He saw a window of opportunity to create not a sterile monument to American values but a dynamic agency by which he could promote them, helping to resolve what he saw as a crisis in US society. .
(Mills. S, 1990, p71).
Mills" analysis of Walt Disney's reasons for taking the company in the direction in which he did, would seem to imply that Disney was at least doing it for the right reasons, as believed he was helping to improve American society. His reasons for this are however largely irrelevant, as the fact remains that, whether it was Disney's intention or not, the Walt Disney company was heading further and further away from it's original ethos.
Two of the major events to alert Christian activists to the alarming cultural change in the Disney empire took place in the late 1990's. One was the appearance of organised "gay days" at Disney's theme parks each year.
Although Disney has denied officially sponsoring these events, it certainly has not done anything to stop them. Unsuspecting parents who have travelled hundreds of miles either to Walt Disney World in Florida or Disney Land in California have been shocked to see tens of thousands of gays, lesbians, bisexuals, and transvestites flaunting their sexual orientation in front of straight parents and their children.
(Land, R.D, & York, F.D, 1998, p15).
Cartoons of Disney characters were used on a web-site in 1996 as a promotional tool for the gay days, depicting Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck as homosexual lovers and Minnie Mouse and Daisy Duck as lesbians. Disney declined to comment on this matter.
This was strange as historically Disney had striven to protect its" public image and properties to the extent that many thought they were going a little over the top. Henry Giroux, cited in Land, R.D, explains a case in point.
In its" zeal to protect its" image and extend its" profits, Disney has gone so far as to threaten legal action against three south Florida day-care centers for using Disney cartoon characters on their exterior walls.
