Were you a Disney kid? If you screw up any time in the past several decades, it is quite possible that you were weaned on Disney movies and you may even have visited the parks as a pilgrimage with your family. One of the movies that was very popular is the Little Mermaid and we may have watched Ariel and dreamed along with her as she wanted to become human and discover the world above the sea. We also were thrilled when she met the handsome Prince Eric.
There are many different Princess movies put out by Disney but The Little Mermaid is different than most of them. Not only was the storyline lovely, but it also produced one of the best soundtracks out of all of the Disney cartoons. Some of the hits that people were thrilled to sing and are still singing today include ‘Part of Your World’ and ‘Inder the Sea’. The album was so popular it even won a Grammy award for Best Recording for Children.
It’s hard to believe that it was released back in 1989 and we have been singing the originals as well as listing to covers of the songs. It looks as if change is coming, however, and not everybody is happy about it.
One of the songs has recently been called over the carpet because it allegedly contains misogynistic themes.
It is the song Kiss the Girl, sung by Sebastian to a calypso beat has recently been pulled out of the repertoire of an old men’s a cappella group after people pointed out some concerns about the content.
Sebastian was singing his heart out as he encouraged him to kiss the girl.
“My oh my / Look like the boy too shy / Ain’t gonna kiss the girl./“Ain’t that sad? / It’s such a shame / Too bad / You’re gonna miss the girl.”
For many years, the Princeton Tigertones had been performing the song but a student newspaper recently published an article that argued about it. They said that the tradition of singing the song encourages to audience members, including a male and a female to kiss each other. That is the promotion of ‘toxic masculinity’.
Noa Wollstein is the column’s author who spoke about the misogynistic message in the song. She said that women have been frequently forced to the stage to participate in an uncomfortable moment.
“I have heard of unwilling girls being subjected to their first kisses,” Wollstein wrote. “I have watched mothers, who have come to see their child’s performance, be pulled up to the stage only to have tension generated between them and the kid they came to support.”
She added that the lyrics “ambiguously encourage men to make physical advances on women without obtaining their clear consent,” noting that once the “mermaids, magic, and PG ratings” are removed, the film and song’s message “comes across as even more jarring.”
The president of the Tingertones, Wesley Brown has issued a formal apology on behalf of the group. He also confirmed that it would be taken out of the lineup until a better way to perform it has been determined so that the audience doesn’t feel offended.
“Performances of this song have made participants uncomfortable and offended audience members, an outcome which is antithetical to our group’s mission and one that we deeply regret,” Brown said.
He also defended the group saying that in the past few years they have “taken intentional steps towards ensuring that audience participation is more voluntary and consensual.”
The controversy over this song comes shortly after radio stations in the United States and Canada started banning the popular winter song, “Baby It’s Cold Outside.”
Cleveland’s Star 102 WDOK-FM was the first to stop playing the song after listeners said the lyrics were inappropriate. They said that the song had a feel that was ‘manipulative and wrong’ and they stopped playing it in line with the #MeToo movements.
“People might say, ‘oh, enough with that #MeToo,’ but if you really put that aside and listen to the lyrics, it’s not something I would want my daughter to be in that kind of a situation,” midday host Desiray told Cleveland’s Fox 8. “The tune might be catchy, but let’s maybe not promote that sort of an idea.”
