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Disney Will No Longer Use ‘Boys And Girls’ At Any Park Greetings To ‘Promote Inclusivity’

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OPINION: This article may contain commentary which reflects the author's opinion.


Disney parks are axing gendered language such as “boys and girls” and “ladies and gentleman” in their park greetings to promote gender inclusivity.

Disney’s diversity and inclusion manager Vivian Ware was heard speaking about the changes in a video conference call recorded by City Journal’s Christopher Rufo.

“We’ve provided training for all of our cast members in relation to that. So now they know it’s ‘Hello, everyone,’ or ‘Hello, friends,'” Ware said in the video.

Parkgoers will no longer hear “ladies and gentlemen” and “boys and girls” in park greetings, according to the video.

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“We want to create that magical moment with our cast members, with our guests,” she said. “And we don’t want to just assume because someone might be in, our interpretation, may be presenting as female that they may not want to be ‘princess.'”

“It was reported last year that Walt Disney World in Florida removed its longtime greeting, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls,’ from its Magic Kingdom fireworks show to promote inclusivity. It was replaced with a greeting saying, ‘Good evening, dreamers of all ages,'” Fox News reported.

“Disney employees walked off the job last week in protest of a perceived lack of company opposition to a Florida bill that prohibits teachers from providing instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third-grade classrooms,” the report added.

This comes after Florida GOP Gov. Ron DeSantis signed into law Florida’s “Parental Rights in Education” bill.

The bill prohibits teachers from giving classroom instruction on “sexual orientation” or “gender identity” in kindergarten through third grade.

“In Florida, we not only know that parents have a right to be involved, we insist that parents have a right to be involved,” DeSantis said at a press conference.

Last week, DeSantis signed a bill that will impose four-year term limits on school board members and subject most material in district schools’ libraries and classrooms to governmental oversight and approval practices.

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During a news conference in Daytona Beach, DeSantis spoke about CB/HB 1467, a bill that he argued is “probably the strongest curriculum transparency legislation in the country” as resistance against “indoctrination in the school system.”

According to the bill, anyone involved in the selection of a K-12 district school’s library materials must complete a training program designed by the Florida Department of Education before they can qualify to do so.

DeSantis said the legislation will enable parents to “defend the education of their kids” and keep instructional, library, or reading list material in line with state standards.

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“I’m a big believer in term limits, but you don’t even always have to wait for that to attach. You can throw the bums out in the election, If they mistreated your kids or if they didn’t follow the law, or if they did anything, you have an opportunity, for many of them will be up for reelection. I think that school board races often did not get much attention,” DeSantis said.

“But I think what we’ve found is that those are some of the most important elections that we’re able to vote on, I think you’re going to have a huge amount of voter interest in these August and November elections for the school boards in the various counties,” he added.

“Then you have this governor’s race in Virginia, where you had the losing candidate say parents that — he said, parents should not be involved in what is taught in the school system. And so there is a debate in this country about what role parents have in the education of their kids. And I think in Florida with, our Parents’ Bill of Rights, with the bill we’re going to sign here today, other bills we’re going to sign later, we believe parents not only have a role, but they also have a fundamental role to be involved in the education of their kids. And that’s how it’s going to be in the state of Florida,” DeSantis argued.

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