Thursday, February 24, 2011
Hierarchy within the Demon World
In this episode I found myself drawn to the hierarchical dynamics within the society of demons. The Scourge believes that they are the superior group of demons. They are 'pure bloods'. They represent every group of people, throughout history, who have ever believed themselves to be superior to another group. I found them comparable to the German Nazi's because of their quest to eliminate the 'half bloods' and create a race of 'pure blood' demons. This leaves those, deemed inferior, to live in hiding just as the Jewish people were forced to do during the Nazi invasion. Their 'Hitler style' leader justifies the killing of 'half bloods' by stating that these actions are what "The higher order demands." He sends them forth to finish the job of eliminating the 'half bloods' with the 'beacon of light'. The 'beacon of light' destroys anything with human blood. I found it curious that they call this 'death tool' a 'beacon of light'. A beacon is a guiding light. Its name gives an image of purity and salvation, neither of which is what the 'half bloods' will receive when it detonates. Maybe it represents what The Scourge believes is the light to creating their demon purity and saving them from inevitable annihilation from demon/human mixing . It is a twisted belief, yes, but fear rooted in ignorance creates a powerful emotion and, sometimes, devastating outcome. In this case, of course, evil does not triumph and Doyle is giving the opportunity to atone for his prior inaction.
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6 comments:
The want for a pure race reminded me of Harry Potter's world and their constant want for pure wizards and hate agianst mixed bloods, or muggles. I think the theme of wanting a "pure" group is common in any show, movie, or book that talks about people with some kind of special characteristic. I am not sure why there is a want for pureness. One idea could be because they want the special characteristic they possess to stay within their people or maybe they want to keep themselves pure so they are strongest and/or superior. Allowing for half-breeds allows for anyone to become part of their special world.
In response to your statement that "fear rooted in ignorance creates powerful emotion," I would just like to say that, while this might have been true, to some extent, in Hitler's Germany, never does Whedon emphasize the Scourge as working out of fear or ignorance. These pureblood demons obviously have a deep seated contempt for anyone that is not pure, leading them to engage in their fanatical quest of extermination.
I like how you described the demons being in hiding as a anne frank esque reference, that is a smart addition to the nazi-demon idea.
I also think Jonathan, your comment about the scourge not acting in fear is really good too. Maybe the original nazi ideology was similar these demons. We have to remember that the people who were in the nazi party were just humans, whereas these characters were all demon, and not human at all.
This was a good post in looking at the similarities between the two. Something I've always thought was the Nazis looked human, but certainly didn't act human. The Scourge wanted to rid the world of half-breeds, while the Nazis wanted to rid the world of anyone not under German descent.
Jonathan's point about the lack of ignorance on the part of the Scourge is interesting. In a way, that makes them scarier! They know what they are doing and they don't care.
I feel like we touched on this only slightly, but the making of them as lacking in ignorance actually makes them NOT synonymous with Nazis, who, were, after all, just people, deeply misguided, and capable of atrocities, but still people (not demons).
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