waltdisneyconfessions:

I was actually really disappointed when Tiana turned out to be a working-class waitress instead of a princess, as the early previews had hinted at. Us black folk have enough movie heroines who are working class or poor trying to fight against racism/classicism, and I had really hoped for us to finally have some royalty or a born-princess, But it’s another typical black story of a hard-workin’ black gurrrl trying to rise above the odds (although she may be a good role model.) It’s overplayed and I was hoping Disney might break the mold. I know it may be ‘unrealistic’ to have a black princess, but since when does Disney care about realism?  

In a way, I agree, but then again, ultimately, I’m glad Tiana was working class… it sets her apart from past princess, but in what I think ends up being a very good way. She has a job, she has a dream that isn’t vague and has nothing to do with romance… even though, by Disney necessity, she eventually ends up in one.

I get what you’re saying, OP, but I love The Princess and The Frog. I really, really do. It has a million and one problems that bug the crap out of me, but in the end it’s something that made me have a glimmer of that feeling Disney gave me when I was a child.

But this is the entire reason blogs like Racebent Disney exist… because Disney made a HUGE deal about Tiana’s ethnicity to the point that I feel they purposefully set in a mythologized NoLa because, that way, she would definitely be “African-American”. They could have just as easily set the story in one of their fantasized medieval worlds or modern day. They could have kept her human. Any number of things… Ultimately, what they did wasn’t the worst thing they could have done (that would be Pocahontas in terms of complete cultural insensitivity), but there is definitely room for improvement.