After an angry mom's rant about "childless millennials" visiting Disney World went viral, a heated debate has spread widely across social media. Though many agree the spurned mom's post was over the top, a number of people have come out in support of the point she was trying to make, which is that adults should not be allowed to visit Disney parks without children.
The post started garnering some buzz on July 19 after a Twitter user shared a screenshot of the original Facebook message. The mom shared a recent experience at Disney World when her 3-year-old son was upset by long line at a pretzel stand. “It pisses me off TO NO END!!!!! when I see CHILDLESS COUPLES WITHOUT ANY [KIDS] AT DISNEY WORLD!!!!!” The rant reads. The anonymous woman continued to vent about how she had to chase her child around the parks all day, as well as deal with his tantrum about the pretzel line. She then went on to accuse a woman in "some very SLUTTY shorts" of making her son cry simply because she was ahead of them on the pretzel stand line.
“DW is a FAMILY amusement park!!” she continued. “DW is for CHILDREN!!!! People without CHILDREN need to BANNED!! Mothers with children should be allowed to skip all the lines!" You can read the rant in full here:
The debate was further fueled by an op-ed in the New York Post titled "Sorry, childless millennials going to Disney World is weird," which basically agreed with the woman's argument. "Millennials are indeed in an unhealthy relationship with Disney, having granted control of so much of their leisure time and personality to a single, enormous corporate entity meant for children," the op-ed reads. The author alleges that taking a trip to Disney World as a "childless millennial" leads to cultural ignorance. The author's reasoning is that you can't both go to Disney and see current films, such as Booksmart and The Farewell. "Why do the same old, safe, boring thing when you could buy a round-trip Norwegian Airlines flight from New York to Paris right now for $280, get an AirBnb and sit along the Seine drinking rosé?," he writes.
The backlash for the op-ed was swift. Detractors were quick to point out that taking a Disney parks vacation doesn't necessarily mean you don't enjoy other aspects of modern culture. While others argued that Walt Disney's original vision for his theme parks was to create a place for children and adults alike to enjoy. Another argument is that many of the rides, including Space Mountain, Flight of Passage and more, are aimed at older park goers.
What do you think: should adults be allowed to visit the Disney parks if they aren't accompanied by children?
Photo: Getty