LA Times article on Disney the "racist"

[Bornieo: Fully Loaded]

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-ca-disneyrace22-2009nov22,0,978597.story

How much of this portrait was the product of a smear campaign by Walt's enemies and how much a product of Walt's own unenlightened attitudes is difficult to determine. What one can say is that the truth about Walt Disney seems much more complicated and nuanced than either his enemies or supporters would have you believe.

[SzczerbiakManiac]

Cool find

[Gemini Cricket]

You know, after spending some time in Hollywood and meeting some of the so-called A-list celebs, producers etc... I wouldn't doubt this article to be 100% true. Homophobic, misogynist and racist crap all the way up the ladder, folks (sometimes spewing from the same person). Then again, I have met some absolutely wonderful stars, too.

[Jazzman]

It was interesting until it addressed Song of the South and regurgitated all of the same old claims about it supposedly being a racist depiction and demeaning and blah blah blah. The next paragraph half-heartedly defended the film, but at the end it's rather obvious where the author's sentiments really lay. Lame. As for Walt, he was a man of the fifties. It was a different time. I get tired of these biopics of historical people which apply today's standards and ways of thought to people who lived in a different time. It's not exactly historical revisionism, but it's annoying.

[alphabassettgrrl]

Yeah, I don't think Disney was any more racist than anybody else at the time. Seems at least he tried. Sometimes.

Yeah, I get tired of revisionist history, too. Can't apply today's standards to people living in the past; we can say the standards of the past were unenlightened, or whatever, but we can't fault people for living under them. People frequently didn't know better. A few individuals may be more enlightened than their peers, but for the most part, people are the product of their time.

[RStar]

IMHO, Song of the South, in an interesting and intertaining way, showed a taste of the life of African Americans to the extent that it could for the times. If it was more true to life, it would have bombed in the theater. And of course, that wasn't the reason Walt made the movie in the first place.