The politicization of everything continues. Who in their right mind goes on this ride and thinks it is a terrible scourge on humanity, rather than just enjoying it for what it is? Country Bears Jamboree might as well be next, since it is bunch of hillbilly bears, I'm sure there must be hostile undertones there. And, hey, Chef Art Smith, time to change your successful menu to some type of fusion to reflect diversity, etc. We've all gone mad.
I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings, and it may just be my background as a civics teacher talking, but the reality is that
everything is inherently political: every public action, ever decision, every artistic choice has an element of the political to it. When we don't notice the politics behind a work or an institution, it's typically because said work or institution simply reflects the values of the current political status quo; for example, a film made in the 1950s that depicts a woman as a traditional housewife would not have been considered political, while one depicting a woman attempting to succeed in an office dominated by men, as most were at the time, would be. But is that fair? Is it not a political choice in that setting to opt to choose "housewife" as the default role for the woman in one's movie, just as much as it is to depict her as a career woman? Both are political, but one reflects what the dominant group saw as the status quo, and thus floats by unquestioned (as context, it's not true that a majority of women in the US during the 50s were housewives;
within the dominant social group, however, which at the time was white suburban nuclear families supported most often by office jobs, that was often the expectation).
Heck, all we have to do is go back to the opening of Disneyland to see Walt engaging in the political, with his desire to showcase "the ideals, dreams, and the hard facts" that shaped America as expressed in the park's dedication. Well, those are political choices: what are the ideals? Who's choosing which ideals are most important, which don't need to be discussed, or which are considered unacceptable? And the "hard facts"; whose version of history and presentation of facts are we going to be presented with? What if Walt had succeeded in getting Edison Square up and running, but used that as a chance to gloss over Edison's abusive labor practices and his theft from figures like Tesla? Walt would have been free to do so, it was his park and was meant for lighthearted family vacations, after all, but such a choice comes with a very clear political aspect to it that Walt wanted to educate the masses but likely would have only wanted to do so on terms he felt comfortable with.
Basically, it's a dangerous turn of phrase we still see people engage with, that the status quo is somehow inherently apolitical, and any challenge to the status quo
is political, and thus unwelcome, when the reality is that both are equally political in nature.
