Secular Myth-Making, Ritual & Commerce, Disney

Disney is doing something only the Catholic Church accomplished half a millennium ago

Casual Disney fandom (much of the Western world, and beyond), and on through serious self-avowed Disney-mega-fandom (we all know these sweet folks), this corporation has institutionalized secular myth-making and ritual and turned a broad subset of the world into parishioners.

Disney’s intellectual property (TV shows, books, movies, memorabilia & toys) and Theme Park experiences combine to show what a secular institution could accomplish over the period of a century, achieving something only achieved by ancient established cultures (Vedic lineage, Buddhism, Christianity before the reformation, Islam), state-sponsored religions (Anglican church before liberalization) or nation-states in the past.

At the risk of parallelomania, here I list the different aspects of traditional religion that Disney have carried over into a secular context and used it to create a massive multi-billion-dollar top-down institution with tens of millions of adherents (casual to mega-fan).

Notably, for most secular institutions (even large and successful entertainment properties such as NBC Universal / DreamWorks, LEGO Group, etc.) this sort of extensive list doesn’t quite make sense. And even then, Disney did it first and better.