Disney slammed for portraying female character with 'unrealistic' body

Disney has been criticized by social media users after depicting one of its animated female characters with an "unrealistic" body type.

Per the Daily Mail, the issue was first raised on social media when a Twitter user with the handle '@Glitch_Plantbro' (whose account on the social network has apparently since been suspended) posted a screenshot of an animated woman from the 2016 short film Inner Workings.

According to The Mail, the short tells the story of an office worker named Paul who wishes to romantically pursue a woman named Kate. However, Kate's character design gives her a tiny waist, long, skinny neck, and prominent, oversized buttocks.

'Glitch_Plantbro' appeared to espouse the belief that Kate's dimensions promoted an unrealistic female body type, after they uploaded a screenshot of her to Twitter, accompanied by the caption: "'In no world did [Disney] need to do this."

A number of other Twitter users appeared to agree with this sentiment. For instance, one person replied:

"I know it's just a cartoon but for the love of god... they need to put some belly on that girl.

"[It] makes me sad thinking kids out here thinking that's how their body should look... It's naturally impossible to have a booty like that with no belly at all!!! [sic]"

Meanwhile, another Twitter user wrote: "And funny how Disney back the days were making realistic proportions of princesses and princes - no big eyes, no extreme waist, everything was so much nicer when looking normal.

"Funny how they make big eyes now for kids to 'understand emotions' like what kind of bs is that? [sic]"

Meanwhile, someone else chimed in:

"What's with the smashed body proportions it looks wrong and strange purpose for comedy reasons it's not funny I'm sorry but this is just lazy character development. [sic]"

However, other social media users have defended the character's appearance, and claim that critics are overreacting - especially considering that most other characters in the short have the same exaggerated physique commonly associated with a caricature.

Whatever your take on Kate's design, it's clear that Disney is paying extra attention to social issues these days, and are even more cautious than ever about the possibility of bad PR.

For example, Disney's streaming service now includes racism warnings for movies such as Peter Pan, The Jungle Book, and Dumbo, among others.