Unikum november 2019

scar did nothing wrong
“The Lion King” is “rule by divine right”
propaganda, and I am here to convince you
that Scar did in fact do nothing wrong.
Ok, he did do some things wrong. He did kill
his brother. And sent assassins after his nephew.
He has engaged in acts that cannot strictly
speaking be claimed to be “moral” behaviour.
But sometimes a leader must do sordid things
for the greater good. And I will freely admit that
all lions – including Scar – should in a just world
get the guillotine. I mean, they are literally
preying upon other animals in order to sustain
their way of living and justifying it all with some
bullshit “circle of trickle-down life” bullshit.
the ways in which Scar is portrayed as villainous,
even though he is no different than Mufasa/Simba:
Scar is shown as blatantly sexist, forcing the
lionesses alone to hunt. Well, newsflash, that is
how all lions do it. It is still sexist and should be
changed, but no regression has happened here.
Scar is shown as a dirty, dirty fascist, literally framed
as nazi with green-lit goose-marching hyenas.
But the literal opening number of the movie has a
scene with all the animals prostrating themselves
in front of their absolute ruler – a scene that could
have been taken right out of “Triumph of the Will”.
The only difference between the fascism of Scar
and fascism of Mufasa/Simba is the colour scheme.
Anyway, I am getting side-tracked… My point
is – that although I am loath to defend a
lion – I do find it fascinating how mistreated
and maligned Scar has been as king. So, accepting
the premise of a monarchy, let me argue
why the portrayal of Scar is unfairly biased,
and how and why Scar is the better king.
The Lion King is Anti-Scar Propaganda
I must admit, “the Lion King” is a brilliant piece of
propaganda. They do not actually try to hide much;
most things they just heavily spin in favour of the
traditionalist and absolutist monarchy. But if you
put anything under the slightest bit of scrutiny, the
propaganda falls apart. On the different policy decisions
of Mufasa/Simba and Scar, the latter is either
plainly better or equally horrible. Let’s first look at
Scar is shown as a direct and indirect murderer.
Do I even need to explain this? How the fuck do
you think lions get their food?? The only difference
between Scar and Simba/Mufasa is that
Scar did not follow the arbitrary and classist rule
against killing aristocrats. (Although Simba was
admittedly somewhat closer to getting this right
with his hippy-like insect diet. It’s a shame he
doesn’t seem to have continued this later in life,
as well as imposing it upon the other lions)
Oh, and Scar somehow single-handedly caused a
drought?? Even if his policies somehow affected the
fucking climate, those would be policies the inherited
from Mufasa and previous kings. Because you
do not induce literal bloody climate change in the
handful of years it took Simba to grow up. I mean,
bloddy hell, he most likely he just got blamed for
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