As a former Florida resident, I can testify that Splash Mountain was my daughter’s favorite ride at Walt Disney World. When we visited the park, we made it a point to go on Splash Mountain first, because there were always long lines waiting for it.
I don’t recall any scenes from “The Song of the South” being shown at that ride. What I remember are characters from the Uncle Remus stories, like Brer Rabbit, who also happened to appear in the movie.
It seems to me that Disney is having a big guilt trip over creating “The Song of the South,” and wants all of us to forget it ever existed. It hasn’t been shown in cinemas since I was a kid, to start with. A few years ago, that inspired me to find the film online, and download it for my video collection. That way I will never forget the movie.
I’d never seen the movie, I found a DVD (iffy quality) at a thrift store for $3 and brought it home. As Disney movies go, it was pretty much as Disney movies go, and it’s ‘offensive’ in the same way some of Shirley Temple’s movies are ‘offensive’. Glad I have an archival copy of sorts, when Bradbury’s firemen squad raids the house they’ll probably just burn the whole place to the ground anyway. :^)
More broadly, Disney is committing suicide.