Disney Stereotypes Essay

Since the first Disney Princess movies, beauty standards have also changed. A lot more cultural diversity has been added to the movies, however, there has not been much progress in the shapes and sizes of princesses since Cinderella, the princesses are still all thin. Princesses are still made to look “beautiful”, but there is no definition of beauty and Disney should make that known to little kids. This sets an image to children of how women should look, not so much how they should dress, since there have been changes from dresses to more comfortable clothing, like in Mulan. According to Ashley Bispo, “By retaining preconceived images of ideal body representations, young girls may be influenced in their later development of self-image. Being consistently exposed to unnaturally thin representations of Disney princess body images may lead to unfavorable body dissatisfaction in the future.”(Bispo, page 8) In other words, Disney’s beauty stereotypes can lead to body dissatisfaction in children due to the fact that all princesses have the same body shape, and since the princes find them attractive, girls may think that that’s what guys find attractive and will be unsatisfied if they look any
Throughout the years, gender roles have changed significantly, but they are still not equal. Disney has been around for over 80 years, and during that time, they have played a major role in how society displays gender roles. Furthermore, Disney movies have set gender specific beauty stereotypes that are still around today and have major impacts on children. For future movies, Disney should attempt to include a variety of main characters that include different genders, races, cultures, and completely exclude they typical “skinny equals nice and beautiful”. Finally, Disney should have well-rounded characters, in a way that people won’t be able to make a stereotype out of