Rainbow Disney collection for 2021 rolls out… but is it a good thing?
Disney has released their brand new Rainbow Disney collection in time for Pride Month 2021, featuring the many characters of Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, and other Disney icons for the first time.
However, as some members of the LGBTQ community have pointed out, Disney still hasn’t settled the inclusivity issues of their many movies and shows.
Rainbow Disney collection has it all
The Pride collection from the Walt Disney company features everything from apparel to accessories, including protective face masks and hoodies.
What’s more, the company is donating funds to signal their ongoing commitment to support organizations around the world that are helping LGBTQ communities.
Disney first debuted their rainbow-themed mouse ear hats in April 2018 to mark Pride month. By May of the same year, they were pushed into expanding their collection with a handful of clothing and accessories items.
With this earlier collection, they promised to donate ten percent of their profits to GLSEN, the US-based organization supporting LGBTQ school-aged children.
The 2018 collection led to an annual release of a merchandise collection with 2019 offering a series of matching family shirts for adults and children.
Rainbow Disney collection for 2021
For this year, Disney is offering brands that are contributing to their collection like Loungefly, Torrid, Hot Topic, Kohls, and Funko. There are also Pride products from Disney, Pixar, Star Wars, and Marvel.
For this year, Disney is also providing funds to several organizations around the world that support LGBTQ communities.
Aside from GLEN, these include the UK-based Diversity Role Models, Minus18 from Australia, BeLonG to Youth Services of Ireland, and the Spanish ARELAS organization.
What’s more, Disney is donating to the following: Diversity München e.V. of Germany; the Nijiiro Diversity, a Japanese initiative; and It Gets Better Project, which is worldwide.
The Walt Disney Company has said in their Diversity and Inclusion Commitment that they want to “create authentic, unforgettable stories, experiences, and products” and doing it “in a way that counts everybody in.”
Is it really visibility… or capitalism?
However, as Pink News reported, there’s been some mixed reaction coming from the LGBTQ community on the Disney line of merchandise.
Some of them cited this as another example of “overpriced” rainbow capitalism from a company that rarely has queer characters in its major shows and films.
One tweeted that started it all was that: “instead of spending money on overpriced corporate pride merch go ahead and support and donate to… any other LGBT+ businesses, creators and charities you see.”
Another tweeted: ““Disney doesn’t support us they love to market off of us in products like this and queer baiting in their films and shows that they call ‘representation’ in reality they give us nothing but an occasional bone to throw at us.”
There was some positive reaction, as one Twitter user noted the first time that Disney featured the trans, bi, and lesbian flags alongside the Pride flag.
“Merch doesn’t fix Disney’s problem w/ #LGBTQ representation. But someone made the call on these pins and that was a good call,” the tweet read.
How about you? What do you think of Disney’s Rainbow collection?