The Shady Side Of Disney Parks

If you ever get the feeling that Disney is just a little too perfect, know that it's all part of the park's clever sleight of hand. Disney Imagineers know better than most that magic isn't just about kicking up the wow factor. Often, the things you don't see are just as important when it comes to pulling off the perfect vacay — like the fact that Disney Parks stay almost completely free of trash. And then there's the way Disney Imagineers manage to draw guests' eyes away from all of the physical infrastructure that might otherwise take them out of the fantasy.

Using a special paint known as Go Away Green, aka Disney's version of camouflage, two proprietary colors are so effective at hiding things in plain sight that guests see them all day long and typically don't register them. Our eyes naturally tend to overlook mundane pastels that blend into the landscape, focusing instead on the more eye-popping colors of attractions like Main Street and Cinderella Castle.

The grayish Go Away Green helps speakers, construction walls, and partitions blend into the background. The color is even used to detract from the door of DIsney's exclusive private membership joint, Club 33. Its dull bluish counterpart, Blending Blue, is typically used to hide or blend buildings into their surroundings. Several examples of both can be seen in a TikTok video from The Mouselets that went viral in 2022.

Perhaps no corporation has generated more modern folklore and urban legends than the world of Disney Parks. But occasionally, they turn out to be true, like the claim that Disney Parks has a fancy secret club hidden in plain sight. Then there's the once true but now outdated claim that yelling "Andy's coming" would cause all of the Disney "Toy Story" characters to suddenly drop. 

As it turns out, the decades-old rumor that Disney's iconic dark ride, Pirates of the Caribbean, once contained real human bones is also true. Like any good pirate story, the classic boat ride, which originally opened in 1967 at Disneyland, features no shortage of three things: Boozing buccaneers, pillaged treasure, and bones. In his book "Pirates of the Caribbean: From the Magic Kingdom to the Movies," veteran Imagineer Jason Surrell claims that rumors about those bones' authenticity are rooted in truth.

According to Surrell, after designing the ride's background and populating it with animatronic swashbucklers, Imagineers felt they'd done a pretty convincing job. But there was just one problem: The fake skeletons available in the 1960s were just a little too kitschy to be taken seriously. Fortunately, somebody had a pal in the anatomy department at UCLA who was willing to give them the hookup. If that sounds ethically dodgy, Surrell insists the park has since replaced the real bones with suitable replacements.

There's nothing like taking a leisurely stroll down Main Street U.S.A., an uncannily wholesome, fictional American town from a time long past. Guests love snapping pics of its perfect little shops and high-flying flags. But as they share their vacation photos with friends back home, a few more scrutinizing folks have started to notice something strange lurking in the background: Flags with fuzzy math. The Internet buzzed with the discovery as folks began to notice flags with the wrong number of stars. Soon, rumors began to crop up around the Internet that Disney uses poser flags so they don't have to respect flag code by taking every single flag down or lowering them to half-mast.

But that doesn't necessarily mean someone at Disney's props department sat around and decided to come up with a bunch of fake flag concepts to scatter across the parks. As some seriously eagle-eyed experts have noted, the flags that don't have 50 stars — one for each state as of 2023 — seem to represent U.S. flags of the past. Since areas like Frontierland and Main Street are meant to be something of a time warp, including a flag with 45 or 48 stars makes a lot more sense. According to the Disney Parks Blog, eager flag spotters can also find examples of the historic John Cabot flag, Pine Tree flag, Grand Union flag, and many more waving around the park.

Part of the appeal of Disney Parks is the chance to step outside the harsh, cold reality of the real world and into a fantasy where everyone is happy and the world has a nice, glittery sheen. When you're lining up to take a spin on Dumbo or taking a bite of a delicious candied bacon skewer, the last thing you need is for the socioeconomic plight of cast members to fracture your suspension of disbelief.

The prevalence of financial and housing insecurity among Disney employees is explored at length in "Sunbelt Blues: The Failure of American Housing" by Andrew Ross. In the book, Ross highlights the long commute many cast members find themselves scraping up gas money for, and the fact that their wages barely cover the cost of food and housing. A 2018 report in Economic Roundtable found that wages had actually fallen for Disneyland Resort workers between 2000 and 2017. To boot, nearly three-quarters of Disneyland employees said they didn't make enough money to meet their basic needs and more than half of them expressed worry over the possibility of eviction. Working at a resort that most employees likely wouldn't be able to afford to visit themselves serves as a bitter reminder of America's ever-widening wage inequality gap. 

For aspiring cast members who want to become Disney characters but don't love the idea of getting manhandled by randos, snuggling into a cute little Pooh or Tigger suit might sound appealing. But apparently, becoming a furry for Disney comes with its own set of problems — namely, the oppressive Florida heat and humidity.

Part of the Disney magic means cast members in costume are never allowed to break character. It actually makes sense since seeing a human burst out of Mickey could qualify as a childhood-ruining moment for some kids. But that means no matter how hot and miserable they get in the Florida heat, the folks in Disney character suits have to stay the course until they're safely back in the utilidors running beneath the parks. According to a TikTok video shared by The Mouselets, a former cast member said failure to do so would result in termination. It's yet another contention supported by the tea-spilling book, "Inside the Mouse." Said one cast member, "During the parades, I've seen many characters in 90-degree heat vomit in their costumes and faint on the floats and were never taken off the float."

When you're walking around the Disney Parks taking in the delights of the Smellitizers, it's probably best not to think about what else could be wafting in the breeze. Apparently, it's fairly common for folks to ask their loved ones to spread their ashes at Disney — so many that the park even has its own secret security code for addressing the issue when it arises.

In 2018, the Wall Street Journal confirmed the severity of the problem, reporting that guests realize ash-spreading isn't allowed, but that doesn't stop them any more than it stops folks from smuggling boxed wine into the Magic Kingdom. According to the Journal, guests are regularly caught slipping pill bottles or plastic bags full of remains past security. Favorite spots for disposal of loved ones' remains include It's a Small World, Pirates of the Caribbean, and the Haunted Mansion. One cast member quipped, "The Haunted Mansion probably has so much human ashes in it that it's not even funny."

When cast members spy a guest sprinkling Grandad's remains, they call for a "HEPA cleanup," a code that refers to the ultra-fine vacuum used to fix the problem. That cleanup also includes the offending guest: According to Disney rules, anyone caught leaving Gramps behind will be escorted from the premises.