#the jedi are ideals

[short-wooloo]

Why I Love the Jedi

Its something that i only recognize in hindsight

When I was a kid, I struggled at times with my self control, I'm on the spectrum, I had trouble at times in school, I got overwhelmed, I had meltdowns and breakdowns, I would get angry and upset I behaved in a way that was not ok, and afterwards I always remember feeling embarrassed and ashamed of how I acted

And the Jedi...

The Jedi were what I wanted to be

They had great self control, they had mastered themselves, they were not ruled by their emotions, they were what I wanted, they represented the ideal of what I wanted to be and to work towards

[allskywalkerswhine]

in fics where luke gets plopped into the prequels i want every jedi within ten metres of him to think hes the weirdest jedi theyve ever seen. he has negative lightsaber form. he doesnt know what a kata is. he handstands when he meditates. his solution to sith is to try and have a chat. hes a political radical who keeps suggesting revolution. you ask him what the jedi code is and he says "kindness and compassion and helping those in need :) ". you ask how he used the force like that and he says some shit about how you are a luminous being limited only by your mind. the councils authority is just a suggestion. he is somehow the new favourite of both qui gon and yoda

[ankahikoibaat]

Star Wars was and has always been meant to be hopepunk and good vs evil at its base, not grimdark and 'morally grey' and 'subversive', and this is a hill i will die on

[intermundia]

i think one of the most infuriating things about using the Force would be the fact that in order to reach out, you have to instead open yourself up and let it in. you must make yourself passive, in order to be active, you know? to see what is really out there, you have to allow yourself to look, which means pausing and offering up your attention non-judgmentally in order to take in the world before you act upon that information. you have to get yourself out of the way, because when your thoughts and anxieties are in the way, you cannot see past them. they are a shield blocking you from seeing the moment, and a filter that leads to motivated reasoning, seeing what you want to see instead of what is really there.

so in a high stress environment, when there is much on the line (fear) or innocents are being harmed (anger), the ability to actually take a second and put aside those feelings in order to understand the situation better and actually be able to fix things is no mean feat. you have to be able to simultaneously detach so that you can focus and act in the best interest of everyone with full awareness of the risks and benefits, while remaining deeply engaged and compassionate for everyone involved. it's not easy, it's not about ego and glory and pleasure, it's about loving the world enough to be an agent of peace no matter the cost. that kind of altruistic discipline would take a lifetime of study, and i think is so deeply admirable as a concept.

[skywalkr-nberrie]

One of the biggest arguments I’ve seen used by the Ob*d*l*s against Anidala, is that scene in the ROTS novel where Padmé says she could trust OW with the secret of the rebellion and was hesitant to tell Anakin and I just wanna say:

Padmé wasn't an idiot. She was an extremely intelligent and competent woman, perfectly able to understand that loving Anakin and thinking that he could be trusted with a certain politic-related matter were two very different things and reducing her choice regarding who to trust with an important political matter only on the basis of her feelings of romantic love diminishes her professionalism, and this is why I say y'all could never understand her.

Padmé didn’t have to "love" OW or even like him at all to know he was the perfect Jedi to ask for help in a secret political matter.

That's the point being made in the novel, she’s hit with the realization that Anakin in this particular moment could not be told this piece of info because of his relationship with Palpatine, and Padmé specifically mentions in the Junior ROTS novel that she didn't want to make Anakin “keep a secret” if he didn’t agree with their stance because it’d be “unfair.” So this also played a part in why Padmé didn’t think it best to inform Anakin about the Rebellion. It honestly had little to do with her actually lacking trust in him, and more to do with the circumstances she was in not allowing her to be open with her husband and her not wanting to make him choose between his wife and his “father figure.”

However, Padmé knows OW’s political ideas aren't tied to ONE particular person but to a philosophy, one which is closer to her own, at that point. None of this was ever meant to be hinted as “romantic” or even remotely insinuated as romantic. It’s strictly professional and even the tone of the scene makes that so abundantly clear.

All I’m saying is that, some of these proshippers are doing the most out here to try and prove their ship, like my loves? You forgot a very important thing called ✨ context ✨ and regardless of her rational thinking, Padmé still went out of her way to try and talk out all of this Rebellion secrecy stuff with Anakin when she confronted him in the scene where she asks if he ever thought they were “fighting on the wrong side.” Padmé didn’t trust OW in the same way she trusted Anakin (with her entire self and being) she had the level of trust and love for Anakin that was only meant for him.

