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"Our society has a shared soft spot for romantic Disney movies (and modern love stories like Twilight), but it turns out these fantasy films may have long-lasting, detrimental effects on your love life. The &amp;amp;#8220;Disney complex&amp;amp;#8221; sends the message that women can fix terrible men or relationships, according to fascinating Australian research. At first it&amp;amp;#8217;s weird to think cartoons could be that powerful, but it makes sense. We usually watch these movies during our most formative years, when we&amp;amp;#8217;re quickly absorbing information about how the world works. Disney movies teach us many things: good triumphs over evil, courage is a prized characteristic, and happy endings don&amp;amp;#8217;t exist without love. A perfect example of this is Beauty and the Beast, which I used to think was incredibly romantic. I mean, the Beast gives Belle a library. Best gift ever! But think about their relationship before that: He holds her hostage from her father, the one person she loves most in the world. She befriends cutlery just so she can have some company. He only eventually becomes a good guy because, by being unwaveringly kind to him, Belle &amp;amp;#8220;fixes&amp;amp;#8221; him. It&amp;amp;#8217;s not quite as sweet as it seems on the surface. The same thing goes for many romantic comedies. From Failure to Launch to Knocked Up, romantic-comedy heroines are often tasked with the job of changing the objects of their affection from rude, immature man-children to dateworthy prospects. Even He&amp;amp;#8217;s Just Not That Into You went against its own teaching that this type of story line, where the bachelor who loves single life drops everything for the girl who isn&amp;amp;#8217;t his type, is the exception instead of the rule! Thankfully, some romantic comedies don&amp;amp;#8217;t fall into this trap. In The Break-Up, Jennifer Aniston&amp;amp;#8217;s character realizes she can&amp;amp;#8217;t change her boyfriend&amp;amp;#8217;s juvenile ways, so she&amp;amp;#8217;s done. The movie&amp;amp;#8217;s ambiguous ending was so refreshing, I want to stand up and cheer each time I see it. I know we see movies so we can escape the reality of everyday life. After all, no one wants to watch relationship after relationship fail on the big screen. Still, media influences our perceptions of the world more than we realize. It took me and my friends too long to realize that if a guy wasn&amp;amp;#8217;t committing, he probably wasn&amp;amp;#8217;t going to come around and make some grand gesture that would win us over. A lot of that was due to naive hope, sure, but at least a little of it was rooted in the fact that we&amp;amp;#8217;ve seen that exact dynamic play out so many times. Why couldn&amp;amp;#8217;t it happen to us too? There&amp;amp;#8217;s not going to be a Disney or romantic-comedy boycott in my future. They both make me happy and have added so much value to my life, whether it&amp;amp;#8217;s through nostalgic flashbacks or bonding sessions with friends. Even so, I&amp;amp;#8217;m glad someone&amp;amp;#8217;s addressing the fact that we should leave the idea of picture-perfect relationships behind once the credits roll. So what do you think? Has your love life been influenced by Disney movies? What about romantic comedies? "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.glamour.com/sex-love-life/blogs/smitten/2014/08/are-disney-movies-affecting-yo>