the secondary male characters in Disney don't get that chance. They personify what ISN'T masculine or manly. It reinforces the notion that being tall, or skinny, or non-muscular, or fat, or intellectual makes you somehow LESS masculine than the heroic lead character. It's a subtle reminder that men face some of the same negative consequences as a result of sexism as well.

(This post should be viewed as Logrus, but with less civility, more profanity, and a large dose of contempt for the producer of the material. In short, for those who are offended by this sort of thing, the gist of my post is: Disney has a lot of stuff to work on, but this guy is a moron who either missed the point of the clips he used or is lying through his teeth.)

Is this guy joking?

This video is moronic. It's the worst and most idiotic kind of moral guardianship: assuming that the portrayal of any negative traits will cause viewers to emulate traits, regardless of who is demonstrating them, when in their arc they are, or why.

Heterosexual relationships are not bad, though their portrayal in Disney is exclusionary. However, these are being produced primarily for a country where anything outside of heterosexuality is still seen by a large plurality of the population as immoral, and even heterosexual relationships outside of a narrowly-defined value are weird. Gay marriage was specifically outlawed in something like eleven states, as I recall, and the company that produces these is a company primarily interested in the bottom line. Are they supposed to spend millions on a project that will result in a massive net loss and probable boycotts because it's the right thing to do?

...well, maybe they should, but this is Corporate America we're talking about. Not gonna happen.

Did the makers of this video even watch the movies they are critiquing? Do they even know the meaning of the word "context"?

In order of appearance, clips of any significant length...

1. The Incredibles: ...maybe I'm obtuse, but I can't get how this is particularly negative portrayal of manhood. A protagonist admits he was a jackass in the past, and an antagonist slaps the apology away because he's too full of grudge over a relatively tiny issue to listen.

2. Beauty And The Beast: There are things to note about this movie having issues with gender portrayal. This video address none of them. It singles out Gaston as the person we're supposed to admire. And that's all the argument I need for any of the portrayals of Beauty and the Beast in this clip, because they only ever refer to Gaston. While a villain possessing a trait does not mean it is necessarily a negative one, the fact remains that this particular villain is much too hung up on his few positive traits (physical fitness is a good thing) to see that his social and mental character are vapid and shallow, and borderline sociopathic, respectively. Although I will say the bit near the beginning where they mute the volume and have him following Belle around looks a lot less innocent when you're older and you recognize the body language of a sexual predator. But again: he's the bad guy.

3. Hercules: ...so shots of Hercules being heroic in killing a monster, like at the beginning, are equated to the clip of Gaston stalking Belle that immediately preceded it? The brief clip of him at the start of the body type segment is just as dishonest. IT'S HERCULES. DID YOU EXPECT HERCULES TO BE BUILT LIKE STEPHEN HAWKING? Moron.

4. Emperor's New Groove: All right, so Cuzco's the protagonist in this scene. This also also him in pre-reconstructed mode, right at the beginning. You know, he's supposed to be the flawed lead who learns a heap of valuable lessons over the course of the film? Christ, what idiot made this piece of shit video and how did he learn to breathe without having to concentrate on it?

5. The Little Mermaid: The clip used is more about Ariel's friends (though, I admit, mostly male) trying to manipulate Eric as a tool to give Ariel her voice back, which would allow them to have a more meaningful relationship that just handsome girl and pretty boy make longing looks at each other.

6. Mulan: The beginning is a bit unpleasant, with one of them specifically referring to preferring pale women (but that is part of the conventional ideal of beauty in certain areas of Asia), and the other not caring as long as she can cook. But again, this is early in the film, and the men in question have not yet been schooled that women are not there for their amusement. Later, in the clip from Mulan where Mulan is told through song that being a man is defined by physical prowess, the song also brings up, just for example, that they should also be "mysterious", which is hardly a physical measurement. Further, Mulan is plainly a woman (girl, even), and she beats up one of the men being held up as an example of manhood. Plus, she's lying about what she is. Shouldn't that make her more of man than anyone else in the film? But guess what, she's not and she's not presented that way.

7. The Lion King: The brief snippet at the beginning of the segment on violence features Mufasa forcing Scar to back down and implies this is a bad thing. It also shows the fight between Scar and Simba and implies that that's a bad thing. THEY'RE LIONS. THEY ARE NOT A SPECIES WHERE THE MALES TALK THINGS OUT CALMLY BECAUSE THEY LOVE EACH OTHER SO HUGGY-MUGGY MUCH. THIS WAS A FIGHT FOR DOMINANCE AND THE ONLY REAL DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THIS SCENE AND THE REAL WORLD IS THAT REAL LIONS DON'T TALK. That Scar didn't kill Nala when he took over is divergence enough from their natural behavior, I think; making them into flower children with love and a smile for all the creatures of the Earth would have been censoring nature.

