Propaganda in children's movies - toxic diet for young minds
What kind of a parent tells their kid that the movie the little one insisted on for a family movie-night is crap? Said kid had already seen the movie and was ecstatic about it, while the rest of us suffered through 90 minutes of pure torture. My verdict: disgusting propaganda crap! It did break his little heart, but although I'm fairly liberal as far as my son's online activities are concerned, but blatant propaganda is where I must draw the line.
The movie that ruined our night is the 2016 'Zootopia', which we did not go to see at the time, precisely because I had it filed under propaganda. It took me less than 10 minutes to know I was right. In case you were fortunate enough to have missed it the movie is about a nauseatingly happy-happy do-gooder of a female bunny who wants to become a police officer. Besides the feminist agenda, the movie's main aim is to drill into young minds the idea that we should all leave in perfect harmony and love one another, especially the predators, who are obviously kind-hearted innocent souls.
Foxes and bunnies don't belong together, sorry!
For the American public, the obvious race divide is between white and blacks. That's not much of an issue in Europe, but we do have our problems with Muslim immigrants overtaking whole neighborhoods and turning them into no-go areas. Should I behave like an idiotic bunny an go hug the silent invading armies? I don't think so.
I tried to explain to my boy why I hated the movie and he countered bravely – 'yes, but racism is bad, isn't it?' Well, obviously it is, but I won't have you brainwashed into thinking you must love everybody. In today's world you're not allowed to criticize anybody, black, latino, muslim, as you risk being accused of stereotyping a whole race. We're all human and all races and religions have their bad nuts among them. If I'm on the bus and move as far as possible from the dubious gang of gypsies, am I discriminating? No, I try to make sure my wallet stays in my bag...
We're supposed to teach our children they can be everything they want and that's OK as far as studying to become an astronaut or a neurosurgeon are concerned. That's doable. However, the ultra-positive bunny in the movie takes it to a whole new level – telling the baby fox it can be whatever it wants, even an elephant! And I was like, oh, for fuck's sake, it's a fox, it cannot turn into an elephant! You could say I'm overreacting, but I'm just fed up with this nonsense of having to accept people can identify with whatever they want – I've seen enough of grown-up men living their lives as bloody mermaids and bearded ladies pretending to be the first men to give birth. No, you cannot be whatever you want. Sorry.
I did my best to explain to my son that Hollywood is a propaganda tool of the US government or other darker forces. Big money go into the entertainment industry for this one purpose and it's getting worse every year. The Ice Age franchise popular back when my eldest was a kid was innocent enough – I mean, forcing climate change on the children's little throats is nothing compared to today's complex issues. Race, religion, diversity, feminism, white privilege – all crammed into a 90 minutes propaganda-drips. Like it's OK for a bunny to call another bunny 'cute', but others are not allowed to use such discriminating word. Might as well write it down for the moment he becomes a teenager – God forbid he tells a girl she's cute!
'Emoji' - full of Marxist crap
Fortunately, we have managed to stay way from the recent 'Emoji' movie, after reviews described it as Marxist propaganda.
Why can't movies be just movies? Fun and entertaining?
Why do I have to be the bad guy and tell my kid about propaganda and the people looking to brainwash him into becoming a compliant totally PC citizen? I'm not into poisoning his innocent mind with all the horrible things going on in the world, he has plenty of time to discover those on his own. On the other hand, it is my duty as a parent to warn him of the attempts made on his young mind. I'm not raising my child to become a sheep!
Thanks for reading
I think you read a little too much into this. Yes, there was the "you shouldn't judge people by how they look" message but that in itself isn't a bad message. And there were characters to dislike and they were in government so I think that's a pretty good message. And I think even most children know that a fox can't really be an elephant.
But for a kids movie with some surprisingly good messages, try The Lego Movie :).
Yes, we saw The Lego Movie and liked it.
I took it differently. I'll write a response post in a day or so.
I tried looking at it another way, as in governments keeping us fighting each other, which is also a reality, but than in movies of this type the villain is the exception and he is brought to justice - which does not happen in the real world. Plus there was simply too much irritating stuff in the movie...
I think you have a point but, the movie was aimed at very young children and my 10 and 13 year old were not even paying attention when we saw it. So much so that they never discussed it after as they do so many other movies. The little ones enjoyed watching and honestly the only message they probably understood was that you can be whoever you want to be, I don’t think that’s a bad message to send to 4,5 and 6 year olds.
Curated for #informationwar (by @wakeupnd)
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