I live in Maine. A small town in Maine. It doesn't get much more white bread than this. Yet we have more black people here than I've ever seen at Disney World. At first, I was freaked out by this, then I decided I just had no idea why the American black middle class seems to stay away from the Mouse in droves. Most black people I've eavesdropped on at Disney have been foreigners. Why? I have no idea. Maybe someone else knows or has a theory?

Disney's appeal is universal for children. But as adolescents and adults, there is no apeal for Black people. Why? Disney is too, well, white. I wanted to go to Disney when I was young, but my mother and stepfather couldn't afford to take the entire family (another factor that keeps your average black family out of Disney). I finally went on school trip, and was not impressed. While it's difficult to enumerate all the things that turned me off about Disney, I can sum it up in saying that I felt alienated. It is the same feeling of alienation that I experienced in college, in the work environment, in my social circles. As a minority, you get reminded that you are a minority on a daily basis, even without enduring racist incidents. I'm black, and I am surrounded by people who don't think like me, don't act like me, and who have very little in common with me, and I have stopped trying to explain why to them. And as for Disney, there are other theme parks with great roller coasters, that cost a lot less. I won't be back until my future children drag me to that intrepid place.

But Rather, we all feel alienated. This is America where everyone is separate. I could use the same statement you do. I'm a white male "and I am surrounded by people who don't think like me, don't act like me, and who have very little in common with me, and I have stopped trying to explain why to them."

You think its tough because you're black? Try being a nerd/geek while growing up and being an adult. It ain't easy.

I went to the Disney parks hoping to learn something new and feel a connection to my fellow man. Nope, nada on both counts (well, almost nothing. Not enough for my time and money anyway.). If that isn't alienation...

You are separate Rather, we all are.

-Doughdee222

"We're all alone . . . so all alone . . .

each by ourselves, we're all alone." --Spamalot

I think part of Disney's lack of appeal to the black community is simply a matter of product. Name a black Disney character. Even the one Disney movie set in Africa (The Lion King) is based off of Shakespeare's best play (Hamlet) and features a cast starring whites (Mathew Broderick, Jonathon Taylor Thomas, Nathan Lane, Jeremy Irons, etc.) In Fantasia's short of Beethoven's Symphony No. 6, a black centaur was edited out of the frame because he was depicted shining the other centaur's hooves. And do I really need to mention "Song of the South"?

If black people either are caricatures or don't even exist in the world according to Disney, why should any black person want to give them money?

doughdee222 , yes, I too can understand that kind of alienation:

"I'm a white male "and I am surrounded by people who don't think like me, don't act like me, and who have very little in common with me, and I have stopped trying to explain why to them." You think its tough because you're black? Try being a nerd/geek while growing up and being an adult. It ain't easy.

-- having grown up with mild Asperger's syndrome myself (which itself in turn is a mild form of autism). I imagine being a nerd/geek is a mild form of mild Asperger's. To keep from wallowing in self-pity I remind myself that "things are tough all over" -- that most people have at least one serious problem or another, even if their problems are different from mine.

ASlyJD, I thought the "Lion King" was a well-intentioned effort to provide noble characters with black voices -- to be like a kind of Grimm fairytale that black kids could identify with. As for:

In Fantasia's short of Beethoven's Symphony No. 6, a black centaur was edited out of the frame because he was depicted shining the other centaur's hooves.

-- that was a pretty clever joke -- in an early 1900s "Vaudville dialect-comedy" sort of way. But it shows the sincere concern of today's Disney Corporation for the feelings of black people that they would tamper with art and history and remove it.

I managed to pick up an English-language VHS of "Son of the South" with Japanese subtitles during a business trip to that country fifteen years ago. (Sadly, we no longer own it.) I imagine that this was also produced with the goal of being inclusive of black people and their culture, but ever-shifting standards and sensitivities make it difficult to create something that will stand the test of time. Even the pioneering TV show "Julia" from the middle-1960s would be unacceptable today due to its self-righteous use of the term "Negro" (which was PC in those days).

