The true American social classes

This implies we all want to go to disney as if it is the ultimate goal to work towards. I'd rather go to the ZOO.

I have friends that used to go to Disney 2-3 times a year. They did not live in Florida. They used to spend so much money to go multiple times a year.
They are now declaring bankruptcy.
Going to Disney is just keeping up with the Joneses.
- It is not just Disney, vacations in general for a family are very expensive but a lot of people are doing them. Granted some of thwm prolly have the money but I bet most don't but they do it.
  I don't understand why people obsess over vacations so much. Such a weird "consumer" behaviour

Eh, this doesn't quite hold up. Grandparents are retired boomers in Florida so you get to go all summer, but your parents are living paycheck to paycheck.

+4. rents out the entire park for an exclusive vacations
- I would say: Owns Disney
  
  How much of Disney and where private jet

I went to Disney once and I have to say I was not impressed. I mean once you went and saw it why would you go back?
- They get new rides, new installments, new exclusive merch, etc., but you’re right for the most part.
- Same. I went about 25 years ago when my kids were little, and I still think it's too soon to go back.
- I would go back with my kids.
  Also, typhoon lagoon is very repeatable.

I don't think this works. I know DINKs and single people who work normal jobs (and a shitload of overtime) and go to Disney like six times a year because they're total Disney freaks. Like, adult Disney people who get Disney tattoos and shit. It's a whole vibe.
- No kids and they choose to go to Disney? You could go to any number of foreign cities or beautiful beaches and they choose Disney? Wtf?
  
  Why go to any number of foreign cities when you can visit everything in Epcot?
  /s
  
  Tell me about it. I think it's bonkers.
  
  Disney is for the real elites who also enjoy surf and turf to signal their rank.
- DINKs are already an entirely separate class tbh.
  
  Very expensive. Hwuh huh.

The amazing thing to me is that Disney used to be cheap entertainment. 1955 admission was $1.10 with rides costing 10 to 35 cents. A teenager could take a date there for what they'd earn in an afternoon. Prices for movies, sporting events, and concerts were similar.
- This is known as the cost disease. As manufacturing gets increasingly optimized, automated and cheap, the share of income that needs to be spent on everything else increases. For example, housing and services like live entertainment or healthcare.
  
  cost disease. I never heard of this before.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baumol_effect

I consider myself well off and have never been to Disney. It just seems like a regular park with more hype.

There's a Mickey park next to where I live (not US) but I never even considered going. I never saw it as anything other than a way to pull US tourists and children in (the two main target demographics apparently).

My Uncle and his family are like this, his kids are adults now and they still go to Disney every year.
We're Canadian. and he is a staunch opponent of the Canadian Healthcare system, He believes that because he can personally throw money at a Doctor, that everyone should be treated that way, first paid first served.

Fuck this noise. The only classes that matter are the people who are rich enough to own Disneyland, and everyone else. Quibbling over whose shit sandwich is bigger is just dividibg ourselves for their benefit.
- This.
  50% of the economy in the US is controlled by the "Whenever the fuck I want" class.
- “Give a man a gun and he can rob a bank, but give a man a bank, and he can rob the world.”
  ― Jim Trotter
  
  This is being attributed to Jim Trotter, but I can't find a source for this claim. I can't even find when he is supposed to have said it…
  It was definitely said in Mr. Robot (2015), and it was definitely not said in the movie The Skulls (2000), no one in that entire movie ever says "bank", despite what some people on reddit claim.
  According to this blog post, the oldest tweet is from 28 Nov 2011 @Bonoboism.
  Maybe someone else can find a better source.
  Note: I'm linking only to archives, not to either reddit or xitter.
- I consider it more of a spectrum, those who are rich enough to own Disneyland on the one hand and those who are fucked the most by the system that benefits the people who are rich enough to own Disneyland on the other. Not everyone is equally fucked by the system that benefits the people who are rich enough to own Disneyland. But you're right about the shit sandwich.
- Nah there are plenty of edible rich people who aren't rich enough to own Disney Land
  
  The wealthy people who can’t afford to own Disneyland are closer to you than they are the people who can afford to own Disneyland.
- I understand what you're trying to do with the 'class is the only thing that matters', but I don't think that is going to fly well in the US, specifically and especially when trying to get groups with troubled histories between one another to work together.
  Trying to unify people by ignoring or erasing their personal or communal identities and histories is not going to be effective at unification IMO.
  
  You sound like a Russian propagandist. It's us against billionaires trying to eat our planet. It doesn't get more complex than that.
  1 person does not get to decide how 99% of the resources are spent.
  
  Quite the non sequitur

Fuck Disney, fuck dividing the non-super rich

Not accurate. Plenty of broke people go to Disney regularly. I know a couple of them.
- Most of them up and move their entire lives to be within driving distance of it even when unable to afford. Disney families are something else
- Yeah there's the 'goes into debt to go to disney' crowd. That's me.

Is there a "went to Disney recently and didn't like it" category?
- Not anymore, you're now declared an undesirable immigrant and will be deported.
- Don't need to go there to know I wouldn't like this commercial overcrowded monstrosity

There should be another Disney class. The “Lightning Pass/Stayed at a Disney Resort/going to multiple parks over several days” Class
The park fees alone are pretty expensive if you’d like to see more than just “Disneyland” and want to see EPCOT, Studios, etc. The try to ride the rides during any popular season you buy Lightning Passes for hundreds or even a thousand more per person, pay for parking over multiple days, stay at an expensive “resort” property…
Yeah. You can go “cheap” and stay off property, but it’s a whole different experience.

galaxy brain -- doesn't want to go to disney
- Their advertising made me actively not want to go. They show kids screaming with joy at their parents saying they are going. My reaction would have been like, ok. I knew this, I didn't want to go because I felt like I would disappoint my parents with a lack of excitement over going.
  
  I love Jenny Nicholson but I avoid her videos about theme parks just so I don't develop my own obsession with Disney. I already like Nintendo too much...

Education levels in the US:
Calls it Disney
Calls it by the location of the park
Calls it by the actual name of the specific park
- Goes to Disney World
  Goes to Disneyland
  Goes to Disneyland Paris.
  
  The first two could be swapped, and isn't Disney World "better" in many regards? One reason Disney secretly bought all the land in Florida was to better do what he wanted to do in California but couldn't because of space and regulations.

As a British guy who worked in the USA for a while, my colleagues couldn’t fathom that I had no interest in going to Disneyland. It was kinda weird the obsession some of them had with it.
- Yeah, it's weird and cringy how into it some adults are. I think part of it is status, though. Everyone knows Disney is expensive, so taking your family is a way to show off your status to everyone with the pics you take for social media.
- Cult of Disney is eerily real. Maybe it's the US version of how some Brits obsess over the royalty.
- Universal is better anyways.
- I remember growing up in the UK and Disneyland or Disney world was always a bit of a joke about giving loads of offers but no takers.
  Then again, it wasn't until I met Americans growing up did I realize how seriously they took Thanksgiving too.

I'm a native Floridian who's never been to Disney. Other Floridians seem disgusted by my presence when it comes up

Went to Disney 3x. Once when my grandpa died, then my grandma, then my dad. Allllll paid for by life insurance payouts. Not sure where I fit in here.
- Grave robber
  
  I know this is a joke but there's people who don't accept life insurance payouts because they legitimately feel this way.
- We'll let you hang out in the middle group.
  I went once in my early 20s. Drove all night with a friend and stayed with his grandparents. Figured I should see what it's like since my parents didn't have vacation money when I was a kid.
  Magic Kingdom was pretty lame to a 23 year old stoner. Should have spent the gas money on drugs.

Once dated a girl who's family who had season passes to Disney.
Neither I nor they even live in the USA.

Disney, where you have to be told how to have fun, where to take pictures and pay too much for crap made in China.

The really wealthy families aren’t going to a Disney park either. Their kids have had passports since before they could walk, and the family is going to an exclusive foreign resort for a trip that costs more for a week than most folks make in a year.
- I assumed the classes were
  Never Disney = Rich/Poor Sometimes = Upper-middle Annually = Middle Class

I went from "goes to Disney Land annually" to "hasn't been to Disney Land for over 20 years."
- I'm the opposite: 1 time in my first 18 years, 2 times in my first 47 years, 6 times in 2025.
  I wonder what the class system is for annual pass holding Floridians.
  
  meth class

Season pass holder
Season pass and Lightning Lane pass holder
Member of Club 33
- This is the right answer.
  Club 33 is the name of a number of private dining clubs. As of March 2025, the reported cost to join had increased to $80,000 with annual costs of $22,000.
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Club_33
  People who go to Disneyland multiple times a year could be just a Disney gay who lives close to the park. They are not some exclusive class.

Long ago when the family lived in Florida near Orlando and prices were a lot cheaper, resident discounts made a whole summer's worth of visits worth it. We realized the hypocrisy when the kids started getting bored of certain rides because they had done them so much, meanwhile some people even then would save up money for a one time visit of a day or so.
But overall the kids did have fun. It was a unique thing to experience.

I believe this only applies to the USA portion of America and not the other 29 countries

Sigma grindset: - doesn’t know what Disney is

Been once not that fun...

You missed: Florida resident

Damn that's real af 💀

Where is "bought DVC points on the used market to make going every two or three years a reasonable thing"?
- How’s this work? I’ve been saving up for years to take my family and am all ears on anything that can make it more affordable.
  
  Not sure what your price range is, but they've been offering some decent discounts for this coming summer (possibly hurting with tourist travel down). Saw this one for people with Disney+ but there are others out there - https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/disney-plus-room-offer/
  Depending on what kind of trip you're aiming for, staying at their "resorts" can be cheaper or easier. However if you're going real cheap, then don't bother with the resorts.
  
  DVC is Disney Vacation Club, their own in-house time share thing. You buy points which are attached to a specific resort, means you get 11 months lead time on booking, where anyone else would get like 6 months I think? You can exchange those points for other resorts if you want, but you get knocked down to that 6 months time frame, too.
  You can borrow points from next year, and bank points from last year. That's what makes "every two or three years" work out nicely. Unused points can be rented to other people if you can't use them before they expire. Different resorts have more or less expensive points, depending on how popular/nice they are. We've got some Boardwalk Orlando, which are on the pricier side, because we like it for what it is and its location, which is basically steps from Epcot, and not far from Hollywood Studios.
  If you buy direct from DVC, you get some additonal benefits that do not carry over to resale market points, but I forget exactly what those are. This vacation time share model is really for people who know what they like, know they like to (and can) go regularly enough, and can afford not just the points but also the yearly upkeep fee that goes along with them. If you're saving up to go once, it's probably not a good idea yet.
  Before we had the DVC, we'd go every five or more years, and we usually stayed at Art of Animation. (Pop Century is right next door, similarly priced.) Family of five makes doing a Disney trip with a single room a little tricky, because a lot of the on property resorts are max four. We've also gone once staying off property, which is absolutely cheaper, but adds to travel times in and out of the parks. This can add frustration if you've got small children - but even the far-flung resorts that only offer buses are travel-heavy. On property lodging can offer ample time to go back to the room and take a break if needed - another thing that's easier if your resort is closer to whatever park(s) you've got going on for the day.
  If you think that's a lot, my wife is 100x more brilliant with all this stuff than I am.