On May 3, 2021, multiple news outlets reported that a Snow White ride at Disneyland was cancelled by "woke mobs" over a non-consensual kiss. Multiple news outlets, including the Daily Mail and New York Post reported the claim before it started circulating on social media.
According to the reports, Disneyland, which finally reopened on April 30, 2021 for the first time in more than 400 days since the pandemic started, revamped its famed "Snow White" ride (Snow White's Scary Adventures with Snow White's Enchanted Wish) to include the "true love's kiss scene" – the climactic moment when Prince Charming awakens the sleeping princess with a kiss, breaking the Queen's curse that had put her into a deep trance.
However, it was reported that critics hit out at the addition of the scene saying it models bad behavior as the prince kisses Snow White without her consent.
"Will Snow White be canceled next? Revamped ride at Disneyland sparks backlash over 'true love's kiss' scene because 'she is asleep and not able to give the Prince consent'" the Daily Mail headline read. Distractify's headline also hinted the Snow White ride was at risk of being "canceled"
Snow White Ride Criticised in a Single Review
We decided to look into the claims of "backlash" over the ride and found one review by SFGate editors Katie Dowd and Julie Tremaine attacking the ride over the scene which shows Snow White being awakened with a kiss "he gives to her without her consent, while she's asleep, which cannot possibly be true love if only one person knows it's happening."
"Haven't we already agreed that consent in early Disney movies is a major issue? That teaching kids that kissing, when it hasn't been established if both parties are willing to engage, is not OK?" the critics wrote in the SFGate article.
In the review, Dowd and Tremaine also praised the attraction and seven paragraphs later, opined that it was "hard to understand why the Disneyland of 2021 would choose to add a scene with such old fashioned ideas of what a man is allowed to do to a woman, especially given the company's current emphasis on removing problematic scenes from rides."
The Daily Mail, the New York Post, The Sun and Fox Business all cite Dowd and Tremaine's review as the only source of "outrage." It seems like coverage about the "woke" mob coming to "cancel" Snow White all centers around one review published in a single travel piece written last week in a local San Francisco paper.
Neither were there any calls to "cancel" Snow White or the ride, nor did the reviewers insist or even suggest that Disneyland alter the ride in any way. Although It is true that the review described a kiss without consent involving a sleeping Snow White, but the "feminist outrage" began and ended in the widely quoted portion excerpted above.
