#Sith Philosophy

[adragonsfriend]

Cultural relationships to Pain: Sith, Jedi, Amavikka

Writing This Story can Kill You, I finally managed to articulate why I think Dooku seems so surprised to be betrayed by Sidious in ROTS, despite the whole 'betrayal is the way of the Sith thing,' and in the process I wrote a smol essay. Anyway,

So I think Dooku’s understanding of the Sith is incomplete not just because he fails to realize that the apprentice is always a slave never a partner of the master, but because he sees the Sith ways of gaining power—drawing from pain, rage, suffering, humiliation (your own and others)—as a means to an end. To him that pain is to be endured on the path to power.

But Sith doctrine properly understood is that the pain has to embraced, and continue to be embraced even when power is achieved. You have to want pain of all kinds to be a part of your being and part of the world. This is the difference between a regular darksider and a sith, the difference between drowning and diving in. A regular darksider falls because they have pain of some kind they can’t escape and can’t deal with, so they reject their experience of that pain so deeply that they project it outward. A Sith has a different relationship with pain. They are not coping with pain by refusing to acknowledge it, but instead by reveling in Pain in all its forms.

‘Passion’ in the Sith Code doesn’t refer to the modern meaning, eg, “I found my passion, and made it into my dream job!” It refers to passion like ‘the suffering and death of <insert your prefered martyr here>.’ They are saying, essentially, Pain is good, Pain is a natural part of the universe, Pain is an end in itself. This is something Dooku fails to understand, and I think it’s what allows him to be surprised that Sidious betrays him: he fundamentally doesn’t understand the paradigm in which Sidious is operating.

Anakin does understand it, and it’s part of what he rejects when he becomes Ekkreth in Shape Changer. I think he absolutely continues to draw on the darkside after that—he really couldn’t get away with not doing so under Sidious’ observation—and his storm-shield is the front of still embracing Pain the way a Sith should, but it has become a lie. In Fialleril's Trophies, Sidious thinks about how it’s disappointing that Vader doesn’t show much spark anymore. He's observing Vader apparently giving in to his depression instead of reveling it, and that’s a disappointment. Just like for Jedi, it’s not really about what the world does to a Sith (eg how much pain you’re in), it’s about how they react to it.

Ekkreth (the spirit) is fundamentally about freedom and an end to suffering. In fashioning himself after Ekkreth, Anakin rejects the Sith relationship to Pain (btw as does cannon Anakin in return of the Jedi by killing Sidious to save Luke, thereby, in George Lucas’ own words, ‘ending the horror’ for the rest of the galaxy). Notably, he also doesn’t embrace the Jedi relationship to Pain, which is that it isn’t an inherent or necessary part of the world and that if you can let go of your attachments, Pain will cease to exist. He says Pain is real, but I am going to end part of it (Sidious). This is the Amavikka relationship to Pain: Pain is always going to exist (Depur always tries again no matter how often Ekkreth frees the people), but it can and should always be fought (Ekkreth) or endured (Leia), not embraced. The Jedi and Sith developed in opposition to each other, while Amavikka culture developed in opposition to slavery.

To be clear: Jedi and Amavikka views are about a thousand times more compatible than Amavikka and Sith. Amavikka is not any kind of middle road between Jedi and Sith, it’s a different paradigm.

[ospreyeamon]

the current in the river is not the current in the sea

In SWTOR we are given a Sithly equivalent to the Jedi’s iconic parting well-wish "May the Force be with you" in the form of "May the Force serve you well." This illustrates an obvious contrast in the ways the Jedi and Sith view the Force and their philosophies more generally. The Jedi emphasise the importance of selfless service and hold the Force in religious veneration; the Sith prioritise personal goals and consider the Force as more a neutral aspect of existence rather than intrinsically divine. However, I think there is also a very practical reason for these different modes of engaging with the Force.

When the Jedi say they serve the Force and follow its will, they mean the Light-Side of the Force. Not the Dark-Side. If you asked them about allowing yourself to be guided through the galaxy by the Dark-Side of the Force acting out whatever you believed its will to be, you would be hard pressed to find any Jedi who would tell you that was anything other than a terrible idea. From that perspective, the Jedi’s difference of opinion with the Sith is as much about which aspect of the Force to engage with as how to engage with it, if not more.

