Why Do Our Child Brains Want to Have Sex with Disney Characters?

The first time I watched Disney’s The Sword in the Stone , I was entranced. The magic, the adventure, and that saucy little minx with do-me eyes. You know who I’m talking about—yeah, that squirrel. That fuckable little nut fiend—ah! Oh god, ew. Sorry. Forget I said that. Let me start over.

The Sword in the Stone is classic Disney—it is an epic coming of age quest with memorable characters like Merlin, the whacky wizard, Arthur, the precocious young king, and that yummy little sex puppet: that squirrel. Okay, fine, I’ll admit it. When I was a kid, every time the scene with the squirrel came on, I was like that dog from UP . I totally wanted to bang that squirrel—well, not exactly. I was around seven years old and didn’t know what “banging” was, so, mostly, I wanted to hug that squirrel really tight, then put her in my mouth and hold her there and cry until that tickly feeling in my tummy went away.

Oh, wow, you’re still here? Alright, I guess I should explain. Every guy I’ve met (willing to talk about it) had awkward childhood sex-feelings for a Disney character. Any guy who told you that Pamela Anderson was his first sex-crush wasn’t thinking about those first pre-sex feelings before they knew that there was an X to their O, a V to their D (or an M or A, to their D, as the case may be). What most men won’t tell you is that before they said “Pamela Anderson”, they suppressed a little shudder, pushing down that childhood fantasy of shoving Flounder down their pants and rubbing up and down on a chair leg till the whole kitchen smelled of garage sale sushi.

I wasn't content with making wild accusations at the entire male sex, so I went out and started pestering friends, family, and co-workers to better understand this phenomenon. The conversations went like this:

"Hey, so you know that super fuckable squirrel in The Sword in the Stone ?"

"Uh, what?"

"Sorry, I mean – I'm writing an article about how, when men are children, they often develop pre-sex sexual feelings for cartoon characters, particularly Disney ones."

"Of course you are."

"Yeah, so did you ever have these feelings and if so, for who?"

From there, I got a range of answers:

"Nala, of course."

“Oh, that woman from Hercules."

"Jasmine – I was so confused but I knew I loved her."

"Honestly, there was something about Ursula. Those tentacles, maybe."

"Every character from Alice in Wonderland ."

"Hey, I don’t want to talk about this. I just called to tell you that Grandma has COVID."

So, everyone but my Dad had a clear answer for me. More so, as the conversation progressed, nearly every guy I talked to brought up Lola Bunny from Space Jam . There is a scene in Space Jam where Lola Bunny comes sauntering into the gym, wiggling her hips, and the other characters all go gaga over her. Every man I’ve spoken to remembers this scene for one simple reason: It was the first and (maybe) last time they’d ever had the thought, “I’d fuck a rabbit.”

The repetition of this character being brought up whenever I talked about fuckable cartoons got me thinking about why this happens. The person who drew the cartoon had to have thought, at the time, “Wait, so you want me to draw what  exactly? A bunny that fucks? Right, okay. Isn’t this going to make kids feel weird?” Yes, Mr. Animator, it is  a weird feeling. It is a confusing, startling, uncomfortable, dirty feeling. Yes, it feels good. No, men of the world, you’re not alone. One friend I asked had this kind of fascination with Cruella de Vil. “I just wanted her to drive me around really fast blowing smoke in my face,” he told me.

“You remember how Nala looked at Simba?” a co-worker said. “Yeah, you remember. That was a sexy lion.” Another, standing nearby, nodded, his eyes misting over with nostalgia before adding, “And Marian from that Robin Hood Disney movie.” “Right, right,” we said before yet another co-worker joined in to tell us that he’d been so confused the first time he saw Jasmine. It felt like we’d all just realized that each had a story about falling off of their bike. It sounds like a weird conversation, but it isn’t—it isn’t because most men have had this experience. Most men remember it vividly because it happens in those years where we start to ask questions like, “Is there really a God?”, “Is Papa actually Santa Claus?”, and “Should I want to fuck that lion?”

Researching this topic, I’ve found little from men. There are plenty of open dialogues about it in LGBTQ+ communities , which is no surprise since they’ve always been 10 steps ahead of straight men in the sexual openness and maturity category. Maybe it is because talking about wanting to have sex with cartoon characters hits a little too close to home for some men. After all, PornHub’s searches for Elastigirl hit over seven million after the second movie was released . Something tells me those searches weren’t coming from confused little boys.

I’m not a psychologist but my best guess would be that children’s cartoons are designed to create obvious emotional connections. Eyes that, in a cartoon world, say “I love you” to the viewers. And to a young boy just starting to experience lust, say, “Let’s have a confusing tickle-fight in your pants.”