The Little Mermaid trailer dazzled many Disney movie fans including adults, who wanted to share their daughters’ reactions while watching the short clip of Halle Bailey singing “Part of Your World.”
These reaction videos of little girls seeing Ariel from Little Mermaid are really giving me life today. ❤️❤️❤️ pic.twitter.com/s42tN0VVa7
— Brooke Hammerling (@brooke) September 13, 2022
Since the release of the trailer, there has been a whirlwind of controversy about how Bailey, a Black girl, is portraying the character, who is White.
Recently on TikTok, a user who has been identified as an Indonesian college student made a video dressed in blackface pretending to be a Black girl with the caption at the top of the video saying “My daughter’s reaction to the little mermaid trailer.”
This is Joss Marchell and he's studying to be an attorney. Clearly bothered by a Black woman portraying a mermaid, he's mocked her by wearing Blackface in an attempt to be funny on TikTok. #JossMarchell is a racist, disgusting excuse of a human.pic.twitter.com/KrNFQxQCCP
— thong song enthusiast. (@thePLAINESTjane) September 20, 2022
“Mommy, she looks like me,” the student says as he turns his face to the camera an says mockingly, “she’s so pretty.” The student then puts on a red wig to impersonate the character.
Initially, the student said he wasn’t going to delete the video, but since then, the video and his account have vanished from the app.
Many TikTok users have posted their reactions to the student’s video, and one person said “Y’all anti-blackness has been showing ever since this was announced, but people claim they’re not racist. The way y’all have treated Halle – an innocent girl – for doing a role is disgusting. There is no explaining this behavior. It is racism and nothing else. It’s so tiring.”
