this post was submitted on 13 Nov 2023
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"Balance to the Force" has multiple interpretations and most of them involve a reasonable amount of mass murder.
Fuck the magic cops.
That one always confused me. Like, there is no good amount of evil, right? But people all across popular media prattle on about evil being necessary as though it makes any sense.
Speaking of "there needs to be a balance of evil" enlightened centrist bullshit, every single self-described "Grey Jedi" I ever ran into in college, the kind that were Star Wars fans and most of their discussions were "who would win in a fight" fantasy football drafts regarding midi-chlorian count estimates, became some kind of chud afterward, such as working for a military-industrial corporation, a surveillance startup, or even joining the Air Force.
I always hated that grey jedi shit. You cannot use your magic powers to hurt people for your own selfish goals just litte a, as a treat. The whole narrative around the force, at least in the better stories, is that the dark side is inherently corrupting - the more you use magic to hurt people to get what you want, the easier it gets to cross that ethical line.
Lucas himself derailed the old thematics of his own franchise when he greenlit the "there is an evil moon and a good moon around a magic planet and the wisest space god decreed that you must have essential evil nutrients or else you get imbalanced" episode of Clone Wars, effectively canonizing "Grey Jedi" bullshit.
This is why it's vital to remember that Maria saved Star Wars in the edit and Lucas didn't even direct Empire or Jedi. Through the magic of fanon and death of the author and contempt for IP law I can just pretend Lucas never said that.
Plus, Lucas was constantly making up new shit and retconning things. I firmly believe he was just making the story up as he went along.
But yeah god I hate the "father son daughter" bullshit. Like why the hell would you even do that? It's so dorky and out of place with the entire rest of the story. ; p
Every actual "Grey Jedi" in the actual setting is either
a) A light side user who thinks the space cops are full of shit. (Ashoka, Bindo or b) A dark side user attempting to be all edgy but who is actually full of shit (Kreia)
Chris Avellone writing Kreia as a Jedi south park contrarian is 100% to blame for the folks UlyssesT is describing lol. Yeah, she's clearly the villain, but these kinds of people were never media literate enough to wrap their heads around that.
"Hmm I think Darth Betrayal has some good points about why doing good things is actually bad!" - a shocking number of media illiterate people down through the years.
I'd like KOTOR2 and Kreia as a villain character a lot more of more "Grey Jedi" wannabes noticed that she always said their choices were wrong and ultimately was a liar anyway and was fucking everyone over for her personal agenda while dragging all life in the galaxy along with her.
The space cops are full of shit, but so are the "a balanced amount of atrocities and cruelty for the sake of enlightened self interest is best, actually" dipshits that are effectively like the libertarians of the setting (if they exist in the setting at all): a bogus alternative to the two-party duality that isn't really better.
If Star Wars had better writing and consistent leftists on the writing team, there'd be room for Liberation Ideology Jedi. Similarly, the wizards in Harry Potter are status quo oligarch assholes running a shadow government and if there was better writing there'd be room for comrade wizards forming communes to make magic available to all.
HP setting's fucking nonsense. literally would only take one wizard to say "hey asswipes, magic is real. here is literally infinite bread. if they try to wipe your memory of this i am literally just going to transform into a fucking bird or something, fly somewhere else, and do it again. let's go kill every world leader."
This was apparently the original concept for Qui Gon and it's still supposed to be true in the background that he was like this and the council hated him for it, it just frustratingly never actually showed up in any actual media
I think they had to retcon the dark side philosophically because of the whole balance thing. In the original trilogy it seemed more like the dark side was just fear and anger and hate. In the prequels they added stuff like passion and ambition, which are good emotions in moderation.
A generous reading of the prequels is that the jedi were wrong, and their fossilized view of the force is what made them blind to the Sith operating right in front of their faces.
Yeah, the Jedi council is pretty dogmatic and set in its ways. Also, more than a little stupid because none of them ever stopped to ask "why the fuck would we want to bring balance to the Force? We have a huge temple on the Capital World and the Sith are in hiding somewhere on the Rim."
One of the things I liked about The Last Jedi is that Yoda sort of says "Yeah, we fucked up bad, the best thing to do is let Rey take the wheel and start over with the benefit of our guidance but without our dogmatism and institutional trauma."
Also Luke admitting he never actually read all the Jedi books. I thought that was a really funny moment.
Luke is the chosen one who brings balance to the force by getting rid of vader and the emperor. People are just bad at media.
No. Anakin is the chosen one, and he's the one who kills the emperor. His final redemption brings the force back into balance by making a grand sacrifice to let go of his own selfish desires and save his son.
Good point!
I really like that in Star Wars there are parallel military and spiritual struggles. The story doesn't pretend that defeating the Emperor and Vader will resolve the military conflict on it's own - That's up to the rebels. They effectively take out the deathstar on their own. And then there's a separate, parallel struggle between the force users, and it's ultimately Luke's resolve and compassion and Anakin's moment of letting go of his hatred upon seeing his son's strength in the Light that resolves the struggle.
You can largely blame Disney for that one. Lucas has been extremely explicit and direct that the dark side and the sith are a corrupting influence on the natural balance of the force and the universe the Jedi serve.
Anakin's entire fall was a decision to place his own selfish desires over his greater roll and duty as the chosen one and hence: it would forever dominate his destiny. Hence it took a supreme act of selflessness and of sacrifice to bring the force back into balance.
People got confused because "well guess balance can only mean equal parts light and dark" and Disney just rolled with it.
He also got tricked into being evil by Palpatine vague notion that he could stop Natalie Portman from dying in childbirth if he was more evil.
It is established that Anakin's politics are somewhat fashy, but that fact that he believes that Palpatine should force the Senate into doing things is never really examined beyond the one conversation where he brings it up. I think Lucas had a bunch of half-formed ideas about Anakin's fall but he didn't know how to fully develop them.
Lucas having half formed ideas that he didn't know how to develop is the prequels
Lucas later retconned that, voluntarily, in a terrible Clone Wars episode involving an evil moon, a good moon, and a pompous magic family with a daddy figure lecturing his kids about how they each need to have just enough evil in their diet for a balanced breakfast.