December 1998 From the EditorDisneyland is junk food
More than 80 percent of Hong Kong people think that Hong Kong should
build a Disneyland, according to a survey.
Would more tourists be lured to Hong Kong merely because of a
Disneyland when there are already four in the world (Los Angeles, Florida, Tokyo, and
Paris)? Does it mean that Hong Kong has already lost its attraction that we need to build
a new, fancy tourist spot? Theme parks are commercialized, standardized, white, middle-class
commodities. Tourism should be promoted on the basis of unique qualities that can represent
Hong Kong.
Indeed, Disneyland may create around 2000 job opportunities, but
the nature of these jobs has been overlooked. Most of the placements (as in Orlando) are
temporary clerical or light industrial which are neither secure nor high-paid. The labour
they employ is mainly unskilled or semi-skilled. On the surface, Disneyland can give a
instant boost to Hong Kong’s battered economy, however, this effect is short-term and
superficial.
Building a Disneyland means sacrificing the countryside. Pollution in
Hong Kong has become so serious that it is as bad as that in Mexico City. Do we really want
to have Mickey Mouse to entertain instead of clean air to survive?
Disneyland is a fake simulation of history. It idealizes the past
by presenting purely the bright side of history; negative elements that might distress or
repel guests are programmed out. For example, "Main Street" in Los Angeles is grounded in
historic reality, a small American town. But the approach to the past is not to reproduce
it, but to tidy it up. It only recreates the positive aspects of the Victorian era, while
economic depressions, strikes, warfare and so on are whited out. It only reproduces the
white, middle-class exclusivity--the safe, socially homogeneous space. It uses a visual
strategy that makes unpleasant things, like garbage removal, simply invisible.
Building a Disneyland is a quick and dirty gimmick to comfort the
worried public. In fact, it can neither promote tourism nor create secure job opportunities.
It will destroy our scarce natural landscape and indirectly support a superficial view of
history.
Editor-in-Chief
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