8. Aladdin: The fight between Aladdin and Jafar was not about dominance--not to Aladdin, the protagonist, and since Jafar is little more than a card-carrying villain who likes being called "O mighty evil one", Aladdin's motivations are really all that matters between them, and talking probably wouldn't get the job done. He was: a) trying to right a wrong he'd committed; b) trying to free the Genie from an abusive master; c) trying to rescue not only Jasmine but her father too; and d) trying to remove Jafar from a position of power he did not deserve.

So we've seen pretty clearly that this clip is a deceptive piece of shit that takes everything out of context. We saw little to nothing of how Disney actually views heroic masculinity, only how they view masculinity as warped through an evil matrix, but this is then presented by the makers of this tripe as how Disney thinks heroes are supposed to behave.

Sexism, violence, and dominance are the primary views of masculinity that boys see, and Disney is a pretty major culprit. I don't deny that. But this is probably the worst piece I've ever seen on the subject, verging on full-on self-loathing propaganda, and as Orwell said, all propaganda is false, even when it is true.

What a disappointing video!

What could have been a good argument is totally undermined by the warping of contexts, as someone else said, it's as though the author didn't even see these films.

I was a kid for most of these and what I came away with in Beauty and the Beast was that Belle was a rocking chick who was awesome because she read a lot (like I did) and was an outsider (oooh me too!) and wasn't interested in the local dickhead, Gaston. And everyone was glad when he was killed!

In Mulan, the guys singing the songs are represented as total thugs and losers, totally deluded about women. I thought that was obvious.

I think the YouTube clip makes some interesting points. I see a lot of people are defending the Disney movies and I agree that there was some clever editting, but that is to be expected when composing an argument. You pick points that you believe strongly support your position.

The ideas he covered are correct, men face systemic oppression also.

Example, everyone is saying Gaston is the villian and his traits are to be ignored. Him being a jerk still does not detract from him being "manly" no one, even in the end, denies that he isn't a manly man. Even the moral of the story Beauty and the Beast, the beast has an ugly temper and smashes furnature and all but stikes Belle, but if you love and are patient enough, you can turn a violent beast into a prince? Great moral lesson.

Side-track:
The Little Mermaid, the only thing she has to convince him to fall in love with her are her looks. She can't talk and is an idiot (combs her hair with a fork). She has no qualities other than beauty, and he's rich.

pacifistvigilante, I have to totally disagree. The Little Mermaid is one movie that doesn't have the ridiculous traditional gender roles. Ariel wants to get out of the sea because she hates it, not because she wants to be with Eric. (See: Part of Your World). The villain, a strong, power-hungry sorceress is a woman, and Ariel isn't an idiot, she is a MERMAID which is why she combs her hair with a fork. He falls in love with her at the end because he realizes she is the one who saved him, and he had been looking for her after she saved him even though he didn't know what she looked like.

That said, I agree with the people saying this video is bogus. While there are ridiculous ideas about gender, masculinity, and femininity in Disney movies, this did a really poor job of dissecting them.

The racism video, on the other hand, my GOD. Disney is horrible. They're finally releasing a movie with a black princess this year, and i'm wondering what the hell took them so long??? Even then, I'm still not optimistic because I know it's going to be incredibly offensive and stereotypical and there is no way they will let the protagonist be anything other than the strong, outspoken, finger-wagging, head-shaking black woman.

i can't believe i'm about to defend disney here-but the examples the author of the video chose were the worst as many posters before me have stated because-especially with gaston, they were villians and their characteristics are illustrated as those not to be copied or encouraged.
its easy to see-to someone who has not seen any of those disney movies, those clips appear to support what the author says-example with the lion king. he says that the climax of all these films end with the men having a big fight and therefore stressing violence=being a man. however in both the lion king and beauty and the beast the "heroes" are reluctant to fight and are forced into being violent by their enemies.

while i do think some disney films are sexist against both men and women-and maybe this not being surprising as disnye himself was said to be sexist, the films chosen are the worst examples of this as they argie the opposite. there are other films and tv shows-especially the ones today-that i would argue as being far worst in depictions of both sexes (most disturbingly-"zoey 101").

