The non-PC "Peter Pan" film (W: Tortillas and enchiladas and other nonBrit Food

[Carol]

Goddlefrood:
> <snip>
> Having grown up in a non-PC world those of a certain age in Britain
would distinguish between Indians from North America and Indians from
India by adding the descriptor "Red". It's also in the Disney Peter
Pan film, which my son enjoys.
>
Carol responds:

I remember watching that film as a child and not being sure whether to
enjoy it or be embarrassed by it. We did refer to Native Americans/
American Indians as Indians in those days but not as "red Indians."
But "what makes the red man red" and "when did he first say 'How'?"
and so forth were clearly stereotypes even in my childish view (I'd
never heard the word, but I had seen real Navajos and Hopis and
Apaches and Zunis in the Pow Wow parade, held before the All-indian
Pow Wow on the Fourth of July. Later, I went to school with Navajo
children from the reservation (who didn't attend school in Flagstaff
until fourth grade, when they were considered old enough to live in a
dormitory and ride a bus to a regular public (U.S. sense) school.)

I can see why people would find the stereotyping offensive even though
it's intended as humorous (and surely, no one would see the depiction
as realistic) although, IMO, we should all be a little less
thin-skinned these days. At least the film offers equal opportunity
stereotyping (it's not just Indians): mothers, fathers, girls, boys,
pirates, and just about every other ethnic group except Jews and black
people is laughed at in that film. (Well, mothers are idealized;
everyone else is laughed at.) I didn't like the mermaids at all--they
seemed to imply that pretty young girls (who happened to have
fishtails) would make fun of and try to drown or injure a rival outsider.

I'm not sure whether the stereotypes reflect the original James Barrie
play or not, but I suspect they do. They seem to date to that era
though some of the stereotypes survived into the 1950s, at least, and
maybe the 1960s (girls and women, anyway). 

At any rate, I'm surprised that the film is still available and not
censored by the PC crowd. The powers that be used to protect kids from
profanity, sex, and violence. Now it's racial and religious
stereotypes and smoking that they're not supposed to be exposed to.

Carol, just commenting on the film and not defending stereotypes but
not fond of enforced political correctness, either