Reading this gives me a chill down my spine. There's something about a corporation controlling, optimizing, monetizing, and branding dominant components of a childhood that just doesn't seem right.
My 5 year old has never seen a Disney movie, yet she told me today that for her 6th birthday she wants a Cinderella shirt and an Elsa costume - both characters she has never actually seen on screen. Her friends at school all talk about it though and recount fantastic stories.
I hear from people saying that we will raise a kid who is out of the loop, so she won't be able to relate and will be an outcast if we don't keep her up to date with all the trends like her peers.
At a certain point as a parent, it's kind of like, it doesn't really matter what we do.
Gasification works and exploits a human weakness. Incorporating it into a game like many mobile games (FarmVille) just wastes people's time and encourages them to spend money on meaningless tokens and trinkets that will literally disappear at some point (as opposed to the still silly and useless trinkets you might get from an arcade prize shop, but at least those you can keep). Incorporating it into something more useful (or at least with a more valuable output) is a good start.
I have come to the conclusion that you really can't "shore up" human weaknesses without chemical changes or maybe some kind of tDCS type system. Even then, there seem to be some major tradeoffs.
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcranial_direct-current_st...
Congratulations. You've discovered the true essence of parenting ;-)
Regardless, this is a highly contrarian position. In fact a recent article [1] comes to the same conclusion, as well as how controversial said conclusion is.
[1]http://quillette.com/2015/12/01/why-parenting-may-not-matter...
The more you tighten your grip, Tarkin, the more star systems will slip through your fingers.
The post near the top about spoilers is a good example. We're all supposed go out of our way go protect the sanctified experience of the movie for true believers. How messed up is that?
Neither of us like the movie that much, because it's monarchist.
Why wouldn't you want your daughter to be like Elsa? Of all the role models throughout history for little girls, Elsa is without doubt one of the best. It is only recently that women weren't portrayed a submissive needing to marry the right man to be successful. Or, Belle? Beauty and the Beast is story about the inventor's daughter, a bibliophile, who is isolated because she can't relate to her bland vanilla society that rejects intellectuals like Belle and her father. I wouldn't write off Disney so quickly. It's worth reading the Power of Myth, the transcript of the interview between Bill Moyers and Joseph Campbell, because you might appreciate the thinking behind Disney movies. You will find that there are people in control at Disney who share your values.
I can't pass judgement on parenting. However, there is a big difference allowing children to watch a Disney movie once a month or even once a week and letting children watch television 4 hours a day after school.
If not, what are you doing as a parent to not make them consumers? Lots would like to know!
The Peanuts Christmas album (vince guaraldi trio) is wonderful this time of year.
Space Balls even made fun of it!
Anyone who thinks Star Wars wasn't super-monetized on Day One isn't old enough to remember it.
I also find hope in recent developments overseas, and anticipate the impact of works such as Puella Magi Madoka Magica on the future of children's television here in the US as well.
Marvel, Star Wars, etc got recycled as well. Marvel got an all brand new universe after destroying Earth-616 and the Ultimate universe to make Secret Wars, and then after Secret Wars they changed things up in the comic books. Star Wars they basically rewrote Episode 4 A New Hope as Episode 7 The Force Awakens by changing the character names and roles. All of this is focused on the young that didn't watch or read the original materials. Disney is youth focused, so us older people in our childhood we had things different in Marvel and Star Wars, and under Disney they have been recycled and changed for a global market now instead of just the USA, etc.
There was a time when the Disney Channel was stealing ideas from Nickelodeon for shows with teens/tweens. But now owning Marvel and Star Wars they can make shows based on those characters on their own channel without having to steal ideas from others.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qTeM68aOpMM&t=30
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CTHwEZK2JA
Or the Madoka-inspired Yuki Yuna Is a Hero, which doubles down on the happy fun times (investing a full five episodes instead of Madoka's two-and-a-half): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=35ljIjdf0Vg
More importantly, even if American audiences shouldn't expect such overtly dark shows in front of small children any time soon, creators are definitely paying attention, and Madoka is exactly the sort of phenomenon which gets creators of all sorts thinking about how to up their game and make something that's meaningful (dark or otherwise). Everybody wins.
With my kid, most characters and shows they like, are owned by Disney. We were going through the list recently and there was a handful only that were not Disney owned. Disney owns the childhood, that not a joke.
And especially such one as Disney...