Should Disney Have a Plus Sized Princess?

Teen petitions for the mass media corporation to create more body diversity in their films

On Jan. 24, Jewel Moore, a 17-year-old junior student at Fuqua High School in Farmville, Virginia, launched a Change.org petition asking Disney to introduce a female character that isn’t stick-thin. After a week of petitions, it had gained over 2,000 signatures.

“Disney films are highly influential and wide-spread, and they impact the lives of many children, especially girls. It would be revolutionary for Disney to show support to a group of girls who are otherwise horrendously bullied by the media,” Jewel wrote in her petition.

Although the petition has attracted a lot of attention, not all of the attention has been positive. There are those who believe that using a plus-size Disney princess would be promoting an unhealthy lifestyle, as there are plus-size people who are not within the “normal” BMI range and could be considered unhealthy.

In my opinion, this statement does not apply to every single plus size person out there, and therefore should not be used to define each and every one of them. There are many women who are larger and curvier, yet are completely healthy. There has been little attention placed on the health of the thin Disney princesses, as it is automatically assumed that they are healthy, when in reality, their body size could represent someone who is less healthy than a plus-size one. One cannot simply determine the health of a person strictly from their weight and size, and although it is understandable to note that there are those who are overweight and living unhealthy lifestyles, the same notion can be applied to people who are not plus-sized.

The conventional blonde, thin, white princess archetype is commonly used throughout Disney and is one of the first impressions a young girl is given. “It’s extremely difficult to find a positive representation of plus-size females in the media. If Disney could make a plus-size female protagonist who was as bright, amazing, and memorable as their others, it would do a world of good for those plus-size girls out there who are bombarded with images that make them feel ugly for not fitting the skinny standard,” Jewel also stated in the petition.

Throughout the years, Disney has strayed from its classic princess archetype in films such as Brave, which focuses on a tomboy hero with red curly hair, as well as The Princess and the Frog, which portrays a determined African-American waitress. Disney’s efforts to represent diverse women throughout their films cannot be ignored, but rarely have the sizes of these women been altered to embrace various body shapes. “I would just like to see a princess with a different body shape. Where’s the pear-shaped princess? The short princess? The chubby princess?” asked Jewel.

Disney plays such an influential and active part in a child’s life – one that has taught all of us some truly valuable lessons while growing up. There is always room for improvement and growth through what is shown in the media, and I personally think that introducing a plus-size princess could provide young girls with a newfound confidence that shows them they are capable of anything, no matter their shape or size.