Neurolimal posted:

Tge situations are sad, but the highest chance for relating to him are often immediately overshadowed by frustration over how easily the situation could have been avoided.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

Then why has the story been discussed for over a decade?


Why aren't the Jedi helping them when they know that slavery is evil?

quote:

People actually relate to Anakin perfectly. They simply don't like him, but this dislike is intense precisely because they relate to him. He's a very intense and divisive character.

You're confusing "liking" with "relating".

Waffles Inc. posted:

Kinda like seeing one's teenaged siblings or fuckup friends, yeah? Someone who has good intentions but just. keeps. loving. up.

Neurolimal posted:

It doesn't excuse it, but it also doesn't mean the jedi are not good, just flawed. The sickness of the republic citizens mean that the Jedi cannot end slavery alone, and an attempt to do so before citizens are willing would likely result in far greater harm to citizens (including droids).

that's not to say they have to wait until the majority is on their side, but every successful movement has had at least a large portion of society in their favor.

Neurolimal posted:

And the droids do not rebel for equality. The slaves of Tatooine exist outside the Republic's society.

Neurolimal posted:

Because forcing countries to adhere to an outsiders' morality simply does not work. ISIS did not arise because of an indifference to the middle east, but by active interference in their lives.



Like I said though, these fuckups are frustrating in how easily solved they are and how tge solutions are not difficult for the character. You can see Kylo assisting First Order out of loyalty to his true father (Snoke), you cannot see why a character defined by defiance and familial attachment does not help his mother. Any sort of tragedy becomes at its worst schadenfreude at his situation.

Waffles Inc. posted:

Anakin? Defined by defiance? Are we talking about the same Anakin?

Neurolimal posted:

He's always absorbed in his emotions, he becomes romantically involved with a politician, he murders an entire family, he ignores Obi's warnings and charges Dooku. He marries said politician in secrecy.

Neurolimal posted:

Because forcing countries to adhere to an outsiders' morality simply does not work. ISIS did not arise because of an indifference to the middle east, but by active interference in their lives.

Neurolimal posted:

Like I said though, these fuckups are frustrating in how easily solved they are and how tge solutions are not difficult for the character. You can see Kylo assisting First Order out of loyalty to his true father (Snoke), you cannot see why a character defined by defiance and familial attachment does not help his mother. Any sort of tragedy becomes at its worst schadenfreude at his situation.

Schwarzwald posted:

If the Jedi need public support before they can take meaningful action, then they should engage with the public and seek to promote a more just society. The Jedi should teach and inform the public of the plight of the slaves; they should seek to change public opinion.

But instead of challenging the public, the Jedi acquiesce to it. The public didn't want to free the slaves, so the Jedi permit slavery. The public wanted a war, so the Jedi became warriors.

I agree with you that the Jedi are good, if flawed. But their flaw isn't that they are unable to defy the public, but that they don't try.

"Smash the Force" posted:

At the start of A New Hope, we hear that the Alliance has growing support within the Imperial Senate, and Imperial Senates aren’t usually very fond of proper revolutionaries. Consider the Alliance’s tactics. Every time we meet the rebels, they have built themselves a base on some deserted planet, where they’re stockpiling heavy arms.

As any good student of Mao knows, a revolutionary movement can only succeed if it wins the trust of the people; holding territory is a game played by the State, not those trying to overthrow it. We never see the rebels being sheltered from Stormtroopers by grateful peasants (while they do ally with the Ewoks, it’s with a fully colonial sense of entitlement); we never see Alliance propaganda being passed around in secret by the oppressed; we never see any indication that this armed faction has any kind of popular mandate whatsoever. It’s not just infantile bourgeois ultraleftism — Blanquism in space.

At the end of The Empire Strikes Back, we see for the first time a full Rebel Alliance fleet; vast blobby spaceships to rival the Empire’s. Aren’t warships expensive? Who’s funding these people? Consider that when we see that fleet, it’s positioned outside the Galaxy. There’s a name for groups like the Rebel Alliance. Not freedom fighters, but Contras, right-wing death squads.

Neurolimal posted:

It's easy to see why they dont try by considering the real-life historical results of military officials exerting power over the governing power (however noble the intentions). their impartialty is percieved as important to their role.

It's not like they are emotionless or unbiased or uncaring either; both Obi-Wan and Qui-gon are depicted as having social lives outside of their official duties, as well as sympathy and remorse ("I'm afraid not.")

