This is.... an interesting perspective. What do you think?
Star Wars Was the Empire right in Star Wars?
- Thread starter Al
- Start date
Darth Cognus
The Huntress™
There was a sequel;
In fact just browse the channel for a handful of other devil's advocates, including for the Sith Order itself.
Broadly speaking I believe that the Empire was inevitable, following a distinct pattern of history. The leader rises up and stakes a position and a strength that was absent during terrible times, filling a vacancy... Caesar, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, I know I've missed some, and then we have Palpatine. Are these good people? Well, even the 'great' ones often leaned/lean expedient and even brutal in nature particularly to their enemies. The Galactic Empire has a particular thing with human purism that might be familiar. The empires that failed and committed wholesale atrocities are obvious but in this list we do have some persistent legacies that are idolized even still, to my knowledge they all came from great turbulence in prior years and the climaxes were often engineered to some extent by the people named. I think Palpatine as a statesman lies somewhere in this list of names in terms of his effect and the empire that was created.
So was the empire right? Setting all morals aside I suppose it was what the galaxy was due to get given the decline of the galactic institution before. For some life was better and for others it was not up to and including instant death. I suppose generally speaking most of the galaxy benefited from stability and on average simply didn't care, one ruler was replaced with another. Unlike say, Stalin however, Palpatine's Empire did seem to have a better average in quality of life, supply was efficient enough and not entirely concentrated to the absolute top. It was not an expansionist ideologue state that burned the production of its vassals into the ground for unsustainable conquest. So despite being an effectively religious nutjob in many respects it seems the Empire leaned better than before where a more prevailing sense of lawlessness ruled and was probably going to result in a war eventually even without Palpatine deliberately egging it on.
That's a lot of words to say... eeeeh. I don't know if all this quite makes up for the damage made in the Galactic Civil War but in all I have to say it could have been worse.
In fact just browse the channel for a handful of other devil's advocates, including for the Sith Order itself.
Broadly speaking I believe that the Empire was inevitable, following a distinct pattern of history. The leader rises up and stakes a position and a strength that was absent during terrible times, filling a vacancy... Caesar, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, I know I've missed some, and then we have Palpatine. Are these good people? Well, even the 'great' ones often leaned/lean expedient and even brutal in nature particularly to their enemies. The Galactic Empire has a particular thing with human purism that might be familiar. The empires that failed and committed wholesale atrocities are obvious but in this list we do have some persistent legacies that are idolized even still, to my knowledge they all came from great turbulence in prior years and the climaxes were often engineered to some extent by the people named. I think Palpatine as a statesman lies somewhere in this list of names in terms of his effect and the empire that was created.
So was the empire right? Setting all morals aside I suppose it was what the galaxy was due to get given the decline of the galactic institution before. For some life was better and for others it was not up to and including instant death. I suppose generally speaking most of the galaxy benefited from stability and on average simply didn't care, one ruler was replaced with another. Unlike say, Stalin however, Palpatine's Empire did seem to have a better average in quality of life, supply was efficient enough and not entirely concentrated to the absolute top. It was not an expansionist ideologue state that burned the production of its vassals into the ground for unsustainable conquest. So despite being an effectively religious nutjob in many respects it seems the Empire leaned better than before where a more prevailing sense of lawlessness ruled and was probably going to result in a war eventually even without Palpatine deliberately egging it on.
That's a lot of words to say... eeeeh. I don't know if all this quite makes up for the damage made in the Galactic Civil War but in all I have to say it could have been worse.
Here's another interesting take:
Note, I wouldn't apply this to all movies totally or for the most part. One such movie is Wal Street by Oliver Stone.
I've seen this idea in other movies too. For instance, in Platoon and Good Morning Vietnam, the two negatively portrayed authoritarian sergeants were actually right on the money about the situation. For instance, in the first movie, Adrian Cronauer's political jokes and and releasing of classified info were a threat on the battlefield. That threat can probably cost real human lives. With the 2nd movie, Sergeant Barnes very brutal view of how the war should be conducted, was, well, actually correct. In fact, if that wasn't the war plan, the US shouldn't have went in. Well, actually, the ultimate plan would be using nukes on the war suppliers (no winner there so best to stay out of Nam).
Note, I wouldn't apply this to all movies totally or for the most part. One such movie is Wal Street by Oliver Stone.