Fans are calling on Disney parks to re-theme its popular Splash Mountain ride based on a nearly 75-year-old movie that has long been criticized for racist themes.
A petition posted on Change.org asks Disney to remove all references to its 1946 film “Song of the South” from Splash Mountain.
The petition says the movie “steeped in extremely problematic and stereotypical racist tropes.” The petition suggests Disney should re-theme the ride around “Princess and the Frog.” Tiana, the main character in the film, is recognized for being Disney’s first African-American princess.
The petition had more than 8,000 signatures as of Thursday morning. The petition’s current goal is set at 10,000 signatures.
Disney has been distancing themselves from the movie for quite sometime now. The movie, set on a plantation after the Civil War, is not included on the new streaming service Disney Plus. And former Walt Disney CEO Bob Iger, now executive chairman, says it won’t ever be.
“I’ve felt as long as I’ve been CEO that ‘Song of the South’ — even with a disclaimer — was just not appropriate in today’s world,” Iger said in March during a shareholder meeting. “It’s just hard, given the depictions in some of those films, to bring them out today without in some form or another offending people, so we’ve decided not to do that.”
The call for change comes as the country continues to hold discussions surrounding racial injustice in the wake of George Floyd’s death in Minneapolis police custody.