Saga The Dark Side - is it evil?

"Getting rid of evil in the universe" is a pretty clear and definitive statement, which clearly isn't accurate. I accept that it's probably not exactly what he meant, but the point remains that it's a good example of the fact that what he actually says doesn't always reflect the reality of a situation in SW.

 

The dark side, as a part of the Force, is just as external as the Ring, because the Force is external. I suppose calling the Force a "physical object" doesn't quite work. It is, however, an energy field. According to the Annotated Screenplays, "There is a giant mass of energy in the universe that has a good side and a bad side."

 

If it surrounds us and penetrates us, or whatever the line was, I guess you could say it's both external and internal.

 

I forget the name of this one Sith Lord, but I'm pretty sure that there was one Sith Lord who in fact did not have a grudge towards the Jedi order, nor did he yearn for immense power and he was not even evil. This Lord of the Sith pretty much just experimented and stuff. Ring a bell? And if I'm right, wouldn't the existance of a non-evil Sith Lord be proof that the Dark Side doesn't HAVE to be evil?

 

I'm not very familiar with the EU, so I can't comment. Just out of interest, though, what was it about this character which caused him to identify as a Sith?

 

Not really sure to be honest, I remember reading about him through the wookiepedia, but he was probably taken as an apprentice from a young age, I would imagine. I think he identified as a Sith but delved so deep into study of the Dark side that he didn't care at all about galactic domination and revenge against the Jedi, or even the true betterment of the Sith. But he was a dark sider, just not evil.

 

From what I know of Sith pholosophy, his days as a Sith apprentice would've been fairly short with that kind of attitude. He sounds more like Sith Librarian!

 

this topic asks the question is the dark side evil? really the question should be is "the force" evil? the force is neither good or evil. it has two sides because it's used in two different ways.

the force is the lifeforce of all the universe. there is no light or dark side until someones uses it. it's like air. you can use it to cool someone or heat it to burn someone but it's still just air. unlike air, the force has aspects that correspond to the way someone uses it. the more you use the dark side the stronger it makes you feel. the more you learn about the light side the more it teaches you. the line between light and dark can be very thin but if someone is using it in negative ways they cross to the dark side.

this is why yoda is so adamant in explaining it to luke. you can do "negative", "bad" or "evil" things for what you think are the right reasons. this means that you're committing evil acts even if you don't feel particularly bad about it and that is how monsters are made. the sith feel that there is no evil and that the ends justify the means as long as they get what they want.

 

I think the force as a concept is supposed to be a bit different to the planet-Earthly life force, though certainly somewhat similar. If you demystify it too much you basically end up with the dark side of the force being little more than doing bad things. I think there's more too it than that - there's a - and I use the word advisedly - possessive element to it. A point at which a line is crossed and a tangible thing - the dark side - has taken hold. That thing, in my view, is evil.

 

Sorry, what I really meant, which I should have said more clearly, was that you can't ever draw on the Dark Side in a way that is neutral with regard to your inner state. As I understand it, the Dark Side requires the use of one's emotions. The Ring doesn't.

 

Vectivus:

http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Darth_Vectivus

is being described by Lumiya, who is doing her best to lure Jacen Solo to the Dark Side. She may be distorting a lot of things about his history.

 

The Force on its own is a power that works best when it is fueled by negative emotions, but it comes with a terrible price. That's why Yoda said that it is the quick and easy path to power. As a Jedi, one must constantly train in the Force without their emotions getting in the way and thus as a result, become just as strong as a Sith. It's basically the difference between using steroids and not using it to get in prime physical shape. Steroid abuse will get you there faster, but you can achieve those same goals without it.

 

I don't believe the 'dark side' is evil, no. I believe it is the motivations and actions that can be and just because someone isn't a Jedi doesn't equal evil just as Jedi doesn't equal moral or good.

 

Lucas does though.

 

There's a correlation, certainly. This is what the Dark Empire Sourcebook had to say about it:

"The Dark Side is a part of nature — it is not inherently evil, but evil comes from its irrationality, its intolerance and its lack of control."

 

Narratively speaking, yes the dark side of the force is somewhat evil. You could get bogged down in semantics and theology, but essentially yes it's jolly bad stuff indeed.

Yoda's cod-guru speech about fear leading to burnt toast seems to imply that the Jedi are aiming for an outcome-determined, functional morality based on the ideal of limiting suffering. There must exist circumstances where a comparatively lesser 'evil' is preferable to a greater one. As we all know, only a Sith deals in absolutes, so an effective and useful Jedi must be prepared to embrace evil. Of course, none of this makes any sense.

In reality there's no such thing as the force, nor IMO is there such a thing as evil, rather just behaviours and events that individuals find hard to rationalise or empathise with, or just dislike on some level.

 

the dark side is evil period. it's using the force FOR EVIL. there is no debate.

 

Alternatively, it's using the Force while in a state of unrestrained anger and/or hatred.

Even if it's possible that the action committed in that state of mind is relatively harmless - it's probably not healthy to the mind of a Force-user to keep doing it.

