According to BoundingIntoComics:
After going to war on behalf of the LGBTQ community with the state of Florida over the Parental Rights in Education bill, Disney is bending the knee to Middle Eastern bans on LGBTQ content on their streaming services.
Disney and Pixar’s Lightyear was a massive bomb at the box office, losing the company over $100 million dollars after calculating marketing, production and end costs. As Disney shifts to move its film to Disney+ in hopes of boosting streaming numbers, the film will not be available in Middle Eastern countries following Disney’s decision to frontload a lesbian couple in the movie’s marketing.
The film joins a growing list of Disney-backed films such as Thor: Love and Thunder, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, West Side Story, and Eternals that have been banned in Middle Eastern countries due to the display of LGBTQ characters within the films. In a move to prevent the media giant from being banned from the region outright, Disney confirms that Disney+ will indeed align with local censorship rules.
“Content offerings differ across our many Disney+ markets, based upon a number of factors. Content available should align with local regulatory requirements,” a Disney representative told THR in a statement, while also stressing that the platform offers parental controls to allow families to determine what their family members watch.
Disney+ will simply not release some of their biggest films in the last couple of years in order to avoid angering foreign audiences. The decision to avoid upsetting the Middle East based on their views towards LGBTQ content is a major shift from how Disney took on Ron DeSantis and the state of Florida earlier this year.
