It’s only as an adult that I have noticed just how problematic the original Disney princesses are (Picture: Snap/REX/Shutterstock)
As a child, I loved Disney movies and Snow White was one of my favourites.
I had the books, the video tapes (remember those?), the cuddly toys, the outfits. I even played Happy in a school play.
It’s only as an adult that I have noticed just how problematic the original Disney princesses are, and the twisted toxicity that Snow White’s story was built around.
The overarching theme of her fairytale was waiting passively to be rescued and fall in love with, quite literally, the first man to come along.
Without a man, she is nothing. Without her prince, she isn’t a princess.
That is until now. The film is currently being remade, this time with a long overdue overhaul. One that proves that women don’t need men in order to be princesses.
In 1937’s Snow White, the prince is only interested in the princess because she’s the ‘fairest of them all’ – then practises some non-consensual kissing while she’s comatose.
And she’s far from Disney’s only damsel in distress.
Ariel gives up her freedom and family for a man she’s never met – to live in silence.
Sleeping Beauty is also kissed while she’s unconscious by a man who breaks into her home.
Cinderella’s saviour from emotional abuse is a man who doesn’t even remember what she looks like after spending the night dancing with her.
Latina actress, Rachel Zegler, has been cast to play the leading lady (Picture: The Walt Disney Company via Getty Images)
Pocahontas’ brutally tragic story is romanticised by Disney after she falls in love a white man, while beautiful, bookish Belle is captured and lives with an actual beast, where it’s her sole responsibility to ‘save him’.
In more recent years, admittedly, Disney princesses have become more independent, solo characters in their own right. But it just highlights further how its earlier female characters are manifestations of a patriarchal society – inaccurate and unrealistic images of a man’s ideal world where women fawn over and need men in order to survive.
Including Snow White.
Which is why remaking it for a modern audience – and our future generations of women – is so important.
It isn’t ‘woke’. It’s necessary.
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The animated classic is finally getting the live action treatment. Directed by Marc Webb from a screenplay by Greta Gerwig and Erin Cressida Wilson (so we already know it’s going to be good), it’s set to star both Gal Gadot and Rachel Zegler, who plays the leading lady.
Though it’s not expected to be released next March, it’s already drawing attention from the so-called ‘anti-woke’ crowd, stating that its diversity is a problem.
Zegler is of Colombian and Polish heritage – she’s Latina, not ‘snow-white’; her companions are no longer seven dwarves, and, most importantly, Snow White’s story is not defined by love – but leadership, companionship, and bravery.
‘It’s no longer 1937,’ Zegler revealed in an interview that has recently resurfaced on TikTok. ‘She’s not going to be saved by the prince, and she’s not going to be dreaming about true love.
‘She’s dreaming about becoming the leader she knows she can be.’
Zegler, quite rightly, called the cartoon ‘extremely dated when it comes to the ideas of women being in roles of power and what a woman is fit for’.
Yet, some TikTokkers disagreed, asking why it’s so bad to want to fall in love with a prince, or to believe in fantasy and romance.
Some have even gone so far as to say the remake shouldn’t go ahead at all. They’ve questioned what the point of Snow White’s film is if romance is erased. That it’s ‘OK to be taken care of’.
You can imagine my reaction.
Through Disney, a woman’s success was determined entirely by her beauty, her silence, and ability to provide love.
Her role in society was to fulfil a man’s ‘happily ever after’ – to find a Prince Charming, and live forever holed up in a perfect, gleaming castle.
Love and marriage defined their stories – and only men could save them from the horrors of a life alone.
What is that saying to our young girls and boys?
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In truth, this fantastical message is a ridiculous, dangerous trope – and it’s not representative of the real world at all.
Yes, women can fall in love but our lives are not defined by men who save, or fancy, us and want to lock us down.
We are not so powerless to men that our right to consent is removed, and replaced by all-encompassing love – as our princesses unhelpfully seem to prove.
To see a princess be the hero of her own story really would be the fairest film – and message – of them all.
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This remake isn’t ‘woke’. It’s necessary.
