Impact of Media Messages on Children’s Perception of Race and Gender
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Impact of Media Messages on Children’s Perception of Race and Gender
Introduction
Children are sensitive to what they see and hear. The contemporary world exposes children to all sorts of audio and visual media. These media contain various messages concerning race and gender. Out of such media messages, children are in a position to create perceptions on various races and gender. Disney movies are an example of the media that are consumed by children. The movies impact a lot on how children understand the meaning of race, class and gender. The continued consumption of such media by children would only serve to further shape their various perceptions. This paper sets out to show that there are numerous media messages that can impact on the understanding of race and gender by children. The media is powerful in terms of the messages it relays to the audiences. The social judgments of viewers can be greatly influenced by what they see on television news (Mastro, Lapinski, Kopacz & Behm-Morawitz, 2009). According to Mastro, Lapinski, Kopacz & Behm-Morawitz (2009), the Whites in the United States of America perfect in racial prejudice against their fellow black countrymen and women. The Whites perceive the Black as being aggressive and overly violent. This negative depiction of the Black Americans by the White Americans is hugely contributed to by media exposure. The ethnic and racial minorities in the country are depicted as criminal suspects in the news watched through televisions. Unfortunately, the suspects of these ‘criminals’, as depicted by the same television news, are the Whites. The social impact of such media messages would promote ethnicity and racism amongst the interracial population of the United States. In this light, the Whites will always depict the Blacks as having negative characters. They would always associate them with danger and crime and thus would create fear between the two. Evidently, the power of media can play towards negative racial profiling. It becomes unfortunate when the same media cannot produce evidence to prove the validity of the negative depictions of the Blacks. There is a lot of media content that children are exposed to from Disney. Some of these include theme park, movies, sports news, magazines and videos. Such stuffs would not easily get off the minds of children after they would have watched them (Disneyinternational.com, 2015). Due to this large content, the impact of that would be created by the media company cannot be disputed. It would be great. As pointed out by Miller & Rode (n.d.), children would easily identify with Walt Disney. This is because the children consider it to be an undisputed source of entertainment. The children cannot possibly resist the spontaneity, surprise, adventure and beauty presented by the Disney movies. They would remain ‘lovers’ of the movies from the company irrespective of whether some of the movies would be scary to them (Miller & Rode, n.d.). Importantly, Miller & Rode (n.d.) note that the cartoon Disney movies consumed by children have the capability of shaping an individual self throughout their life. Notably, the impact of Walt Disney Media Company on children would be difficult to curb since as has been mentioned, the children have developed a passion for them.
Another notable point is that children who consume Disney media contents are made to believe that life is all about happiness and that sadness is not part of it. The Disney movies expose the children to illusion that are nice and good. As a result of watching the movies, children would live in dreamlands and fantasy and try to get their minds out of the realities of life. Miller & Rode (n.d.) observe that the Disney movies and their discourses have led to the convergence of many political, technical, economic, social and aesthetic pressures in the learning and teaching cultural space. Further, the scholars point out that the movies contain “realities” that are purposefully distorted. As it is, media is among the biggest systems of education. In this respect, a large audience consisting of both adults and children would be influenced by what the media shows. Therefore, when media intentionally distorts information and convinces the consumers that that is the reality, it gets to tamper with the perception of a large section of the society. Being one of the largest media companies in the world, Walt Disney significantly contributes in this respect. Children would create a significant meaning out of a single image they see in the movies. They would grow with the perception they developed out of the image into their adulthood.
Miller & Rode (n.d.) continue to point out that the Disney movies clearly exposes viewers to classism, sexism and racism and that criticism have always been leveled against them. The movies present prejudice to a great extent. Miller & Rode (n.d.) single out the film “Song of the South” as one of the movies that depict prejudice. Due to this reason, Disney now claims that the distribution of the movie is being done in Japan only. According to Disney, the film has been and is still a success in Japan. This shows that even the company itself has learnt that the film is not good for the consumption of the masses and as to such, it is trying to convince the world that it is now restricted to Japan alone. It beats logic why a media company would proceed and produce a film that it very well knows would brew any form of prejudice.
Further, Disney exposes children to gender issues. Unfortunately, the media company portrays the issues in such a manner that the children would easily create negative perceptions about either of the genders. An instance of the depiction of geneder by Disney would be found in “Aladdin”. The main character in the film exploits her body to get favors. Also, the character tries to catch the ‘bad’ guy’s attention through the use of a kiss. Ariel, the character in “Little Mermaid”, listens not to her father. This depicts disrespect and at the same time depicts women as being powerful in their own right. Later on in the movie, the character is portrayed as one who makes use of her voice to get the attention of the males. However, she later loses her voice and the only thing she remains with for attracting the prince is her body (Mickey Mouse Monopoly, 2012). These movies depict women as being exploitative of men because of their bodies. Viewers of the movies would create the perception that women do not have other forms of getting that which they want and that their last resort would be to offer their bodies. Another movie from Disney and is full of family violence is “Beauty and Beast”. The “beast” abuses and imprisons Bella (Mickey Mouse Monopoly, 2012). Children should not be exposed to such content.
It has also been noted that some of the Disney movies are very racist and should not be screened. Brooks (2007) stipulates that the movie “Song of the South” is overly racist and depicts African-Americans as an inferior race. The implication of the movie is that the African-Americans would always be under the Whites and serve them in such capacities as caretakers of their kids. Exposure of children to such movies would make them have the perception that indeed there are some races that are superior to others. It would not be in order for a child to grow with this perception in their mind. Racism is not healthy for the development and oneness of the world society. As such, the worst thing to do would be to introduce a young child to racism by making them believe that their race is either superior or inferior as compared to other races.
Conclusion
Media is an important factor in shaping the perception of children about the society. Walt Disney is an example of a media company that is in a position to hugely influence such perceptions. As has been discussed, the company has media contents that portray gender issues and racism as well as classism. In this respect, the teaching of stereotypes and negative examples can be effectively conducted through the movies. This would be made more possible by the fact that the impact of the materials from Disney Media on children is immense.

References
Brooks, X. (2007). Is Song of the South too racist to screen?. The Guardian. Retrieved 8 June 2015, from http://www.theguardian.com/film/filmblog/2007/mar/28/therearetwodisneyfilms
Disneyinternational.com,. (2015). Disney - Disney Online International. Retrieved 8 June 2015, from http://www.disneyinternational.com/
Mastro, D., Lapinski, M., Kopacz, M., & Behm-Morawitz, E. (2009). The Influence of Exposure to Depictions of Race and Crime in TV News on Viewer's Social Judgments. Journal Of Broadcasting & Electronic Media, 53(4), 615-635. doi:10.1080/08838150903310534
Mickey Mouse Monopoly. (2012). Hollywood.
Miller, S. & Rode, G. (n.d.). The Movie You See, The Movie You Don’t. (Publisher and place of publication not provided).