Does the dark side lead to insanity?

The Dark Side definitely twists and corrupts force-users once they open themselves to it, we see how much Anakin changes and how twisted Palpatine is. They are supposed to ignore their conscience and rational self, and draw on their more raw emotions and and animal instincts for power. But does it actually start to drive them into madness, and explain their increasingly irrational thoughts and actions?

 

I'm not sure the Sith were insane, so I would have to say no, I don't think it does.

 

I think the Dark Side leads to egomania, and that might lead to insanity...

 

Can't ever see me thinking of Dooku or Maul as a "madman". Both of them seemed logical, well meant, and pretty "sane".

And ... the other two Sith we meet seem like they were insane before they were seduced.

So I say NO.

 

Do the Sith Lords become insane after practicing the Dark Side? No. Do they have a much higher chance of falling into insanity then let's say, the Jedi? In my opinion, yes.

 

It depends on your definition of insanity.

 

I wonder what would be classified as insane?
As the label of insanity can be given in such generalised terms...

Like : "Oh boy, he did something truely insane!"

Or: "He is insane because he goes to such extreme lengths to ensure whatever he wants happens."

Or this:"He is insane, or more properly he is psychotic, as he shows all or most of the symptoms of true psychosis such as delusional thinking, possibly hearing voices, yadda, yadda, yadda."

I think the first two would be common for Sith Lords, but the last, well.. that is probably rare.

Sith Lords are mortal creatures too, and when his or her mind starts to go because of abnormal brain chemicals, they might not even realise it. He would be a Sith, but it would be affected by whatever he was ill with.
I know thats kind of a "duh" thing, but it seems that Sith Lords are seen as near-perfect creatures, who make few mistakes, and are perfect tactictions,(Sp) masterminds, strategists, whatever.

So an psychotic Sith Lord, one who IS actaully-by-the-book psychotic, would be interesting to read about. And we would see during his story how his mind starts to unravel, how it begins to affect his goals, his ambitions, whatever. He starts to do increasingly questionable things, starts to act irrationally, starts to make little mistakes and then bigger ones as his judgement starts to go.

 

The sentence that I just bolded is exactly what we see happen to Anakin before and after he pledges his loyalty to PalpSidious. We see him do questionable things like massacre a village of Sandpeople (although we don't see him kill the women and children)and he vows to his dead mother that he won't fail again but unfortuantly he does. Anakin makes the little mistake of murdering an amputated & defenseless Count Dooku and then he makes bigger ones like betraying Mace Windu by cutting off his hand, help PalpSidious annihilate the Jedi Order including the younglings, slaughter the Seperatists leaders, neary choking his pregnant wife, and trying to kill Obi-wan. We also see Anakin act irrational when he made his "more powerful then everyone" speech to Padme and went bezerk when he saw Obi-wan which led to her choking and the inevitable Anakin/Obi-wan fight.

As for the 3 definitions of insanity, let's look at the following:

-Darth Maul fits the 1st definition since he was crazy enough to take on 2 Jedi at the same time (well, his master Sidious was more crazier than he is for battling 4 Jedi and Yoda, the grandmaster of all Jedi).

-Both Count Dooku and PalpSidious fit the 2nd definition for their plot to destroy the Jedi and their takeover of the Republic and the galaxy.

-Although Anakin has bits of the 2nd definition, he mostly fits the 3rd by letting the Dark Side consume his soul to the point where he believes anything Sidious tells him.

With all of that, I say that the Dark Side does lead to insanity.

 

How is number one crazy in the slightest? That is simply the way that warriors and soldiers operate, they face uneven odds all the time because it is how they know they have to get things done sometimes. That';s not crazy or even remotely close to insane.

The second definition isn't close to insane or crazy either. Political coups happen all the time, plots to take over or overthrow governments are not far fetched or insane in any way. Dooku and Palps were men with power, and they had enough power to get the job done, that's not insane, that's brilliant planning on their part.

The third definition isn't insanity either, that's a lust for power, that is inside everyone and every being. Whether it is the desire to be the best, to get the best grades, to get the highest score, or to bench press the most. Anakin had that lust as well and he followed it to a logical conclusion. The way he went about it would fall under the category of a little crazy, but not insane.

 

I don't know. I don't know if the Dark Side leads to insanity. And I don't know if a strong effort to maintain an idealization of what goodness is supposed to be, does the same. I don't know.