Mixing up her unwavering faith in Anakin as her husband with her trust in OW’s devotion to duty as her comrade/ally is purposely deluding yourself, because the two aren’t the same and therefore can’t be compared. An example of this is: Padmé constantly putting more value to Anakin’s words over OW’s in the end of ROTS when he came to tell her of Anakin’s “crimes”. She completely disregarded what OW had claimed about her husband and instead made her way to where Anakin was herself, to ask him directly. Despite what the truth was, this is proof of her trusting Anakin unconditionally, and I didn’t even think I had to spell that out because it’s as clear as day.

In conclusion, Padmé didn’t trust OW more than Anakin, she just knew the circumstances she was in didn’t exactly make it easy for her to openly talk with her husband about these matters and that’s part of what played into the issues they had in ROTS, it’s exactly what Sidious wanted.

[anghraine]

Disney-era Lucasfilm has given me essentially one film I adored (Rogue One, which also has my favorite SW ship and two of my favorite SW characters in Cassian and Jyn). It's also produced two more films that I very much liked (though only one of those still remains high in my estimation tbh), and a bunch of SW material that is not really the SW that plays in my mind, but at least fun and interesting to think about with the very glaring exception of TROS. I never had any investment in Legends, either, so for me the Disney era is not some huge loss.

I say all of this to emphasize that I'm not a kneejerk Disney SW hater. Nevertheless, I'm actually very disappointed with DLF's tendency to emphasize how ground-breaking and diverse and ~challenging some new SW media thing is without doing much to support the people involved or appearing to foresee that a fanbase prone to bigotry, nostalgia, and throwing screaming temper tantrums for decades on end is not going to react well. This is in no way an excuse for those fans, but DLF does not seem to ever predict how SW fans will respond despite their well-documented history of responding really badly to anything that remotely challenges them.

I love SW and I love my personal friends in SW fandom, but there have always been a significant number of vocally hateful and reactionary SW fans who manage to shape the discourse around basically everything in it. This is completely predictable. The fact that DLF seems completely unprepared for this reaction every time they give central roles behind and in front of the camera to women and/or POC, and also appears to do very little to support the actual RL marginalized people they hire when not just cravenly giving in to the worst elements of the SW fanbase (*cough*TROS*cough*) is incredibly frustrating.

Yeah, this is about DLF's poor handling of eminently predictable fan tantrums over The Acolyte which has just culminated in cancelling it after a bare eight episodes, but it's happened so many times at this point. The Acolyte was far from perfect but after how visibly unprepared DLF were for the raging bigotry directed at Kelly Marie Tran, John Boyega, and Daisy Ridley, or how weird people were about Solo, or the misogynoir surrounding the response to Reva in Obi-Wan Kenobi, or or or—they absolutely could and should have known that something like The Acolyte was going to need a lot of higher-level support to have any chance of success. At the very least there's no excuse for being surprised at this point.

And it feels a bit like it, and the actual people involved in it, were never really given a fair shot and the real higher investment is going to be in, like, Baby Yoda 4: Now With More Ewoks.

My friends and I just finished our first run of Jedi: Survivor, which we really, really liked, but there is definitely a tragic white boy protagonist propped up by POC and/or women (many now dead!) aspect to the whole thing that feels essential to its popularity. And it is frustrating and disappointing and all the more so because it's so eminently foreseeable at this point.

[zealfruity]

Star wars au that takes place in that one time period in history where it was very possible for cowboys, pirates and samurai to hang out.

