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2017, Disney released, "CoCo", a story about the importance of family, community, a sense of belonging, tradition and remembrance, revolving around Dia de Muertos, (Day of the Dead). It was visually stunning and the story was true to the, Mexican heritage. It was a smash hit and continues to be relevant today. Disney's stock is currently at a 5yr. low, so why did they abandon their core audience? Great article, thank you.

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This is exactly how I feel. I would love to learn some old stories from different cultures, some fairytales or myths passed down. I would love to see those in their own culture. I just can't agree with the hypocrisy it takes to appropriate only one race and their stories. And, it's mostly because, like you said, it's lazy and boring. I know there must be great stories of all cultures. Also, it does feel like moralistic preaching. As soon as I start watching a show or movie, I am ready with 2 strikes. If I feel like I'm being preached at or messaged to or the entire premise is a "woke" version of something, I wait to hear or see 2 examples. At number 2, stop button and a dislike.

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Nailed it on every point. I’ve been baffled for some time now at Hollywood’s insistence on remaking white movies with black actors. By all means, cast more black people in movies. But make NEW movies, tell NEW stories. I love the idea of telling us African folktales with black actors. The Little Mermaid is a Danish folk tale—why would black actors even want to tell white stories? Tell us some black stories! I think we would all love to hear, watch, and learn from them.

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I'm a post-racialist - No problem with folks of different "Races" being cast as characters of different races... Heavy handedness, virtue signaling, etc. is the problem for me...

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Skipping over the painful truth that Andersen's "The Little Mermaid" is an absolutely dreadful story typical of the oeuvre of an extremely troubled guy, the absurdities of the current passion for inclusive casting include making Prince Eric the white adopted son of a black queen in some tropical setting where we may imagine his name might be somewhat of an anomaly.

What strikes me as profound cultural racism is such an apparent dearth, in the minds of "creatives" these days, of compelling-enough archetypes drawn from African and African-diaspora folklore that Northern European culture must be, you should excuse the word, cannibalized.

It's like all those black American women wearing Nefertiti pendants. Are there truly no West African cultural signifiers proud descendants of that region's people might choose to identify with?

This is a much, much bigger topic to explore than who plays Ariel, and I'd say it would be more useful to talk about, say, why Jodie Turner-Smith playing Anne Boleyn was ridiculous and not inspiring.

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Disney knows that remakes often do not measure up to the original. Almost always the original was great & popular & successful. That is why they're remaking it and why the remake so often compare unfavorably. So, if Disney wants to squeeze more money out of a franchise they insert some progressive stance in the remake - race, gender, sexuality, etc - and now they have a shield against criticism.

If someone says "Ugh. This new movie is almost half again longer than the cartoon and it feels like it!" Disney can get the word out through channels that the comment should be dismissed because of racism - then they assert that author would have been happy with a long boring movie if Ariel were White (Nope.)

Another benefit of the insertion of progressive values is creating a manufactured controversy over the film, enticing some progressives to buy tix in a show of 'solidarity' - thereby enriching Disney. I recall hearing controversy over this movie months ago and wracking my brain to recall what the original cartoon was - my only recollection of the animated version was a rogue artist put a disguised penis on the VHS cover but it was quickly removed by Disney. I finally decided that anyone who has strong feelings about it - either way - has way too much free time on their hands.

One last parting comment about Hollywood fads and gimmicks. After the movie Jaws was a smashing success, Hollywood churned out dozens of awful 'ocean monster movies.' After Star Wars, they churned out awful space movies. After any big hit, Hollywood churns out awful imitators. These movies are typically low quality and generally awful (can anyone remember all the other sea monster movies or space movies?) Gender & Race switching is today's gimmick and should be a warning sign that the movie cannot stand on its own merits.

Caveat Emptor.

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I think Disney did a wonderful job manufacturing outrage for this film. They learned their lesson over the debacle of A Wrinkle in Time, where they didn't lean in hard enough to make sure everyone knew if you didn't like their movie you must be a racist.

This time, every. single. story. talking about The Little Mermaid, whether it was an interview with Menken, a behind the scenes look at the CGI department, or banal box office reporting, the authors of each piece prostrated to Disney, letting them know they loved it, and if you don't, you must be racist.

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I agree with your premise. It's blantant hypocracy and creates resentment. Broaden our culture and minds with new characters. Their are also many black themed plays available.

I read that IMDB changed the ratings algorithm for little mermaid because ratings were not good enough. They even admitted it with no shame. So if they can't force us to like something they will cook the books and lie. I had season tickets to the theatre featuring national theatre troupes. For the play 'Anastasia', they made the tsar black (he's Russian) even though his daughter Anastasia was white. One of many examples. My entire group did not renew our season tickets.

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We are living in an age where the man who made Thomas Jefferson black on Broadway had to prostrate before the crowd because he... *checks notes*.... didn't have appropriate African Lantinx representation in his movie about the neighborhood he grew up in.

https://www.npr.org/2021/06/15/1006606967/lin-manuel-miranda-apologizes-for-lack-of-afro-latinx-actors-in-in-the-heights

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Nicely put. Another way to put it is: its just idiotic.

This obsession will not help one 'young black girl' empower herself. If anything, millions of young girls who grew up in an actual racist culture in the 50s and a somewhat prejudiced world in the 80s/90s have proven the reverse by succeeding in every field: we humans strive on adversity, we recoil when pampered or privileged.

Second, its always black girls. 13% of the population, meaning @ 6% of black females? Leaving the other @ 50% of the populations girls of color irritated. Not to mention the white girls.

