A Good Lesson from "The Little Mermaid"

 "The Little Mermaid" is a classic Disney princess film, in which a mermaid named Ariel falls in love with Prince Eric, and Eric falls in love with Ariel and her beautiful singing voice. In an attempt to become closer to Prince Eric and escape sea life, Ariel makes a deal with a witch named Ursula to become human for three days. Within those three days, Ariel must recieve a kiss from Eric or turn back into a mermaid and belong to Ursula forever.


Lots of controversy has sparked from this movie, as it attends to very old-school and non-progressive views of gender roles and beauty standards. Many are offput by the general plot - a sixteen-year-old girl seeking a man's love, and then being put in a situation where she can only be saved by the man's kiss. Others are disturbed by the body image messages that the movie sends, particularly the huge difference in percieved attractiveness between the villains and the protagonists. While Prince Eric, Ariel, and the King are all skinny, muscular, and fit, villains like Ursula are as obese as an animated character can get.  

Regardless of the controversial aspects of the movie, there is at least one good lesson for children that can be learned. In the beginning of the movie, Ariel sings about how many material goods she has, but that she is never satisfied, and always wants more. She then goes on to sing about how she wishes to experience life on land, to meet humans and live their interesting lives. Her entire journey toward happiness, which is Prince Eric's love, is fueled by an emotional connection and desire for love, and she is truly happy at the end of the movie once she obtains that. We see that she is much more passionate about spending quality time with Prince Eric than playing with her "gadgets-a-plenty". The takeaway here is that it is more important to invest in experiences, rather than things, and that true happiness is derived not from what we own, but who we are surrounded by.



Comments

  1. Katy TurnerMarch 22, 2021 at 10:18 PM

    Hi! I think that you touched on a really interesting theme that is present in a lot of Disney movies, the idea that the main characters or any character that should be perceived as "good" is skinny, muscular (if they're a male) and just generally attractive, while the villains are what society considers as conventionally ugly. Do you think this narrative of bad people being "ugly" has influenced the way society things in some way? Or do you think these movies are just a reflection of what society already thinks?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Edison OoiApril 1, 2021 at 2:23 PM

      I think both directions are valid, however since Disney movies are directed toward young children who are still in their developmental phase, the appearance of good vs. bad people in these movies has a bigger impact on how society begins to consider what is unattractive.

      Delete
  2. Lisa AndresMarch 27, 2021 at 2:08 PM

    You make a really good point, Edison, when you mention that Ariel "is fueled by an emotional connection and desire for love" and that matters more to her than material things.
    Do you see this at play in any other Disney movies? A renunciation of material goods in order to connect with someone? Is the message undercut at all by the fact that these are 2 wealthy people? (Sort of the idea that "only someone who has a lot of things would say that things don't matter"?)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Derek DeliberatesApril 20, 2021 at 6:13 PM

    Hi Edison! I love the lesson that you brought up from the movie. I resonated with this theme. However, I find it interesting that Disney decided to pursue this theme in the movie (as well as other movies), given Disney's inextricable link to capitalism and consumerism. Do you think Disney's representation of this lesson that you discuss is inauthentic in any way?

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What do you NEED to be happy? What do you WANT to be happy?

Image
Happiness, like with most feelings, is an abstract concept that humans have created to categorize a certain intangible emotion that occurs under certain conditions. An extraterrestrial alien - who does not experience feelings in the same way humans do - could learn about happiness, understand it is a good thing to humans, and pass every exam on the biology of what happens to our bodies when we are happy, yet still never actually feel happiness. What do we need to be happy? Well, in a literal sense, we need regulation of hormones such as serotonin and dopamine in our bodies to be happy.  To answer the question correctly, I argue that humans need to have a sense of purpose for their existence. This purpose can be anything, as long as the person believes in it and operates under it. In Aldous Huxley's Brave New World , people in the lower castes are spawned and trained to not only operate on a lower societal level, but believe that they are destined to be that way. To people in the h...
Read more

What is SpongeBob SquarePants?

Image
  SpongeBob SquarePants is a Nickelodeon TV show about aquatic creatures who live very human lives, but in an underwater world known as Bikini Bottom. The show first aired its pilot episode, "Help Wanted", in 1999. In "Help Wanted", the main character, SpongeBob SquarePants, gets hired at the local fast food establishment called "The Krusty Krab" after saving the workers from a mob of anchovies. This episode sets the scene for the entire SpongeBob universe. The creator of the show, Stephen Hillenburg, was a marine biologist who worked as an educator before pursuing his true dream of becoming an animator/artist. Hillenburg's first iteration of SpongeBob came in 1994 when he got the idea to create a show where sea creatures live in a small town and behave more like humans that fish. He borrowed the character named "Bob the Sponge" from the show The Intertidal Zone  and further developed it into the SpongeBob we know today. Hillenburg's visi...
Read more

How Disney Can Responsibly Teach Future Generations

Image
There is no debating that young children learn from the content they consume. For me, watching "SpongeBob SquarePants" was the way that I learned a lot of English words, and I found myself reciting these words in random situations, without even knowing their meaning. It is no coincidence that 9-year-olds across the country were uncontrollably performing Fortnite dances after the game became wildly popular on YouTube.  Above all media outlets, however, Disney reigns superior in terms of outreach and influence on society. From huge collections of animated movies to cult-like theme parks, it seems as if Disney occupies mental real estate in the minds of almost every person in the world. Given its ubiquity, and that its content targets young children, I think it is fair to say that Disney is shaping young minds in the digital era .  We've already seen that in older Disney movies, such as "Snow White" and "The Little Mermaid", the plotlines follow a similar...
Read more