That a lot of Disney parents

[BuntyCollocks]

Are downright neglectful?

Just watched Mary poppins - the mum pawns her children off on a chimney sweep she's never met before, and now watching Peter Pan, where not only do they have a dog for a nursemaid, but they throw said nursemaid outside, and leave the children alone in the house to go to a party!

Shocking. My judgey pants are firmly hoicked.

Don't forget the Disney step parents.

Poor Cinderella being used as slave labour. Snow White's step mum trying to bump her off.

maybe it's a generational thing? I always wondered where the mother of the children in the faraway tree actually thought they went for hours, if not days, on end...with only some cake and lashings of ginger ale for a packed lunch too! And then coming home with talk of strange friends and faraway lands - shouldn't she have been calling some kind of early intervention drug and alcohol service?

YANBU.

Aurora's mum and dad too, all that effort burning spindles, then they let her wander about alone on the very day the curse is supposed to come true

Jasmine's dad, all that bluster about a suitable suitor for his only daughter, and he lets some flashy sod with a load of elephants and a band dazzle him without even speaking to him first!

Ariel's dad, knows he has a headstrong, stubborn daughter, so enlists a bloody crab about 1/20th of her size to keep her in line.

Bruno Bettelheim tried to explain all this.

Disgusting.

i always thought that about The Little Mermaid Golden

I.....not i.....bloody shift button

Personally I think the animal hoarding on 101 Dalmatians deserves a call to the RSPCA

The Mary Poppins mum is supposed to look disgraceful and neglectful - she's a suffragette! We're supposed to be appalled.

I always think Mary Poppins is about the Dad really, at least in the film, and the Mum is therefore just a walk on part. They had to give her something else to be doing, and a job was unrealistic, so they made her a suffragette. But really it's all about Mr Banks. She is a 2D character in the background IMO.

I don't think Mrs Banks is a suffragette in the Mary Poppins novels, so the neglectful suffragette is a Disney addition...

I think Disney sanitises fairy tales totally - the stories themselves are full of fathers trying to marry their daughters, abandonments, baby snatching, starvation, gruesome disfigurements, cannibalism, etc. Bruno Bettelheim as someone mentioned upthread argued that they allow children to explore their deepest fears in a remote/symbolic /'safe' way.

It's like Zack and Cody, their mother never seems to be watching them and London is left looking after herself with Mr Moseby checking in every now and again.

It's all of them - what about Charlie and Lola's Mam & Dad? Charlie is that child's primary carer and he's only about 9. Even my three year old asks about that (in her world not having a Mama is the worst possible thing that could happen...).

And what about Dora? She's away travelling and not a parent in sight.

Studio Ghibli are just as bad Dad in Ponyo is useless, Mum is OK but abandons son with magical fish to save the old folks. Totoro he just lets the pre-schooler hang out with monsters in the woods, while he works.

to think

There wouldn't be much drama without the space given by neglect. Nor any soace for children to be hero(in)es.

Putting it in the context of modern fairytale, can you imagine "Harry Potter and the Helicopter Parent"?! Even smothering/control freak parents like Mrs Weasley and the Malfoys have to lose their grip at the threshold of the Hogwarts Express.

Yes!