# How racist (if at all) do you think "The Princess and the Frog" will be? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 2, 2009, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646 "2009-12-02T00:30:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 5:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/21 "2009-12-02T05:43:18Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I’m going to cut Disney some slack for the Native Americans in Peter Pan. Peter Pan is told from the perspective of a child. The book, play, and adaptations certainly don’t have a nuanced view of pirates so why pick on them about Native Americans? I don’t think the book was nearly as stereotypical. Plus the book wasn’t really told from the POV of a child–it seems like it’s told from the POV of an omniscient, fairly mature third person with a pretty good sense of humor. Finally even if it is from a child’s perspective doesn’t necessarily mean anything. Children get a lot from adults. It’s not like kids grow up in a vacuum assuming that all NAs act like that without adults already giving them those images. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/22 "2009-12-02T05:49:59Z")
> [@garygnu](#): > > I’m also wondering how much of the film the two leads are in frog form. I thought frogs were French? (Ahah, _that’s_ why it’s set in the French Quarter!) ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 5:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/23 "2009-12-02T05:52:38Z")
> [@dhkendall](#): > > Yeah, Disney [doesn’t really have a good track record](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0038969/) making movies with black characters in them that’s not racially insensitive. 😉 > > (Interesting fact, we own that movie. I got a credit card for the first time just so I could buy that movie for my wife, who had fond memories of the movie as a kid and likes the famous song from that movie. Went to eBay and had to try 3 times, the first two the attempts to buy were mysteriously blocked somehow, I surmised it must be Mickey’s Lawyers making good on their threat to make sure that movie never again sullies the shores of N. America. Finally succeeded the third time, just before another attempted injunction (no way, mouse! I won it fair and square!) > > Got it on VHS, though, and that format (and our player) is slowly going away. I don’t relish having to replace it via DVD, considering all the trouble getting the VHS was … How did it stand up? I remember seeing it as a young child in the 80s and enjoying it, but I’m sure I would have missed anything racist at the time. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/24 "2009-12-02T13:39:24Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > I’m going to cut Disney some slack for the Native Americans in Peter Pan. Peter Pan is told from the perspective of a child. The book, play, and adaptations certainly don’t have a nuanced view of pirates so why pick on them about Native Americans? Exactly. In fact, to call Tiger Lily et al “Native Americans” is grossly inaccurate. They were native to Never Never Land—not America. Like pirates and fairies, those “Red Indians” were part of the Edwardian child’s imagination, and to complain that they were stereotypes is to miss the point. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/25 "2009-12-02T13:46:46Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#): > > Exactly. In fact, to call Tiger Lily et al “Native Americans” is grossly inaccurate. They were native to Never Never Land—not America. Like pirates and fairies, those “Red Indians” were part of the Edwardian child’s imagination, and to complain that they were stereotypes is to miss the point. But that Edwardian child got that imagination from somewhere. He didn’t just come up with it. And let’s face it, said Edwardian child was probably being fed with a heavy diet of “Aren’t non-Brits awfully savage and uncouth?” ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/26 "2009-12-02T14:06:14Z")
> [@](#): > > Yeah, Disney doesn’t really have a good track record making movies with black characters in them that’s not racially insensitive. **Song of the South** was still shown in US theaters as recently as 1982. It’s not racially insensitive – it just presents a _wayyyy_ unrealistically rosy picture of race relations in the South. > [@](#): > > When the film was first released, the NAACP acknowledged “the remarkable artistic merit” of the film, but decried the “impression it gives of an idyllic master-slave relationship.”[5] > **[Song of the South](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Song_of_the_South)** > > Song of the South is a 1946 American live-action/animated musical drama film directed by Harve Foster and Wilfred Jackson, produced by Walt Disney, and released by RKO Radio Pictures. It is based on the Uncle Remus stories as adapted by Joel Chandler Harris, stars James Baskett in his final film role, and features the voices of Johnny Lee, Baskett, and Nick Stewart. The film takes place in the U.S. state of Georgia during the Reconstruction era, a period of American history after the end of t... If you want to see something that really hasn’t aged well, look at the excised scenes from the “Pastoral” portion of **Fantasia** [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/X7o9HOSdnR0/hqdefault.jpg "Fantasia Censored Scene 1") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7o9HOSdnR0) [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/0dnS0bgaf-o/hqdefault.jpg "Fantasia Censored Scene 2") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dnS0bgaf-o) [![](https://i.ytimg.com/vi/eFXDZ-gb-9w/hqdefault.jpg "Fantasia Censored Scene 3") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFXDZ-gb-9w) > [@](#): > > The film was once again edited for the 1969 release, this time to remove Sunflower, a centaur depicted as an African-American girl in the Pastoral Symphony segment. According to the Memory Hole, “Performing menial duties for the blonde, white female centaurs, Sunflower is a racial stereotype along the lines of Amos and Andy, Buckwheat, and Aunt Jemima.” > **[Fantasia](https://movies.fandom.com/wiki/Fantasia)** > > Fantasia is a 1940 motion picture, the third in the Disney animated features canon, which was a Walt Disney experiment in animation and music. The soundtrack of the film consists of eight pieces of classical music, played by the Philadelphia... ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/27 "2009-12-02T14:42:28Z")
A _Newsweek_ essay on the film’s interracial romance: ['The Princess and the Frog': Disney's Mixed Race Royalty](http://www.newsweek.com/id/223508) ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/28 "2009-12-02T14:48:37Z")
This is the studio that gave us _Cool Running,_ which explained that Black people are funny in the snow. This could not be worse. ---
**Author:** ![MeanOldLady](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/meanoldlady/32/10737_2.png) [@MeanOldLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MeanOldLady)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/29 "2009-12-02T14:52:50Z")
> [@garygnu](#): > > After complaints about the initial ideas about the story, Disney met with black leaders to try to address potential problems. Black leaders? Uh oh, I hope nobody consulted Al Sharpton. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/30 "2009-12-02T14:57:47Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > This is the studio that gave us _Cool Running,_ which explained that Black people are funny in the snow. This could not be worse. It also gave us The Incredibles, which explained that Black people kick ass in the snow when voiced by Samuel L. Jackson. Isn’t it _ **possible** _ they’ll get it right this time? ---
**Author:** ![Bridget\_Burke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7cd45c/32.png) [@Bridget\_Burke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bridget_Burke)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 3:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/31 "2009-12-02T15:28:52Z")
> [@Mahaloth](#): > > Here is Entertainment Weekly’s review. They loved it and didn’t mention racism at all. > > [Read the review here.](http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20322455,00.html) I checked out the comments. Several balked at the Randy Newman score; one suggested Quincy Jones as a better choice. Wikipedia’ing revealed that Quincy Jones was born in Chicago & raised in Washington State. His amazingly versatile career includes discovering Leslie Gore; he wrote “It’s My Party.” But he has no NOLA links… Randy Newman lived there very early in his life & visited throughout his childhood. He wrote Louisiana 1927 & has raised money for the city, post-Katrina. Given his long history of writing movie scores, I’m not worried. I don’t go out for many movies, but this might be worth a trip. It will be interesting to read comments from people **who have actually seen the film**. ---
**Author:** ![Freudian\_Slit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/5daacb/32.png) [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/32 "2009-12-02T15:31:18Z")
Quincy Jones may not have lived in Louisiana but maybe the commenter just meant that he was a better composer/producer than Randy Newman? I know whose music I’d rather listen to. ---
**Author:** ![smiling\_bandit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9a140/32.png) [@smiling\_bandit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/smiling_bandit)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2009, 6:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/33 "2009-12-02T18:51:20Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > This is the studio that gave us _Cool Running,_ which explained that Black people are funny in the snow. This could not be worse. … I like _Cool Runnings_. It’s an incredibly stupid, stereotyped, predictable movie about **Jamaican Bobsledders**! How can you not love that?! ---
**Author:** ![The\_Evil\_Prince\_Zorte](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e95f7d/32.png) [@The\_Evil\_Prince\_Zorte](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Evil_Prince_Zorte)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/34 "2009-12-03T02:06:54Z")
I saw the film, and didn’t think there was any trouble, beyond the stereotyping that is inevitable. There is always some kind stereotyping in movies because it serves quickly define a character in terms everyone understands. To get an idea, read the (4 last I checked) negative reviews at Rotten Tomatoes. They all disliked the film on the basis of race, rather than on its own merits, and seemed to have gone into the experience expecting to have a problem with it. One of the comments to those reviews remarked that some people can find racism in a glass of