Dear Christian parents: Don't celebrate Disney's ‘less gay’ animation films

Beating around the bush never works, and direct communication is always best. As the Bible states “let your yes, be yes and your no, be no.” And there's a good reason why this is necessary: mixed messaging more often than not will not produce the right results.

This is particularly true when it comes to pushing back against all the business commercialization and consumer marketing that ambushes our families with pro-homosexual propaganda. There is no better way to more clearly communicate that parents will not tolerate having their children be bombarded with such messages, or any sexual messages for that matter, than when we use our purchasing power to withhold our hard-earned money. Think Target for proof, which reported a loss of $10 billion in 10 days in 2023 as backlash for its attempts to target children with pro-homosexual-themed clothing merchandise. 

Like Target, Walt Disney's film franchise felt consumers' and parents’ wrath back in 2022 when it released two prominent animation films and unwisely chose to craftily insert same-sex themes into both. One of those animations was “Lightyear” (a spinoff of the beloved and popular film series “Toy Story”), and the other was "Strange World," which also inserted into its storyline the left's climate change agenda in addition to homosexual themes.  Both films flopped and lost the studio between $100 to $200 million, each.  

Due to the financial hit, Disney studio executives evidently went to great lengths (much to the chagrin of its staff) to water down another of its animation films released this summer, “Inside Out 2,” with “less gay” themes.   

While this may appear to be a victory to some pro-family advocates, parents should not rush to celebrate too soon and must remain cautious. How else can we incentivize the marketplace to reverse the current trend to insert overt sexual messages into practically everything, if we don't remain diligent in withholding our dollars? We cannot afford to financially reward companies, like Disney, who take four steps forward and merely two steps back. We must stand strong and demand there be no hint of subliminal sexual messages targeting our children; this is the only way we have a chance of having moral values restored back to our public square.

And as we should have learned by now, the secular left is never inclined to give up its agenda.  

Look for instance at the downward transition American culture has made since the secular left succeeded in having student prayer removed from public schools in the 1960s. Things have gotten so bad that in Maryland, the Montgomery County Board of Education won a federal court case this past May against parents who, for obvious reasons, want to protect and opt out their own children from being brainwashed and forced to adhere to the school district's homosexual propaganda curriculum.

Thankfully, this same group of parents, who are being represented by The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, is not backing down and have filed a petition to take their case to the U.S. Supreme Court. 

This is exactly the tenacity we need to see more of — parents being unwilling to compromise when their children are being targeted with sexualized propaganda in schools. 

That is why I have teamed up with TPUSA Faith and have released an upcoming documentary titled: “22 Words - Exposing the Loss of Decency in American Education,” which showcases my school board visits across this nation in fighting to end the sexualization of children in the classroom.

We need to push back against the sexualization of our children on every front: being involved in the classrooms, speaking at school board meetings, and using our purchasing power to reject perverse sexual marketing messages.  

So, when Disney makes a film that is “less gay,” may the majority of us stick to our principles and view this as still unacceptable and not good enough. In other words, let us not send mixed messages.