The whiteness of Disneyworld's patrons may be part of a more general phenomenon. A couple of times my family went camping at an annual folk festival in Kerrville, Texas. Folk music in this country has a strong leftist and progressive tradition (it looked like a hippy commune from the 1960s, with men here and there wearing tie-dyed skirts instead of shorts, anti-war bumper stickers -- you get the idea), and you know that the rarity of black faces in the crowd must have just broken their progressive hearts.

A place cannot be "intrepid." Intrepid means "audacious: invulnerable to fear or intimidation." It's usually used to describe an explorer or an adventurer. Based on the tone of your post, I'm guessing you meant "insipid," meaning "bland: lacking taste or flavor or tang."

fsilber:

ASlyJD, I thought the "Lion King" was a well-intentioned effort to provide noble characters with black voices -- to be like a kind of Grimm fairytale that black kids could identify with.

Oh, I do appreciate that they were trying to appeal more to the black demographic, and I think it worked pretty well. James Earl Jones has the perfect fatherly/kingly voice for Mufasa. But the movie still relies heavily on white star power, which I think undercuts the appeal.

As for:

In Fantasia's short of Beethoven's Symphony No. 6, a black centaur was edited out of the frame because he was depicted shining the other centaur's hooves.

-- that was a pretty clever joke -- in an early 1900s "Vaudville dialect-comedy" sort of way. But it shows the sincere concern of today's Disney Corporation for the feelings of black people that they would tamper with art and history and remove it.

I do think that removing that clip was a good thing, as the black servant centaur is rather insulting. And "Song of the South" will never be released, which is also a good thing as the Uncle Remus stereotype deserves to die.

But the end result is that black people don't exist in the Disney universe. Couple exceptions just came to mind: I vaguely remember one black pirate in "Peter Pan," but I'm not certain. Also, I think the new Faeries series of dolls and videos has a black fairy.

So unless a black family has so completely assimilated into the white middle class that they aren't bothered by the "Snow Whiteness", I can see how a black family would feel very isolated and excluded. And at the prices Disney charges, I definately understand not wanting to spend that much money for the experience of not fitting in.

The whiteness of Disneyworld's patrons may be part of a more general phenomenon. A couple of times my family went camping at an annual folk festival in Kerrville, Texas. Folk music in this country has a strong leftist and progressive tradition (it looked like a hippy commune from the 1960s, with men here and there wearing tie-dyed skirts instead of shorts, anti-war bumper stickers -- you get the idea), and you know that the rarity of black faces in the crowd must have just broken their progressive hearts.

Most definately! This country seems to be in a cultural aparthied. Obviously, some of it has to do with the breakdown of the mainstream media's monopoly of entertainment. And certainly no one is forcing people into different cultures. While I don't often agree with populists like John Edwards, I find his metaphor of "two Americas" apt, albeit understating the case. (Rich/middle/poor) (urban/ suburban/rural) (white/black/hispanic) (agnostic/religous/ fundamentalist) --mix and match to find your group and never stray from it. The ideal of a homogenous America never truly existed, but surely this fragmentation cannot be good.

ASlyJD:

And "Song of the South" will never be released, which is also a good thing as the Uncle Remus stereotype deserves to die.

What, exactly, is wrong with the "Uncle Remus stereotype?" Is it the dialect, or is there something inherently offensive about a kindly, old, wise black man?

ASlyJD:

The ideal of a homogenous America never truly existed, but surely this fragmentation cannot be good.

Why shouldn't fragmentation be good? I like the idea of preserving sub-cultures, whether immigrant or native. What exactly is wrong with liking different kinds of music, food, dancing, conversational style, churches, clothing, or any other cultural trappings?

Fitzpatrick:

What, exactly, is wrong with the "Uncle Remus stereotype?" Is it the dialect, or is there something inherently offensive about a kindly, old, wise black man?

Because it's much more than that. "Uncle" is not a term of endearment in this context. Your best friend's kid may call you "uncle" because your somewhat like a sibling of her parents, but that isn't what is going on here. "Uncle" was a term used by whites to refer to older, black, male slaves.

Plus, the "Uncle Remus" stories were collected by a white person (Joel Chandler Harris) who advocated slavery and said so in the foreward to the book.

There is a lot of baggage that comes with the image such that Uncle Remus isn't just a "black male" version of Aesop.