 

The real question is, does the dark side lead to inanity?

 

"The Dark Side of the Force is a pathway to many abilities some consider to be pointless." - Darth Sidious

 

Not insanity. I would certainly say it leads to what is judged as evil. Some Sith, Revan for example, I would not class as insane. In fact a lot of their actions would be well thought out, which isn't the trait of a madman. Killing for killing's sake, such as Malek, yeah that would be insane, but I wouldn't say it's a hard and fast rule.

 

That's why I think much of it depends on a person's definition of insanity. Those who think that one must be insane to be willing to commit atrocities such as the destruction of planets and torture would certainly view the Sith as insane. However those with a more specific and clinical definition may not.

 

the government does that. a lot of governments use torture and destruction to make their point. are the people serving those governments insane?

 

There's certain people who would argue that they were if they served their governments in any capacity that brought harm to another human being. I'd certainly argue that there's something mentally wrong with anyone who supports torture, though I don't know if insanity quite describes it.

 

hm... yeah, so we kind of have a problem, don't we.

 

Yep, as insanity is to a large degree subjective. The clinical definition is the most concrete one but I don't know enough about it to be sure if the Sith fit that.

 

if you consider egomania a mental illness, then sure, it leads to insanity. Sociopathy, not so much; otherwise Vader wouldn't have cared about Palpatine murdering his son.

 

Count Dooku, the way he is descibed in the ROTS novel, fits most if not all of the clinical symptoms of a sociopath. Even when he was a Jedi Master before he left the Order, it seemed he was using people. Maybe that is why his face does not change, he doesn't need to go Dark Sided to do some of the stuff a Sith does. He can kill in cold blood without drawing on his anger and hate. When he kills someone, it would be like swatting an insect. You don't hate the insect or are angry at it, it is just annoying and in your way. So you simply kill it. That is probably how Dooku thinks of people, they are just things to be used or gotten rid of. He probably doesn't hate them, they are just there. A Jedi would feel something for them. Dooku, even as a Jedi Master, would not.

 

No way man, Count Dracula is pretty reasonable. He offers Kenobi a good offer, gives the dudes left in the Arena a chance at survival, and seems interested in preventing bloodshed. The guy was trained by Yoda, and in turn trained our fave Jedi Qui-Gon. Yoda or Qui-Gon would certainly have picked up on any "weird" tendencies the guy would have had.

And like I said about the times we see him in the movies, he always offers surrender terms and looks to prevent bloodshed. I doubt Vader or Palps, and maybe even Maul would be so generous.

 

^^ Being a sociopath doesn't necessarily mean you're going to go around chopping people's heads off left and right whenever the mood strikes you; look at Hannibal Lecter, or a number of real-live sociopaths who went undetected for years.

 

Even when your up against multiple enemies, even you must realise that you can't defeat them all BY YOURSELF and it IS crazy for you to even try. Anyone that does are SO insane because they are too reckless, foolish, and suicidal to see that the enemies will eventually gang up on you and kill you so as Obi-wan said it best, "You can't win but there are other alternatives to fighting".

But the way they went about their planning has put countless lives in danger. It IS crazy to want to plot on taking over the governemt because it can lead to death and cause "civil wars without end". Its risky and it IS insane for that line of thought can lead to a "very dark place".

Just ask the Jedi.

But if we let our desires go too far, they become obsessions. Obsessions can and WILL drive people insane because it erases all rational thought to the point where they won't care about who they hurt or kill as long as they achieve their goals. Anakin didn't care about what kind of person Palpatine is or what he is doing to everyone in the galaxy as long as he does what PalpSidious says in order to achieve the power to save Padme from dying in childbirth.

 

Uh, the way I remember it Sidious, Dooku and Maul were all very successful at taking on multiple Jedi so I guess they weren't really that crazy after all. Are you suggesting that anytime someone is facing unfavorable odds it would be crazy to try?

So I guess you would consider the founding fathers of the United States insane then? After all they were staging a coup against the lawful British government and their plot put the lives of everyone in the 13 colonies at stake. And your line about the Jedi means nothing. The Jedi think anger and marriage are bad things too. It doesn't mean that anger and marriage are crazy.

 

It's not only them, Vader did the same in the Jedi Temple. A Sith taking on those odds seems like it's really just knowing what they're capable of. There's arrogance in it as well, but it's definitely not crazy.