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Subliminal Messaging and The Disney Corporation |
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Maryanne Tucker |
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60 Minutes |
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In 1995 when whispers began to rumble from the Southern Baptist concerning Disney abandonment of their commitment to traditional family values and moral decency, a boycott seems like the only answer (Pinsky, 2004). At the Southern Baptists convention in Dallas on June, 1997 the conservatives made their point as Reverend Tom Elliff, drove the message home “I think a boycott is a Christian response” (Pinsky, 2004). With a 85% vote the boycott resolution passed (Pinsky, 2004). The American Family Association (AFA), a pro-family, anti-homosexual Christian organization, who had been rallying against Disney for a number of years became one the Baptists biggest supporters. In October, 1997 they joined forced with Reverend Richard Land’s organization in the making of a film entitled The Disney Boycott: A Just Cause (Pinsky, 2004). Following this Rev. Land was asked to participate in CBS’s 60 Minutes on November 19, 1997with Michael Eisner CEO of the Disney Corporation at the time (Pinsky, 2004). During the interview Lesley Stahl asked Rev. Land to tell her what was wrong with the movie The Little Mermaid? Admitting that he had not seen the movie himself, he told Stahl that he had been informed that “a clergyman became sexually aroused while he was performing a marriage ceremony.” When the show played the clip, Stahl, pointed out that you could indeed see the aroused clergyman, but only if you slowed the video down and pointed it out. Eisner’s comment on the subliminal message was that “it’s completely untrue…It is clearly his knee”, and it is in the next clip and defended so by the animator who drew the scene, Tom Sito (Pinsky, 2004). The impact from this interview was mixed and many thought that the interview was designed so to make Rev Land look like a “backward, intolerant hicks” noted Cary McMullan, writer for The Ledger notes (Pinsky, 2004). Since then the AFA has called an end to their boycott, but has no intention of pulled back their fangs completely. In an article posted on their website www.afa.net the organisations president, a Methodist minister by the name of Donald Wildmon states in the paragraph titled “Keeping an Eye on the Mouse”, "We encourage people to continue boycotting if they believe that to be the right thing to do." He then goes on the say that the Corporation is still not out of the dog house and that the boycott could be back on if the company does “something particularly egregious” again. Wildmon ended by stating that “as far as we’re concerned, Disney is on probation”. |
2004 |
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Boycott |
