How does one become a member of the Dark Side?

The dark side isn't an actual place, it's simply a frame of mind. It's all about the intent of the user.

You lie, it is too a place. And I even have proof,

Proof that the Dark Side is an actual place

And to answer your question M_B_J, only I can approve new members.

 

Very excellent observation. Given what we know of the Force as being an energy field created by "all living things" it would be contradictory for the Jedi to be considered among the forces of good if they used that power for personal gain.

It seems that the Sith consider the ability to wield the Force as a birthright, whereas the Jedi consider it more of a responsibility to use their powers for the betterment of others.

What exactly do you mean by "personal gain"? If you mean "using the Force for illegal activity" (such as mindtricking the banker into giving you a billion credits) or "using the Force for immoral activities" (such as killing an innocent person for the sake of killing), then I'd agree that using the Force for personal gain is a bad thing.

But there's another, and what I feel to be an ignored, definition of "personal gain": "using it to keep yourself happy - in morally sound ways (obviously)." I think that it's stupid to ask the Jedi to not use the Force for themselves when they worked so hard for so long to master it. It's like saying to a wizard that he can use magic only for others, never for himself. When it comes down to it, Jedi are as much human (or Charlactan or Wookiee or whatever) as anybody else, and nobody has any right to tell them that they were born to be slaves to the galaxy.

-Aunecah

 

Having discipline and a code that guides a Jedi's use of the Force does not make them slaves to the galaxy, but I guess you could argue that forced conscription into the Jedi order for life is tantamount to slavery.

One of the basic reasons why the Jedi Order and the Jedi Code are necessary is that in their absence, some of the people who have the ability to use the Force would be inclined toward using that power to serve their own base desires (such as greed, lust, thirst for power, etc.), which would eventually result in chaos and possibly the oppression of non-Force users.

So, to avoid this, the order indoctrinates these people from a young age, instilling in them a kind of altruism, which (hopefully) will prevent them from using their power for the kinds of selfish ends that would destabilize society.

 

DarthNigel - When I mean the Jedi are being enslaved to the galaxy, I'm not saying that's because of the Force of the Jedi Code. It's because they are expected to place the galaxy's needs before their own, to serve the galaxy before themselves, always galaxy, galaxy, galaxy first. (At least that's the way I'm reading people's arguments with "shouldn't use Force for personal gain" blah blah blah.)

Say you are a precocious child with an amazing talent for music. Are you expected to spend the rest of your life relentlessly teaching other children how to play the piano for free while never playing music for yourself? Or how about you have an amazing sense of intuition; are you supposed to join the military and help the planet but NOT help yourself by figuring out which stock to invest in?

When it comes down to it, the Jedi are helping the galaxy because they choose to help the galaxy. It is neither their duty nor should it be their duty. Being born with a gift does not make you a public servant or slave. And there is nothing wrong using what you have for yourself.

But just like all other gifts, you can use it the wrong way. For example, a computer genius could use his skills to program new games or hack into confidential information. You can use the Force to save somebody's life or kill the same person. That does NOT mean that you should stop the person from using the Force for themselves.

-Aunecah

 

What exactly do you mean by "personal gain"?

I meant it in the terms of using the Force to acquire more power. It wouldn't be too difficult for a Jedi Knight to travel to some backwater planet and set himself up either as a dictator or to rule secretly by controlling an elected leader.


Or imagine someone with Jedi powers in a casino. Wanna bet how the chance cube would roll every time?

 

But, but, but Qui-Gon did that with Watto. (At least I'll swear to Jedi and Sith alike that he did. ) He's excused because he's doing it for what he thinks is the good of the universe? I think that killing Anakin is the best thing to happen to the galaxy, can I do that?

Casino? Chance cube? "A Jedi craves not these things."

-Aunecah

 

I think there's a world of difference between having a talent for playing the piano and a talent for controlling the minds of other people.

The point of my earlier post is that where you have individuals with that kind of power, which would enable them to take over small planets or carry out all kinds of other crimes (as Herman pointed out), it becomes useful and necessary to have a mechanism for controlling those powerful beings.