In understand ratherbeshopping's points, and my guess is that he or she is from the majority/original black american community, whose ancestors have been here centuries.

Those of us in the immigrant african-american community love Disney! Having been born and raised an America, african kids in the U.S. are so used to not belonging that we almost expect it. We don't fit with either the black or white communities, so, because white is the majority/dominant culture, we end up acquiring a lot of tastes in common with the majority. Based on my friends, I would guess this is the same for first-generation kids of asian, arab, and other minority groups.

aslyj.d. is right that the Lion King was a cop-out, though. I remember watching it in the theater when it came out and thinking, "um, the first Disney with africans and there are no humans? Can they not draw curly hair as well as straight?" I also remember cheering when Jasmine and Poca came out because they were the first non-european princesses, but being kind of annoyed that they had to be "princesses" (silly ideal for girls, IMO) at all, and learning that Jasmine and Aladdin were modeled after white stand-ins and purposely made to look as european as possible. Plus, what is up with Poca's figure? Please go back and look at that movie, because her porn star figure is not at all wholesome!

By the way, Disney is supposed to be coming out with a new movie/"princess" called Maddy (new orleans setting), but they changed her name to Tiana after some protests that maddy sounds too "slave" ! At least Maddy was historically accurate. I find it hard to believe there were a lot of Tianas in the 1920s. Who knows?

I'm sorry you felt that way. I did notice an absence of blacks in DisneyLand. We're in Texas now but were sent to Utah for a couple of months ---wow! I saw only one black man and he didn't want to be messed with. I wanted to go up and hug him because I was as out of place as he was but knew that would be inappropriate. I should say I've done work with parents in African American schools, helping them assist their kids in school. Disney is definitely a white theme park. And don't look at the princesses, their presence is just giving our girls a dream they'll never attain.

Thank you for the correction. I've let my vocabulary shrink after years of having documents sent back to me so that they could be rewritten using "plain language." Obviously, I'm not in an academic setting.

Rrhain:

Fitzpatrick:

What, exactly, is wrong with the "Uncle Remus stereotype?" Is it the dialect, or is there something inherently offensive about a kindly, old, wise black man?

Because it's much more than that. "Uncle" is not a term of endearment in this context. Your best friend's kid may call you "uncle" because your somewhat like a sibling of her parents, but that isn't what is going on here. "Uncle" was a term used by whites to refer to older, black, male slaves.

Well, yes. They didn't want to be insulting to an elder by calling him "boy", yet the police Mister (from "master") or Sir implies subordination in the part of the speaker. Because racism put blacks on a lower social grade, a white person would feel de-graded (literally) by using a politeness term that implied self-subordination.

The elimination of this ethos is what whites have in mind when they insist that they do not practice racism.

FrayReader:

I also remember cheering when Jasmine and Poca came out because they were the first non-european princesses, but being kind of annoyed that they had to be "princesses" (silly ideal for girls, IMO) at all, and learning that Jasmine and Aladdin were modeled after white stand-ins and purposely made to look as european as possible.

I thought Disney did a pretty credible job making Jasmine and Aladdin look semitic -- but not exaggerating it to the point of being an insulting caricature.

You're comparing being a nerd to being a minority??

if you changed you clothes and dressed trendy would you still be looked at like a nerd? probably not. if you used the coolest slang and went to the gym to get a banging body would you still be looked at as a nerd? maybe not. you may even start to feel like less of an outcast/nerd too. now tell me what I could to be less black. bleach my skin? Nope. change clothes? nope still colored.

Your comparison is weak my dear.

now about blacks going to Disney. I'm a Florida Native and I've been to Disney a ton of times.I've never felt alienated or like I didn't have anything in common with the other guests there. Most of the times that I've gone were with family reunion and school type deals, and as we got older the rides didn't do it for us anymore, the prices are astronomical and many times older kids would rather go to Universal Studios.

doughdee222:

You think its tough because you're black? Try being a nerd/geek while growing up and being an adult. It ain't easy.

I have grown up that way, thanks. And I don't see it being at all a problem. You couldn't make a connection with your fellow man at Disney? Did you try, or just walk around with a scowl on, determined not to have fun and meet people? Every time I go, I talk to new people. You need to put out a little effort too.