This isn't directly related to X-Wing, but more the general universe. I have felt pretty strongly that the Jedi were not good guys. The world of Star Wars contained slavery of both droids and humans (clones), and the Jedi were the dispassionate protectors of that order. They happily utilized slave troops, and nowhere do I see any real attempt to help people. The Jedi were, and are, spectacularly self-centered.

If so, are the Imperials really the bad guys? The two factions are Imperial and Rebel, maybe we should just leave it at that and quit viewing the admittedly sinister looking Imperials as the villains…

There are good guys, as long as you do things their way. If you do not play by their rules then they will use direct warfare, economics, and covert actions and assassination against you.

If you destroy hole planets to enforce your will it could be seen as bad. Good or bad is determined by the winner of any war

good and bad are all determined by a point of view

the so called "bad guys" could be the heroes in the eyes of others

Well the thing is the Jedi have their jerks and their nice guys just like any group. For every Mace Windu saying “The code the code you must respect the code” there’s a Qi-Gon promoting compassion. The problem is the Jedi Council during the prequels had experience such a long era of relative peace that they’d gotten complacent in their own greatness. The Droid and clone thing is iffy. Is an artificial creature real? Droids may have quirks but tend to not gain independence unless they go so long without a memory wipe that they essentially glitch themselves into being fully actualized beings. As for the clones I’d recommend reading the republic commando novels, in it the Jedi Character is horrified by how the clones are treated and in the films Obi-wan looked rather uncomfortable with the idea at first. The novels also talk about how beyond even conditioning the clones have their brain chemistry altered into a more “herd” mentality, the first clones, that would become the Null Troopers, were almost killed by the kaminoins because they were too independent.

But all that aside the rebels aren’t the Jedi, aside from a few like Luke, Starkiller, and Kota the rebellion has nothing to do with them. They may take up some of the force religion again but I’d say it’s more as a symbol than anything. The Empire is certainly the “bad guys” though, they are racist against non-humans, impose martial law more or less everywhere, A New Hope mentioned that the senate was dissolved and worlds were being given to Imperial governors, stripping the planets of their autonomy. Not to mention the fact that standard imperial military doctrine is pretty much “Throw as many men at the objective as it takes, they don’t have that much ammo.” They don’t even try to make their people’s deaths be for a purpose.

I could spend a lot of time discussing this. For your sake, I will try and boil it down.

In the prequel trilogy, it is obvious that the Jedi Order has lost their way. They answer to the Galactic Senate instead of trusting their feelings. They aren't necessarily the bad guys, but by subordinating themselves to others, they have lost their ability to use the Force.

Yes.

The Jedi are the good guys. The Republic Senate, less so. They are not the same entity. Do not conflate them.

The Republic Senate decided to go to war. The Republic Senate decided to use clone soldiers. The Republic is the one that declares war, imposes economic sanctions, declares assassination missions, etc.

In the Clone Wars, the Jedi went along with the Republic because of their pledge to defend it. By the end of the Clone Wars, the Republic had become something unrecognizable, nothing like the Republic the Jedi pledged themselves to, and then it ceased to be the Republic entirely and the Jedi realized -- too late -- that they had been blind to the enemy within because they were too focused on the enemy without.

By most real-world moral/ethical systems, the Jedi are pretty clearly good. Maybe not PERFECT, but good.

The Jedi even mostly treated the clones better than the Republic itself did. They're the ones who started the trend of giving clones actual names instead of just using ID numbers.

GodotIsWaiting4U said:

This.

Being "good" doesn't require perfection. If it did, no one would be the "good guys". Moral relativism has no place in Star Wars. At its core, it's a galactic battle between two clearly defined forces of good and evil. Period.

Unfortunately, a lot of EU stuff has gone "off script" in this regard (looking at you, NJO series).

The Jedi made mistakes as an order. The movies don't highlight it, but many Jedi left the order at the beginning of the Clone Wars because they felt the Order had lost its way and was blind to the corruption of the Republic they'd sword to protect. Slavery? Jedi Generals? These things were never supposed to happen. Most of those that stayed were killed by Order 66. Some of the "Lost Ones" that left the order prior to Order 66 survived the purge, though Vader was pretty thorough in hunting them down.

Yes, the Jedi are really the good guys.

Yes the Republic decided to go to war, The Republic decided to use clone troopers and all those other things, But dont forget that it is being manipulated by a Sith Lord with an agenda of his own.

