I’m not seeing the problem with this, though I’m sure Shodan and duffer would disagree. 
I understand the idea of a democratically elected ruler for life…sort of a combination president/supreme court justice. But if you’re going that route, how believable is a 13 year old girl as your elected rep?
That’s not fair. He was simply saying the old “perfect man” problem again. If you had one, he’d make a great ruler. In Star Wars, the perfect man turns our to be a vicious monster.
[quote]
Well of course it’s about promoting democracy: wasn’t Leia a Republican senator as well as a princess of the blood? {And please, no tortured explanations about how this feat was possible, particularly any which involve the last two toy commercials}.
What’s the problem? She was princess of the planet’s government and became a representative of its government.
Apparently, Naboo has a large cadre of young, energetic, highly-trained people. They then elect from these a ruler. I can’t say it’s odd, because while theyoung-people aspect is highly unusual, the idea of electing a king is not uncommon. The Holy Roman Empire did so after every ruler’s death, and they’re hardly the only ones.
I admit, people harping on this pisses me the H*** off. Can’t you people freaking step outide your own imaginations for a moment? And maybe, think about how things might be different, even (especially!) if it doesn’t make sense to you? It’s people like you that kept sending in letters to the Babylon 5 folks about how Centauri hair was too strange. :rolleyes:
It’s more of a beauracracy than a democracy…
It’s only to be expected that Lucas’s self-professed reasons for writing, producing and (sometimes) directing the SW saga would have evolved over 30+ years. I don’t hold it against him.
Elected monarchs are certainly rare in human systems of governance, but not unheard-of. The Pope is elected by the College of Cardinals - which is, admittedly, selected by his predecessor(s) and is hardly a democratically-representative body. Holy Roman Emperors were elected by fellow royalty across Western Europe. Several British monarchs (James I, Charles II, and William and Mary spring to mind) were invited by Parliament to take the throne.
I also don’t really see a contradiction in having royalty and democracy exist in the same society (just look at Britain today). In “SW: A New Hope,” Princess Leia was an Imperial senator. She held a royal title in her capacity as part of the ruling family of Alderaan, and also held her title as senator in the larger, Galaxy-spanning Empire. She simultaneously served two different governing structures, the planetary one being a smaller subset of the larger, galactic one.
I read the linked article and nowhere in it was Lucas directly quoted as saying “Oh, Star Wars was always about promoting democracy.” Why, then did you put those words in quotation marks in your thread title as if it were a direct quote?
Sure Star Wars values democracy over empire. Old Republic = good. Empire = evil. It’s as simple as that.
I’d sure like to see a cite on that. I’ve never read anything of the sort, and the explicit content of the movies seems to contradict that. In Ep. II, Aankin espouses the benevolent dictatorship model and Amadala is shocked and says it’s a bad idea.
I think the Danes did it at some point as well. Or I think I heard that while studying Hamlet.
Anyway, hasn’t it become deeply obvious that the LAST person who should be asked what Star Wars is about? And I’ll read the articles later, but the Old Republic was a republic of some sort and the Empire was, well, an Empire, so I’m not seeing what’s anti-Democratic here.
…is George Lucas? :smack:
I read somewhere an interview from Cannes where GL says that the acting is supposed to be wooden and the dialogue stilted, since the series was created with inspiration from 1930’s style episode drama (Flash Gordon, I’m sure).
Mmm. Sure. I believe you, but never lie to me again.
Sorry, meant to also add that we can look at Phantom Menace and see that Lucas is committed to democracy via the promotion of peaceful and mutually beneficial trade agreements.
“But there’s probably no better form of government than a good despot. […] He can actually get things done. The idea that power corrupts is very true and it’s a big human who can get past that.”
– George Lucas (New York Times interview, March 1999)
Quoted in this article (sorry, it’s subscription only). Obviously my memory substituted “benevolent dictatorship” for “good despot.” Whoopsie! :rolleyes:
Reading these threads always reminds me of an observation I picked up on another message board (at least I think it was another one, it might’ve been this one though). The main point was that Star Trek fans, for all their wankerishness, will at least call a lousy Trek movie or episode a lousy Trek movie or episode; they don’t try to excuse it, or say that it was somehow lousy on purpose and that the lousiness is the result of some deep-running genius beyond the ken of the simple-minded. Star Wars die-hards, OTOH, seem intent on explaining away every niggling little fault, apologizing for every shortcoming and actually trying to reconcile the shifting web of rationalizations George Lucas has offered for a work that is often deeply inconsistent and not terribly well thought out.
