Is green the new black?

New Orleans is the setting. The 1920’s the time. Jazz is a boom. Voodoo terrifies people and princess Tiana sets a cultural debate.  Black turns into green and vice versa in this new-fangled movie: “The princess and the frog”. Who is Tiana? She is the first Disney’s African American princess. It was about time for Disney to come up with something new. This movie tries to widen children views by showing different races and social classes in order to include a new culture into Disney’s world. But, ladies and gentlemen, it failed big time! Instead of showing how to accept other races and how not to discriminate, it did the opposite. The movie is a pitiful example of racial segregation. What was my first hint? Most of the movie, the two main black characters are actually green. Yes! Both, prince and princess, are cursed to be frogs. It took eighty-six years for Disney to please us with a black princess and to do what? Turn her green the entire movie! Come on Walt!

First of all, the most important and shocking proof of segregation in the movie is Tiana’s dream. She comes from a poor, hard-working and low class family who lives in a humble but cosy black neighbourhood. All Tiana’s parents have ever known has been working hard to achieve their goals. Even though they are very poor, their dreams are very rich and ambitious. Tiana fights against all odds to make her dream come true. After her father’s death she became a double shift hard working waitress in order to save every penny she could. She yearned to buy the huge abandoned building downtown where she pictured her restaurant coming to life. Surprised? Me too! The dream of this specific princess is not to marry a beautiful man, be rich, have children, etc. No way! The first African American Princess must want to work at her own restaurant. Why is it that this was not the dream of any of the other Disney princesses? I found it a bit offensive since the movie is set on the 1920’s, where black people were treated as an inferior class that was only good at serving others. If the writers of this movie were trying to be inclusive with the so called race of this princess, they did the exact opposite.

Adding even more evidence to this segregation issue, we have Tiana’s beautiful future husband, Prince Naveen. He’s a distinguished, foolish little man that comes from Maldonia. It is surprising that the only possibility for a black young woman is to get together with a man of her own race. Would it be so unreasonable for a black princess to marry a white, blue eyed and blonde prince? Instead of showing these trifles are not important, the writers are letting everyone see there is a large gap between black and white people that cannot be removed. The movie, indirectly or not, shows that the conflict at that time was that the black were meant to serve the white, not marrying them.

“The princess and the frog” fails to set a deserving place to black people in America. Disney tried, at least, to make the unthinkable effort to show others, that society was starting to accept the differences that were apparent at that time. But it fell in the pit of the same old stereotypes that, sadly, are still a current issue even nowadays. Bittersweet is the taste this movie leaves us with; because where black should have been important, green was dominant. Now, the final questions are: Do you want your children to reproduce these stereotypes? Or do you want them to be better than that?