Only a sith thinks in absolutes
So, I went to see star wars last night with 900 other geeks from Caltech.
There's one line from the movie that nobody's going to understand in 20 years. The line has nothing at all to do with the movie, and everything to do with the politics of W. Bush. Yes, if you've seen the movie, you've already recognized the title of this post as being from the dialogue between Obi Wan Kenobi and Anakin Skywalker as they fight in the volcano world of Mustafar. The dialog goes like this:
Anakin: "Either you're with me, or you're my enemy"
Obi Wan: "Only a sith thinks in absolutes"
Now, let's all admit that this is a pretty good jab at W. But, if you take the second line seriously for a moment, as if it is really from the movie, it makes no sense. Not only does it make no sense, but it sells out the basic premise of the entire series of movies, which is Jedi versus the Dark Side Of The Force. Good versus Evil, damnit! The Jedi are the ones who see the world in terms of good and evil. In my opinion, Lucas pretty clumsily pushed his analogy past its breaking point with this line.
And I was on board with the analogy too. Yes, let the Galactic Empire be the United States! Let Darth Vader be George W. Fine with me, although I wouldn't give the US president credit for having any extra midichlorians. Damnit Lucas, why did you have to mess it up by also turning the Jedi knights into postmodernist liberals. Still, given your tack, there was an obvious continuation:
Anakin: "Either you're with me, or you're my enemy"
Obi Wan: "Only a sith thinks in absolutes"
Anakin: "Actually, that's a misunderstanding. We Sith aren't really about 'good' or 'evil', we mostly just use the force as a means to our own ends. If you think about it, the Jedi are more the ones thinking in terms of absolutes."
Obi Wan: "yes, well what I mean to say is, you're accepting the narrative of the oppressor; try listening to the narrative of the oppressed."
Anakin: "What?"
Obi Wan: "Just give up, I have the high ground."
Anakin: "You think confusing me gives you some kind of moral superiority?"
Obi Wan: "No, I mean that if you jump at me, I'll cut off your good arm."
Anakin: "Oh, so it's back to the movie then is it?"
posted by Jeremy @ 1:54 PM
3 Comments:
Which means that the dark side of the force must be...
programming!
Speaking of which, my google interview went pretty well on Tuesday.
Not only was the statement out of character, it was weak, out of place, and it was a self-accusation.
"ONLY a Sith deals in absolutes"
Really? I was wondering where all the mathematicians went.
Why not simply:
"You're talking like a Sith, Anakin!" or
"Only Sith make enemies out of friends."
It's because Lucas was obsessed with making political statements rather than with writing a good screenplay. It was yet another jab at Bush and his association with religious right "absolutists". The irony is that the heroes of Lucas' story are religious absolutists.
What Lucas really wanted to say was "Only you, Bush, and the Christian right deal in absolutes and blood-for-oil, and you all want to subject the whole universe to your capitalist moralist empire, which is why I'd really love to cut your arms and legs off and let the whole world watch you catch on fire and nearly burn to death so that you can go on living in seething agony till we can let you know that your wife is dead and we've kidnapped and brainwashed your two children and taught them to hate you and attack you. Ha, ha, ha, ha!"
Luckily, George ultimately recognized this as a run-on sentence.
"Not only does it make no sense, but it sells out the basic premise of the entire series of movies, which is Jedi versus the Dark Side Of The Force. Good versus Evil, damnit! The Jedi are the ones who see the world in terms of good and evil. In my opinion, Lucas pretty clumsily pushed his analogy past its breaking point with this line."
Incorrect, it does not sell out the basic premise of the entire series, because the entire premise of the series is NOT about good versus evil, but rather that life is a PAINFUL but natural and beautiful thing, and often times there WILL be no clearly right and wrong way. Anakin convinced himself that the power of sith was the only way he could save the one he loved, at the cost of democracy.. he also convinced himself that if there was one ruler, then there would be no war because things would move along more swiftly. He was blinded by his desires, his emotion, and led from the way of the jedi because he gave into his emotions and could not accept that death was a natural part of life and the force.
It may have been a political statement, but it was a statement of pure truth: the world is not all black and white, it is black and white and shades of grey. To ignore that is to ignore the difficulties in life that make it worthwhile.
This post is 5 years old, what am i doing -_-
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