Of course, there are options - you could simply find them and kill them (like that General in the X-Men wants to do to the mutants), you could confine them to a prison camp on some remote world, etc. The route taken in the GFFA is to grant them autonomy, remove them from playing a direct role in the political power structure, and let them govern their own behavior by means of the Code, so that at the very least, they will not use their power for evil, and so that if all goes well their power may be a positive factor in keeping the peace in the galaxy, and keeping tabs on the actions of force-users.

That being said, it's obviously not a foolproof solution, as the films depict. But in order to make it work, a Jedi must see himself as coming out ahead in the bargain: he sacrifices some personal freedom, but gets to be a part of something bigger. Thus, the Jedi have to be seen as an elite, a club that you would want to be a part of, not something everyone's trying to escape from. Part of this comes through indoctrination: teaching padawans at a young age (how I hate the word "younglings"!) about the responsibilities and sacrifices that come with great power. It also comes from the way the Jedi are viewed by non-Jedi: noble, honorable, trustworthy, selfless, and dedicated to the good of society over their own personal gain. (I think that in ep3 we'll begin to see what happens when this rosy view of the Jedi begins to give way to suspicion and skepticism.)

Of course, another reason to not want to leave the Jedi is that if you do try to set yourself up as a dictator, or try to make some other ignoble use of your powers, the Jedi are likely to figure you out in time and crack down.

As far as Qui-Gon's actions in TPM are concerned, I think the attempted mind trick on Watto is only mildly problematic. He obviously thought that their situation was grave enough to warrant the use of his powers, and he made a judgment as to what was appropriate. There's no evidence that he didn't intend to pay for the part they needed, the dispute was only over what form of payment was acceptable. A more unscrupulous person may have simply whipped out his lightsaber, hacked Watto to bits, hid the body in the junkyard, taken the part, repaired the ship, and been back to Coruscant before anyone in Mos Espa had a clue.

 

There's a limit to what you can force people to do for the sake of security.

Force-sensitive people are identical to computer geniuses (or pretty much any other genius) on a certain level. A trained Force-sensitive could destroy an entire world; considering how much people depend on computers these days, a computer programmar can also destroy continents/world. What are we supposed to do now? Agree to give a computer programmer training only if he agrees to use the computer only for others'? Maybe he likes playing games a lot, but sorry, you can use a computer only for the promotion of the good of the society, not for your own happiness.

That's not something you do in this world and that's not something you do in any galaxy, no matter how far, far away it is. Considering how much effort the Jedi put into learning the Force and considering how terrible their lives are, there is NOTHING wrong with them using the Force for themselves.

But like I agreed with Herman already, there's a difference between using the Force to cheat somebody and using the Force for self.

-Aunecah

 

>>>>But, but, but Qui-Gon did that with Watto. (At least I'll swear to Jedi and Sith alike that he did. ) He's excused because he's doing it for what he thinks is the good of the universe?

Some people say that he's excused, because he meant well- after all he was "cheating" the die to free a poor slave boy.

Others think that he isn't excused because cheating is cheating- whether Watto was doing the wrong thing by keeping a slave, using a rigged dice etc. is irrelevant because two wrongs don't make a right. (Is it OK to use the Dark Side if you only use it against a Sith?)


Personally, I think that the very existence of this question, the moral ambiguity is the whole point of Qui Gon's character- the fact that there is clearly a very fine line between using the Force (or indeed any power) for oneself, and using it to help others, and the fact that this power is seductive, and can corrupt. As Lucas has said (paraphrasing), when good and evil become mixed, everything is blurred- everything becomes shades of grey.

Firstly, look at how his character has been established;

-He mind-tricks Boss Nass into giving him a submarine- using the Force to steal. But it's so he can go and deal with the problem on Naboo; to help someone else. His acts are easily excused, because the good "obviously" outweighs the bad.
-He attempts to mind-trick Watto into accepting currency he considers worthless- again using the Force to steal, but in order to help someone else. Again, it's excused because the good outweighs the bad.


However, in light of subsequent revelations, in the knowledge that the Naboo invasion was engineered by the Sith and that Qui Gon was seen as a "maverick" Jedi who disobeyed the council and didn't follow the Jedi Code, we see this in a different light again. Sure, Qui Gon was trying to help the Naboo, but the Naboo only needed help because it was a part of Darth Sidious' plans; Qui Gon was unwittingly helping the Sith.

