What to do with your problematic IP if you're Disney...

I just backed out of an online conversation with someone I consider to be a bit of a dim bulb.

The topic of discussion was the Disney film, "Song of the South", which hasn't seen a commercial home video release since a LaserDisc was available in the Japanese market in 1990. This LaserDisc is the source from which most bootleg/graymarket VHS tapes and DVDs have been mastered.

I posited that, since it is a film with many problematic themes, Disney has chosen to not release it on home video and/or streaming services. Meanwhile, Dumbo and Peter Pan ARE on Disney+, and prefaced by a disclaimer that these films feature outdated cultural depictions/stereotypes, etc.

The other person insists that Song of the South is banned. By WHOM, I asked? I know that the NAACP has made its very salient points about that film normalizing postbellum-era Black servitude in the American south, but I have never heard of any governing body having BANNED this film. Disney knows it's not a good look, and that people would very likely protest/boycott SOTS as a product. Period.

So, this genius insists that, of course, the film is banned. By Disney itself.

No, this company is holding back a release of a piece its intellectual property that is no longer acceptable to most modern-day consumers, and would cause more strife than profit. What's more, Disney has made the decision to de-brand the SOTS aspects of the "Splash Mountain" rides at its parks--in favor of swapping in characters from "Princess and the Frog" (which I think is a positive, progressive move).

Could Disney, by virtue of disallowing SOTS video releases and application of that IP to its active brand application, be internally "banning" it? Yes, but that's a stretch of the verb, in my humble opinion. Your mileage may vary.

End rant.

#disney #intellectualproperty #ip #problematicfilms #songofthesouth #disneyparks #insensitive #divisive #noninclusive #cinema #racism #laserdisc #princessandthefrog #naacp #cinema