What Star Wars Teaches Conservatives

And yes, he did say "Arlene Specter".

:rofl:

Thanks io9:
http://io9.com/5240930/embattled-conservatives-look-to-star-wars-for-guidance

That is just too precious for words

The real lesson is: NOTHING teaches conservatives ANYTHING.

n/t

:)

x(

Even worse than "are you an angel?" from Episode I, or "I hate sand" from Episode II. Even worse than "Hold me like you did by the lake on Naboo," or "She's lost the will to live." Those were all terrible lines, but mostly for the way in which they were delivered.

The "with me or against me" / "only Sith deal in absolutes" is a ham-handed attempt to link the Sith to George Bush, and nothing more. It's completely the opposite of the Jedi/Sith dichotomy. The Jedi deal in absolutely nothing but absolutes. To the Jedi, the world is a battle between pure evil and pure good, and the only way to uphold the good is complete and total devotion to the Jedi code. They do not allow personal relationships, human feeling and compassion towards members of their order, any deviation from their organizational structure, or any intellectual freedom. There is only the Jedi Code; everything else is seen as a path to irredeemable evil.

The Sith, on the other hand, are all about ambivalence. The Sith are not dedicated to evil as an ideal; they simply believe that good and evil are artificial and meaningless value judgments, especially when applied to one school of mysticism in comparison to the other. To the Sith, there are no absolutes whatsoever: there is only power. Power isn't good or evil; it's simply a tool, and it's a tool the Sith acquire for its own sake. Palpatine didn't want to destroy the Republic or the Jedi as part of some ideological crusade; he simply wanted power, and that meant dismantling everything that stood between him and unlimited power over the galaxy.

Anakin did not fall to the dark side because he hated goodness and wanted to destroy it; he fell because he failed to adhere to the Jedi Code as he became convinced that Padme and his own personal ambition were important, and because the Jedi Council's inflexible dogmaticism prevented them from seeing that their rigid campaign of disciplining and humbling Anakin was only pushing him away from the Jedi Code. Anakin then found himself with a desire to save Padme from a threat he perceived, and with a disdain for the Jedi masters. Palpatine exploited both to convince him that the Sith were not an evil, but rather were simply an alternate path.

In the Star Wars mythos, the Sith are wrong, and the Jedi are right. There are absolutes. Good and evil are real, actual, palpable things, and adherence to the good is necessary lest the evil conquer. If you start to believe that evil is not real, you will become evil yourself without even knowing it.

And then we get to that line, which unnecessarily (and unintentionally) throws the entire moral structure of his mythology for a loop. The fact that George Lucas managed to undercut the entire framework of his entire six-movie cycle in one line he added at the last minute as a way of expressing a completely off-topic personal opinion is, in my eyes, a microcosm of the career of Lucas. He can create a brilliant, transcendent, resonant, popular, beloved modern mythology. And then he can completely lose sight of everything he's built to follow some particular fancy, popping the audience out of their immersion and cheapening the whole affair.

So close, and then...you missed by a mile.
Considering how often I usually agree with your opinions,
I'm genuinely SURPRISED by your post.

I'm gonna put you on "ignore" while I ponder a few things. :hi:

How strange.

Richard Steele only deals in absolutes. :D

I think Lucas wrote a horrible line there with "only Sith deal in absolutes," but in some sense it was a perfect line: it exposed one of the big problems with the Jedi. The Jedi had become so single-minded (and ignorant of the dark side of the Force) that they were caught completely off guard by the return of the Sith. And it makes sense in terms of the description of Anakin as "the one who would bring balance back to the Force."

All-in-all, a good synopsis. :thumbsup: Beware the dark side of the Ignore List.

And the inconsistency of the Jedi philosophy is something that plagues the whole series.
I always thought of the Jedi as something similar to samurai (actually AFAIK George Lucas has confirmed this). And as such, they have their code of ethics but they are also influenced by taoism, which teaches avoiding extremes and absolutes. The training that Luke Skywalker receives in "The empire strikes back" definitely suggests that the theme is meant to be eastern religion (which again is sort of problematic because Samurai are generally not the same as monks). The paradox stems IMO from the attempt of placing this theme into a "Lord of the Rings" style good vs. evil epic battles setting. Samurai are all about pragmatism and loyalty. Good and evil are not relevant concepts to them. I think George Lucas just took a bunch of things that he deemed "cool" and put them together. If one is in search of a coherent philosophic theme, I think Star Wars is somewhat disappointing.

"I think George Lucas just took a bunch of things that he deemed "cool" and put them together."

The problem is Lucas stole from a bunch of different if not totally contradictory sources when coming up with the Star Wars mythos and that's why it doesn't really make sense when you hold it up to scrutiny. Yes, he stole from bushido but what a lot of people miss is just how much Lucas stole from Dune, and that the Jedi are just Bene Gesserits in drag. The Sisterhood is as amoral as a pseudo-religious order can possibly be (Missionaria Protectiva, much?). When you pluck a morally ambiguous concept from a complex universe and try to stick it into a black hat/white hat cowboy justice universe of course it's not going to make any sense.

The thing is, it's still somewhat believable until you throw the prequels into the mix, with all the retconning, universe-breaking bullshit therein (midi-fucking-chlorians, really?!). I mean, I love Star Wars to death but let's be real, here. Lucas is a shitty writer and world builder and the only reason Star Wars is as good as it is is because other, more talented people have left their mark on it.

..... And I resent yet another right-winger trying to coop Star Wars, where the forces of good were clearly liberal, and the Empire was a totalitarian right-wing fascist state.

I am totally confused.

Jesus, who doesn't get 'Star Wars'??? Apparently it went right over this guy's head.

which is something very hard to do for them.

Principal Yoda could always be trusted, unless you were trying to sneak a smoke in the loading bay. Then you were definitely gonna get detention, dude.

(He uses the word "principals" instead of "principles" five different times. Five.)