I have to say that it's horrible that we as Americans put multiculturalism over traditions. Don't get me wrong, I believe in multiculturalism. I think that every culture's stories have the right, and responsibility, to be heard. However, it galls me that we take some of our most cherished stories and either distort or ignore them in order to help the esteems of other cultures. Case in point: Disney's new Cinderella. During the Emmy awards tonight, Brandy sang a song from Disney's new version of Cinderella, and during the song, they cut away to some scenes from the production.
Cinderella is a folk story from Central Europe. It is a great, historically set story in a land that in the time it was written, was almost 100% caucasian. There was no Asian Prince (I think the guy on the clip was Asian, he might have been Latino, it was a fast, blurry shot) and though you might think that this is racist, Cinderella, as written, was white. Of course, ripping the story to shreds in order to include every culture in the world is considered an endeavor that is worth merit. But if we re-told Mulan with the main character being a WASP, it would be considered racially insensitive. I guess people of the born into the cultural majority in the United States don't need pride anymore.
In a number of school systems in our great land of the free Samuel Clemens' seminal work: Tom Sawyer is banned because it used the word "nigger." Yes, we all know that in the 1990s, the term "nigger" is offensive, but in Clemens' day, it was the appropriate word. Do we keep our children from reading one of the classic pieces of American literature because of a word? Let the teachers do their job and teach the kids why the word was used… but don't put a perceived self esteem issue above education.
If you want to build self esteem in children of other races, tell their culture's stories. Have children read the classic works of all cultures. Produce movies based on these stories. But, please stop destroying the classic European stories to make them more accessible to other cultures, just because it's politically in vogue these days.
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