 

I like to think of being Force-sensitive as possessing the ability to use one of those intense martial arts which are primarily for defence only - but which also give about ten options for killing an attacker with a single blow if need be.

Point being, anyone possessing such an ability requires a great deal of discipline, so as not to abuse such skills. The Jedi quite clearly enforce such discipline, the Sith appear to encourage a lack of any sort of restraint. The notion of 'The Dark Side' seems to refer to a lack of self-control, which, while being very human, is something far more dangerous in individuals like Anakin and Luke, than say, Han Solo (who clearly strays towards such instincts regularly).

However, this innate power which Anakin, Luke, Obi-Wan, Palps and so on possess doesn't exist in the real world, so the 'Dark Side' simply has to be taken as a metaphor for a lack of self-control alone.

 

I disagree. The Sith were not undisciplined and unrestrained bestial killers. Palpatine spent decades being perfectly polite and civil to everyone in the galaxy, Maul was shown as patient and meticulous, Tyranus clearly enjoyed formality and good manners and never once displayed a hint of undisciplined behaviour (even when it meant his death).

Vader was sent to kill children and politicians as part of some sort of Sith ritual and clearly didn't enjoy it. (Okay maybe killing the politicians gave him a bit of grim satisfaction...) He was the least restrained of the bunch, what with his casual choking of underlings and haphazard neck breaking interrogation technique, but he's the exception not the rule. That said, he still wasn't totally undisciplined and unrestrained; he obeyed orders - even from non-Sith. He meditated. He wanted more but waited decades before moving against his master - and when he did, at that moment when he was truly unrestrained, his motivation was to save his son, not to take over the galaxy.

 

^^^
Very well put - but I would consider the Sith to be completely unrestrained when it comes to any sort of moral framework, which I believe they simply dismissed as irrelevant.

If, however, we're talking about about Good vs Evil, then a structure of morality, however arbitrary and shifting, comes into play, simply based on including such concepts. In which case, Sith / Dark Siders abandon all attachment to such restrictions, while the Jedi attempt to adhere to the 'Good', as best they can, based on what they believe to be this 'Good' or 'Light Side of the Force'.

And perhaps it was this ambiguity which led GL to create the character of Qui-Gon Jinn who seemed to be focused on balance, rather than winning a conflict of light vs dark.

For me, the Dark Side is very much represented by the "win at all costs" mentality you often see in sports teams across all codes - illustrated none better than the likes of a vile football player by the name of Kevin Muscat, who captained his Australian A-League team to two double premierships/championships, and who remains reviled worldwide for the violent and slimy behaviour that has coloured his entire career across Australia, Scotland and England, earning him the title of 'The World's Most Hated Footballer'.
Google the bastard - and let the hate flow through you.

 

May I submit Darth Greg Chappell and his Sith apprentice, little brother Trevor, with reference to the sporting analogy described above?

 

May I ask what exactly you are saying about Qui-Gon?

I ask because I don't wish to misunderstand your position. If you mean to suggest that Qui-Gon was ambiguous about the existence of moral goodness which is ascertainable, inherently preferable and *should* prevail (in a normative sense), I have to disagree.

 

I won't attempt to speak for Darth_Nub, but my interpretation of what he said isn't that Qui-Gon was ambiguous about the existence of moral goodness, but perhaps that he was more accepting of the inevitable existence of evil. The removal of the Sith did not, after all, eradicate evil. Rather it brought the inevitable darkness in the galaxy back into balance.

My own take on Qui-Gon is that he was more about achieving a balance between focus on the moment and the future than anything else.

 

I think Sith have a moral framework. It's authoritarian and distasteful but it's there. Palpatine's dialogue with Anakin (as well as Anakin's dialogue with Padmé) suggests they desire order and stability. Order, they claim, is worth making sacrifices for. Now you can say that was all just waffle to trick Anakin into becoming a fascist theocrat, but I think there's always a glimmer of truth in what Palpatine says.

What you call a dismissal of moral frameworks could be interpreted as a pragmatic rejection of dogma...

Isn't abandoning attachment more like a Jedi belief though?

Attachment to ideas/ideologies seems dangerous for a force use.

Attachment to the Jedi code resulted in the corrupt and ineffectual organisation seen in TPM and AotC. They were not the Arthurian knights righting wrongs and fighting the good fight like Kenobi in ANH, they seemed more interested in maintaining their neutrality than freeing slaves (or even tackling social inequality within their legal jurisdiction). They dispensed justice, but only as directed by powerful (and corrupt) senators.

Very good point. I think the EU writers tried to put Windu in that pigeon hole, too, though with a slightly different flavour... Anyway, it's quite sad that Qui Gon (and Mace) came to a rather futile sticky end. It's quite a shame that more wasn't made of the Qui Gon angle in episodes 2 and 3 (though now we have TCW to fill in that gap, I suppose).
(And you never know, Mace may turn up in Rebels before long...)

Sport? What?