I am Elsa
My best friend and I disagree about this. Everything I’m about to say is my opinion only- not Disney’s, not my employer’s, and definitely not Kate’s.
This is me, right now:
I am a confident middle-aged white man, on a train, taking a selfie.
The movie Frozen is a morality tale about a kid with a privileged upbringing, who doesn’t know it. Such is often the way of privilege. The kid is doubly fortunate for having both the upbringing and a seemingly innate talent with magic. Having never been properly instructed in how not to be an ass, the kid makes a total nightmare of that first job, dicking over everyone involved and running off to build a castle called Reddit or something
But wait! There is redemption. After all, it is Disney.
Eventually, the love of a sister, a sister’s friend, an animal, and a talking snowman prevail on this person to chill out with the isolation and selfishness; to look around and see people who are suffering.
To help.
Now, I gotta give it to Kate, I don’t know if there’s anything for a 21-year-old woman to learn from this movie. If you haven’t seen the movie, the protagonist is 21, and there are some spoilers below, I guess.
As an allegory, it’s pretty compelling to a forty-year-old man, and I think about these lessons all the time.
Don’t shut people out.
Listen. Seriously, just listen. Even if you’re scared.
You have power and privilege, and no amount of denying it is going to make it go away. Use it for good, not for evil, not for selfishness, and certainly not to make snow monsters.
Fractals!
Parenting: don’t take advice from trolls.
Let it go.
You are beautiful, and people love you.
Despite of, and because of, you.