Lessions From Disney: Talking to Your Kids About Loyalty

I wrote some blog posts for another site. Those blogs are being taken down, but because I worked hard on the pieces, I'm keeping them anyway

Today’s Lesson: The Price of Loyalty
Materials:

• Movie: Treasure Island
• One Black Spot
• Treasure Map
• Pirate Ship
• Talking Parrot

Loyalty is a virtue to be treasured. And it might be treasure that is worth its weight in gold. But just how far should it go? These are the questions presented in the classic novel by Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island.
It’s a wonderful book if your kid is old enough to read, but it’s also a great film for younger ones and movie lovers in general. The film starring Bobby Driscol as Jim Hawkins and Robert Newton as the one-legged pirate of all pirates, Long John Silver, sailed into theaters in 1950. It was the Walt Disney Studios’ first completely live-action film and the first screen version of Treasure Island made in color.
In the film, young Jim Hawkins gets pulled into the world of piracy when a sea captain named Billy Bones dies at the Hawkins family inn after being presented with a black spot. Right before dying, Bones gives Hawkins a map to the legendary treasure of Captain Flint and warns him about a one-legged man.
Jim runs from the inn and gives the map to Squire Trewlany and Doctor Livesy, who make plans to head out to sea onboard Captain Smollet’s Hispanola, with Jim as cabin boy. Trewlany hires a sea cook – with one leg, Jim notices. It is, of course, Long John Silver, who hires the remainder of the crew made up of his fellow pirates. Silver has his own reasons for coming aboard the Hispanola: He wants the treasure for himself. Silver befriends Jim, also for reasons that aren’t entirely clear: Is he using Jim, or does he genuinely like him?

Was Jim so desperate for a friend that he was willing to side with a pirate to get that friendship?

Onboard, when Jim overhears Silver planning mutiny he is told to keep being friends with Silver, so he can learn more.
“Stay friends with him?” Jim says warily. “Yes sir, I’ll stay friends with him.”
Jim’s loyalty to both sides becomes increasingly difficult and, while maintaining loyalty to Smollet, he still doesn’t want anything to happen to Silver. As cutthroat as Silver is, he really has a friendship with young Jim. When the ship makes its way to “treasure island,” and battle lines are drawn, Jim is given the map and told by the doctor to use it to save his life if he needs to.
When Jim is stabbed in the arm during the fighting, Silver expresses genuine concern (after taking the map from him). He keeps the other pirates from attacking Jim and says he is “taking care of him proper.” He waves the white flag to bring the doctor to the fort, telling the men he will trade Jim for the map (they don’t know he already has it). And he parlays with the doctor, telling him: “You could cut my good leg off before I lay a finger on [Jim].”
When the doctor comes to rescue Jim, Jim says he can’t leave because he gave “Long John” his word.
Now that Silver has the map, will he find the treasure – and, if so, will he get away with it? Will Jim help him or stop him?
Was Jim so desperate for a friend that he was willing to side with a pirate to get that friendship? When loyalties are tested, why are we drawn to one side over the other? Will the lure of friends always win out over the stability of parents?
In the end, Treasure Island is more about a hunt for a treasure, than the treasure itself. It’s about loyalty, friendship and the legacy you hope the leave. And - just like the black spot – once you are marked as a friend (or an enemy), it is a hard label to lose. Ay matey!