This is only exacerbated by the sith, who do just that and are an eternal concern for the Jedi.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

Again, you keep coming back to imperialism. This is because you do not have any imagination. You cannot imagine revolutionary actio.

The Jedi do nothing about slavery, and as a result the Republic becomes the Empire. This is the cost of non-interference.

quote:

Anakin spent a decade attached to Obi-Wan as an apprentice, so he didn't have time to help his mother. When he's free, he goes find her. Pretty simple.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

The Jedi are not a military force, they are a religious order serving as peacekeepers.

And if that's a problem, again, why don't they just leave and align themselves with slaves?

As you have argued, they are making an ethical choice to support evil.

Waffles Inc. posted:

Now imagine if that before Moby Dick came out there were three books about Ahab's kids (or maybe the Whale's dad?) that had really fuckable characters and that inspired a generation of readers to love that genre, and then Melville gave those readers Moby Dick.

What I'm getting at is that the prequels never got a chance to be looked at fairly because people who hate the prequels hate them exactly for being like what you're describing for Moby Dick, unlike the OT which has very fuckable characters

Neurolimal posted:

Well thats the thing; the character doesn't need to be a good person to be relatable. Tragedies operate off of that. The question is less "who do I root for?" And more "who can I see myself as?". Moby Dick succeeds in making Ahab relatable, and as a result the message of how self-destructive his vengeance is becomes clear to the reader.

Neurolimal posted:

Imperialism is the only option for an outsider to do what you are demanding. Real-World western slavery did not end because a scandinavian community organizer lent his expertise and opinions to the filthy masses.

Neurolimal posted:

He spends enough time after defending Naboo to request his mother's freedom. Her freedom was his primary concern when leaving Tatooine. Watto even displayed that he was willing to sell her. He's hitting it off with a wealthy queen in front of hundreds of thousands who consider him a hero.

Neurolimal posted:

He doesn't have to be good to be relatable. We see him get understandably pissed off, we see him feel conflicted in situations we are willing to believe are difficult. We see him look for guidance, we see Adam put out an intensely human performance. We see him display his vulnerabilities and repressed soft side to Rey.

quote:

The tragic part of the PT is tgat TFA succeeds in making the audience relate to the tragedy of a character who starts out as a mass murderee, while we never feel attached to a slave who is indoctrinated and loses his mother.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

The fact that you keep denouncing violent revolt in a STAR WARS thread of all things is baffling. Do you even remember what the OT was about? Why is it okay for Princess Leia (an aristocratic member of the Senate) to lead the Rebellion but the Jedi cannot aid slaves?

Lord Krangdar posted:

That's a good point.

Does Princess Leia know/acknowledge that the Republic is the Empire, and vise versa? I'm kinda sad that the new sequels took a direction away from letting us see how the Rebellion would have established a new (or old) government. I wish they had done like Dune Messiah and showed the horrible responsibility after defeating the evil overlord and taking his place.

Neurolimal posted:

Well thats the thing; the character doesn't need to be a good person to be relatable. Tragedies operate off of that. The question is less "who do I root for?" And more "who can I see myself as?". Moby Dick succeeds in making Ahab relatable, and as a result the message of how self-destructive his vengeance is becomes clear to the reader.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

She actually starts out working in the Empire. She's a member of the Imperial Senate.

Lord Krangdar posted:

Oh yeah, I always forget that part because IIRC its only mentioned once.

Neurolimal posted:

They serve a variety of roles, typically in law enforcement and executing the will of the republic.

They do not leqve because they believe in the importance of their duty. In your proposed situation they are forced into an ultimatum; from their perspective there is no good choice and evil choice.

Neurolimal posted:

Kylo is a struggling youth buckling under the legacy of his family, the absence of his father, and the attachment to the only father figure who made time for him.

quote:

In none of Kylo's most tragic or vulnerable moments do we believe he could have done better. Meanwhile, in AotC Anakin's loss is overshadowed by confusion about why he didn't have his rich girlfriend queen move her to a republic planet.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

What are you even talking about?

The fact that you keep denouncing violent revolt in a STAR WARS thread of all things is baffling. Do you even remember what the OT was about? Why is it okay for Princess Leia (an aristocratic member of the Senate) to lead the Rebellion but the Jedi cannot aid slaves?

Neurolimal posted:

I am not denouncing violent rebellion. I am denouncing both moral intervention and military coups.