Third, if the idea is woke sales, they are certainly aiming for a small portion of the market. If the idea is reparative hiring, thats unfair to all the other actors out there looking for work, again, the vast majority of whom are not black, and have their own tales of woe, personally and historically.

Fourth, if my own social group, all liberal but for one or two, are anything to go by, its creating a backlash. Personally if I see another black actor in an ad I think I'll vote for Trump just to annoy the woke. George Floyds murder has unleashed a movement that will push back tolerance for years, if not a generation is my guess.

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I'm waiting for a musical about Martin Luther King Jr. or Malcolm X with an all white cast. Yeah...that'll never happen.

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I remember, back in '98, there was a controversy when Disney cast Toni Braxton as Belle in "Beauty and the Beast" on Broadway. I didn't get the hoopla about it--it's a fairytale, why couldn't Belle be Black? Not to mention the addition to the score of the wonderful song, "A Change in Me," written for Braxton, which has remained a highlight of the show ever since. The issue is largely of Disney's own making: they create animated features, and attach to them tons of merchandising and branding using the images of the characters as icons--so of course a certain amount of consternation is going to be because of the fan attachment to these images. I have no issue at all with Ariel being Black. The Broadway musical employed diverse casting--Norm Lewis played King Triton, Tituss Burgess was Sebastian, etc. The difference in 2023 is that color conscious casting has become politicized and enforced by the industry. Once that happens, audiences, critics and the like are going to view these choices skeptically and feel they're being imposed by ideology (preaching or scolding viewers) rather than being creative innovations. This ends up being unfair to the performers (Halle Bailey shouldn't have to defend her casting--she should be assessed purely on her talent and performance) and the audience. Up until the recent firestorm over Netflix's "Queen Cleopatra," people were timid to criticize "race-swapping," for fear of being labeled as racist--but now there's a global conversation about these choices--the good, the bad and the ugly. And I think that's a good thing.

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I haven't seen it, either, and don't intend to, but my question is why is the color of the lead actor relevant to anything? Does she tell the story in a way that meets her many talents as an actor?

I'd say Dr. Ferguson needs another nap.

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I don't hear much about tokenism any more, but it seems to be the end result of pandering and virtue signaling. I wonder how actors feel about being offered roles just so producers can tick their diversity boxes. I do not think this is always the case, but it seems like it's becoming much more commonplace. Idris Elba (THE greatest living actor, in my opinion) recently took a lot of heat for saying he didn't want to be known as a "black actor," just "an actor." The closest experience I've had relating to this was when I was offered a job only because I had the correct credential. They didn't care about my skills, job history, nothing. I was glad to be offered a job, but I still felt weirdly invisible. There is something cold and inhuman when we assess people and view them only through the lens of immutable traits. Race essentializing is just one of many examples of how we dehumanize people and render them invisible in Western society. On a more optimistic note, the best point the author made is that instead of always doing remakes of classic European fairytales, Disney should borrow from other rich traditions around the world. In addition to introducing Western audiences to stories from other cultures, why not also make up some new ones?? Even in fiction writing, authors are encouraged to use as little imagination as possible by our society. As our country continues dumbing down, it seems we're getting more boring as well. If anyone needs inspiration or thinks it can't be done, just look at Miyazaki's movies. I'm getting really tired of jerks trolling every comment I make here, so I'm going to preempt it this time by saying if you disagree with what I'm saying, be civil about it or don't waste my time because I'll simply block you without finishing reading your insults.

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This was a good article.

I agree that Hollywood is lazily pandering, but also think that it may be done cynically for marketing purposes; reactionaries on one side will vigorously attack these movies for the reasons you describe, while the other side, seeing criticism as -ist, or -phobic, will consider support of the film as a "virtue" and ironically, a form of resistance.

However, Hollywood is also forcefully imposing identity politics on the arts through its awards process (which studios are going to make movies that won't be considered because the imposed quotas) and in the explicit aims of some of the decision makers (see the Disney videos where there's talk of a "gay agenda" in their content or a push to have 50% LGBT characters; there's also the growing number of kids shows where these politics are emphasised).

It's not about the story, it's about forming ideas and forcing a worldview. Where this used to be understood as a byproduct of media and something to be skeptical of, it's now being deliberately pursued as a desirable policy.

Lastly, the author wonders about Latino underrepresentation. I think it has to do with too many Latinos presenting as white, a problem of "colorism". During the Floyd unrest, you had casting calls for "brown-skinned" Latinos (Miguel from Cobra Kai Tweeting this).

In response to all of this nonsense, Hollywood will find an audience that increasingly turns away (e.g. the death of movie stars). "If you stop paying attention to the monsters, they'll lose their powers."

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“... the few true racists left in the US ...” How small is your bubble, Dr Ferguson?

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It's an empirical question and, I'm afraid, the empirical evidence don't support your version.

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Nope, don’t agree. We can and should swap out the traditional white characters in our time honored fairy tales to reflect our diverse population. Let’s have a lot of versions of these beloved fantasies that children enjoy. Keep the originals too, and YES definitely let’s have some new ones highlighting other heritages like CoCo.

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I saw ‘Billy Elliot’ in London where Billy, a white Yorkshire lad was played by a black Jamaican with a Jamaican accent. The parents were cast as white. It was weird. Throughout the musical you had to keep telling yourself that a Yorkshireman was white….it was just weird….and last year again in London, we saw ‘My Fair Lady’ and again a poor white flower girl was cast with a black. It creates a dissonance- not to mention that she just didn’t have the vocal range of Julie Andrew’s who was first cast in the part.

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