water. It isn’t a 100% authentic representation of Southern black culture, but what animated film is an authentic representation of anything? Several reviews scoffed that Disney proudly proclaims their first African American princess, and then avoids the issue by making her a frog most of the time, somehow negating her race. However a central message of the film is that surface isn’t what matters, it is who you are, whether black or white, rich or poor, frog or human. The main objections seems to be that Tiana isn’t black enough, but then maybe the real problem is she isn’t frog enough. I’ve never seen a frog as light green and she is far prettier than your average amphibian. Take that all with a grain of salt. I can’t have a truly informed opinion about this because I am white, and in denial of the inherent racism that lurks deep within every white American’s soul. ---
**Author:** ![RachelChristine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7ab992/32.png) [@RachelChristine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RachelChristine)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/35 "2009-12-03T04:10:03Z")
Just a teensy bit of googling will find the loads of articles about the name change. The princess was originally to be named Maddy, before they changed it to Tiana (I think the Prince had a name change too). You can find lots of articles for and against each name, which I found hilarious. ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/36 "2009-12-03T13:28:32Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > What is considered offensive and what is not changes so much, even if the film isn’t considered offensive today, in ten years it might look like “Birth Of A Nation”. And that’s really the issue with Peter Pan’s Indians. 1940s portrayals of a Edwardian child’s imagination of “Red Injuns” is not in line with late 20th century/early 21st century cultural sensitivity awareness. ---
**Author:** ![Unintentionally\_Blank](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/unintentionally_blank/32/5418_2.png) [@Unintentionally\_Blank](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Unintentionally_Blank)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/37 "2009-12-03T13:32:43Z")
> [@Dangerosa](#): > > And that’s really the issue with Peter Pan’s Indians. 1940s portrayals of a Edwardian child’s imagination of “Red Injuns” is not in line with late 20th century/early 21st century cultural sensitivity awareness. Which really means people oughta lighten up. We lament the loss of anything that reminds us of the past yet can’t possibly stand when it REALLY DOES represent the past. Heck, but a Surgeon General warning on it I hope we look back at the whole Political Correctness era as overbearingly unnecessary. ---
**Author:** ![Drain\_Bead](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e47774/32.png) [@Drain\_Bead](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drain_Bead)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 1:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/38 "2009-12-03T13:48:41Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > This is the studio that gave us _Cool Running,_ which explained that Black people are funny in the snow. This could not be worse. Wasn’t that at least somewhat based on a true story? Or am I just hallucinating that whole Winter Olympics with the Jamaican Bobsled Team? ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/39 "2009-12-03T14:44:19Z")
At least a little reality-based: [Jamaica national bobsleigh team - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamaica_national_bobsled_team) ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2009, 2:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646/40 "2009-12-03T14:58:48Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#): > > But that Edwardian child got that imagination from somewhere. He didn’t just come up with it. And let’s face it, said Edwardian child was probably being fed with a heavy diet of “Aren’t non-Brits awfully savage and uncouth?” As an aside, I was recently reminded of E.T. Seaton’s _Two Little Savages_ (a book I loved as a kid) which is a thinly veiled autobiographical account of an Edwardian schoolkid growing up with the usual childhood interest in Indians as an exotic other, and taking that interest … quite far. [Seaton became founder of the “league of woodcraft indians”, which strongly influenced the Boy Scouts - though the latter, under the leadership of Baden-Powell, purged the “Indian” out of the organization] Anyway, Seaton’s a fascinating character - a pivotal figure in the development of a concept of animal rights, intererested in early Feminism, in the rights of native north americans, a famous artist and naturalist, and of course an excellent writer - though his account of himself is often as much myth as reality, according to his biographer. Of how many others can it be said that they caused a sensation among the artistic set in Paris (Seaton was arrested for suspicion of murder when setting up props for his masterpiece for the Academy, a picture involving wolves gnawing on a human corpse - the picture was rejected as “grotesque”) and, a few years later, was chased out of Texas for suspicion of cattle-stealing? Anyway end of digression … 😃 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-racist-if-at-all-do-you-think-the-princess-and-the-frog-will-be/519646.md?page=3)