The Sith would broadly agree with the Jedi that allowing yourself to be directed by the Dark-Side of the Force is a bad idea, though their explanations as to why it’s a bad idea would probably be quite different. The Sith don’t consider the Dark-Side to be some grand wellspring of Evil (barring the occasional fallen ex-Jedi in possession of Serious Issues). Rather the Dark-Side is, shall we say, wilful. A current that, if you don’t watch and correct for it, will pull you into a riptide and cast you out to sea.

Moving more into headcanon, I think most Sith believe the Force to be a thing of many wills rather than a single unifying one. The Dark-Side in particular is a giant overlapping patchwork; living people, dead people, living planets, dead planets, temples, artefacts, memories, fates, and a host of other things all reaching out through the Force exerting themselves on the universe. Some of these wills may align with your own, some of these powers will be helpful, but others are antagonistic or dangerous. Which ones depends on who you are and what you want – navigating, bargaining, and coercing your way through this landscape is a tricky business. Ultimately, the safest part of the Dark-Side to tap into is nearly always going to be the part connected to yourself, fuelled by your own passions, because the emotion and will are yours.

Following the will of the Force in this context is following the siren call of the creepy holocron whispering that you should pick it up, succumbing to the corrupting aura of the Dread Masters, or drowning in the final wishes of the restless dead. If you can’t impose your will on the Force, you run the risk the Force might impose its will on you. You need to have a firm grip on who you are and what you want if you plan on channelling the power of the Dark-Side.

That lack of the assumption of the Force’s benevolence is why the Sith’s farewell can be interpreted as "good luck staying on top of that tiger you’re riding". It doesn’t make sense to call upon the Force for guidance and protection if you believe you might have to fight the Force or whatever’s living inside it for your soul at two in the morning.

[darkloreofthesith]

"The Empire is just another chain to be broken. A true Sith serves no master but themselves. Thus to seek mastery over others is to invite weakness. For as dependent on you as they are, one is also dependent on them."

-- From the accounts of Sheris Tral, Sith Ronin

[theunbeholden]

Basics of The Sith Code

Peace is a falsehood to blind me from the truth, the truth that only through my passion and will can start on the path towards freedom and become great. There is only passion. I use my passion to gather strength in the dark side and fuels my purpose. My strength gives me power over my enemies and the physical skills, abilities, and ability to face myself and know myself well. Tapping into my…

[obsessivefreakandpartners]

Obi wan's love for Anakin is so tragic.

Obi wan was always loyal to the jedi code. Principles came first, loyalty to people second. He was trained since infancy to be that way.

And he did that till his very end. Even tho he was never the same person after the events on Mustafar.

For he loved Anakin will all his heart. He knew deep down how attached Anakin could be and how dangerous that was. He knew he loved Anakin in ways a jedi shouldn't have. He knew how it killed him on the inside when he chopped off Anakin's body, being true to his cause.

He is one of the selfless people in the star wars universe. He put ideals such as democracy, justice, greater good, first, even if it meant him suffering a great deal in the process and eventually dying.

[maulfucker]

Yeah yeah jedi Maul au we've all seen him. But what about senator Maul au. Representing Dathomir, a neutral world like Mandalore that is still somewhat hostile to outsiders. Wearing fancy clothes that show a bit too much skin for the cold climate of Coruscant. Falling in hate at first sight with Padmé, the only other senator who brings a gun to the senate floor "just in case". The two of them having a weird rivalry because Maul doesn't trust the Jedi and is neutral in a lot of subjects that Padmé is a vocal defender of.

[memoriesofthingspast]

🌻🌈✨🚀

queer;non-binary; etc.

[circle-around-again]

"But then [Maul] noticed the darkness was moving and alive with dancing bright red stars. And he suddenly knew what he was really looking at. Dark clouds. And drifting, burning ashes. ... He felt free. ... He became resolved to survive. He would do anything and everything necessary to stay alive." (Windham, 64-5).

As the sky above copies his colours, Maul finally grows into himself and unlocks a secret, unplanned, love for life. Moments later, his vigorous desire to hold on to it develops.

The ungodly determination that allowed Maul to survive bisection was born in this moment.

The imagery here also relates to the cosmic nature of the dark side. It is as we expect, of course, a vision of hell. But there is beauty and majesty; The dark side is not a sickness here, but is joyous, like Maul. Alive and dancing. How interesting for something which is associated only with suffering and death.

