Poll: Jedi or Sith Philosophy: Who is right?

[CaptainMarvelous]

Neither, but Jedi as a societal construct is more beneficial. On a personal level, Sith because its best for the individual, Jedi for a group.

It's like that thing with heaven and hell are both just people with really long spoons for arm.

 

[DoPo]

Neither... religion and false virtue is garbage compared to the proletariat strength of the earth!

In truth, I'll go Sith because Red > Blue

Sarge can back me up on this.

Red has also been thoroughly proved to be faster!

And now I wonder what would a crossover between Star Wars and Warhammer 40k look like.

 

[KyuubiNoKitsune-Hime]

And now I wonder what would a crossover between Star Wars and Warhammer 40k look like.

What would a Warhammer 40k and Star Wars crossover look like? Oh I know the answer to this one! A Mess!

 

[Ihateregistering1]

I always sort of assumed that the Sith were depicted as pure evil in the Lucas Films because, ultimately, George Lucas has always said he wanted to the films to be kid-friendly, and that means having very well-defined good and evil sides, so therefore Jedi=Good, Sith=Bad.

I've played a decent amount of Star Wars games (though I literally just started playing KOTOR) but never read any of the books or comics or anything, so I assume that in the expanded universe it's a little more nuanced. In the prequel films, I did notice that the attitude of the Jedi seemed to be "we were born with special powers, therefore we're better than you and have the right to dictate how you live your life", but the Sith pretty much seemed to have the exact same attitude, just angrier.

But if I had a crap-ton of mitichlorians and had to choose a side? Sith all the way. Red lightsabers look bad-ass, you get to wear cool black capes or robes, get bad-ass cybernetic implants, do whatever the hell you want, shoot lighting from your fingers, and choke fools through a videophone.

 

[TWRule]

Well, within the context of the universe, the Jedi probably got it right since they apparently get not only eternal life and the ability to still consciously interact with the world after death (force ghost), but apparently the promise of eternal serenity following that, whereas the Sith seemingly either get oblivion or an eternity of torment...Jedi get the better deal there.

But if you actually analyze each ideology for the philosophical adequacy of their ideas? Yeah, it's utter nonsense on both sides, and nothing that a real and sane human being could live by. The Jedi are basically an oversimplified mix of Christianity and Taoism, while the Sith are an oversimplified mix of Ayn Rand's Objectivism (which is itself a perverse oversimplification of Nietzsche's thought). Those real-life ideologies had major flaws even before being oversimplified and mashed together haphazardly for the Star Wars universe.

But then again, Star Wars' point might be to instill a sense of the battle between Good and Evil being real, even if it doesn't fit into popularly established philosophies (that is, even if no one has a perfect intellectual grasp on what 'Good' should mean).

 

[Objectable]

In base philosophy, I follow the Jedi.. THe Sith believe in Might is Right, that those who wield power should use it for their own gain. Meanwhile, the jedi follow might for, that those who have power should use it to help others who don't.

 

[Cold Shiny]

In KOTOR 2, if you play as a Sith, the Jedi try to kill you. If you play as a Jedi, they still try to kill you.

I dunno who's right, but the Jedi definitely aren't.

 

[LordLundar]

And another vote for neither. The Jedi Knights are the fanatical followers of Order while the Sith are Fanatical followers of Chaos and both see the balance of the force as the utter destruction of their opposite.

They're simply two sides of the same coin, nothing else.

 

[Terminal Blue]

IRL, I find the Sith philosophy to be more appealing because it's basically about embracing your emotions as a part of who you are, rather than repress them out of existence through self-denial.

However, in a universe where the force actually exists, the Jedi are absolutely right and the Sith are idiots.

See, force sensitivity in Star Wars is actually kind of a disability. An ordinary person can pretty much do, think or feel whatever they like and still retain a degree of autonomy and psychological health. A force sensitive cannot. Once a force sensitive becomes angry, or frightened, or feels any of the emotions it would be totally normal for a person to feel, they run the risk of drawing on the dark side. When they do, they will suddenly realize that a whole new source of power is available to them, an incredibly easy source of power. They suddenly feel euphoric and amazing, like they can do anything.. as long as they keep drawing on the dark side.

