This week, folks on X, right-wing radio shows, and the agenda of Disney fan blogs came together to form a terrible Voltron around one issue: Disney's cancellation of beloved Disney icon Tinker Bell due to a lack of awakening.
"Wake up destroys everything. No wonder mental health is deteriorating," X user Pamela Garfield-Jaeger, LCSW, responded to the news.
"Oh my God," political commentator/ghoul Tommy Lahren said on Fox News Radio, "we have another political correctness overload that's actually ruining everything that's innocent and fun."
Ben Shapiro posted a YouTube video titled "Disney Removes Tinker Bell." (I don’t know exactly what he said to Tinkerbell, since he begins the video by declaring, “There are currently two visions of Western society—” and I had a stroke and died.)
But is everything innocent and fun really ruined ? To find out the truth, I did some investigative reporting by visiting the Disneyland website and learned that Bell is scheduled to hold meet-and-greets tomorrow at Pixie Hollow from 8:15 to 10:30 a.m. and 11:15 to 2:30 p.m. I also checked Snopes, which is your source for all fact-checking.
So no. Despite the amount of innocents and zeroes wasted trying to spread the story around the internet, Disney didn't cut Tinker Bell out of anything. You can still watch Peter Pan on the Disney+ streaming service. You can still see Tinker Bell at Disneyland. She still shines in Disney video intros and serves as the company's mascot in every way.
Why do people think Tinker Bell was cancelled?
The history of this rumor goes back many years. Back in 2022, the New York Times published an article regarding Disney's review process for the use of content that appears on the Disney+ streaming service. The report quoted unnamed Disney executives as saying that "Tinker Bell was flagged for caution because she is 'body aware' and jealous of Peter Pan's attention," adding her to a list of potentially problematic characters and content middle.
Fast forward to May 3, 2024, and Disney blog WDW News published a report titled "Tinker Bell Meet and Greet Sign Removed from Town Square Theater."
On May 7, TheStreet.com published an article stating that "Disney World has quietly canceled a meet-and-greet event in the parks with one of its classic characters."
On May 9, some random person on Facebook posted (and then deleted) a fabricated statement by a "Disney executive," and the culture warriors had plenty of evidence.
If you put all these pieces together, filter it through a paranoid lens and squint hard, you can see how it adds up to "Tinker Bell Cancelled." (Although, all of this seems like a lot of work compared to "check out Tinker Bell's schedule on Disneyland's website.")
Maybe Disney should cancel Tinker Bell
From what I know about Tinkerbell, she looks fine. I don't think anyone has a problem with her (except when she's drinking), but if she 's bad , I hope Disney cancels her ASAP. Cultural tastes change. Something may be innocent and harmless to one generation but completely unacceptable to the next. Adults (ideally) can put things into context and decide what is acceptable for themselves, but kids can't. So if Tinkerbell is encouraging little girls to feel bad about their bodies or whatever, I hope Disney removes her from their parks, puts a disclaimer on her movies, and gently nudges her to On the ice floe. I hope they do this soon. While the company isn't opposed to canceling certain events for cultural reasons, they do take their time: There are still remnants of "Song of the South" lingering in Disneyland in 2024, and it's been a long time since Adam Clayton Powell Everyone has known this movie is racist since Clayton Powell said it in 1947 .
Although Disney is classified as an evil empire that preys on children, it is simply a company trying to make money, so there is no basis for any editorial decisions they make regarding intellectual property. That's just the bottom line.
Personally, this is very disappointing. If I had my way, Disney would be a leader in cancel culture. I hope they cancel those creatively bankrupt things, like the entire Marvel Cinematic Universe. Then they should cancel things that don't even make sense, like the little old man in Up , just because it's funny.
Just do anything, Disney. Cancel that $500 million Star Wars hotel (Oops. Too late.) Cancel my credit card debt. Go crazy. But most of all, Disney, I want you to cancel everything that Tomi Lahren and Ben Shapiro and their ilk hold dear. Mickey, Minnie, all of them. I want Disney to say it's because talking animals might bother PETA, or that Donald Duck not wearing pants is too sexually suggestive (I mean, it's hot, not going to lie). People on the right are always talking about boycotting Disney, but they never seem to stop showing up . Maybe this is the push they need so they can stop being in front of me in the haunted house.