Now, consider the fact that Qui Gon is always focussed "on the here and now"- there's no way a character like that is going to figure out that behind everything he's doing is a Sith pulling the strings. Sure, he's 'going with the flow', wherever the Force guides him, but completely unaware that it isn't the Force that is guiding his actions- it's the Sith. (Which, in light of Attack of the Clones, could be seen as an example of how the Dark Side clouding everything works out.)


The difference with the morality of the dice roll is slightly different, but with huge implications. He is attempting to cheat Watto on the bet, with the intention of freeing Anakin so that he can take him to train to become a Jedi. In manipulating the Force, he is directly manipulating Anakin's destiny as a result. Qui Gon seems to be implicitly assuming that the Force has somehow made a mistake in guiding the Chosen One to where he was at that stage in his life, and is "correcting" that mistake and taking him off to train to be a Jedi.

Is he following the Will of the Force? I think that the scene where Qui Gon speaks to the council answers that question;

Look at Qui Gon's conversation with Yoda;
QGJ- "All I ask is that he be tested."
Yoda- "Trained as a Jedi, you would have him. Revealed, your opinion is."

Also, consider the fact that Anakin's failing as a Jedi is basically a result of his not following the Jedi Code- something we had already been shown that Qui Gon didn't particularly care for. And that when Qui Gon's master left the Jedi Order- apparently because of a similar dissatisfaction as Qui Gon with the state of affairs, he fell to the Dark Side and joined the Sith.

Finally, stepping out of the scene and looking at a more literary clue- the scene opens with Qui Gon's description of his encounter with Darth Maul. "He was well trained in the Jedi Arts. My only conclusion can be that it was a Sith Lord." This is a foreshadowing of things to come, as this is the scene where he is asking that Anakin be trained in the Jedi Arts- and of course, this results in A

 

Great post, Scott. But we know that mindtricking isn't something done only by Qui-Gon. Ben doesn't seem to have any compunction doing it in ANH, either. It could be argued that Ben got that from his master, but there's also the possibility that it's generally acceptable for Jedi to mindtrick people for the greater good of the galaxy.

-Aunecah

 

Thanks (again!)

I think the significant difference between Qui Gon and Obi Wan's mindtricks is that Obi Wan uses them in a passive, defensive way- to deflect the stormtroopers attention in order to protect Luke and the droids (and later on, to protect himself); to prevent them from taking certain actions. Qui Gon uses it actively and aggressively (for want of a better word)- to prompt Boss Nass/Watto into taking specific actions he wants them to take.

"A Jedi uses the Force for knowledge and defence..."

 

Which supports my point that it isn't as much what you do but how you do it that matters.

Thanks Scott (again ).

-Aunecah

 

A couople of theories on this topic.
1. Its a way of life, chosen by each person wether Jedi/Sith/normal? To put it in today's terms, if I choose to become a Baptist, even though my family are all heathens, so be it. It's my choice, and I walk that path.

2. As Master Yoda eludes to in ESB, things that you crave- excitment, recklessness, adventure, etc... these things are not in the mind of the Jedi, essentially forbidden by the Jedi Order. Sort of like a 'choirboy' deciding he wants to drink, smoke, and have premaritial sex. If you do these things, in the eyes of the JO, you will be expelled, and, to go back to Yoda, "forever will it control your destiny.'

Sorry to bring in the Church on this, just trying to make a real world connection.

 

The darkside is a metaphor for taking the easy way.
Fear and anger. Theses are two emotions most commonly linked to the darkside and are subsequently the two hardest emotions to master. There are other ways to evil to be sure. Lets not forget that GL is admittedly
spiritual and much of it reflects in this subject. I would venture to guess that if asked in an interview he would say that any of the seven deadly sins are equally surefire ways to the darkside if not heeded. Truly if you think about it in that venacular Anakin
probably was the most powerful of all the Jedi, for it takes a combination of at least 5 of those sins (wrath,lust,envy,pride, and gluttony (power)) to convert Skywalker to evil. Pride is definetly what takes Dooku down the slippery slope ( arguments with
the council, strong political ideology ). Qui Gons somewhat questionable methods could very well have lead him to the darkside if not for his demise. It at least would answer the question as to why he didnt reach a higher force conciousness when his body died. That is a subject that im sure was debated heavenly years ago in these forums.

 

Anyone who hurts and kills other people purely for their own personal gain is on the Dark Side.