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The Generation with No Disney Princess
#1
Interesting article about how there was a 30 year gap (1959-1989) between the making of Sleeping Beauty and The Little Mermaid where Disney didn't make a single princess movie. This period just happens to coincide with the Xer childhood era, making Xers the only generation since the Silent to not have a Disney Princess in their youth (unless you count watching older princess movies growing up). The Silent had Snow White, Boomers had Cinderella and Aurora, while Milennials had every princess from Ariel (The Little Mermaid) to Tiana (The Princess and the Frog), and New Silent so far have Rapunzel, Anna & Elsa, and Moana.

http://www.jenx67.com/2014/07/generation...ncess.html
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#2
This also reflects (in general) the scarcity of benign, child-friendly media for children. Yes, small children did get Sesame Street, but that largely as a replacement (if an improvement) over Captain Kangaroo. At that, Sesame Street reflected a culture that tried to rush children to adulthood -- at least in teaching certain basics. The '60s is also the end of the line for clubhouse-style local programming, TV stations replacing those with adult-oriented variety shows like The Mike Douglas Show. It wasn't bad TV, unlike some of the bilge now available, but it had no child appeal.

Maybe it is a mere coincidence that Disney did have 'princes' (Mowgli in The Jungle Book and the young Arthur in The Sword and the Stone) in the 1960s -- but that was the end of the line for flattering images of children. With those boys, brute force mattered either for bare survival or for getting ahead. There was nothing effeminate about the 'man-cub' or the future legendary king.

The optimum during the Boom Awakening would have been to let children be children.

X children tended to grow up harder and more cynical than older or younger cohorts. As adults, X would pay for that.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated Communist  but instead the people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists -- Hannah Arendt.


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#3
Wow. A little factoid I never knew.

At least we got a President! Take that, Silent Generation! Big Grin
Steve Barrera

[A]lthough one would like to change today's world back to the spirit of one hundred years or more ago, it cannot be done. Thus it is important to make the best out of every generation. - Hagakure

Saecular Pages
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#4
If there was an Xer Disney princess, she should look somehow like "Princess Bean" from Matt Groening's Disenchantment:

[Image: zrlvixozbs3jg6ceczgl.png]

(I know it's mean for Xers, but they are used to it!)
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#5
@OP: Yeah, that's significant.
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#6
Also remember that Gen X came of age as the Lib movement got in full swing - being a "nice" princess was suddenly a bad thing. We got Leia Organa, with her Stormtrooper-slaying pistol (latent Force powers to be revealed later), Diana "Prince" (aka Wonder Woman) with her "Lasso of Truth" and Invisible Jet, and Sarah Connor, who loses her "prince" to the "dragon" but defeats the monster herself, and only then fleeing to safety. No, not all kid-friendly, but then, as has been pointed out, that's been our deal since forever.
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