Something that was getting shared a lot once (not too sure how true) that the whole “lion is the king of the jungle” thing was pushed by the Church in Europe to counter the pagan cult of the bear. The bear was basically worshiped as an embodiment of strength, saying that he’s not the strongest tarnished his image.
Lions fights other cats in their pride. How often do Tigers even run into another tiger? So experience goes to the lion.
Tigers kill by grabbing the throat with their teeth and letting the prey suffocate. Lion has a big wirey mane around his neck - something evolution gave him for… Fighting other big cats.
Yes the tiger is bigger, but the lion has the tools and experience to overcome that small size difference.
How often do Tigers even run into another tiger?
All the time. While tigers lead solitary lifestyles, they’re not devoid of socialization. Territories overlap and lead to peaceful interactions and conflicts over borders. Sometimes they even cooperate in hunting or live together, though that’s less frequent. The nature of their interactions is mostly dictated by sexual relations and the ratio of tigers to prey.
This is not meant to contribute to the tiger vs lion issue.
I also think it’s interesting to note that while the mane serves a practical purpose, it’s also wildly oversized as a result of sexual selection.
I asked my house cat. He said he can beat them both.
Lions in the wild are so inbred, they might as well be royalty.
Nah, lion is king cause he naps 21 hours a day.
We used to think that they nap most of the day because we couldn’t see what lions did at night. With new camera technology, we can now. Male lions are, maybe, a little more badass than we thought. Their job is basically to fight other lions and hyenas and shit and patrol their territory. They do this at night. Lionesses are still super badass and maybe even more badass than we originally thought, too. I guess what I’m saying is that lions are just badass. The difference is that lions are social creatures while, as far as we can tell, tigers are more solitary, so there’s a comparison issue there. Male lions do, at least, do a bit more for the pride aside from sleeping and fucking, like some of the old documentaries I remember made it look like. That’s just how they are during the day, but I mean, they’re cats. They do a lot of shit a night we didn’t really have a good handle on until recently. Male lions are big and muscly and powerful not for no reason. They have to have that in case something else wants to fuck around with their pride and find out. The lionesses are the providers, the male lions are the protectors that stay at home and protect the territory. We like to try to fit things into our own ways of understanding, but they just do it different. It’s how they evolved to survive.
Lion is king because he’s social. You can’t be a king without subjects. Tigers are the ronin of the jungle. Lions are the king of the savanna.
Cheetah are the best!
The housecat wins. They were the only ones smart enough to attach themselves to humans, thereby ensuring they’d be prolific all over the world. They can be assholes to us and we STILL clean their poop and feed them!