The red stars could be the Sith themselves: stars gone supernova with the dark side, trading a long life for the thrill of power. Destined to fall, like ash, to irrelevance. Beautiful all the same.

[adragonsfriend]

"The Jedi are slaves to their doctrine..."

...yeah. Just like how boarding school is the same thing as prison.

**Also with a side of reasoning about why Jedi and Amavikka culture are different.

I haven't seen this opinion expressed in its full form too often, but I see it semi-regularly in diluted forms, and I honestly think it's dangerous as hell. It makes an equivalence between adhering to some admittedly high rules and expectations and literal actual slavery, where one person owns other people and spends their lives and labor without regard for their personhood.

I went to a boarding school for secondry school, and there was a little joke that went something along the lines of, "They give us a bed to sleep in, three meals a day, and you have to be back in your dorm at a specific time... sounds really similar to prison to me." And just between students, it was funny, it's still worth a chuckle occasionally.

Make that same joke to someone whose been to prison or worked in a prison, and they'll probably look at you like you're an idiot, and maybe if you're lucky they'll even tell you all the reasons you're dead wrong.

Comparing a Jedi's duties to slavery follows the same logic as the joke. It takes the superficial elements of two things, and says 'see? these things are the same, therefore everything else must be as well.'

Boarding School & Prison:

Both provide beds, meals, and restricts where you can be at certain times.

Jedi duty & Slavery:

Both involve rules you don't get to decide yourself, are sometimes dangerous, don't allow owning property.

I could write a longer sentence that could hypothetically describe either duty or slavery, but I think this gets the point across well enough:

Superficial similarities do not make two things the the same, and pretending they do is, I think, tied to the deeper issue of making judgements about the expectations and rules of cultures outside our own without first examining their causes and effects. With that idea in mind, let's go through a couple of Jedi rules and expectations and look at some reasons why they have developed the way they did, why they're very reasonable for the Jedi, and a little about what we can take from them. Then, because I think a comparison is helpful here, let's do the same for Amavikka culture.

Jedi Cultural Rules/Expectations

The Jedi are a culture of Force sensitives, people with the power to help or to harm literally in their blood. What rules and expectations does this give rise to?

No romance-- Love and lust are powerful forces. Not necessarily always good or always bad, but definitely powerful. There's a reason people have been writing stories about lovers who screw up their own and others lives over getting to be together since the dawn of time. There's a reason lovers have been screwing up their own and others lives over getting to be together since the dawn of time. There's a reason queer people being punished for be open about who they love is damaging. There's a reason banning interracial marriages is pretty damn evil (i mean that one's more complicated then just love being powerful but i digress). But all this said, when the expectation is followed out of genuine devotion to a way of life, it's very possible to live a fulfilling life without a romantic partner; there are lots of monastic communities where people willingly choose not to marry or do romance because they are entirely committed to other pursuits. Love and lust are powerful things, and Jedi hold a lot of power. They cannot afford to be driven screw over themselves or others, because they really could hurt a lot of people, so they refrain from engaging with romantic pursuits at all.

Don't get attached to material things-- Jedi live communally without a sense of ownership over most things, aside from their lightsabers. They don't need that kind protective instinct because they work together to provide for each others needs. Jedi do collect personal items and have hobbies that require physical things, but they wouldn't be devastated if they lost those things, they would move on rather than go to lengths to reclaim them.

Practice controlling yourself-- You have an ability other people don't have, and it gives you the power to kill/otherwise take advantage of lots of people. Not doing that is important is incredibly important, so you need to practice knowing and controlling yourself so that if you end up in the situation where you want to hurt someone, you can stop.

You carry a weapon, think before you draw it, think harder before you kill with it-- Jedi go out in the world and seek to do good, sometimes that means willingly encountering violence, and sometimes encountering violence means fighting, so Jedi carry weapons. But the weapons they use are not casually mastered ones, like a blaster; the lightsaber is a precise and deadly weapon--you can do a lot of damage being just knowing how to fire a gun, but a sword is a different story. The lightsaber forms require constant practice and consideration as to when they should be used, and so it's natural that Jedi have a lot of philosophy and work that is tied to not just how but when they use their weapons. Interestingly, we often see lightsabers drawn, they are being used as a tool, to cut through doors or light up an area, not just as weapons.

