Why Disney should rethink their LGBTQ+ representation on-screen?

Source: The Guardian

Disney’s efforts are not in the shadows, Victoria Alonso who is a Marvel Studios executive has stated that the studio is committed to empowering the members of the LGBTQ+ community with more representation on screen but just increasing the on-screen appearance of queer characters is not going to be enough. If the studio fails to tell meaningful queer stories through their shows then the increased visibility can easily be taken as queerbaiting. 

Queerbaiting is very serious and the LGBTQ+ community hates when shows do it. If Disney just increases the on-screen appearance of queer characters without giving them meaningful stories then their efforts are most likely to backfire on them. The LGBTQ+ community can very easily feel invalidated and invisible. And Disney has to go the extra mile when it comes to the LGBTQ+ community considering its history. For decades Disney has had queer-coded antagonists. Disney spent years demonizing the community and now if they want to get on the good books of the LGBTQ+ community then they have to start with affirmative and authentic queer stories.

Disney cannot just put queer characters in small side roles and accept the entire LGBTQ+ community. They need a queer character as a leader if they want to undo the decade of mistakes. And it looked like Disney was heading in the right direction with The Owl House which featured a bisexual lead character but things didn’t go as expected and The Owl House was canceled. The producer of the show Dana Terrace shared that the series was canceled because it “did not fit the Disney brand”. Now I don’t know what is happening in Disney’s brand meetings but this is surely not the way they will empower the LGBTQ+ community.  

The solution to this problem is not very complicated, it's a rather simple one actually. On-screen, queer romance can help Disney on this front although on-screen queer romance is getting a bit cliche Disney needs to do it anyways if they want to see any change in emotion in the LGBQT+ community. But this is only a start if Disney wants to portray genuine stories and then they need to show the problems queer faces in their life. One of the biggest aspects of a queer’s life is when they have to come out. So coming out stories can really help the LGBTQ+ connect with Disney’s content.

Disney needs to step out of their general line of storytelling and forget about “fitting the Disney brand” and start showing diverse stories. And a diverse story is not about Who, rather it’s about what is their story so there is no point in a queer character if we don’t know their story. If the representation is insufficient then Disney’s goal of empowering and inspiring the LGBTQ+ community will fall short. Disney has a long way to go and it will be interesting to see how Disney moves forward with LGBTQ+ representation in MCU’s phase 4. What do you think? Comment down below.