Thinking about Disney Movies

So with this Journalism class we watch many different videos about media and so on. Another documentary that we watched last class session was Mickey Mouse Monopoly. This documentary made you really thing about what you see in those Disney movies and really make it hard to look at a Disney movie the same way. This documentary talked about some of the bad influences Disney movies have on children without most people even noticing.

There are many examples given like how most female characters look the same in their movies with a slim look and even large breasts. Other things were how they supported spouse abuse and inaccuracy historical events. Movies like Mulan and Pocahontas have some things that never happened in history like Pocahontas’s relationship with John Smith. They both existed but never had a romantic attraction or relationship; she later married another white man not John Smith. Or in the case of Mulan they Chinese coulter never had dress up nice and interviews to find a husband. Those are just two areas that historical events were false just to make the movie good and happy.

Another part is the promotion of abuse and staying with it in the movie Beauty and the Beast. In this movie the Beast is mean to Beauty, yells at her, treats her bad like no “food if she won’t eat with me”, tears her family apart. She stayed with him to try and find his inner good, this movie goes with spousal abuse or abusive husband beating on the wives and the wives staying with her husband.

Those are just some examples that this documentary talked about there were many other examples in the documentary. Now I just want to share this, I don’t want you to stop watching these movies or scare you about them. This documentary also made me want to go out and see a lot of these Disney movies that I have not seen in some time. It seams like the big point this documentary had was to make parents aware of what their children are watching and to give parents the tools to talk to their children with what they just saw in the movie they just watched. So I really recommend seeing this documentary to expand your thoughts and views of media with children. If anything else this will make you think more about what you see.

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Hip Hop in the Media

So for those that don’t know this semester I’m taking a Journalism of gender, race and sex in media ….or well that’s the title of the class or close to it. In this class we go through media and look at it deconstructing it and finding the deeper meaning of that media.  This last class session we were watching a documentary Hip Hop Beyond Beats and Rhythms by Byron Hurt.

Hip Hop Beyond Beats and Rhythms was talking about how all hip hop of recent time gives the message of being a man asserting dormancy by having lots of guns, lots of money, lots of girls, and killing others.  This documentary talked to people in the industry about what the music portrays even kids were spinning their own that would only mention guns killing people and other violent sides.  Yes I know that this type of violence is seen in other types of media like movies, TV, and video games but at the same time there is some difference in those types of media.  But at the same time the music all sounds the same with almost no difference between songs. 

One big question that was mentioned is why is all this music this way?  The response to this question was this is what the audience wants to hear.  If that’s the only reason then I think there is a big problem with society nowadays.  There was a movement with the woman community boycotting the hip hop music industry.  However most people in the industry didn’t care about the boycott because these people never bought their music to begin with so there was no lose of money.  So my one big question is if people that would normally buy the music, were to boycott the music they listen would the industry change what’s being said in this kind of music?

Now I know that most people that read this probably don’t listen to hip hop or rap much, but if the message out to those that do and make a point why it’s bad.  Maybe just maybe we could actually have them boycott the music to get a change in the industry……yeah this is just a thought or maybe a naïve wish but maybe one day it will happen.

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