Disney celebrates values

My family made the great American pilgrimage this summer: We all went to Disney World. The kids, of course, loved it. And though I'm a bit ashamed to admit it, I did, too. Not just for the rides, though they were great, but for the uplifting and even profound messages the place embodies and conveys.

Intellectuals are not supposed to like anything about Disney. The movies are too earnest, too colorful, and just too darn perky for the sophisticates, who would like it better if more people would prefer the undiluted nihilism of Woody Allen's "Match Point" and "Crimes and Misdemeanors" to such crowd pleasers as "The Lion King" and "Toy Story." The parks, too, are scorned for their unflagging cheerfulness and for the relentless efficiency with which they manage to separate patrons from their money.

Nevertheless, there is much to admire in Walt Disney's built utopias, which are spectacular monuments to one man's faith in the power of technological progress and the enduring value of democracy.

These days, we are constantly bombarded with warnings about the ways in which technological advancement has contributed to the world's problems. We hear dire predictions about the effects of global warming, the sprawl and pollution caused by ballooning populations, and we see all too vividly the destructiveness of modern warfare.

The Magic Kingdom's Tomorrowland, refreshingly, reminds us of the simple, but vital fact that technology also has made our lives vastly better and promises to continue to do so. Disney celebrates both the high-tech possibilities of space travel and such very down-to-earth developments as the invention of electric lights, washing machines, and personal computers, whose contribution to our lives is so easy to overlook.

The truth is that technology is neither wholly good nor wholly bad, but empowering and liberating. Sometimes that power has been used well and responsibly, and sometimes not. But the consistent effect of technology has been to enhance democracy.

By reducing the advantages accruing to physical strength and by liberating women from the drudgery of household labor, technology has made possible a greater degree of equality between the sexes, and by facilitating the dissemination of knowledge, technology has made available to the multitudes opportunities once available only to a privileged few.

And democracy, truly, is Disney's great theme. To Huey Long, democracy meant "every man a king." At Disney, the idea is similar: every boy a prince and every girl a princess.

Disney explicitly celebrates American democracy with such exhibits as the Liberty Tree and the Hall of Presidents, but, in fact, once you pay the admission charge and enter the Magic Kingdom or any of the other parks, virtually every aspect of the experience expresses the core ideal of every democratic society -- respect for the fundamentally equal dignity of all persons.

Tens of thousands of people from around the country and around the world visit the Disney parks every day -- far more people visit the Magic Kingdom on a typical August day than live in the city of Waterville -- yet they are all treated with consideration and respect by the staff, and there is scarcely any crime or even any conflict.

Much of the credit should be given to that humble, but quintessentially democratic institution, the queue. No matter who you are, the rule is first come, first served. The alternative to queuing is either some scheme of privilege, such as whites to the front of the bus, or the sort of anarchy one sees traveling in some countries abroad, where only the pushiest people with the sharpest elbows even get on the bus.

Adults love to hate the "It's a Small World" attraction, but they shouldn't. Sure, the song is syrupy, but the ride's basic message is attractive, and profoundly true: The world is full of a diverse array of peoples with different cultures, but at bottom the common humanity that unites us is deeper than what divides us.

Perhaps the easiest thing for cynics to mock about Disneyworld is the unabashed optimism for the future, expressed for example, in the "Carousel of Progress" where the animatronic figures sing, "there's a great, big beautiful tomorrow shining at the end of every day."

It would be naïve to think that there is some guarantee that all our tomorrows will be beautiful and great, but Disney is right to remind us that we cannot make our tomorrows great or beautiful without the faith that we can make them so.

Joseph R. Reisert is associate professor of American constitutional law and chairman of the Department of Government at Colby College in Waterville.

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