Then over time, very subtly, they come to depend more and more on the dark side. In fact, they become less and less able to draw on any emotion or power not of the dark side, and the sense of power they feel starts to feel less and less sufficient. The only way they can make the feeling of power come back is by behaving in accordance with the dark side, by constantly being angry, by constantly killing things, by nursing their festering hatred of everything. All the emotions they used to have atrophy away leaving only a vicious cycle of self-loathing, compulsive behavior and rage.

In case it's not obvious at this point, let me spell it out. The dark side is space crack. That is why the Sith are absolute idiots, that is why they constantly sabotage themselves through compulsive displays of petty, mindless evil. That is why they can't work together or accomplish any lasting goals. That is why their interesting philosophy essentially boils down to being angry all the time, because they aren't in the driving seat any more. The dark side is in the driving seat. They go where it wants, they do what it wants, they feel what it wants. They're the broken shells of human beings being driven around by their addiction.

If I was in the Star Wars universe and happened to be cursed with force sensitivity, I would definitely side with the Jedi. The Jedi teach voluntary self-restraint, which is regrettable but understandable. The Sith teach false freedom in order to disguise their involuntary servitude to their own power.

Some Star Wars stuff, most notably the Old Republic games, have a much more shades of grey understanding of the force with this very dualistic notion of balance. How canon you consider that will vary, but even then it doesn't really fit with the depiction of the Sith even in those games.

 

[immortalfrieza]

Kidnapping children from their families?

People keep mentioning this, and it's inaccurate. The Jedi do not kidnap children, they take infants that tests show to be Force Sensitive and ask their parents if they want them to train to be Jedi, and if the parents say yes they can take them, if no they can't, and that's the end of it.

Still, the fact that they only take in infants is another flaw, it means that their pupils are indoctrinated to the Jedi Code and thus it leave VERY little room available for change and thus improvement because they become incapable of truly recognizing where that code fails. Students of around Anakin's age when he joined should have been the norm rather than the exception for this reason, kids young enough to still be able to train in The Force yet old enough to have developed something of their own world view at the same time to ensure the Jedi Code could be more effectively modified to reflect human/alien nature.

Snip

To be fair, they've already stated that unless something in the newly official material outright contradicts it the Legends canon is as much canon as the movies are.

As for both Orders, their fundamental problem is that they are both a religion, and like all religions tries to fit the world to their views, rather than their views to the world. Neither side is truly interested in actually modifying their Codes to become better at understanding themselves and The Force, instead they try to drive themselves and The Force to fit into what that Code dictates, this is why neither is able or wants to fix the rather glaring flaws that only those who don't belong to either Order can very plainly see are there.

 

[immortalfrieza]

Snip

To be fair, they've already stated that unless something in the newly official material outright contradicts it the Legends canon is as much canon as the movies are.

They did? When?

Hold on... this has all the details of the new canon as far as I'm aware: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/User:Toprawa_and_Ralltiir/Canon

 

[CrystalShadow]

Neither... religion and false virtue is garbage compared to the proletariat strength of the earth!

In truth, I'll go Sith because Red > Blue

Sarge can back me up on this.

Red has also been thoroughly proved to be faster!

Purple is the one true colour. All others are mere decomposed imitations.

 

[immortalfrieza]

Snip

To be fair, they've already stated that unless something in the newly official material outright contradicts it the Legends canon is as much canon as the movies are.

They did? When?

Hold on... this has all the details of the new canon as far as I'm aware: http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/User:Toprawa_and_Ralltiir/Canon

That was definitely a lot of non-committal replies. It annoys me when they start doing stuff like this and drag the decision out on whats canon or not. On the bright side drews revan novel can be safely disregarded so yay!

That said would've thought SWTOR was definitely canon given its still actively given new content.

Heh, maybe Heddle was taking lessons from Yoda. Being vague and contradictory while acting as though he actually knows what he's talking about is sort of his thing.

 

[Daw]

The problem is like every dangerous thing, be it magic from the dragon age games, the force or even guns in our own world.
Having somebody to check up and watch over people like this is needed.
In the only movies point of view they're both kind of crazy until luke who finds his own balance (like qui-gon and obiwan tried to)
with all the EU there were good examples mentioned like the old republic and imperial knights (and new jedi order) who let people be in love have friends and interests.

