Disney still going all in on woke

(Disneyland Resort via AP)

Disney has been making some noise publicly about exiting the culture wars, but their writers and producers aren’t so keen on that idea, apparently.

The clip below is from one of their cartoons, the “Proud Family,” which first appeared earlier this month on the Disney + streaming channel, and will be released next month on the Disney Channel that goes out on cable.

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It’s pretty much a children’s primer on critical race theory, which we were assured hasn’t escaped out of the Law School laboratory to become infectious in the wild. The children’s show is basically the Omicron variant of the mind virus.

If critical race theory is a mind virus, Disney has become its Dr. Fauci preaching all the worst responses.

All sorts of questionable-to-debunked race theories are pushed in the video, with the hero kids doing their activist shtick for the benefit of a cheering audience. 

“We the descendants of slaves in America have earned reparations for their suffering,” the song continued. “And continue to earn reparations every moment we spend submerged in a systemic prejudice, racism and white supremacy that America was founded with and still has not atoned for.”

In the cartoon, that last line was punctuated by four black students glaring while the only white student on the stage with them held a sign that read “still has not atoned for.”

“Slaves built this country,” they shouted again, claiming, “We made your families rich,” as they listed plantation owners, northern bankers, New England ship-owners, the Founding Fathers, and current senators among those who had profited on the backs of slaves.

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It’s par for the course for liberal activists to make such sweeping and questionable claims, and they find a ready audience in children who have yet to develop the base of knowledge and critical thinking skills to evaluate the claims.

Children’s programming from back in the dark ages aimed to reduce prejudice and build up a positive set of social norms, encouraging children to be better people and making the world a happier place. This kind of programming aims to gin up anger and resentment as if pounding into kids’ minds the idea that they are victims and their fellow citizens their oppressors.

The aim is to produce activists, not better people. It is about turning children into political weapons.

Ideas like this are not appropriate for the age range of Disney’s intended audience. I actually think that discussing such ideas in history or philosophy classes, as part of a larger debate about moral issues, responsibility, and alternate views of justice would be perfectly appropriate. A civics class that looks at controversial issues and different views of moral responsibility would be a good thing, and even radical ideas deserve to be heard.

But not as propaganda, and certainly not aimed at young children. This is both and should be condemned.

Disney’s turn to activism is part of its larger problem: they just aren’t generating much good or creative content anymore. And instead of investing in new, interesting, and creative work, they produce formulaic dreck. Their Marvel movies are failing, Star Wars became execrable long ago, and the traditional Disney content is all about queering the kids and left-wing politics.

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It’s not working for the brand, either. Their stock is in the tank, their activism is costing them goodwill and autonomy in Florida, and their streaming channel is losing billions. They aren’t CNN yet, but that is the trajectory.

I was never in love with Disney movies, as so many were. I am old enough to have only seen them on a 13″ or 19″ TV. We had no tapes or DVDs, and I never saw any in the theater. But even I understood the magic of the old Disney, and that magic appears to be evaporating. I find it a bit sad, if for no other reason than they have been a big part of our cultural heritage.

The Critical Drinker has a (NSFW) video on the decline of Disney, and it’s worth a watch:

I hope Disney can get out of this uncreative rut and get back to doing good work. Unfortunately, getting there will require retooling the entire company.

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