Disney+ officially pulls a few films from the kid’s section of its service, including the iconic Disney films Dumbo, Peter Pan, and The Aristocats. On the ‘Stories Matter’ section of their website, Disney+ explained why each movie was pulled from the kid’s section of its service.
For Dumbo, they explained that the crows and musical number pay homage to racist minstrel shows, where white performers with blackened faces and tattered clothing imitated and ridiculed enslaved Africans on Southern plantations.” They add, “The leader of the group in Dumbo is Jim Crow, which shares the name of laws that enforced racial segregation in the Southern United States.”
Disney+ pulls ‘Dumbo,’ ‘Peter Pan,’ and ‘The Aristocats’
In terms of Peter Pan, Disney+ explains that “the film portrays Native people in a stereotypical manner that reflects neither the diversity of Native peoples nor their authentic cultural traditions. It shows them speaking in an unintelligible language and repeatedly refers to them as ‘redskins,’ an offensive term. Peter and the Lost Boys engage in dancing, wearing headdresses and other exaggerated tropes.”
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And, lastly, in terms of The Aristocats, “The Siamese cat Shun Gon is depicted as a racist caricature of East Asian peoples with exaggerated stereotypical traits such as slanted eyes and buck teeth.” Disney+ adds, “He sings in poorly accented English voiced by a white actor and plays the piano with chopsticks.”
Despite all of this, adults can still access these movies on their profiles, but they will also come with disclaimers such as the following: “This program includes negative depictions and/or mistreatment of people or cultures. These stereotypes were wrong then and are wrong now. Rather than remove this content, we want to acknowledge its harmful impact, learn from it and spark conversation to create a more inclusive future together. The move is understood to be part of an ongoing review by Disney of content in all its films.”