Sadly, "Squid Game" may be right about democracy

[marmar]

Sadly, “Squid Game” may be right about democracy
"Squid Game" began as a critique of late-stage capitalism. It ends as a cautionary parable about tribalism

By Melanie McFarland
Senior Critic
Published June 27, 2025 1:30PM (EDT)

The following article contains minor spoilers for the third season of "Squid Game."


(Salon) The rules are always changing, even when they don’t appear to be. In the opening season of “Squid Game,” players are invited to vote after 255 of their fellow contestants are gunned down in a game of “Red Light, Green Light.” This vote only happens after a survivor blurts out the text of consent form clause #3: If all the players can agree to stop playing, he reminds the manager liaising with them, then the game will be terminated.

The faceless administrator pauses, as if he didn’t expect any of these fools to have read the fine print, before confirming that yes, they have a right to decide whether to stay or leave. By the razor-thin majority of one vote — a single red X — the games halt. Reason prevails, but only briefly. Not long after everyone tumbles into their normal lives again, the beastly debt snarling at their throats sends many running back to the arena either to get rich or die trying.

....(snip)....

“So many free democratic countries around the world are choosing their leaders and therefore their futures through the act of casting a vote,” the series creator observed at a For Your Consideration event that took place last month in Los Angeles. “And the reason that elections exist is . . . to provide the right direction for a society to head.”

“However,” he continued, “as we all see, it is actually leading people to even further division, hostility against one another, and it’s almost as if it’s working in the opposite way of what it was originally intended to do.”

....(snip)....

We can understand why the perilous state of “fair and free” elections was on his mind. Yoon is a hardline conservative who attempted a coup a few weeks before the second season debuted in December 2024. U.S. viewers watched those events unfold, along with Yoon’s eventual removal, and wondered why our supposedly hardier democracy couldn’t operate like we were led to believe it should. .....................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2025/06/27/squid-game-season-3-premiere/