The ones who are willing to blow up entire planets of innocents are probably bad guys.

longthyme said:

That's just it, the Jedi Order were on the side of the Empire. They fought against the separatists/rebels until the empire turned on them. At no point did they fight for the people, even Mace Windu was perfectly happy to ignore the law in the end. The only time the Jedi were stirred to do anything besides support the Empire was when they found out the emperor was a Sith, and even then they didn't try to help everybody they just tried to kill him. Yes, I know it wasn't technically the Empire yet but all of the totalitarian pieces were in place long before Order 66.

I have a hard time considering people good guys when they are willing to allow "legal" blockades/invasions, slavery of humans (Tattooine, etc.), slavery of non-humans (droids, who are clearly sentient individuals), and eventually take a slave army of 5 year olds and use them to try to squash the rebellion.

Sorry, whether or not the Empire was bad it is pretty much impossible for me to consider a priveledged, aloof, slave holding, callous group of individuals as "good guys". I read about a group that believed the Jedi fell as a direct consequence of distancing themselves emotionally and avoiding attachments, which seemed like a very accurate crticism to me. Being dispassionate is not the same thing as being good.

Luke and the Jedi who came after him were as different from the original Jedi as the New Republic was from the Old.

The seperatists are not he same entity as the rebels. You know who else broke the law? The sith, by "consolidating power and murdering everybody."

Actually, the Emperor followed the law. The powers given to him were done so by the Senate, voted to him one at a time. Even the destruction of Dantooine was an attack against a rebel planet illegally supporting the rebellion. For that matter, when Vader siezes the ship in the first Star Wars scene ever shown he was absolutely correct, the ship was an enemy combatant on an espionage mission not a councellor ship on a diplomatic one. One of those cases where legal and right are not the same thing.

The separatists and the rebels were not the same? Why, because one of them was portrayed as the good guys and the other was not? From the beginning, the separatists believed they were resisting an ever more totalitarian regime. There was no period of time in between the two. The separatists from 1-3 were manipulated by the Sith, certainly, in order for the Emperor to gain power. But they didn't disappear, they just became the Rebellion and eventually won their war. This would be why Obi Wan is seen on a Separatist/Rebel ship at the end of Episode III.

At the end of the day, the Emperor was voted into office. The Rebels took it by force. On the original topic, the Jedi never threw in on the side of justice, they just got themselves clobbered by the Empire and wound up there. This doesn't mean there weren't good Jedi, but the order itself was rotten to the core.

Some interesting points in the last few posts…

The first time I saw Episode III, I was confused by the opening text crawl at the beginning that said "There are heroes on both sides. Evil is everywhere". It took me a while to realize that GLs intent was to show that there were good guys and bad guys on both sides. I interject that not all separatists were simply resisting a totalitarian regime; some of them were simply greedy. Others with purer motives were manipulated into rebelling.

I agree that the Jedi were/are the good guys. Part of the drama of the situation is the fact that thought they are good guys, they have lost a measure of their power because of their unwillingness to do the right thing. They have become shackled and emasculated by politics and by their own traditions, and they don't even realize that they are less powerful.

By the time of Ep IV, I would say that most rebels were good guys. There may have been some well-intentioned imperials, but they have only ever appeared in EU material.

Actually the Rebels are not the remnants of the Seperatists at all. The Rebels as they would become were sanctioned by senators appalled at what the newly proclaimed Emperor had become. Remember that the rebel movement was initially set up by Bail Organa, a senator. Palpatine manipulated people (good people) to do evil things. The seperatists were manipulated by him (in the guise of Sidious) to blockade Naboo in protest at taxes which in all likelihood were legitimate. Then the Jedi were trying to protect the Republic as a whole which is why when they found out Palpatine was a sith lord they had to move against him. Something he had kind of manipulated all along, he forced their hand yet again and then declared them traitors. And at least the Jedi didn't murder children, which if you remember Anakin (by now Vader) did, and in cold blood, that is pretty evil in anyone's book. Evil is measured not by inaction, if it were we all would be evil, but by action, the Jedi made mistakes, they are after all human no matter what else they are, and as Yoda always pointed out, the Dark side can cloud things, which could be why the Jedi never saw all this coming, in fact I believe Yoda said as much in Episode 2 or 3.

There is a deleted scene for Episode III showing several senators, including Padme, Bail Organa, a young Mon Mothma and several others meeting and laying the ground work for what would become the Rebel Alliance.

Actually the jedi did blow up a planet of force users in the past cause they didnt want to join the order (the oringinal teras kasi were force users, beleive followers of palawa or something). You would need to define what good is. Is good blowing up a starhsip to kill one dangerouse entity on it while killing the rest good?

Just as the force is clouded and things could not be foreseen by the Jedi, so is the belief that the jedi are "good".

This is not the good you are looking for, move along…

They don't murder rooms full of young children. So… there's that.