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Tangled

Rapunzel.jpg
Tangled.webp
Mother Gothel.webp

Tangled is the typical story of Rapunzel, with Rapunzel being kidnapped as a child and locked up in a tower for all of her life. Rapunzel’s kidnapper, Mother Gothel, who she believes to be her mother, keeps her in the tower by emotionally manipulating her, scaring her into thinking the world will murder her as soon as she leaves the tower, as well as gaslighting her whenever she brings up the subject.

For this clip, I was able to find a video of most of the times that Mother Gothel maltreated Rapunzel in Tangled. In the classic Disney tale of Rapunzel, it is clear that Mother Gothel is the villain in the story. Even if you haven’t watched it, one can infer from all of the emotional abuse she inflicts on her so-called “daughter”. Throughout the movie, in order to keep Rapunzel within her grasp, she lies, and manipulates her, with gaslighting being her main weapon of choice. NBC states, “Psychologists use the term “gaslighting” to refer to a specific type of manipulation where the manipulator is trying to get someone else (or a group of people) to question their own reality, memory, or perceptions. And it’s always a serious problem, according to psychologists” (DiGiulio). As it is a Disney movie, the audience is not able to see much turmoil within Rapunzel through her journey caused by the abuse, however, in the end when she confronts Mother Gothel for everything she has done to her, she lets her anger at her “mother” for what she has inflicted upon her throughout her life. Despite not having much of a reaction, Mother Gothel’s treatment of Rapunzel was still horrible in terms of emotional and verbal abuse. By lying about the real world, speaking about how there were “men with pointy teeth” and other things that would typically frighten an innocent 17-year-old, Mother Gothel was taking apart not only her courage to go out into the real world, but destroying her self confidence, as well. Both mothers and fathers should want to build their children up to go out into the world, not make them scared enough to stay with them for as long as possible. This goes along with all of the other things Mother Gothel has told to Rapunzel. Instead of building up confidence and general skills that are needed for adulthood, Mother Gothel decides that it would be better to have Rapunzel be socially and physically dependent on her that way, in her mind, even if she does manage to get out of her hands, she would be too socially inept to function outside of her care. Obviously, this was not the case; Mother Gothel underestimated Rapunzel’s strength, but even just as a regular mother, it is extremely harmful to hold your children back, in any way, just for their selfish wants.

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