Would You Put a Swimsuit on a Platypus? (With Pic)

Somewhere between fact, folklore, and urban legend we heard this: Walt Disney’s cartoon character Donald Duck was once banned in Finland because he didn’t wear pants.

That seems a bit much coming from a country where mixed genders, young and old, sit buck naked in the sauna.  But, hey, if we have to choose between a country with naked saunas or Donald Duck, pass the pickled herring and get us jobs in the Nokia factory.

Anyway, can we all agree that putting pants on a cartoon duck, or a real duck, just doesn’t make any sense?  Can we agree that a bathing suit on a swimming Platypus would be Goofy too? ( Uh oh. We just mentioned Donald Duck and Goofy in the same post.  Maybe Disney trademark police will flag this. )

Is it such a stretch, then, to ask why anyone thinks Lycra or Nylon trunks are an improvement over our bare skin when we go swimming?  Maybe even Walt Disney didn’t think so.  He started the movie Pollyanna with a bare bum shot of a kid holding a rope who then swings out and drops into the ole’ swimming hole.

So maybe there’s hope.  Walt Disney wouldn’t clothe a duck or a skinny dipper.  Now if we can just release him from that cryogenic chamber he’s frozen in and thaw him out, Walt can help us!  Oh yeah. We’re back to urban legend again…



04/24/12 Update:  Here is the story behind the (erroneous) rumor that Finland banned Donald over his lack of trousers.  Turns out the city of Helsinki simply stopped buying the Duck's comics for its library system as a budgetary measure.   According to Snopes.com .