You can leave-- If there's something else you are more committed to--you fell in love with someone, you want a traditional family, there's some other philosophical/cultural/religious path you consider more important than or not compatible with Jedi way, you think you could do more good elsewhere, etc--you're allowed to leave. You won't be a Jedi anymore, but you should absolutely come back and visit the Temple sometimes.

There are plenty of useful lessons to be learned from Jedi culture, because there are power imbalances all over the place in our lives whether they come from privilege, wealth, physicality, or emotional leverage over our loved ones, which we must navigate without being cruel when we are more powerful than others. We don't all live like Jedi though, because we don't all carry weapons, and most of us don't have the means/potential to become mass murderers if we lose control of ourselves for awhile, and most of us aren't trained to be diplomats going on missions with possibly immense consequences for millions of people.

Amavikka Rules/Expectations

Amavikka culture developed directly in response to slavery. What strategies and expectations does that give rise to?

Secret marriages-- Love is powerful and meaningful because no matter what happens Depur cannot take it from you, it lasts beyond just sharing space with the same person, and even beyond death.

Japur snippets-- Small, apparently inconsequential items are more easily held on to, and even if they are lost, they can be recreated and have the same meaning, because what your family means to you is more important than any physical representation. Still, physical reminders of that love are very helpful in dark times.

Absolutely nothing is owed to Depur-- The people in power have never done anything for you, and if they ever appeared to, it was done in the spirit of keeping you imprisoned.

False flattery to lie to Depur-- Works really well to trick a vain, powerful person who has power over you because it can get you what you need while avoiding negative reactions from them (not a super healthy thing to do outside of dangerous, power imbalanced relationships).

You'll always be one of the Mother's children-- No matter how far you go, even if you are sold on, even if you mess up massively or become chain blind, even if you leave Tatooine, you're still one of the Mother's children. Cruel situations provide lots of opportunities for pain to twist its victims into being cruel themselves, but someone can always tell you a story, and if you listen, you can always come back to that family.

There are plenty of useful lessons to be learned from Amavikka culture, because there are power imbalances all over the place in our lives, be they parent-child relationships, employer-employee, wealthy-poor, customer-retail worker, or the very real forms of slavery exist today, that we must navigate without without getting hurt when we are less powerful than others. We don't all live like Amavikka people though, because the power imbalances in many of our lives are not nearly as absolute or without recourse as people who are explicitly property as sanctioned by the government.

Sith Rules/Expectations

Just for kicks, let's look (very briefly) at the Sith as well. Sith recruits tend, with the major exception of Palpatine, to be people who have witnessed or been the victim to a lot of pain. The exception, Palaptine, was someone who enjoyed inflicting pain on others even before he became involved with the Sith. What expectations does recruiting vulnerable people with really intense, untempered relationships to pain create?

If you are weak, hurt people to get them to stop hurting you-- In fact, feel as much pain as possible yourself, so that you don't forget why it's important that you continue hurting other people.

If you are powerful, hurt whoever you want-- In fact, just hurt people, all the time. They would do they same as you if they weren't such pitiful weaklings.

The are plenty of useful lessons to be learned from the Sith about what not to do, because there are power imbalances all over the place in our lives, and whether we are powerful or weak in those relationships, carelessly inflicting pain on ourselves or others typically just adds to the pain in the world.

Conclusion

this has been my TED talk. it's excessively long. it took an excessively long time to write. go away and be nice to people or something, idk.

[ospreyeamon]

So, at the risk of sounding incredibly heretical to Stars Wars as a whole, I’d like to ask this. What’s your opinion on the various force traditions, their beliefs, and the aspects of the force that draw upon? Are they all valid ways for a force adept to live by within reason or is one way or the other? Personally I tend to say that they are, it just ultimately down to the individual who decides what they use their gifts for.

Star Wars as a whole has soft worldbuilding and the Force is very much a soft magic system. For a soft magic system, it generally pays not to give a lot of hard answers about what it is and how it works. They tend to depend strongly on things like emotion and intent which are difficult to pin down. I think that's why the Force is considered so resistant to scientific study; it's like if you set out to study physics and immediately encountered Wave-Partial Duality. This force changes its behaviour depending on where you are, what you want, and what mood you're in? What a pain to analyse. So, I don't think any Force-tradition or philosophy should be set up as definitely correct because a soft magic system presents best with a certain level of mystery or ambiguity left about its workings.

