Lib Professor: Disney is Racist, and Only Black People Like Jazz

Townhall.com ^ | 4-29-2014 | Michael Schaus

[servo1969]

Don’t you just love classic Disney movies? Animated cinematic adventures that espoused the importance of life values, growing up, and racism… Well, that’s what some lefty professor is arguing at Syracuse University. Apparently, the Jungle Book is just chock-full of racism (and not because of “man-cub’s” strange desire to remain uncultured). Professor Robert Thompson told Yahoo Movies (um… this article was forwarded to me – like most people, I don’t actually visit Yahoo Movies) that the Jungle Book is racist because of something to do with Louie Armstrong.

Apparently, when Mowgli meets the Ape King, young children are being brainwashed with Disney-Technicolor to hate African Americans… King Louie, after all, is a representation of the American Negro, according to the overly sensitive professor. (Seriously, can we just allow something from my childhood to remain untouched by liberals?) According to CampusReform:

Critics have stated that the scene where the ape character, King Louie, sings "I Want to Be Like You” to the human character, Mowgli, he is not just a cartoon animal wishing to be human. Rather, Louie represents an African-American stating that he wants to be a member of the white race, which is represented by Mowgli.

Wow… Now who’s racist? I always figured King Louie was just a power-hungry primate that saw Mowgli as the animal-kingdom-equivalent of a “get-rich-quick” scheme. But, then again, I was six when I first saw the movie. Of course, it gets better:

When Professor Sharpton Thompson was informed that King Louie was actually voiced by Louis Prima (an astoundingly talented Italian singer), he didn’t back off of his comments:

The song is [still] racist, regardless of who sings it, because it has a jazzy tone similar to Louis Armstrong’s music.

Oh… So the song sang in the Jungle Book by a prominent Italian American is derogatory toward African Americans because it was set to the traditionally “Negro” sound of jazz music. (Full disclaimer: This was not my intuitive leap… I’m merely rephrasing the esteemed professor’s contention.) So, apes and jazz are indicative of black people, according to Professor Thompson… But Disney was the racist, right?

Wait: It gets better still. As Disney is ramping up to do (another) remake of the classic animated film, Thompson has taken it upon himself to make sure the new version is politically correct. One fear that PC-minded professors have had in the past, is that racism might still creep through because King Louie spoke “differently than other characters” in the original film.

I mean, sure, Larry the Cable guy speaks differently than most comedians; but I don’t exactly see a bunch of trailer-trash Lynyrd Skynyrd fans upset about every southern accent that comes across the silver screen. (Although, I do see a few angry emails in my immediate future for that last sentence… Full disclosure: Much of my family comes from the south, and is even related to Stonewall Jackson. Love y’all!)

DePauw University professor Jeffrey M. McCall said, "The King Louie character can have his speaking mannerisms updated in a way that suggests he speaks in a manner similar to other characters.” Right. Because nothing quite epitomizes the fire-hungry chimp like an upper-crest Oxford accent. Hey, maybe he and Shere Khan could be done by the same actor. (Which brings up another point: How come no one finds it racist that the power-obsessed tiger has a King James command of the English accent?)

I know it seems a little useless to tell a couple of PC-obsessed academics to “chillax”… But, c’mon! We’re talking about an animated movie (about a “man-cub”) that was made in 1967. Don’t ya think we could just ease back on the social-psycho-babble for roughly 90 minutes, and enjoy the amazingly groovy jazz music that was highlighted throughout the film? (Oh, which reminds me: Baloo appears to be a welfare king, judging by his signature song. That’s not racist, is it?)

I actually feel kinda bad for Professors Thompson and McCall… They can’t even watch a classic Disney movie (with a Louis Prima soundtrack) without thinking about some black guy blowing on a trumpet. Walt Disney might have had his own personal character flaws, but it kinda seems like these two academic hacks are a little overly obsessed with racist tendencies.

[Westbrook]

to the title: “and Only Black People Like Jazz”

Wait! Not only do I like jazz, I’m a jazz musician.

Can I qualify for affirmative action now?

[Flick Lives]

Wait a minute - how did we get to drag racing?

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!

