Inappropriate TikTok Trend Hurts Disney’s Only Black Princess

A TikTok trend uses songs from Princess and the Frog to make inappropriate videos about other Disney characters – and some claim this is ruining the only positive Black Representation in the Disney franchise.

Disney just recently announced that their Splash Mountain ride will be reimagined as a Princess and the Frog theme – giving more fame to their only black princess, Princess Tiana, and solidifying her legacy for decades to come. For a while, it seemed everyone online was rewatching the movie and giving recognition to Tiana and the positive representation she created for BIPOC Disney fans.

The music in this movie is truly iconic, great lyrics, great message, and really unique for Disney Princess movies – but unfortunately it’s being used for a questionable trend. The song ‘Almost There’ is sung by Princess Tiana when she’s saving up for her dream of opening her own restaurant. A TikTok user by the name @squidwardcoochay made a video during the week of August 10th to the song. The video was meant to suggest some adult activity between Princess Tiana and Prince Naveen, as the lyrics “I’m almost there” played throughout the TikTok. The user then recreated this video with the same song but different Disney characters, making sexually suggestive content about Rapunzel and Flynn and Mike and Sully.

According to some reports, this user made almost 70 videos just like those in under 24 hours! Obviously with this many videos, they wound up being on a TON of people’s For You Page’s and this somehow became the latest TikTok trend.Other people started recreating the videos with new character combos, such as this one showing Venelope and Wreck It Ralph, and the song became super popular on the app as people jumped on the trend.

However not everyone thought this was funny and harmless. Some people online expressed concern that an empowering song from such an important movie in Disney history was being reduced to a gross, hyper-sexual meme. TikTok user @LindseyWheeler1 posted a video with the song and said “for a lot of black girls this is the only process that we get to and can identify with. It was funny at first but now people are saying they can only think of the meme related to this song now. That hurts because this soundtrack barely got to shine until just recently. I don’t want mine and many girls’ most important childhood movie to be turned into a joke.”

Lindsey has a fair point, since so many people online are expressing that this song and movie is ruined for them and they can’t watch it without thinking of sexualized Disney character. A Twitter user responded to the TikToks by saying “I can’t watch The Princess and the Frog normally now, y’all be ruining my childhood” and another said “TikTok HAD to ruin my favorite Princess and the Frog song”.

here is already very little recognition given to BIPOC characters and storylines, so it’s unfortunately that now when you google Princess and The Frog, news about this TikTok trend pops up instead of people recommending you watch these black storylines.One TikTok user commented on Lidnsey’s video “it’s literally one of the best soundtracks Disney ever put out, it deserves a better legacy than this meme” and another said “Tiktok is funny but it’s upsetting to see that people sexualized Princess and the Frog…just admit you don’t care about representation of the black community”.

Some people are arguing that the whole trend is harmless since the characters being sexualized aren’t real so there’s no real victims. But the original TikTok user made more videos to this song and … tf you thought the Disney characters were weird, it got much worse.The user started making videos to the song ‘Almost There’ that depicted real people in suggestive positions. One video portrays Noah Beck and James Charles together, and Nikita Dragun to Tony Lopez together. If you didn’t know, there’s been rumors flying that Noah Beck and James Charles are secretly dating, with people online convinced Noah Beck is secretly gay and trying to force him to come out of the closet publically. A similar situation has been happening with Nikita Dragun and Tony Lopez. Both Tony and Noah have repeatedly said they are straight and are simply good friends with the LGTB+ influencers.

It’s unfortunately that this meme is trying to perpetuate these rumors and sexualize influencers who have asked the public to stop commenting on their sexuality. This is gross and wrong and all more reasons why the internet is outraged at this trend damaging the legacy of Disney’s only Black Princess.

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