Neurolimal posted:

Leia is representative of the rebellion. The rebellion is of citizens of the empire opposed to the emperor. You focus too much on her title over her actions and imagery.

I am not denouncing violent rebellion. I am denouncing both moral intervention and military coups.

Neurolimal posted:

Leia is representative of the rebellion. The rebellion is of citizens of the empire opposed to the emperor. You focus too much on her title over her actions and imagery.

Neurolimal posted:

I am not denouncing violent rebellion. I am denouncing both moral intervention and military coups.

Hat Thoughts posted:

i still don't agree with this tho, like, did u see Hateful Eight? Who do you see urself as in that? I read Demons by Dostoevsky recently and who the heck am I supposed to relate to in that?

brawleh posted:

How do you see something that you don't believe is there? How do you make any kind of ethical or moral judgement on what you cannot see, again impartiality does not exist here only a subjective truth exists. What is the truth of the jedi(republics) myopic understanding of those that lie beyond their horizon.

Can they(you) truly hide behind this idea of a republic majority being the only way to address slavery when they don't count all the people of the republic as people. Can laws born from such thought ever be, in any sense, Just? and if so what is the value of their duty as guardians who value peace over justice.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

This is a simple question:

Where is the Rebellion ever shown to have a democratic mandate to justify their attempted coup?

Lord Krangdar posted:

What if the OT Rebels had managed to stage a coup to kill the Emperor, instead of a full violent rebellion?

Neurolimal posted:

They fight for a physically powerless leader. They are not depicted as forced into the conflict. We have no reason to believe they are forced into the conflict. They make a willing choice to rebel. Their rebellion is not inherently just and rely on the moral judgement of observers; I see the rebellion as just.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

You have not answered the question:

When are the Rebellion ever shown to have a democratic mandate that justifies their attempted coup?

Neurolimal posted:

When the rebellion is shown fighting the empire. We have no reason to believe that the rebellion does not consist of significant numbers of citizens rebelling against the emperor.

This is made even clearer in the special edition of RotJ, which sees a parade over the end of the empire in coruscant.

"Princess" Leia is a representative of the people (hence being a member of the Senate). She holds no physical or mental bonds over the rebels. She is their leader because they want her to be the leader.

"Smash the Force" posted:

At the start of A New Hope, we hear that the Alliance has growing support within the Imperial Senate, and Imperial Senates aren’t usually very fond of proper revolutionaries. Consider the Alliance’s tactics. Every time we meet the rebels, they have built themselves a base on some deserted planet, where they’re stockpiling heavy arms.

As any good student of Mao knows, a revolutionary movement can only succeed if it wins the trust of the people; holding territory is a game played by the State, not those trying to overthrow it. We never see the rebels being sheltered from Stormtroopers by grateful peasants (while they do ally with the Ewoks, it’s with a fully colonial sense of entitlement); we never see Alliance propaganda being passed around in secret by the oppressed; we never see any indication that this armed faction has any kind of popular mandate whatsoever. It’s not just infantile bourgeois ultraleftism — Blanquism in space.

At the end of The Empire Strikes Back, we see for the first time a full Rebel Alliance fleet; vast blobby spaceships to rival the Empire’s. Aren’t warships expensive? Who’s funding these people? Consider that when we see that fleet, it’s positioned outside the Galaxy. There’s a name for groups like the Rebel Alliance. Not freedom fighters, but Contras, right-wing death squads.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

Neurolimal posted:

This is entirely dependent on the idea that the rebels are being funded by an outside force. It's entirely speculative and requires the assumption that among the vast number of planets under the empire, nobody could build ships nor collect funds to build ships. Amusingly enough, it comes to the conclusion that a nebulous and nefarious Other has supported the rebels, as there couldn't possibly be enough unfaithful empire citizens to successfully rebel against the empire!

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

This outside group are the angered elites.

Hence "Princess" Leia.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

This outside group are the angered elites.

Hence "Princess" Leia.

This oculd have all been avoided if the Jedi stopped slavery.

lfield posted:

You're imagining that. It's not in the film.

Neurolimal posted:

The elites are members of the empire.

They are supported by empire citizens against the empire.

The rebels do not disband once their supposed meal ticket is enslaved. They are motivated to fight harder.

BravestOfTheLamps posted:

Even Neurolimal understands what the Rebellion is:


The Rebellion is not a revolution or popular movement, it's an elite coup.