The House of Mouse has always been something of a contentious topic for me based on a couple of lingering nagging factoids. Chief of which being the fact that they pulled out of the video game market because they didn't understand us and in doing so ripped out the possibility of Star Wars games remaining as diverse and varied as they had been- any Disney games outside of the Kingdom Hearts deals- and a sequel to Alien Isolation like we all prayed for. Disney just deprived themselves and us of entire prospective worlds of engagement and I will never forgive them for that. But that's baby stuff, I'll admit. Just my own personal gripes with one of the biggest Entertainment companies in the world- and there are many out there with much more legitimate reasons to despise one of the most buttoned-up and despicable companies on god's green earth.
Losing a loved one is forever going to be one of the most harrowing experiences that all are expected to go through at least once in love. Ideally at least twice, but these are just expectations. Worse if the loss comes in a manner perceived 'premature' thanks to malpractice or maleficence or any of the other ways one might expire. (Am I talking about this weird? I don't typically mention actual death on this blog. Not really sure what kind of gloves to wear.) It can feel like all the world has sealed back off around you and that font of light and possibility has dried up and will run out eventually. Thus is the reality of facing the incomprehensible. The constraints of mortality. (Where am I going with this?) I guess what I'm trying to say is it takes a special kind of scum bag to try and take advantage of the recently bereaved. Thank god Mickey sent his best, then!
You may have heard of it. A woman with allergies visits a Disney park and apparently (should I say 'allegedly'? This is England- we have pretty regressive defamation laws. I'm going slap a big 'alleged' over this entire story, to be clear.) conveyed those allergies to the restaurant upon which she was eating. So kind of oversight allegedly occurred and the woman ended up facing some kind of reaction which ultimately had a hand in her death. A tragedy to be sure. But then if you've heard of this it's probably because you've also heard how the Husband is coming up against a request to dismiss the lawsuit he is filling against the big D due to, seriously, the terms and conditions of a Disney Plus trial he signed up to on his console during 2020. (See, I worked gaming in there somehow!)
Now- at first I'll admit to feeling a bit stranded upon hearing that. The gulf between 'my partner died of avoidable allergies at an eatery' (enough to make me terrified of eating out with anyone with any similar dietary restriction) and 'you signed up for a free trial to a subscription service' seems to wide to reconcile. I mean, maybe if her death had something directly to do with the service I could see it. Like, maybe she dropped a few too many expensive Disney Plus shows mid season and the streaming service grew sentience, hacked into her home ventilation and slowly poisoned to death- then there'd be a correlation there! But somehow I don't think we're at that point with our technology yet. Give it a couple more decades.
So I'm sure your curiosity has read the headlines and maybe you are wondering if Disney Plus' Terms and Conditions really does hide a little nugget that absolves them of committing manslaughter against anyone you might know. Well... no, it doesn't. Instead they have a clause in which the party agrees not to engage in any dispute outside of individual arbitration- basically restricting a public jury who will surely side against Mickey's Clubhouse. It is, in the kindest possible terms, an act of sheer and complete desperation from a lawyer who, to be honest, probably just lost their job by even arguing this. They put it all on the line by conceiving of this absolute hairbrained dumpster shoot, and absolutely dropped the ball by allowing the story to turn into a public circus thus costing Disney more than they ever would have to loose by just paying this man off. Which they should have done to begin with.
But wow, doesn't that just come across as the perfect Disney-ass headline? 'Disney wants to kill your love one's and you stupidly signed off to let them get away with it?' This was literally an episode of South Park years ago where people learned that blindly signing the Apple Terms and Conditions gives them the legal right to pull a Human Centipede on you. Now I'm no lawyer, but I do know that conditional clauses do not rewrite laws by their very existence. Just as how a liability waiver does not protect a company from wilful negligence and an NDA does not cover illegal acts, I suspect a terms and conditions for a streaming service, or heck even for the park itself, could interfere with an accidental death case. That would be insane.
And yet doesn't that just fit the very brand of Disney? Litigious to the point of tyranny, Disney rules their image through fear and subjugation. Be happy your aren't a rodent or errant strolling wildlife- because Disney are more than happy to exterminate on their grounds for the goal of 'maintaining the dream'. They've hunted down tiny 'mom and pop' shops for having similar sounding names to some of their IPs, they'll reign hellfire on IP infringements. If there is any company out there with an ever more vicious approach to engaging with the public, be they fans or not, than Disney themselves it would have to be Nintendo- and that's only because Nintendo slapped a generational fine on a dude- I'm sure Disney will take the chance to surpass the pettiness once given the chance.
Disney have always been the rosey-looking company that wears the label and tuxedo whilst their bouncers break the legs of the undesirables around the back. They'll drape themselves with the kid-friendly allure because children are the easiest to squeeze fandom and money out of, and bring up the wrath of hell on anyone who gives them the wrong end of business. We might laugh at the sheer absurdity of this situation but make no mistake this isn't an example of a rogue entity, but a slip up of the mask. These behaviours are learnt within a machine that encourages dehumanisation. And remember what they say- lean a little closer- roses smell like crap.
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