What’s Wrong with Walt?

Disney has given the thumbs up to explicit TV content.

Surprised? We are too. As the owner of streaming service Hulu, Disney is directly profiting from explicit content on that platform.

When Hulu was first launched, it was a joint venture between 21^st Century Fox, NBC Universal (owned by Comcast), Disney, and Time Warner (WarnerMedia). Disney has since acquired 21^st Century Fox, and Comcast and Time Warner have both sold their ownership stakes in the streaming service to Disney, giving Disney complete ownership and control over Hulu.

Like Netflix, Hulu has been investing heavily in original content; and like Netflix, much of its original content is not suitable for family audiences – despite the Disney ownership.

As majority owner, and subsequently as sole owner, Disney green-lighted such programs as “Pen15” – a suggestively titled series “teen comedy” that included a scene of an adolescent girl masturbating in front of a mirror; “A Teacher,” about an inappropriate relationship between a teacher and her student; “Harlots,” a period drama about a London brothel; and, in development a series called “Bitches,” and another called “Punk Ass Bitch.”

If only Walt Disney could see what has become of the company that still bears his name.

Disney was once the gold standard for wholesome, family-friendly entertainment. Today, the Disney corporation stands for targeting children and teens with inappropriate, highly-sexualized content. Disney once stood for fostering positive values and coming along side parents to keep children entertained while preserving their innocence. Today, Disney stands for thwarting parents’ efforts to filter inappropriate content from coming into their homes.

Walt Disney understood his responsibility as a creator with the power to impact the culture: “Today, we are shapers of the world of tomorrow. That is plain truth. There is no way we can duck the responsibility, and there is no reason why we should.”

He must be spinning in his grave to see what has happened to the media empire he founded. To see the distorted, dysfunctional world the Disney corporation is shaping; and the way today’s Disney executives are gutlessly ducking responsibility for the untold harm they have done to our culture.