Shortly after the announcement was made that actress Halle Bailey would play the role of Ariel in the new live-action remake of the classic 1989 film, the hashtag #notmyariel started trending on social media. This hashtag was used as a way for people to complain that the girl playing Ariel wasn't white like in the original movie.

As someone of Indian ethnicity, when it comes to how people from my culture are represented in Disney movies, pretty much all I have to go off of is Mowgli from The Jungle Book. As you can probably guess Mowgli, a 10 year old boy who lives among animals, is a little hard for me to relate to.

While Mowgli is a great character and The Jungle Book is not a bad film or story, it is for reasons like this that increasing diversity in Disney films should be something that is celebrated, not vilified.

Traditionally, Disney was not the best when it came to representing characters that weren't white. Some of the older movies from the 20th century featured characters dressing up in blackface, or the infamous brown-skinned centaur slaves in Fantasia (1940). People of color were generally demeaned, if they were shown at all. Movies like these were very much a product of their times.

More recently, Disney has done better at representing different ethnicities, cultures, and skin colors in its films. Moana was possibly the most relatable character for me, among other reasons, for the simple fact that out of all the characters in the Disney films, she was like me. A teenage girl with brown skin and curly hair.

Some people mentioned that there would be outrage if characters that were traditionally of culture, such as Pocahontas, Mulan, or Moana, were changed to white characters.

This is true but as others have already pointed out, culture was central points in all those films, and changing the ethnicity of those characters defeats the whole purpose of the story.

There are white characters in Disney whose ethnicity are relevant to the story, such as Hercules, or Merida from Brave, and if the skin color or ethnicity of those characters were to be changed, I could understand why people would be upset.

But the color of Ariel's skin is not central to her story. Frankly, it shouldn't really matter whether she is white, black, Chinese, Hispanic, etc. Yes, if you want to get technical, the race of the new actress does not match the source material. But to be fair, the original source material, written in 1836 features:

1) Ursula living in a house made of bone with plant people that strangle mermaids

2) Dead mermaids with no souls evaporating into sea foam

And finally,

3) The Little Mermaid having her tongue cut permanently from her mouth

Frankly, I think it's okay if the movie strays from the source material a little.

Personally, I'm just happy that for once they cast an actress who is actually a teenager to play the 16 year old Ariel, instead of using someone in their mid-20s.