Petition to Robert Chapek

A Petition on Behalf of America’s Children

To: Mr. Robert Chapek, CEO The Walt Disney Company, 500 S. Buena Vista St., Burbank, CA 91521

Dear Mr. Chapek:

I congratulate you on becoming the CEO of The Walt Disney Company, an institution trusted by millions with entertainment that is safe for children and families. I also congratulate you on your own family. Family and children are our most precious personal and national assets.

That is why I join with Parents Television Council (PTC) and my fellow PTC members to implore you to remove the new miniseries A Teacher (shown on Disney property Hulu) from your streaming roster and never offer another such program. A Teacher depicts the predatory sexual relationship (explicitly) between a 30-something married female high school teacher and her underage male student.

While the show’s creators suggest that this television program is a “warning” against such relationships, scientific research confirms that presenting such explicit sexual and romantic depictions in media lead to tolerance, approval, and imitation by young people in real life.

No matter what kind of warnings they place in front of the program, it glamorizes – and even romanticizes – something so abhorrent. Disney knows full-well of the enormous impact its programming has on children.

Mr. Chapek, this programming is insidiously toxic and dangerous to impressionable young people! There is no amount of warning that can mitigate this danger. It is nothing that a company with Disney’s brand and heritage should be producing or distributing. Please put children first and remove this program.

With concern for America’s children,

Signed: