I'm Starting a JA Run-On Story- Please Add On!

Obi Wan's Saber Handler, I agree with you entirely. My point exactly, as we progress I am really beginning to doubt these Jedi as competent "defenders of truth and justice".

And another example of these morals: Mace Windu. This is really a poodoo-hole. He obviously doesn't take his fellow Jedi seriously, looks annoyed at Yoda about Qui-Gon. So, he's an oddball for the council. You don't have to respond like that. He's on the council, for crying out loud and all he has to do is talk to a boy. What else are these guys doing that controlling the force.
No wonder, the Sith grew to power. I think the Jedi needed some kind of good purging.

This reminds me of this very interesting theory of a fellow councilman who introduced the "corrupt Jedi council"-theory, including a traiterous Yoda and Mace Windu. It all seems to fall in place...

Anothersky, I am happy to hear someone just as bothered about that "certain point of view" stuff as I am. This really makes Luke look very, very good, doesn't it. He is honest, annoyed by lies, I really believe Luke is actually the "One who brings balance to the force". More and more am being convinced of this, GL must have misinterpreted his muze.

 

Oh, I think everybody was bothered by the "a certain point of view" thing. I mean, maybe not bothered, but it's like "Yeeeesssss.... All right, Obi-Wan. Good try. A certain point of view. We'll buy that, of course. (Sigh.)"

By the way, was Obi-Wan right to lie ?
I mean, what if he told Luke right from the start who his father was... Do you think that Luke would have gone saving Leia and all, or would he have just ended up on Prozac ?

 

Sabe...LOL He probably would have needed prozac or something much stronger. I just don't know when or how he should have been told. But the way Luke was told about whom his father was, wasn't exactly the greatest way on the planet.(talk about an understatement) I guess I just have a gripe about the lying.

 

Yesss....Kenobi lied, because he wanted to what????? Spare Luke's feelings? Then, when Luke was to go to Bespin to save his friends, what advice he had gotten from the two great Jedi Masters? "Forget your friends, boy, who cares with them, you have more important things to do. You are being trained to kill your own father.Preferably faster than he can say "I'm your father!" And you are not ready to do that yet.Besides, you might have some scruples about killing your own daddy, before hearing his half of the story.No way,kid, you are staying right here with Yoda, and finish your training. Your friends are not that important.You don't need to feel their pain, you don't need to feel their pain."
Luke answers. "I don't need to feel their pain."
From here on,what would happen? Write your own ending

 

Ol'val, all.

Certainly the ends do not justify the means. Sometimes, it is true, one must kill. Although too often necessary, it is never a desirable solution. The Jedi learn many ways of battle, but any battle in which a weapon must be drawn, be it lightsaber or assisted persuasion, is already half lost.

That being said ...

Truth does depend on perspective. The average human lies about 200 times each day: lies of appearance, most of them. Kenobi's own shading cuts rather more fundamentally, yet two things should be considered:

1) Darth Vader seems to contain little of the Anakin Kenobi knew;

2) In the early teenage years, Luke was ready to hero-worship a revealed father. Children are more perceptive than their guardians guess: Luke would surely have picked up on Owen Lars' view of Luke's father ("He'll never make a farmer, Owen. There's too much of his father in him." "That's what I'm afraid of."). Seemingly trapped on the dead end planet of Tatooine, ready to seize any opportunity to escape (remember the Imperial Naval Academy application), the early Luke have been all too willing to embrace his father's offer to rule the galaxy at his side.

So: Kenobi hedges the truth. (Granted, a major hedging.) He could scarcely do otherwise if Luke was to fulfill the purpose for which he was born.

Oddly enough, Yoda also could not tell Luke the truth -- although Yoda accomplishes this rather through omission than commission. (Ask me no questions ...) Remember, Yoda serves the Force, as, indeed, do all Jedi -- but serving is not understanding. (Yoda himself makes this distinction.) Yoda has himself been the central force towards stagnation on the Council for half a millennium. Even though it is Mace who speaks the words, it is Yoda who is most firmly set against Anakin's training. Why? Could it be that Anakin (and later Luke) had to learn not to trust the status quo? Had Luke learned to trust Yoda blindly, that stagnation, that entropy, could only have continued into a new generation of Jedi ... and the end result of stagnation is extinction. Instead, Yoda, serving the Force, can only prepare Luke, giving him the core Jedi principles which provide him with the strength to receive the truth from his own father and hold true to those principles. This is Luke's first life test, a test which will not be complete until Luke confronts his father for a second time. (The confrontation in the cave may be seen as preparation for the true test.) Yoda's own confirmation (and thus acknowledgement that he has withheld an important truth from Luke) creates a second test, a second teaching. In both tests, the Jedi principles hold firm -- and Luke emerges the stronger for them.

Truth is always a shaky thing when based upon this world of appearances, of illusion (maya). Most often, there is no reason to speak anything other than one's perception of truth -- but sometimes, the appearances may interfere with the greater truth. Example: a small lie by Qui-Gon: "My droid has the specifications of what we need." R2D2 does not belong to Qui-Gon -- yet by claiming a false ownership, Qui-Gon deflected the potential complication of others in Mos Espa claiming that ownership by right of possession. There was no need to seek out that particular problem -- so Qui-Gon averted it at its source. Another "lie" was the falsification of appearance created by Qui-Gon's donning of a water farmer's poncho, rather than wearing his own Jedi robes. Again, this lie avoided unnecessary attention and the trouble that would inevitably follow -- a trouble born simply of the appearance, and not of any greater truth. Fully 90% of the 200 odd lies told by humans every day are of this nature: "No, of course I have time to listen to you." And in so saying, Qui-Gon created a new truth, created the time needed to speak to every person as an individual, to speak with compassion. This is a concept Kenobi was still learning at that time.

Now to the more "creative" solutions.

A number of elements were coming together quite rapidly on Tatooine, in

 

My, what a strange desire seems to be out there to accept opinions on some subjects without questioning. Hmmm? (Maybe I should have added a comment on DiCaprio ...)

Honesty is never out of place.


"Lisa, we don't have to think. That's what we have politicians for."

 

My take?

There's nothing morally 'wrong' with being 'dishonest'....to one whom you expect 'dishonesty' from, for their own perceived 'gain'. I have no probs lying to a lier, or cheating a cheater.

Honesty, is to be granted to all...who agree with that. Those who Don't: those who have no 'Respect' for the idea of 'honesty' can't be said to 'Deserve' it back; once they show 'betrayal' (or, contempt) of such belief, They Deserve to be as 'led astray' in their goals, as they attempted with others. More relevently: those who find it Useful/Profitable to be 'slave-owners', show they have no 'respect' for 'slave-beings'. Compassion, Pity, Empathy, they m-a-y have; but, these emotions have nothing to do with Respect. Honesty is one form of Respect. Give no respect? Then deserve no honesty...except as one finds ...useful/profitable.

Who here sees Watto as 'deserving' 'honesty'? Watto had no prob being a 'slave-owner' (spare me the hypothetical of "Maybe he kept them to protect them."---a 'hustler'? R-i-g-h-t! ); for me, that he found it 'useful' is good enough to 'evaluate' his Deservation of 'honesty! Besides, it Was made clear later that Watto was dishonest in a literal sense: he tried to 'back out' of a high-risk deal he lost to QG, and QG had to remind him that Jabba might be interested in hearing about that.

Methinks GL will touch on this point a bit more clearly in II

[This message has been edited by Rowlf of Taarna (edited 07-31-1999).]

[This message has been edited by Rowlf of Taarna (edited 07-31-1999).]

 

P.S:

On the other hand: 'Honesty' implies No 'obligation' to 'tell ALL about what one believes' to any/every questioner who has a question for one; I therefore also have no prob with Obi and Luke.....any more than I have for Any 'parent/Teacher' with a child/student.

 

"I am not young enough to know everything." - Oscar Wilde

 

Tall trees catch the most wind.

 

It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood.
- Karl Popper

 

Jedi can't lie but they can cheat only if is for a good cause . Lets take Qui-gon Jinn. He cheated with Watto with the cube he used the force to make the cube roll to the color blue.



Darth Mattxpac

 

"The microscope can see things the naked eye cannot, but the reverse is equally true."
- Hans Selye

 

"The eternal silence of those infinite spaces strikes me with terror."
- Pascal

 

Just moving this thread up to the post-Xanotoes era.