The jedi being basically super good 'cops' is problematic because somebody will chase you down to get pay back, and some people even with best intentions can become unstable due to loss.. or fear of loss.
But because they cut off any real connections as children i think its a more dangerous road, They don't know how to deal with loss or even deal with love.
in extreme cases both have been the sole cause of jedi going off the deep end.

In the sith's case they do make a pretty good empire for a while, i mean its just like rome.
for power people will kill and the powerful people at the top will allow it if alliances are made, but the infighting weakens the whole, thinking they can become this ever living almost unkillable emperor means they'll do anything to further their own goals which leads most of them dead after killing anyone they can.

If any sith did a good job and bad job at the same time i think its Sidous or palpatine/the emperor depending on your favorite movie/series.
He was such a good villian he planned out his plans for years knew every move 5 steps ahead of anyone else at any time, but he had rather big flaws too.
Killing his master i guess sooner or later he wanted to do it but i still think it may have been "because it makes him more evil!" plot inserts.
and what happens after the rise of the empire he steps on all the little people... why?
Sure he could and he could put down any rebellion until he couldn't but towards the end of the war they were still eating out of his hand, a couple of bribes and dead senators here and there and he could've kept the power he had and made the public think they still had some power.

But then he goes overboard and builds his huge empire, in the EU he had a vision that a powerful alien race were coming and the galaxy would fall if it wasn't prepared and he thought he could prepare it better by taking over the galaxy (of which wouldn't the knowledge of knowing an alien race was coming help keep people together?)
In the movies he just has power for the sake of power building ever bigger ships which could blow up planets he could blow up already just by taking longer (and wouldn't that be scarier? star destroyers bombing your planet for 7 days as the dust and heat kills most the population slowly?)

In the EU he had more depth which made him seem like a much better character he had clone back up bodies few besides his elite guard knew of, and his military build up was for a better reason than bad guys like big ships!


But my thoughts are a more open jedi order with the jedi who can't become knights serving the knights as watchers and guides building more 'temples' but not having them as such and allowing families and friends and loved ones inside with supervision.

You wouldn't stop people turning to sith but there would be a damn lot more people to talk to about their feelings of loss and how scared they are when something happens, and they can step down to being watchers and helpers when things happen until they're up to speed again.
The Jedi in the movies put themselves up far too high above everyone else they were meant to be protecting the people but besides when they were being saved they never saw the people they protected.



My favorite sith is Malgus he had good ideas and got killed off in a dungeon in SW:tor boo.
he wanted to rebuild the empire working with their slaves as equals rather than kicking them down and they turned Revan into a crazy person.

 

[remnant_phoenix]

A bunch of people have already said it, but both sides have serious problems.

The old Jedi Order was far too monastic, arguably to the point of being a cult. Taking children away at a young age, disallowing and discouraging emotional connection with people outside the order, dogmatically adhering to principles to keep "the darkness" out? These are all signs of a cult.

The Sith are selfish to the point of self-destruction and fail to recognize how this is a problem, despite all those who have imploded in the past, how can one join the Sith thinking that this is a path to anything else?

The New Jedi Order (dipping into the EU, but still) was founded by Luke Skywalker and allowed Jedi to have romantic attachments and own private property. It's the difference between a church of nice Christians who encourage each other to engage with those outside the order in a good way and work to make the world a better place as opposed to the old Jedi Order which was like New England Puritans who felt that they had to live apart from the world, practice strict and restrictive dogma, and exorcise all hint of "the dark side" from their midst.

So if the New Jedi Order applies, Jedi all the way. Fighting the good fight without being an exclusionary monastic quasi-cult.

 

[Callate]

Immortality versus my closest confederate inevitably plotting my demise.

Hmm. Let me think about this for a bit.

 

[vallorn]

And now I wonder what would a crossover between Star Wars and Warhammer 40k look like.

What would a Warhammer 40k and Star Wars crossover look like? Oh I know the answer to this one! A Mess!

Every Force user is a Psyker. The force becomes a malignant and hateful force in the universe. That combined with the gigantic proliferation of planet/ star/ system killing weapons in Star Wars (And especially the EU) would lead to a scenarion that is best summed up as "Things go boom, The musical. Directed by Tzeentch."

Then again, Slanneshi Sith would be fun...