[tennessoui]

"anakin slinks back into their house at least once a month with a dead sith in his mouth like a very deadly house cat" - 100/10 no notes this is hilarious :D

anakin is a surly cat who was accidentally domesticated, escaped into the wild, and honestly obi-wan knows it’s bad for the environment (the galaxy around them), but it’s literally exhausting to keep him inside all the time. obi-wan is sore and frankly tuckered out (the only activity he has found that anakin likes more than the occasional murder is sex)

it’s enough that he knows anakin always comes back after a few hours outside (yeah usually dripping in remnants of bloody crime lol) - and all obi-wan has to do to ensure anakin stays very close is mention that he thinks he’s going to invite one of the neighbors over sometime soon.

leave it vague. leave anakin guessing. he can’t kill ALL their neighbors. obi-wan would be cross

[arirter]

Eye of Darkness is NOT letting Elzar escape the polycule allegations he is literally always thinking of Stellan and Avar ghxjsialk

[ashdoesfandomarchieved]

not pro jedi, not pro sith, but a secret third thing

[legobiwan]

Set during the era of the High Republic, The Acolyte will begin to unravel how an esteemed organization like the Jedi Order could be in its golden age and also on the cusp of the chaos that unfolds in the Skywalker saga. “If Star Wars is about the underdog versus the institution, [in The Acolyte] the Jedi are the institution,” Headland says. “I was so interested in a storyline where the Jedi were at the height of their power — and I don't mean The Phantom Menace, because at that point, there's a Sith Lord in the Senate that they're not picking up on.” Headland wanted to explore further back, when seeing a Sith seemed as likely as encountering a velociraptor. “Like it's a thing I've heard of, but it's not a thing that you would ever consider you'd be interacting with.” With a darker tone focusing on the duality that exists beyond the simplistic black-and-white view of good versus evil, The Acolyte asks a key question before the fall of the Jedi: “What went wrong?” Headland asks. “And if the bad guys are actually the underdog, it just seemed like a cool reversal.”

Article

Color me intrigued.

[short-wooloo]

A lot of people seem to have the idea that the point of SW is that Jedi are not automatically good

No

The Jedi are good, full stop, end of discussion

But

Its not that being a Jedi is what makes you good

It's that being good is what makes you a Jedi

To be a Jedi is to choose good, you can't be a Jedi if you're not choosing good, and if you're choosing good you're choosing to be a Jedi

[tatzelwyrm]

People on this site need to stop questioning Merrin's taste in men just because they personally don't find Cal physically attractive.

They should be questioning Merrin's taste in men because Cal lives in Greez's basement and picks shards of priorite out of Nekko poop.

[independent-variables]

Hi! I found you through the post-chain of clones and torture (I appreciated the possibilities it means and how it made me stop and reflect) and I would love to hear more about the nuances in Clone/Jedi ships, if you have the time one of these days!!

I would think the field mine that is the power imbalance alone between a general and their commander is loads, without taking into account freedom/who is considered a person/who has the power to say no. What else would you flag? *ready to take notes*

Feel free to keep this private, as you mentioned the distinction between Public/Private -- and if you're not comfortable feel free to not reply! I understand and I will keep on thinking about this on my own! :D

Hello!!! I want you to know this is the absolute dream ask to get, you are a gem and I am so glad my meta has got you thinking. If I have to be thinking about this at least I don’t have to be thinking about it alone, lol. I’m gonna go ahead and post this publicly because it’s not targeted to any particular ship it’s more about my understanding of the Jedi.

Alright, clone/Jedi ships, where to start… First of all I do read and write for various clone/Jedi ships, I don’t have any kind of moral “you’re a bad person for shipping this” agenda here. I just find the trends of what issues fandom chooses to address within these ships and what issues fandom tends to ignore to be personally frustrating.

You are 100% correct the power imbalance is massive, and the age gaps are nothing to sneeze at either. Depending on when the couple gets together there is also the slavery to contend with. But usually these are addressed in more serious fic. When a writer takes the characters and the ship seriously and wants to do the story justice, the slavery/power imbalance/age gap trifecta tend to be portrayed as Serious Things the couple needs to navigate. This is good! This is wonderful! These are indeed Serious Things a Jedi and clone couple will need to navigate if they want to make a go of it; everything surrounding consent and life experience and what they both want out of the relationship. These are hard conversations to have and difficult differences in life experience to navigate, but not impossible.

What makes it impossible for me to completely suspend my disbelief with any and every clone/Jedi ship is not anything to do with the power and consent issues inherent to the ship. It’s the fact that my own understanding of the Jedi and their no attachment policies gives me a kneejerk NO reaction whenever a Jedi gets into a committed romantic/sexual relationship and the writer portrays this as a good thing. The NO feeling increases when the partner is a clone and the relationship starts during the war.

