Relationship to Disney Culture

What is your relationship to Disney culture?  How does Christiansen validate or challenge your views?

My relationship with Disney culture is complicated. I was somewhat into Disney as a child, though I wouldn't say I was a Disney fanatic, I was more so a fan of Disney Channel shows. However, for whatever reason, I never got to watch the classic Disney movies, such as Finding Nemo, The Little Mermaid, Toy Story, The Lion King, etc. I still have not watched any of these movies or any of the princess movies. I'm okay with this for myself. I remember the turning point for me and my stance on Disney. I was watching a documentary about garment workers in Bangladesh and the conditions they faced, such as extremely low wages, inhumane hours, crumbling factories, no benefits and more. Real quick-- we often use the words "extreme", "inhumane" and "crumbling" to describe conditions that are all of these but to a much lesser degree. So I want to emphasize that the workers were being paid something like 15-30 cents per hour. Their hours were so long that many of them didn't have time to walk home to rest before their next shift so they would sleep there. And Bangladesh is home to the worst and deadliest garment industry accident of all time, the collapse of the Rana Plaza, with approximately 2,500 injured people and a death toll of 1,134. So yeah, the buildings that house these factories pose a serious safety risk to the garment workers. So anyway, in this film, I saw the garment workers' efforts to organize and demand better conditions. They weren't asking for much, just a living wage, normal hours, a safe work environment, you know... the bare minimum. As they documented their efforts, there was a lot of back and forth with the international brands they worked for to discuss their demands and Disney had one of the biggest company presences. I distinctly remember the conversations had between the workers and Disney representatives where Disney refused to pay the workers what they were asking, which was somewhere around $1.30 per hour. From that point forward, I decided Disney was not a company I was interested in supporting. Just like Lesley, I completely boycotted Disney. When they moved to Disney+, I did not purchase a subscription. But lately, I feel conflicted. Disney channel was such an important part of my childhood and I still bond with others through this similar connection and experience today. I really don't want to rob my son of this experience or this opportunity to connect with other people by not exposing him to any Disney at all. Like really, he doesn't even know what Disney is. However, drawing form our discussion in class, I realize that Disney is not all bad or at least the Disney content isn't. The corporation is terrible, lol. After reading Christiansen, I'm excited to introduce Kairo to Disney while incorporating dialogue and a critical analysis perspective around its hidden messaging and stereotyping, similar to what we did in class and what Christiansen had her students do with cartoons and other media.