Is Frozen a trojan horse sneaking a message of gay rights into our innocent children's heads?
I think it is possible. And hurrah for that!
The idea first occurred to me this afternoon when my Facebook feed alerted me to a post by Kathryn Skaggs, the blogger behind A Well-Behaved Mormon Woman. Although I had seen, and enjoyed, the film and listened to thousands of hours of music and information about the film, courtesy of my 6-year-old, and had heard about 'the gay spouse in the sauna' and even given thought about how powerful "Let it Go" can be as a coming-out anthem, I had not given much thought to the film's 'gayness'. I think this is most likely because the film is not inherently gay. It is the story of the relationship between two sisters, and their parents, and fear, with a little comment on the complete insanity of the normal Disney princess marriage. None of those issues have much to do with the gay agenda.
Except. They all have to do with what it means to be a human being in 2014 in the dominant western culture. They have to do with how we think about how people who are different should be treated and how the past ways of dealing with people who were different (in race, ability, sexuality, education, culture, gender, etc, etc) - by shaming, or hiding, or segregating, or re-training - were not effective in removing the "problems" and did not make society better. Which means that there is a better way of dealing with the "problems."
Frozen is about the gay agenda because the gay agenda isn't about gayness. It is about people-ness. It is about who counts as a human being with human rights attached to them.
Frozen feels like a trojan horse to Skaggs because she has already accepted the premise that human difference is not, in and of itself, a problem. I am willing to bet that she feels that the treatment of blacks before the civil rights movement was wrong and shameful. I am sure she believes that people with disabilities should be treated with human dignity and not shoved into institutions. She may even believe that people have the right to believe whatever religion (or not) they choose to believe and that people with different thoughts and ideas should still be able to share those thoughts and ideas. She is, I am willing to bet, a product of the current, dominant social belief in the inherent dignity of human beings.
What scares her is that she is wise enough to understand that those beliefs lead directly to the belief that gay men and women have an inherent right, because they are human beings, not to be treated differently. They have the right not to be shamed or hidden. And they have the right to have their most meaningful relationships - as partners and parents - recognized and protected in the same way hers are. Not because they are gay. Because they are human. She sees that the morality of Frozen - which is good - opens the door to gay marriage . . .
And there is the rub. Because gay marriage is, in Ms. Skaggs' worldview, bad. A priori, bad. No amount of evidence or proof could prove it otherwise. Therefore Frozen has to be bad, even though it feels good, even though the principles underlying the film are principles that she believes in - she is clever enough to see that her own principles - outside of that one rule that gay marriage (and gayness itself) are bad - outside that, her own principles lead her to the same conclusion that I have reached, and the majority of Americans have reached - that gay people are, above all, people and they have the same rights from and responsibilities to the community as any of us do. Skaggs already supports the principles that underlie the movement toward gay marriage in this country. And because she has always believe that gay marriage is wrong and bad and dark and evil she sees evil in something that she herself innately reacts to as good.
Which gives me hope. Ms. Skaggs' grandchildren, who saw Frozen because their grandmother took them, are growing up in a world that embraces difference and diversity. They are being influence by Frozen and every other movie and book and show and song that is written with the underlying belief that to be human means to be true and honest and unafraid of difference. And because they grow up in this culture they are likely to know and care about people who are of different races, who are gay, who are disabled, who have a mental illness and aren't ashamed to admit it. Because they grow up in this world they will, hopefully, see the beauty and ability inside their own differences and they will not be ashamed. They will embrace themselves and each other. And the world will be just that much better because they do.
It is interesting that much of Skaggs' critique (and the critiques of others) focuses on the song, "Let it Go". Yet none of them pause to think that this song takes place in the middle of the story - not at the end. Elsa hasn't finished her journey in this song. This is a song of starting, and starting well, but so imperfectly. Elsa does need other people. She cannot - and she does not - live out her life alone in an ice palace. Elsa was incredibly damaged by her parents. They were terrified and they taught her to be terrified - and so she never learned to use and shape her powers for good. Those powers were treated like a curse and they became a curse. But the cure for that was NOT that she left (though that was a necessary start). It was when she came back. When she fixed the problems she had created and learned to live with herself and with her kingdom.
Gay marriage is a good thing because it brings the amazing abilities and personalities of gay people and their families back into society. It demands responsibility from all of us. And it rewards all of us with stronger - fuller - richer and better communities. And so, if Frozen is a story about bringing the different into the light and then bringing it home - it is about gay marriage. And it is a great thing!
