You don’t have to watch TV shows or movies from very long ago to find yourself cringing. Transphobia in The L World. Sexism in Suite Life of Zach and Cody. Racism in… pretty much everything. Luckily, the world has done a lot of growing as far as sensitivity goes. Some may think “What’s all the fuss about? It’s just TV!” The way I see it, the media we consume affects us in a very real way. Look at something as simple as fashion trends. During peak popularity the hair styles, make up, and clothes Rachel and Moncia would sport would drastically spike in popularity. Monkey see, monkey do. So when the media is perpetuating negative stereotypes, it keeps those ideas alive and well in our society. There are many ways this manifests but this particular article is focused on queer coding in Disney movies.
Queer coding is when a character is given stereotypical queer characteristics but is not specified to be queer. This in itself is not an issue. The issue lies in the fact that out of the Disney characters it is the Disney villains who are heavily queer coded. The male villains are often portrayed as effeminate, easily scared, expressive, wearing “pretty” clothes. The females are masucline, severe, and often appearing to be transgender. There is nothing wrong with these characteristics until they are attributed to villainous characters and mocked on screen. To further explain, let’s take a look at some of the characters Disney has queer coded throughtout the years.
Let’s start with an obvious one; Captain Hook from Peter Pan. According to This is Local London , “[C]aptain Hook gets easily scared, is very expressive when he speaks, has a high-pitched voice, wears makeup, wears looser clothing, and is preoccupied with his looks.” Scar from The Lion King fits the bitchy gay man trope as he has a “strut”, is very expressive, and makes snarky comments.There is a looong list of issues with Pocohantus and a queer coded villian makes the list. According to Rae’s Media Notebook “[G]overnor Radcliffe sips cordials with his pinky sticking out. He wears a flashy gold outfit in his musical number “Mine”. He speaks softly, using what Thorpe would describe as a “gay voice” Ursula from The Little Mermaid was based off of a real life famous drag queen named Divine. As for Maleficent, Screen Rant writes “[H]er hard-lined masculine build, phallic horns, and severe personality are meant to be un-feminine and thus evil, contrasting the heroine’s maiden-like innocence. “ Jafar from Aladdin, Hades from Hercules, Lefou from Beauty and the Beast……I could go on but you get the idea.
On the other side of this is the reinforcement of gender roles with the movie’s protagonists; the heros are manly and the damsels are in distress. Princesses are soft spoken, gentle, helpless, child brides who wait for their prince to come fix all of their problems. The princes are strong, resilient, and masculine and save their princesses time and time again. Everyone is having a good heterosexual time. Now, am I saying its homophobic to fit gender norms? Of course not! Do you. (I really hope that doesn’t include selling your voice to go be with a guy you’ve never met but that is none of my business.) It is just that these characteristics are contrasting the villanous queer coded characters and seen as inherently better. Nobody is making fun of Aladdin for his chiseled chest or Li Shang for his battle skills. They are just guys out here being dudes!
I’ll give credit where credit is due; Disney has been doing a great job making women more self possessed with movies like Shrek, Frozen, and Brave. Giving its female characters a personality, complex emotions, and goals outside of marrying before the end of their sophomore year of high school, is a big step up from what we were watching before. I would argue that the male characters have not changed nearly as much. Baby steps.
The rampant use of queer coding in Disney is concerning mainly due to their target audience; children. Children are even more impressionable than adults (if that seems possible) and this psychological association of queer characteristics to evil characters furthers the harmful idea that being queer is wrong or, from a religious perspective, sinful. These classic movies aren’t going anywhere and have the ability to ingrain these homophobic ideas generation after generation. For queer kids, it can make accpeting their identity that much harder. Does this mean we cancel Disney? Throw out the classics? Boycott Disney World, deeming it the most problematic place on Earth? I don’t think so. There is no way to shield children from bigotry. It is everywhere, alive and well. You can’t erase history by pretending it didn’t happen. Besides, I freaking love those movies. What I think is much more important is what is done moving forward. A big part of this will be queer represenation in media produced for children.
Something that never ceases to amaze me is how people can begin a sentence with “I am not homophobic but…” and expect whatever is said next, typically a blatantly homophobic comment, to be excused. I see this every time queer characters are introduced in children’s television. They say something like “I’m not homophobic, I don’t care what people do, but do kids really need to see that? It will bring up uncomfortable questions. They will be exposed to sex!” Meanwhile, their child is plopped in front of the TV watching an unconscious Snow White kissed by a man or Ariel leaving home and giving up her voice to be with a man. That doesn’t promote uncomfortable questions?! To these people, listen up. You aren’t worried your child will know about sexuality. You have been joking about them having “boyfriends” and “girlfriends” since before they could talk. You have laughed as someone told you that “you’ll be chasing the boys away from this one” about a toddler who can’t even use the toilet on her own yet. What you don’t want your kid to be exposed to homosexuality. Maybe you are aggressively homophobic and don’t want your kid to be gay. More likely, you’ve grown up in a society that equates homosexuality to promiscuity, sex, and sin. Deeply ingrained inside you are these ideas about the queer community that you’ve never given another thought. You see heterosexual couples as the default, the standard. Anything else is “the other” and therefore inappropriate for children. This is exactly why children need to see queer representation. To see queer people as parents, teachers, friends, not just villains and deviants. To see them live normal lives. To create a new generation that sees queer people as equals. To stop the oppressive cycle that results in very real issues for the LGBT community.
So you don’t have to cancel your movie marathon, symbolically burn your Goofy stuffed animal, and start exclusively watching Rupaul’s Drag Race. You can love Disney and appreciate the classics while still being aware of negative aspects of the films and supporting the future of queer representation in children’s media.