Move over Pepe Le Pew — the amorous skunk isn’t the only cartoon Romeo sparking outrage these days.
When Disneyland reopened its doors last week after a year-long closure due to the pandemic, it unveiled a major revamp to an original attraction. The ride previously known as “Snow White’s Scary Adventure” has been transformed to a less-frightening version, now known as “Snow White’s Enchanted Wish.” Updates include LED black lights, laser projections, and new animatronics. What hasn’t changed, though, is the magical smooch that awakens the pale princess from her slumber. And that fantasy trope, as old as fairytales themselves, has some culture critics up in arms.
In a travel piece for The San Francisco Chronicle’s digital publication, SFGate, Managing Editor Katie Dowd and writer Julie Tremaine complained that Prince Charming plants “true love’s kiss” on the sleeping Snow without her consent.
“[The kiss] cannot possibly be true love if only one person knows it’s happening,” the pair write, asking, “Haven’t we already agreed that consent in early Disney movies is a major issue? That teaching kids that kissing, when it hasn’t been established if both parties are willing to engage, is not OK?” They then suggested Imagineers come up an alternative ending that departs from that of the 1937 film.
The essay caught the attention of Fox News, referencing it as an example of cancel culture run amok. One representative exchange came when “Fox and Friends” Anchor Ainsley Earhardt briefly asked Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) for his thoughts and Kennedy replied, “I don’t know where these jackaloons come up with this stuff.”
Several Left-wing outlets then claimed the coverage was nothing more than Fox creating a tempest in a teapot.
Daily Beast Editor Justin Baragona called the coverage “obsessive,” and Huffington Post Senior Culture Reporter Curtis M. Wong accused the network of building a “bogus cancel culture narrative.” Not to be outdone, Media Matters’ Matt Gertz assembled screenshots of Fox’s reporting on the topic, sneering, “All morning long. Because someone wrote a take for the the San Francisco Gate.”
But Dowd and Tremaine aren’t alone in casting the iconic kiss in a non-consenual light, and the other people bringing it up are hardly anonymous Twitter users.
In 2018, at the height of the #MeToo movement, Frozen voice actress Kristen Bell told Parents Magazine she had a hard talk with her daughters about Snow White, asking them, “Don’t you think that it’s weird that the prince kisses Snow White without her permission? Because you cannot kiss someone if they’re sleeping!”
The year before, Osaka University professor and author of a book on sexual harassment, Kazue Muta, argued that movies like “Snow White” and “Sleeping Beauty” promote sexual violence. And Middlebury College hosts a website devoted to the deconstruction of Disney princesses and rape culture, citing the classic fairytale ending as an example of “Taking away a woman’s authority and sense of self by allowing men to dominate them sexually and emotionally.”
Disney’s previous capitulation to such woke complaints may be emboldening demands like Dowd and Tremaine’s. Self-described super-fan and blogger Jonathan Vanboskerck said that the Mouse House’s decision to remove Trader Sam from the Jungle Cruise and the bride auction from Pirates of the Caribbean is ruining the immersive fantasy experience his family has come to expect from the theme parks.
Given these concessions, critics have good reason to expect results if they push for more.
Megan Basham (@megbasham) is the entertainment reporter for The Daily Wire. She’s a Rotten Tomatoes-approved critic who was previously an entertainment editor and podcast co-host for World Magazine.
The views expressed in this opinion piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.