@ Britbacca

You mention the “rippling example of Manhood that was exemplified in Gaston”. Then go on to say that Jafar “reinforces the notion that being tall, or skinny, or non-muscular, … or intellectual makes you somehow less masculine than the heroic lead character.”
While I see your point about the sidekick in “Beauty and the Beast” and the antagonist in “Aladdin,” the antagonist in “Beauty and the Beast” was hypermasculine and tall. The antagonists of the films are on opposite sides of the “masculine” spectrum, yet both are still evil, and are defeated by the more sensitive and kind heroes.

Though I don’t fully agree with your examples, I do agree with the fact that men face the negative consequences of sexism.

Dominique,

Interesting take on Wall-E. I have to admit, I honestly had not thought of it that way (and I'm usually one of the first to point out sexism in pop culture!), although there was something about the way Eve was portrayed in the beginning that always bugged me, I just couldn't put my finger on it.

Overall, by the way, I *adored* the movie. It's one of the very few that had something for everyone, managed to be touching, hilarious, and intellectually interesting all at the same time. Kudos to Pixar for managing to pull off a quality dystopian comedy with a good overall message to boot!

But, yeah. I didn't like how Eve suddenly went all giggly. It just didn't make sense to me, and didn't fit with the character we were introduced to. Now, Wall-E was adorable, in a little tagalong puppy kind of way, and if it could have been done in a way that didn't invoke romance but merely hero-worship turning into friendship, or something, I wouldn't have a problem with the following-around qualities of it. But, yeah, it does fall into the trap of sending the message that unwanted persistence equals appropriate courtship.

That said, I love that Eve is the strong one, the sensible one, and

**WALL-E SPOILER ALERT**
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the one who saves Wall-E's life at the end.
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**END WALL-E SPOILER**

And I like that Wall-E is the romantic, the only one of the two that does any kind of swooning, etc. In way, it does sort of reverse the stereotype of all-business guy realizing there's more to life by getting to know free-spirited girl (think Dharma & Greg). I also really liked the relationship between John and Mary, which seemed very gender-neutral even though there was obvious attraction between them. If they make a sequel (a high likelihood given the success of the film), though, I have a sneaking suspicion the relationship would become much more gendered :-P

Anyway, I will give the movie kudos for doing a lot of things better, gender-wise, than a lot of other kids' films. But, you're right, they've still got a long way to go.

As to some of the other comments about the movies in the film (which unfortunately I can't watch at the moment as work blocks youtube), interesting thoughts all around, and from what's written here it sounds like the video doesn't make its point particularly well. As to the animal films, however, I do think it's valid to ask about the choice of animals, particularly where you have multiple species -- for instance, which animals are more likely to be represented by female characters versus male characters? Bambi, I think, is a good example of an animal movie that doesn't go overboard with gender, which makes sense since it's a coming of age movie, not a romance like most Disney films. But other movies, like The Lion King, might merit a little closer evaluation (also, I think it's worth noting that Simba grows up and becomes an adult lion *away* from the pack, being essentially raised by Timon and Puumba, while Nala stays with the older female lions -- pretty clearly driving home the message that boys need to "rough it" and find their own paths, while it's perfectly acceptable for girls to simply stay in the home and do what all the other women do).

Beauty and the Beast is one of my favorite Disney films, but one thing I dislike about it is how it portrays Belle as being the calming influence on Beast -- as though women are the nurturing, gentle presence that "tames" men from their "natural" beast-like states. Obviously, these stereotypes are both anti-man and anti-woman. Anti-man because it simply isn't true that most men are inherently brutes who must be changed to fit into civilized society (at least, it's no more true of men than it is of women). And anti-woman because it puts the responsibility on women to make sure that men behave like normal, responsible human beings (which they're perfectly capable of doing on their own). Overall, the movie does some really positive feminist-friendly things, but that aspect of it is something of a pet peeve of mine.

Finally, w/r/t the appearance issue, um, what about the girls? While there are definitely at least a couple Disney male heroes who aren't stereotypically beautiful (Beast before he transforms, Quasimodo), I honestly can't think of a female lead who isn't, and would welcome examples if anyone can think of any. Also, this comes with the caveat that it's been quite a while since I was young enough to make a point of catching each new Disney film (and I still don't have kids of my own to repeat the practice with a new generation).

i'm not sure about the others but i highly doubt that Mulan was made to be a sexist film. this is actually my all time favorite disnye movie because it shows females could do it too. yeah, there are those songs- "Make a Man" and "A Girl We're Fighting For"- but it's actually irony.
you don't have to be man to be a great warrior.
Mulan proved to everyone that she was just as good (even better) than the other warriors, which were all male.
oh, i just have to love that woman.
she brings happiness into my life.