I know in my heart various clones and Jedi developed intense feelings for each other during the war that could definitely be called attraction, or love, or develop farther into love. I know this. I know there was much drooling and many heart eyes. What I absolutely do not believe for a second is that any self respecting Jedi would even consider for a moment acting on those feelings. That is kinda the point of being Jedi. Entering into a romantic/sexual relationship with a person who is not legally recognized as a person and therefore has no rights or protections? A person whom YOU (Jedi you) holds literal power of life and death over? Absolutely the fuck not. NO. It does not matter if this person is perfect and wonderful and your soulmate and would gladly fuck you silly every night over the desk you two do paperwork on, There Are Standards! There Are Morals! There Are Codes!

If a Jedi and a clone start any kind of Anything during the war, that is a sign something has gone very very very wrong with the Jedi. There would be consequences from within the Jedi Order if this was discovered. Doesn’t matter if the perfect clone soulmate consents absolutely, this is about what it means to be a Jedi and what it means to hold power responsibly and what it means to follow a code of conduct and what it means to be a member of an organized religion. And that toxic “something is wrong but I don’t care because this feels so good” dynamic in and of itself would be interesting to explore, I have found a few fics that explore it, but more often than not a Jedi being in a committed relationship is hand-waved as long as it’s not marriage.

And that’s it. That’s my issue. When nothing starts until after the war and when it is made explicit that Jedi-- by the their own Order’s standards and expectations-- cannot and should not be in any kind of committed romantic/sexual relationship, then I have no problem suspending my disbelief and grinning as the dashing clone Commander and the noble Jedi Knight kiss passionately in the sunset. Good for them. Let them have their moment.

Because, Anakin and Padme are kind of a big deal. Like. The problem was not that they got married, the problem was they made a commitment to each other. Marriage represented and defined that commitment but the wedding was not the start of the toxic obsession and death was not the end of it. Anakin loved Padme with everything in him and loving people is good! Loving people and serving people with compassion is part of the point of being a Jedi! But committing all of your (Jedi your) love to a specific person is very much The Opposite Of Being A Jedi. This is a long and roundabout way of saying I think monogamy is against the Jedi religion actually.

This is also why Obi-Wan and Satine are kind of a big deal. I know what fandom thinks of that particular interlude but I really enjoyed it because it reinforces the whole-- monogamy is not a Jedi Thing. If you (Jedi you) want a committed sexual/romantic relationship, that’s cool, that’s fine, but you can’t have that and also be a Jedi. Jedi cannot have both. There are no handy loopholes for that rule. Because it’s not “Jedi cannot get married” it’s “Jedi cannot be committed to someone or something outside the Order.” And that is a good and logical and reasonable rule to have for an organization of space wizard monks. And it bothers me that a lot of fans who write the Jedi in romantic relationships and especially who write the Jedi in romantic relationships with clones don’t want to engage with that aspect of Being A Jedi and would rather handwave it or find a loophole, because we had three movies already on why there is no loophole and why Jedi cannot have both.

[kaxtwenty]

I find debates on, “who would’ve been the better master for Anakin,” pretty pointless because as long as Palpatine’s there to constantly dangle everything Anakin ever wanted right in front of him, it’ll always go the same way.

Anakin’s core flaw is his need for control, a result of his trauma from growing up enslaved. It doesn’t matter who is tasked with teaching him to overcome it, he just can’t so long as there’s a devil there constantly explaining every reason why he doesn’t actually have to.

The only thing that really changes is who duels him on Mustafar.

[teaforce-steph]

Look, the last few missions in Jedi Survivor ruined me. If Cal absolutely has to fight Vader and die in the next game for thematic/Star Wars reasons I'll be mad about it forever, so the payoff better be worth it at least.

I don't just mean successfully keep the path/crew/Kata safe as the initial call, I also want to salt the earth on whatever remains of the inqisitorious program at that point. Ideally by doing the Star Wars equivalent of driving a golf cart over Vader's Empire-themed birthday lunch and into the pool.

I imagine this would involve flooding the fortress a 3rd time, and only Vader escapes with the grace and composure of a sad wet spider barely making it out of the bathtub alive.