Leaderboard

I think this is a great, valid, and topical question. I have many of the same feelings as posters above but will add something else that we've done in the past and will continue to do. OFFSET! You know when you buy airfare and they tell you that if you pay a little more you can offset your carbon emissions for the flight? I do that for some of the places we visit! In the past I have donated to Women's and Gay Rights organizations when visiting the Middle East. The LDF, ACLU, and NAACP when in certain US States. And now will probably add Abortion Rights and LGBTQ+ orgs in our US Visits as well. Like others have said, I will not let stupid laws and rules that most of the public doesn't even support stop me from doing something I love and making me happy, but I absolutely can choose to spend the bare minimum in certain places or with certain brands. Everyone who does our trips know that I will go out of my way to avoid Chick Fil A and try to stop the bus at food stops where that's not even an option but I'm not going to ban someone from eating there, I'll just try to educate them on either better options or the offset theory that I use! We have been very vocal since before it was a thing that we don't support JK Rowling but Kristen loves Harry Potter and I'm not going to deny her something she loves because of that horrible bitch! I'll just continue to be vocal about it so people can at least know that she's terrible! Hope this helps and makes sense!

well . this happened today. (and to quote @coasterbill.. it really does explain why "Disney hasn't bothered to fight it") https://nordot.app/1013893337012584448?c=592622757532812385 here's the headline from the Orlando Sentinel "Gov. DeSantis’ new Reedy Creek board says Disney stripped its power" CNN picked it up now too: https://www.cnn.com/2023/03/29/politics/desantis-disney-board-control/index.html

If I decided to only visit places where the government has never done anything shitty or to only support businesses that have never done anything shitty or donated to anything shitty then I would never leave my house. Brit and I are both politically engaged but this is not something that we worry about 99.9% of the time.

Vote with your wallet, and do NOT feel guilty about it. but it's going to come down to your decision. *if* I were to ever go back to Dollywood - and I'd very much like to. I'd spend a lot of $$ there because Dolly is and always has been an ally, therefore I would support something she's involved with, even tangentially. But I would not spend $$ elsewhere in the area (ie: I'd stay at Dreammore, wouldn't eat downtown in Gaitlinburg, etc) unless I was certain I would feel comfortable supporting the individual business. it's basically the "rules" I follow myself now..I choose to never eat Chick-Fil-A, or Cracker Barrel. ultimately, you do what you want to do, and if you want to justify it, you can justify just about anything. but don't ever feel "guilty" about your support of something when you agree with what they do. (another perfect example: SeaWorld I really don't give a shit about what the Blackfish activists, or PETA activists try to tell me about the park. I've seen the good they do for the animals they rescue, and I'm just fine giving them my support and money). hope that input helps?

I'm not extreme. I avoid certain products if it's convenient enough. Entertainment wise, I choose what aligns within the best interests of our child related to our personal values. I avoid businesses and destinations who promote the causes that go against our values, but not at the cost of raising "the weird kid." Maybe we wont avoid most popular destinations all together, but I'll certainly avoid loading up on merchandise or buying their products elsewhere. It's a compromise. I gave exponentially fewer shits about the political environment before I had a child.

This is something I've thought a lot about, especially with the shenanigans in Florida and Tennessee. Back when Mike Pence was governor of Indiana, he did some pretty awful stuff that caused a bit of an uproar. Holiday World was pretty quick to say "They don't speak for us" and still support basic human decency, and though some of that is obviously out of not wanting to lose your customer base, I think it was genuine. There are a lot of good people in Tennessee and Florida. Disney has been done wrong by DeSantis, and I don't really quite understand what he's going for there. Just really seems like he thinks hating vulnerable people will win him votes, and he's willing to harm his state's biggest source of income to do it. Just bonkers. But DeSantis is not Florida, and from what I understand, he's not actually very popular there. As for us, we've spent a lot of time and money and effort getting ourselves to a safer place to raise a family, and a lot of it had to do with the political climate in Missouri becoming more hostile to folks like us. I think the next few vacations will probably be around the Great Lakes area, but that's more because things up here are easier to get to than they used to be than it is out of a desire to spend money in states that are aligned with our politics. Minnesota is a good place full of good people, but it's got its wackos too. Everywhere does. We'll probably get to Florida eventually. We were going to in 2020, canceled it for obvious reasons, and really haven't seen a good opportunity to reschedule yet. It'll happen when the time is right. I guess that's my long winded way of saying do what you feel is best. Whatever you decide, if you decided with good intentions, then you did all right.

^Very very helpful information. Won't count on being able to hop in line for things before park close. That's definitely an element of the Tokyo Disney parks that is unfortunate compared to the U.S. parks where you can just get in line 5 minutes before close and extend your day a bit. That, coupled with seemingly earlier close (9:00 PM) might make it difficult to get too, too much done. But we will keep our eyes peeled on how the parks are operating closer to our visit.

Honestly Amy, I won't be much help here. All my parks travel for a good ten years was done through TPR and Elissa and Robb's planning and scheduling. I think they would be better at commenting and advising. Along with pretty much everybody else you mentioned here. And "all of the above" looks pretty good, from what I'm seeing, so far. Hope any or all of this helps you.