The quality of kids’ content is rapidly declining. That is just an unfortunate fact. The decline is being ushered along by the idea that traditions are bad and, therefore, anything having to do with a tradition is not good either. So anything remotely traditional must go. “Throw the baby out with the bathwater,” they say. This, of course, is all evidence of new-age parenting and coddle culture, which I will continue to speak out against.
Nowhere are the effects of coddle culture more evident than on college campuses. I often get asked to speak at colleges and sometimes I am just baffled by the students — so baffled that I want to know who raised them. I really want to meet their mom and dad. How did they get to college with the mentality they have at 19- and 20-years-old? These students will wait in incredibly long lines and sit through my speech just to turn around and try to give their own during the question-and-answer portion of the session because they want people to hear how they feel. They missed some obvious lessons on values growing up.
Meanwhile, I am trying to instill traditional values in my children. But that’s not necessarily easy because when you pay attention as a parent, you see how much our culture has shifted, even in the slightest ways. Take, for example, the music I allow my children to listen to. In my book “Blackout,” I quoted Confucius, a Chinese philosopher, who said, “If one should desire to know whether a kingdom is well governed, if its morals are good or bad, the quality of its music will furnish the answer.” In my book, I was relaying how music has changed drastically in only a few decades. We went from The Temptations and the Commodores to Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion. My point in “Blackout” was, the values of black America are reflected in its music. But it’s not just black America; it’s all of America.
We can even see this degradation of music over time in Disney music. My favorite Disney princess has always been Aurora in “Sleeping Beauty.” I absolutely loved Aurora, so I often play “Once Upon a Dream” for my daughter. Even the sound of Aurora’s voice is uplifting, and the song’s lyrics are lovely and classic:
I know you, I walked with you once upon a dream
I know you, that gleam in your eyes is so familiar a gleam
And I know it’s true that visions are seldom all they seem
But if I know you, I know what you’ll do
You’ll love me at once, the way you did once upon a dream
Fast forward to the movie “Frozen.” To be clear, I have no issue with this movie. I have watched the movie, and it’s fine; however, I am disappointed at how modern these movies have become. Anna, played by Kristin Bell (who, for the record, does great work and is amazingly talented), sings a song titled “For the First Time in Forever.” These lyrics are quite a bit different than those of Aurora’s song:
Don’t know if I’m elated or gassy
But I’m somewhere in that zone
‘Cause for the first time in forever
I won’t be alone
Later in the song, Anna sings, “I wanna stuff some chocolate in my face.” I suppose the song is meant to be relatable and cute, but it’s also off-putting and tactless. In the bigger picture, the change of lyrics represents a degradation in our music, our language, and even how we communicate. Aurora is frightened when her path crosses with the prince, while Anna wants to meet a prince, feels gassy, and hopes to stuff her face with chocolate.
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These lyrics are by no means something to panic over. After all, “Frozen” is a cute movie, but we should pay attention to the fact that the lesson it carries with it is, without question, that traditions should be done away with. And — spoiler alert — just when you think Princess Anna is going to be rescued by a handsome prince, she’s actually rescued by her sister’s love. The implication is, having a handsome prince save her (i.e., the idea of a budding nuclear family) must be done away with; it’s garbage. This is the message being funneled to children today, and though you may be tempted to think it doesn’t matter, it does.
Bentkey. DailyWire+.
Disney is remaking the classic movie “Snow White and The Seven Dwarfs,” and with it, they’re sending a new message. Rachel Zegler is the lead actress playing Snow White, and listening to her is thoroughly unbearable. She is an entitled brat and probably someone I would have come across on one of the college campuses I visit. She believes that everything in the past is terrible, that we should only be looking forward, and that being progressive is a necessity. She despises the idea of a pretty princess and a prince. She does not like any of that. Furthermore, she knows what she wants and what she deserves, which she has made crystal clear when she commented on the money she deserves for her role. She’s been filmed saying, “If I’m going to stand there 18 hours in a dress of an iconic Disney princess, I deserve to be paid for every hour that it’s streamed online.”
“I’m if gonna stand there 18 hours in a dress of an iconic Disney princess, I deserve to be paid for every hour that it’s streamed online.”
The new Snow White is the most insufferable woman I’ve ever seen pic.twitter.com/U1swu4roRl
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) August 2, 2023
She sounds nice. She sounds even nicer when she talks about “Snow White,” the classic movie we grew up watching with the princess everyone loves. (By the way, this is not a partisan issue. Most Democrats and Republicans enjoy the Disney classics. Except Rachel, who just happens to be the one acting in the role of one of those major classics.)
We get it, Rachel. It’s not 1937. Men are weird. Men are creepy. Weird. Weird. Men might even be cut from the film. But she doesn’t stop there. She continues to drone on about her version of a princess.
I don’t know how many more times she could say it or how much clearer she can make it for us: Snow White is going to be a boss. She’s going to go to work. She’s not going to worry about family. Who cares about finding a handsome prince? She can make money. The idea of a prince can no longer be tolerated. She can do “bad” all by herself because that’s really where the future is. It’s progressive.
While these are subtle changes to characters, they are changes parents should be paying attention to — because it’s morphing into entitlement and narcissism. It’s all about you and what you bring to the table and how much you can accomplish without any other person. As Confucius once said, our morals — which I would argue are very bad — are just being furnished by our culture. We are living among the most entitled generation that has ever existed, and the last thing we need is for it to continue to show up in the content our kids are watching.
This is why there needs to be a disruption in kids’ content. The Daily Wire made a promise to spend $100 million over three years to build a kids entertainment company, and on Monday, we delivered on that promise. The Daily Wire released Bentkey, the new streaming platform for kids entertainment, dedicated to telling stories that kids will love and parents can trust. And this is just the beginning of what is to come.
Take a look at all Bentkey has to offer: pic.twitter.com/f23Imva5ZA
— Daily Wire (@realDailyWire) October 16, 2023