I realize this is a
controversial opinion. Still, for those who haven't already heard of it and
started gnashing their teeth, here is a brief overview.
I had to search a little
to find an article that didn't make a lot of disparaging references to Disney
being politically correct. Now, some of you could very reasonably be thinking
that of course Gina, with her bleeding heart liberal ways, is in support of
this politically correct move. That would be an oversimplification anyway, but
also this news dropped at an interesting time.
I have been reading a
little about pirates. It was because of a book, Rejected Princesses: Tales of History's Boldest Heroines, Hellions, and
Heretics by Jason Porath. There
were more women pirates than I suspected.
I always knew about Mary
Reade and Ann Bonney - they are depicted on the walls for the Pirates of the Caribbean ride queue. They weren't even in this book. I
knew about Ching Shih (who was in the book) from a Feminist Frequency video,
but there were so many others I had never heard of: Alfhild, Grace O'Malley,
and Sayyida al Hurra, (as well as some seafaring women who were not pirates) until
I was wondering exactly how common it was to be a pirate and a woman.
That is hard to answer,
because you really only get known if you were a captain, but there are
estimates that it was as many as 1% during the Golden Age of Piracy (roughly
1650 - 1730). This at least makes the "redhead" being a pirate
reasonable enough.
That led to me thinking
about the question of historical accuracy in general. Even if wench auctions
were common, there could be valid reasons for not depicting them in a ride that
is taken for fun and does not delve into the issues of what is being
represented. However, the more I read, the less likely a wench auction seems.
This is not a testament
to the chastity of pirates; they used brothels all the time. Knowing how some
people respond to fleet week even now, you know, I'm sure they could get
company. However, it appears that they were much more likely to loot a ship
than a town (completely logical), and at least during the Golden Age if the
ship surrendered they just took the goods without killing anyone. If it didn't
surrender and they fought they were likely to kill a lot of them, with captive
most likely to be pressed into service on the ship or sold as slaves, and
predominantly men. None of this is making pirates good people, but it's still
not coming up with a lot of raping and treating women as chattel.
This means that if you
are sold on historical accuracy the entire ride needs to be changed. If you are
just sold on women being property, existing solely for the use of men, I would
like to hear your cogent arguments for why Disney should continue that legacy.
Not long ago I wrote how
the women of Hidden Figures should have
been around in Apollo 13 and The Right Stuff, but there are people who would argue that
the inclusion of women (especially Black women) there would have been political
correctness gone wild. In actuality that would have only been honesty and
giving of proper credit.
I know there are people
who resent the imposition of modern values on something classic, but I'm not
sure that's what this is. First of all, if something that was once widely
accepted is clearly wrong, we not only can say it, we must say it. The rise of
neo-Nazis and slavery apologists makes that more necessary, not less.
In addition, there are
times when it seems like 1960s America was more sexist than the 18th-century New Orleans. Granted, that's not a full picture either,
but it's at least worth thinking about.
Remember, the 1960s came
not long after World War II. Magazines and products were trying to push women
away from factories and military positions back into the home, to have no other
aspirations than being good wives, mothers, and shoppers in a way that had not
been the case before the war. In addition, Freudian psychologists had fled Europe and brought all of their stupid ideas about
penis envy and icebox mothers here. Men from that time period were quite
capable of getting it wrong. We can move past that and still have a good time,
I promise.
Back to Feminist
Frequency, one thing Anita Sarkeesian regularly points out is that you can
appreciate something while still being critical of it. That is worth keeping in
mind. I'm glad if you have had fun on the old ride, I have too.
That being said, if no
longer having images of women in a coffle - some weeping, some scared - with no
control over their fate unless they can escape... if that being gone ruins it
for you, why is that? That's worth thinking about. If it's just a knee-jerk
reaction to any change, even one for the better, that's worth thinking about
too. Those thought patterns will come up again and again.
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