News Character Ignores Children, Sparking Outrage

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warfelg said:
Anyone see that rather odd video come from Disney? The Woodie character in parade spotted a young black girl dressed like Jessie, and after almost a minute of trying to waive her down (unsuccessfully) he went and grabbed her to have Jessie give the girl a hug.

Comments, predictably so, are ripping the Jessie character actor for not spotting it while praising the Woodie actor.
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I have not seen the video but as someone who actually was a character entertainer at Disney I can tell you it is highly possible that the actor did not see the girl. Every character has a very different design in their suit and the actor's line of vision is rarely equal to that of the character's vision. I never was "associated" with Jessie but was with other Toy Story characters and I know even when the the sight line equaled the character it was often very limited. Other characters I was involved with had sightlines out of mouths and sides, etc.... Parades are a different thing but the characters greeter is absolutely critical to the role and it can't happen without them -- greeters often are responsible for making sure the character has focus where the focus needs to be.
 
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I wonder what that means for the other parks with the sesame ip in them with Rosita…
 
CoasterTalkBob said:
I have not seen the video but as someone who actually was a character entertainer at Disney I can tell you it is highly possible that the actor did not see the girl. Every character has a very different design in their suit and the actor's line of vision is rarely equal to that of the character's vision. I never was "associated" with Jessie but was with other Toy Story characters and I know even when the the sight line equaled the character it was often very limited. Other characters I was involved with had sightlines out of mouths and sides, etc.... Parades are a different thing but the characters greeter is absolutely critical to the role and it can't happen without them -- greeters often are responsible for making sure the character has focus where the focus needs to be.
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I agree and that point was made a few times. But my issue with this situation is that the character (Jesse) was on the other side of the parade and people were praising the other character (Woody) for making someone go out of their way to greet someone.

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Basically my TL;DR synopsis is that these instances are not properly explained and these pushbacks are absurd. I mean hell, look at Rosita getting all branding pulled from the park! Just absurd to me.
 
If this story is true, I am honestly confused. Let's assume the actor in the costume did something wrong. What on earth does that have to do with the character? Why is Rosita being removed for the crimes of some person dressed up as her?
 
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I'd imagine it's the park playing to the lowest common denominator of thinking - even if they replace the employee, the character is whom everyone recognizes for the issue since the employee is anonymous.
 
Nicole said:
If this story is true, I am honestly confused. Let's assume the actor in the costume did something wrong. What on earth does that have to do with the character? Why is Rosita being removed for the crimes of some person dressed up as her?
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No clue. Rosita was (IIRC) the first Mexican bi-lingual character on Sesame Street too. But they are getting sued for $25million over this in a class action lawsuit so I imagine it’s an overreaction to show that they “fixed” the issue because, it seems, part of the lawsuit action is kids can’t tell between the suit and an actor in it.
 
warfelg said:
I agree and that point was made a few times. But my issue with this situation is that the character (Jesse) was on the other side of the parade and people were praising the other character (Woody) for making someone go out of their way to greet someone.

Here a video:
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Basically my TL;DR synopsis is that these instances are not properly explained and these pushbacks are absurd. I mean hell, look at Rosita getting all branding pulled from the park! Just absurd to me.
Click to expand...


While I'm all for calling out racism when it occurs, I think this video is taken out of context - the little girl is wearing a Jessie dress, which is why Woody got her attention. Characters going out of their way to greet guests dressed like them is a fairly common occurrence at Disney parks and had nothing to do with the color of her skin.
 
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VB06Hokie said:
While I'm all for calling out racism when it occurs, I think this video is taken out of context - the little girl is wearing a Jessie dress, which is why Woody got her attention. Characters going out of their way to greet guests dressed like them is a fairly common occurrence at Disney parks and had nothing to do with the color of her skin.
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If that’s in reference to what I said, then thinking my comment is about race takes my feelings way out of context.

May places have character interaction policies during parades that they aren’t to interact individually with kids for many reasons.
 
warfelg said:
If that’s in reference to what I said, then thinking my comment is about race takes my feelings way out of context.

May places have character interaction policies during parades that they aren’t to interact individually with kids for many reasons.
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Not in reference to what you said, I was referencing the tweet itself. Sorry for the confusion.
 
Obviously this is a FNAF-esque situation where the suit itself makes the wearer racist
 
This is such a ridiculously bungled PR situation by the park. They should’ve stuck solely to the message of “It’s hard for our characters to see and sometimes they inadvertently miss people” and nothing more. By constantly apologizing, pledging to be more inclusive, and now taking actions like this, Sesame Place looks to be admitting guilt.

They should be constantly and unremittingly pressing on the message issue of “Our character couldn’t see the girls because of their limited vision, we’re sorry it upset them, and we’ll work with our actors and costume design team to do whatever we can to improve our characters’ vision.” The conversation has shifted to racism because SP followed the conversation into that space. Now they’ve lost control of the conversation and keeping taking steps that only fuel the racism narrative. Big mistake.
 
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Mushroom said:
This is such a ridiculously bungled PR situation by the park. They should’ve stuck solely to the message of “It’s hard for our characters to see and sometimes they inadvertently miss people” and nothing more. By constantly apologizing, pledging to be more inclusive, and now taking actions like this, Sesame Place looks to be admitting guilt.

They should be constantly and unremittingly pressing on the message issue of “Our character couldn’t see the girls because of their limited vision, we’re sorry it upset them, and we’ll work with our actors and costume design team to do whatever we can to improve our characters’ vision.” The conversation has shifted to racism because SP followed the conversation into that space. Now they’ve lost control of the conversation and keeping taking steps that only fuel the racism narrative. Big mistake.
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* Could not agree more * Appeasing an aggressor only makes him aggressive. SS should have simply said it was an obvious mistake and perhaps add they will change their policy to add assistants to manage the characters. This shows awareness and responsibility and most importantly solves the problem. Getting rid of the the first Mexican bi-lingual character on Sesame Street in response to a charge of corporate racism is the worst thing the company could have done. Cancel culture at its ugliest.
 
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At the same time the lawsuit really makes it out that no matter what SS did it would never be enough. It’s as much greed as cancel culture.
 
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warfelg said:
I agree and that point was made a few times. But my issue with this situation is that the character (Jesse) was on the other side of the parade and people were praising the other character (Woody) for making someone go out of their way to greet someone.

Here a video:
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For more detailed information, see our cookies page.

Direct Link to Embedded Media Source

Basically my TL;DR synopsis is that these instances are not properly explained and these pushbacks are absurd. I mean hell, look at Rosita getting all branding pulled from the park! Just absurd to me.
Click to expand...

Oh this was absolutely just a "seeing yourself" thing..... I honestly can't remember if it was a Disney instruction or an unwritten rule but characters always were excited to see their own character. I would have responded in exactly the same way in either character's position. In many cases, "Jessie" would have been disappointed had they found out that they missed someone dressed as them after the parade..... I know I would have.

People making a big deal about any of this video is absolutely ridiculous..... literally nothing to see but normal operations.
 
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