 

Yes they can if it is for the greater good.

 

Wow, I'm impressed with your profound views on this topic. I am still not satisfied. I don't see any problem in withholding information from people to protect them as Yoda did. But Obi-Wan goes about and JUSTIFYING his lie with his weird lines. That's probably what bothers me most. He would have been much more honest to say: Luke, understand I could not tell you the whole truth, you would have become an easy prey for the emperor" or something like that.

Mind you, I totally reject the concept of the "ends justifying the means" or "not being honest with those who do not deserve honesty". If everyone would have morals like that the galaxy would soon be in total chaos. And remember: Jedi are defenders of truth and justice. Chaos should never be the result of their actions.

 

Ol'val, all.

Interesting, queeg:
I don't see any problem in withholding information from people to protect them as Yoda did.
To some extent and without some very good justification, I do -- which is precisely the root of the discussion I am continuing in brihana25's thread in Suggestions, and for that matter one of the underlying causes of the entire JC fiasco of the past weekend.


Learn from the mistakes of others. You cannot live long enough to make them all yourself.

 

LUKE IS NO ANGEL!!!

HE LIED,....OH YES TO THE EWOKS, HE MADE THEM THINK 3PO WAS A GOD AND WAS GOING TO USE MAGIC ON THEM!!!!

HE ALSO PULLED A HECK OF A FAST ONE ON JABBA THE HUT (LIED ABOUT BEING A JEDI!!!) AND TRIED TO USE HIS MIND POWERS ON JABBA! WHEN IT WAS ALL DONE HE JUST CAME IN AND DID WHATEVER HE WANTED TO JABBA AND HIS GANG,...AND IT WASN'T NICE!!!

I am not apauled at Qui-Gon's or any of the Jedi's little cheats, but really, if Qui-Gon was going to lie and cheat to get this hyperdrive, why didn't he just steal it???

Listen to the Radio Version of ANH, There is a very funny part where Ben convinces a buyer to buy Lukes speeder for more than it's worth, and then he explaines it to luke a after luke says "There are advantages to the force that I'm just beginning to see, Ben!" (great stuff)

 

Jedis do things to preserve peace in the universe, right? I guess there are two kinds of lying and cheating. The Sith kind and the Jedi kind.

 

I consider this a very interesting topic. Since SW is a vehicle for Lucas to present classic paradigms of good and evil, you'd think he would avoid letting the good guys do shady things to achieve their ends. Yet we see both Yoda and Ben utlilize deceptions, and we see Ben, Luke, and Qui-Gon use (or try to use) the Force to manipulate others. It seems to tell kids that it's OK to be underhanded if you think it's necessary to achieve your goals. What kind of message is that? Sure, the Jedi are out to protect the Old Republic/defeat the evil Empire, which they see as an importnat and noble cause. But look at Palpatine. He is out to rescue the Old Republic from the bureaucracy that is destroying it. He is doing what he thinks needs to be done to save the Republic from itself--a noble cause. He goes overboard with wrongdoings in trying to achieve what he sees as a better society, but it's all a matter of degree. Wrong is wrong. What we see the Jedi do is wrong, it's just less dramatic.

 

Hi. That's all I have to say.

<cbt:73>

 

<if a computer can lie and cheat, why not a jedi? - kayla>

 

Why is everyone using their own moral ethics as a measuring stick for the Star Wars universe? Many ethics are cultural. In a universe of many cultures, there can only be a few universal ethics. Yoda seemed to focus only on dark and light, offense and defense. He never told Luke he couldn't lie. Luke learned that through his cultural upbringing. That's why he chose to save his father rather than kill him as the jedi council (Yoda, Obi-Wan) would have wanted. Maybe that's why jedi are trained young so that jedi ethics can be instilled. Maybe the ends justify the means for the 'pure' jedi. Remember, killing is wrong too.

 

Who does it serve when the Jedi lie or cheat?

If the individual Jedi serves the Order and the Order serves the Republic, than lying or cheating is not the perception of the doer, as long as it serves the larger purpose.

A Jedi that lies and cheat for his of her personally gain would not be tolerated by the Order or the Republic.

or maybe not
RC