[equaviator]

I Wanna Be Black

By Lou Reed

Play Song
I want to be black
Have natural rhythm
Shoot twenty feet of jism, too
And **** up Jews
I want to be black
I want to be a Panther

Have a girlfriend named Samantha
And have a stable of foxy whores
Oh I want to be black

[Chorus:]
I don’t want to be a ****ed up, middle class,
College student anymore
I just want to have a stable of foxy little whores
Yeah, yeah I want to be black

I want to be black
I want to be like Martin Luther King
And get myself shot in spring
And lead a whole generation too
And **** up the Jews

I want to be black, I want to be like Malcolm X
And cast a hex over President Kennedy’s tomb
And have a big prick, too

[Jimmy Valentine's brother]

So that's what happened to Joel Chandler Harris' Song of the South and Aesop's The Grass Hopper and the Ant.

[dmz]

If only black people liked jazz there wouldn’t be any.

<><><><

I’m sorry, but that is just a silly and entirely meaningless comment. Amost as silly and meaningless of the professor’s comments.

[dmz]

except I find “smooth jazz” to be dull and boring.

<><><><

smooth jazz in a contradiction in terms.

See Thelonious Monk.

[MagnoliaB]

LOL!

[driftless2]

Playing the banjo or accordion in hell might make it more tolerable. As long as those damn flames from that Lake of Fire don’t constantly torch my keister.

[dmz]

Hell is Kenny G being blasted for all eternity.

<><><><

Back a few years, I used to take a handful of Kenny G cds up to the counter and tell the clerk that these were in the wrong place - the jazz section. They almost never got it.

Like someone calling Madonna an artist, Kenny G is many things, but that does not include being a jazz musician.

Did you ever hear Richard Thompson’s “I agree with Pat Metheny”? Written after Kenny G overdubbed his stuff on Louis Armstrong? Blechh.

[dfwgator]

Did you ever hear Richard Thompson’s “I agree with Pat Metheny”? Written after Kenny G overdubbed his stuff on Louis Armstrong? Blechh.

Yes, that was hillarious....And Metheny's rant on Mr Gorelick was great....and this is a guy I've never heard say a bad thing about anyone.

[dfwgator]

See Thelonious Monk.

I'll see your Thelonius Monk and raise you Ornette Coleman.

[CodeToad]

So, if we go to Africa we will find great jazz musicians? LOL! Not! jazz is definitely a white thing as are all the instruments used in jazz.

[Disambiguator]

I like jazz too, except I find “smooth jazz” to be dull and boring.

You mean, like Kenny G? Ever seen this?

[DaveA37]

The guys a “Professor”........What did you expect he would say?

[DoughtyOne]

I don’t care what type it is. I pretty much enjoy all of it.

As for the watermellon and fried chicken, yum. Your on...

[DoughtyOne]

Guy’s obviously never heard of them.

[DoughtyOne]

There you go...

I should have thought of that!

[Misterioso]

Without the support and interest of the white public, there would be no money to pay black jazz musicians. The recording industry provided the jazz musician (black and white) with the means of reaching the mostly white listening audience, which was willing to pay for the music. In the earlier days, white businessmen “exploited” the black musicians by employing them in nightclubs and recording and distributing their music. Therefore, without the attraction to black jazz of white listeners, there wouldn’t have been a market for it.

[dmz]

Without the support and interest of the white public, there would be no money to pay black jazz musicians.

<><><><><

Black musicians were playing jazz before the whites came in large numbers during the swing era.

They weren’t getting rich by any stretch, but the music existed.

Existence and the presence of good paydays are 2 very different things.

I would caution about comparing the impulse to play music and making good money. If it was about the money exclusively, we’d have very few bluegrass musicians, even fewer folk singers, and well, you get the idea.

JMO.

[Misterioso]

Of course, the fact is that jazz, if defined as improvising variations on some theme by one or more musicians, has been in existence for a long time in Europe and elsewhere. It might even be described as an expression of human nature.

You mentioned Monk. Try to imagine his career without the dedication of Alfred Lion and Francis Wolff, Bob Weinstock, and Orrin Keepnews. Given his personal difficulties, I think it unlikely that we would ever have heard his music without their support. I love Thelonious. I have everything he ever recorded (I hope) in my collection of LPs and CDs. I do not think that his success can be attributed to the appreciation by African Americans alone.