xphile69 Review of Mickey: The Story of a Mouse

Mickey: The Story of a Mouse (2022)

Mickey Mouse Modeled After a Racist Caricature

[9/10 · 19 November 2022]

I really enjoyed the honesty that Disney acknowledges in this documentary that Mickey Mouse had a connection to minstrel shows, based on a racist "Jigaboo" character, who was made to mock black people in the early 20th century. It was interesting to find out that these racial stereotypes that white people created back when Mickey Mouse was originally created were acceptable then, rather than acknowledging African-Americans as complex and individual human beings. Mickey Mouse stands the test of time today surely contending that, despite his racist origins, he shows that we all have to open up old stereotypes and lay them out, superimpose them on top of today's world, in order to understand them, to have any chance at all of truly making them go away. Thanks Walt!