Not saying vibrotronica was doing that necessarily, but it does come to mind.
And I wasn’t doing that. The acting in Phantom Menace and Attack fo the Clones ranged from the acceptable (Ewen McGregor) to the excruciating (Jake Lloyd, poor kid), and the blame for that lands straight at Lucas’ directoral feet. The screenwriting has been all over the place in the prequels and has introduced tons of unneccesary complexity into the story. Even though I will be the first to admit that the byzantine history of the Star Wars universe is one of its appeals to the fan, just as it is with Star Trek and Buffy and Babylon 5 fan, Lucas has someimes crossed the line into the just plain stupid. And who can forget the awful love story in Attack of the Clones, where Aanakin’s idea of a fun date is riding giant ticks?
To say Lucas sucks is an opinon to which everyone is entitiles, but to say that Lucas favors totalitarianism requires a cite. I read David Brin’s article, which gives the cite for your quote secondhand, in 1999 and I disagreed with it then and I disagree with it more now. Basically, it’s a real dressed-up version of the old Star Trek vs. Star Wars argument. Star Wars is not science fiction like Childhood’s End or Gateway–it’s a fairy tale in space. Nobody’s disputing that. Does the Star Wars saga argue that a small group of elites should make the decisions for the entire culture? Of course not. When the galaxy is ruled by democracy, things are good. There are petty squabbles, as there always are in democracies, about trade and such, but the world of the Republic in Phantom Menace is a superior place to live than the authoritarian Empire of A New Hope. When the small group of elites (the Jedi) become too enamored of their power and believe themselves to be all-seeing and all-knowing, a threat pops up unseen and toppples them. And who is the only person seen seeking abosolute power for themselves in all six movies? Emperor Palpatine. How does the saga treat him? As a role model, or as the worst villian imaginable?
Brin also says that in the original triolgy we are forced to choose sides between the Empire and the Rebellion, who are really only proxies for two factions of the same ruling house. This is untrue. The real political decision makers in the Rebellion are people like Bail Organa and Mon Motha, the last remnents of the democratically elected senate in hiding, like the Free French government in World War II. The Skywalkers are warriors–they’re knights. Luke is NOT in charge of the rebellion. He is COMMANDER Skywalker–he’s not even a general in the armed services. Vader is NOT in charge of the Empire–the Emperor is and Vader is his servant and apprentice.
So there are a lot of reasons to bash Star Wars, but Brin’s argument, to me, are not as legitimate as “The acting sucks.”
Well, since belief in the force is now less faith and more biologically proven fact, maybe it was a microbocracy…or bacteriocracy…or whatever.
Governance via yeast infection?
Nahh, government by STD; that wat’ry tart has been around…
A pornocracy, then.
Where do I sign up?
Guilty, comrade. 
She probably wouldn’t have inherited it from Amidala—that would kind of made it a bit easy for Vader to track her down, wouldn’t it? (“Mission log: In orbit of Tatooine, have captured Senator Leia, princess of Alderaan, daughter of Queen of Naboo Padme Amidala—hey, wait a minute…”)
Mission Log: In Tatooine orbit, that miserable sandy desert world where I was born a slave, then diagnosed as being teeming with Force goobies and rescued by a couple of passing Jedi, who despite being willing to cheat at gambling, were too high-minded to rescue my Mum, whom I later found had been kidnapped by a bunch of Sandpeople I went on to brutally slaughter in the midst of romancing a former queen. In short, the place where practically every event of galactic importance over the past forty years has occurred. Worth a visit? Nah, probably just a coincidence. Note to self: does my bum look big in this cloak?
Give Darth a break. He grew up in slavery on Tattooine, and his mother was killed (and probably gang-raped) there. I find it perfectly reasonable that Vader didn’t want to go down there again in A New Hope.
Also, Leia is a princess because she was adopted into Alderaan’s royal family. Her title has nothing to do with Naboo or Queen Amidala.
I hope you have all seen Darth Vader’s blog