The way I think of it, the different traditions are different cultural lenses through which the Force is viewed. They are all observing the Force, interacting with the Force, thinking about the Force. But the Force is vast and complex and contradictory; it's not at all something that can be neatly narrowed down into something easily digestible. All the traditions are based upon the reality of the Force but are incapable of capturing that reality in its totality. True understanding is striven for, but never reached.

The Jedi and Sith both model the Force as having two aspects, but the Voss don't. Are the Light-side and Dark-side of the Force things that objectively exist, or is that just a useful short-hand to communicate that the Force exhibits differing behaviour in the presence of differing levels of emotion? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And that's not even bringing ethics and morality – source of ten-thousand flame-wars – into it. If there's one thing I am sure about when it comes to the Force, it is that the Light-side and Dark-side aren't the Good and Evil aspects of it. Good and Evil are just useful short-hands to bundle concepts for discussions of ethics, morality, and right-behaviour (which is why getting everyone to agree about how to define them is a futile cause). We invented them like we invented honour and justice.

The Dark-side is the aspect of rage, but rage may come in response to an unjustified killing. Rage recognises injury and unfairness, real as well as perceived. The Dark-side is the aspect of fear, but fear may come in response to the risk that other people could suffer. Fear warns against danger. I think there is a reasonable argument to be made that the Dark-side of the Force is more dangerous – but even if it were desirable to live a life free of risk, it isn't possible.

When you ask if they are all potentially valid frameworks for a Force-adept to live within, by whose definition of "valid" do we judge? Yours? Mine? Their own cultural tradition's, when all of the traditions have produced more than one? The people who actually have to put up with their behaviour, assuming those people could reach a consensus on the matter?

To give a straight answer, yes, I do agree with what it is I think you're saying.

What I really would like to see from the depictions of the traditions is more nuance and internal diversity. Let the embrace-love vs eschew-attachment (includes bonus arguments about what is love) be ancient conflicting branches of Jedi philosophy, rather than the writer’s preferred interpretation for that particular spin-off. Let the better-to-be-lawful Jedi and better-to-be-good Jedi tussle. Let Sith write off the whole "expunge all vulnerability, only power matters" thing because it obviously conflicts with the "pursue your own goals, screw other's opinions" thing. Let branches of Sith naturally-select away from backstabbing LOL because the known cheaters are outcompeted by cooperative groups over the long-term. Even better, let the Jedi and Sith's societies struggle about how to deal with the fact that they can mind-trick people.

[commandercodes]

think the key to understanding the attachment/non-attachment theory always just comes down to "the things that you personally like are not actually and literally the Best Things in the entire world, and you shouldn't make prioritise them over the wellbeing or opinion of other people just because they're Yours" and if you do not want to follow this particular rule, you do not actually Have To Be a jedi if you don't want to be.

[dizzyhslightlyvoided]

The iconic weapon of the Jedi, the lightsaber, is a weapon which 1. can only really be used at close-range (unless you throw it, which you can only really get away with if you're using the Force to begin with), and 2. requires massive amounts of skill and training just to avoid slicing your own face off, let alone actually using it regularly (and again, you probably need Jedi reflexes and precognition just to get a foot in the door).

There's a reason why they chose this weapon instead of, well, literally anything else. That reason is that killing isn't what Jedi are all about. They don't want to kill people. They aren't "great warriors"; "war does not make one great" and all that. George Lucas describes the Jedi as "intergalactic therapists"; first and foremost, they're negotiators and diplomats, bringers of peace, and they certainly aren't made for war. Indeed, a situation where killing is the only option is considered a failure state.

Thus, the lightsaber is the weapon of the Jedi because when your only weapon is a lightsaber, killing requires intentionality. It requires training, practice, and so much control, so many different kinds of control. The lightsaber at your hip is simultaneously a signifier that you don't want to use it, and a warning that if left with no other choice, you will use it with deadly skill and efficiency.

Sith use lightsabers specifically to flex on the Jedi.

[oreolesbian]

does… does dave filoni know that the whole “anyone can be force sensitive if they put their mind to it” bullshit fundamentally shatters the entire core of star wars world-building around force users? like - does he understand that?

[revanknightwoman]