Okay,
kids fellow
adults, we have to talk about Pirates of the Caribbean.
The
internet has been losing its collective mind over the past several
days concerning the announcement that major changes are planned for
Pirates in no fewer than three parks—Paris, Orlando, and our own
Anaheim. The one garnering the most attention is a proposed overhaul
of the Auction scene, where instead of male pirates auctioning off
women as “brides,” including a very sultry (and suspiciously
cooperative) redhead, the redhead herself will be a pirate auctioning
off inanimate loot such as luxury furniture.
The
announcement has garnered two basic flavors of reaction. Long-term
fans of Disney theme parks are deep in mourning over the imminent
demise of one of the most iconic scenes in the single greatest theme
park ride every constructed. On the other hand, many feminists are
celebrating the fact that a chronically objectified female character
is finally being empowered and made the captain* of her own destiny.
As
a long-term fan of Disneyland who is also a feminist, I can see both
sides. As I suspect most of my readers are more familiar with (and in
accordance with) the theme park fan arguments, I am going to play a
bit of devil's advocate and explain the feminist point of view, as
well as addressing some of the common complaints from the fans.
Please
do not take this to mean that I am in any way in favor of the
announcement. I think there is a bona-fide dilemma
here, in that it's pretty obvious something
ought to be done, but there is no indication as to what the best,
most appropriate something
is.
See,
here's the thing. The Auction scene is not only iconic, but genuinely
brilliant in its design, with layers and layers of vintage Marc Davis
wit. But that doesn't change the fact that it is, in fact, a
depiction of sex trafficking.
Played for laughs. In a family theme park.
In
1967, after the Sexual Revolution but before second-wave feminism,
this must have seemed a real corker. But there's no way we'd tolerate
it if the ride were first built today. Awareness of the horrible
realities of sex
trafficking, and sexual violence against women in general, has never
been higher. I have heard from people unfamiliar with the ride who
were flabbergasted that such a scene a) was included in the first
place, and b) has lasted as long as it has.
A
common defense of the Auction scene is that, well, pirates are bad
people who do bad things. If we are too sensitive to witness those
bad things, why even have a ride about pirates at all? This argument
misses a great deal in the realm of context.
We witness a wide variety of nefarious deeds on this ride, from the
cannon attack on the fort to the torching of the town, and most of it
rarely sees criticism from the public. This is likely because we
don't witness the effect of most of it on the victims.
We don't see soldiers injured by cannonfire or children rendered
homeless and destitute by the ransacking of their hometown. We do
see the gentlemen of the town, lined up and made to witness the
torture of the mayor for information, in a direct parallel to the
auction scene, but I think even it comes across less harsh than the
auction by current sensibilities, perhaps because a) the victims are
men,** and b) the nature of the crime against them is something that
most people don't worry about happening to them in real life.
But
there is another reason the “pirates are bad” argument doesn't
sit right with me, and it's that I'm not sure Pirates of the
Caribbean does take
the position that pirates are bad. The ride has always presented its
buccaneers a bit ambiguously; distinctive characterization and witty
dialogue cannot help but make them sympathetic even as we are
supposed to deplore their choice of career. And now that the film
series has gotten involved, things are even muddier—Curse
of the Black Pearl pits one
morally gray pirate against an entire crew of utterly villainous
ones, but the sequels present the pirate characters in a
progressively rosy light and mostly cast non-pirates as their
antagonists. I would argue that the franchise, taken as a whole,
encourages us to identify with the pirates, to see their marauding as
good messy fun and approve of what they do. The townsfolk are
probably horrible stuffed-shirts anyway. They deserve to be
raided.***
The
next objection is along the lines of “But it's art, and art
sometimes makes people uncomfortable or violates social norms,” and
this is absolutely true.
Much of the cleverness and humor in the Auction scene is rooted in
its trangressiveness, in the sheer audacity of depicting what it
depicts. But we must face the fact that those of us who engage with
it as art are surely
in the distinct minority. The vast majority of guests in those boats,
particularly the children,
are instead engaging with the scene as entertainment.
Now is probably not the time to go into the relationship between art
and entertainment, but I think we can all accept that there is a
difference, and that engaging with something on the level of
entertainment is usually a more passive and shallow process than
engaging with it on the level of art. It comes down to an issue of
what sort of message Disney is prepared to send to people who are not
prepared to address said message critically.
And
that, basically, is where we find ourselves and where the
decision-makers in charge of Disney theme parks find themselves. As a
society, we have finally reached a point where the Auction scene as
we know it is no longer acceptable. Again, this does not mean I am in
favor of the proposed change. But I don't consider it a travesty as
such. Rather, I consider it a shame...and
the crux of the shame is that we reached this point now,
and not at a time when we could be confident that Imagineering was
equipped to give us a quality replacement.
*
Pirate pun.
**
It's not cool that we as a society are more comfortable with men
being victimized than women, but it is what it is. I'm just analyzing
the issue here.
***
I'll leave the implications regarding the Auction scene up to your
own deductive reasoning abilities.
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