La Ron S. Readus
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All Jedi Are Cops! (VIDEO SCRIPT)
🕑 Added 2024-09-04 20:00:04 +0000 UTCReaders, I don’t know if you’ve noticed recently, but there are a LOT of fake Star Wars fans now.
Like, a WHOLE lot; like a HELL of a lot...
And while I know the hate originated less during Disney’s acquisition of Lucasfilm and more toward the privileged palm colored baby boomer geeks that told George Lucas that the shit he came up with was wrong because Phantom Menace wasn’t what they were expecting...
The part about their palm is pretty much the main thing transferred from the reason it originated to the reason it consists
Not saying you can’t be a fan of Star Wars and be white; the shit was literally made for you
/Like, Luke Skywalker’s story arc over the OG trilogy is literally the 12-step process of The Aryan Hero’s Journey, let’s be real/
But they have utilized reverse-gatekeeper tactics -- willing to make themselves look like a fool in something they don’t even know anything about -- in order to justify the racism they spew because it falls under the technicality of criticism. And it’s really telling at this point.
Nowadays, fake fans are rallying to the fact that Star Wars movies and TV shows made by Disney since acquiring LucasFilm have been less inclined to spotlight a white and/or white-passing man...
All so they can proceed to negatively impact its rating with disingenuous critiques and reviews under the guise that it IS genuine.
Most of them targeted the new characters portrayed by black and POC peeps -- /something that DEFINITELY didn't start with the 1999 release of The Phantom Menace, what are you talking about?/
While others were doing weird things like seeing lore and items from the “Legacy” Expanded Universe they claim to love so much... /be officially brought into the new timeline and complain about it/
Trying to invalidate the NEW concepts that were introduced to the lore since the acquisition just because it doesn’t match with anything that’s been allowed to exist in the current timeline
/Say that the choreography and cinematography of some lightsaber duels looked cheap and lame, just because the inspiration behind them wasn’t based on the main East Asian culture they regularly goon to.../
And, most importantly, review-bomb the wrong intellectual property in DROVES because they’re not smart enough to think that other things with that name existed YEARS before it did.
/So it only made sense that The Acolyte was the Star Wars show that drew all the things wrong about the fandom together in unison./
Not only was the main character a woman like Rei, but she’s also black!
/And there’s two of them!/ (This is getting out of hand. Now there are TWO of them!)
Add on top of it that all four of the main human characters in The Acolyte are depicted as and performed by someone that can ACTUALLY survive the desert planet of Tatooine without the suns giving them skin cancer...
And one could say that the expectancy of toxic not-fans of Star Wars finding any and all ways of discrediting this show -- even if they used legit and genuine criticisms of it as a shield to hide behind -- is at levels that only Emperor Palpatine from Return of the Jedi could comprehend.
(It is unavoidable. It is your destiny)
This is why, for today’s lesson, I wanna touch on a subject that continues to make these fake-ass fans of Star Wars cry even harder when it comes to the Acolyte
Because while they’re spending all this ridiculous amount of time and energy trying to discredit the show because their nostalgia is too closely connected with their generational curse of a supremacy complex...
/Star Wars: The Acolyte actually has within it a great message of social justice they COULD be considering a “woke waste of time” instead, that -- thanks to it taking place 100 years before the prequel trilogy near the end of the High Republic era -- comes across beautifully in the themes of power, control and complacency over the course of its 8-episode season, if the fake fans in question weren’t so fucking stupid./
The message in question: The Jedi are the police. And we should DEFUND the police. Let’s begin.
______________
Hey, Readers. La’Ron here. Offering you analysis and perspective on your favorite bits of geek and pop culture media
If it wasn’t obvious from the intro, this video will in fact contain spoilers for Star Wars: The Acolyte. It’s currently available to stream exclusively on Disney Plus, so give it a watch if you haven’t seen it yet and don’t want me to spoil pivotal points of it for you in this video.
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Not only is it the home for all of my written editorials, opinion pieces and reviews for film and television after they debut on Patreon...
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That’s the syllabus. Now onto the lesson.
So what makes the Jedi cops?
Well, it pretty much started with how Jedi were depicted when the Republic was established into the canon during the prequel trilogy.
/While released in 1999, Star Wars: The Phantom Menace allowed us to see a world in a galaxy far, far away in which a legion of religious space monks are so highly regarded in the government of the universe that they receive senator-level support, funding, lobbyist power, and gain significant sway in how said government should be authorized./
And while I’m sure said relationship with the Jedi Order and the Old Republic had been made relevant before the prequel trilogy, for a lot of us Star Wars fans who didn’t read every comic or “Legends” expanded universe novels, seeing this relationship play out on Phantom Menace was WILD.
/Because yes; the Jedi are the good guys. But that’s because we haven’t seen any other usages of the force from any other Force-sensitive institutions that are the embodiment of a more fluid -- more gray -- aspect of the good and evil binaries that the Force represents. And with the exception of Qui Gon Jin who -- at the time -- was the most active representation of this situation, we hadn’t seen a force user that despite disagreeing and going against the wishes of the end-all-be-all of Light Side reps that you can still be a hero./
The Nightsisters were that when they were created in 1994, but we -- the general populace -- didn’t know about them or their exclusive connection to the Force until the animated series “Star Wars: The Clone Wars.”
/Same can be said of characters like Ashoka and Bayland Skoll becoming what Qui Gon represented on both ends of the Force’s now established gray middle/
But the way that the prequel trilogies framed the Jedi Order’s relationship with the Old Republic -- knowing that there’s Sith corruption within the institute with the goal of transitioning it to empire -- tells us that the reason why the Order has access to all of this political power and prowess is BECAUSE they’re to be perceived as “good.”
And it's in how we see the Jedi utilize those resources and opportunity during the Old Republic era that we have access to in the form of the prequel trilogy and the various animated series taking place during the Clone Wars...
That we see the Jedi grow INCREDIBLY comfortable in having such a big say in how space politics should go.
/Not to mention knowing said power would begin to be heavily mandated and removed the moment it’s known to those who distribute it, thanks to power of the privilege forcing them to lose the plot of being a Jedi in the first place./
(Yoda: Blind we are, if creation of this clone army we could not see, Mace: I think it is time we inform the senate that our ability to use the force has diminished, Yoda: Only the Dark Lord of the Sith knows our weakness. If informed the senate is, multiply our adversaries will.)
Don’t worry, I’ll touch on that last bit later.
As of right now thanks to various real-life occurrences and George Lucas applying American colonization allegories into how easily it was for the Jedi to allow the Republic to turn into the Empire, seeing the way the Jedi are overfed and underworked is a common sight in media made during the Old Republic. Mostly because it’s the most accurate depiction.
And while that depiction is VERY reflective of modern day policing, Star Wars: The Acolyte allows us to see the decay of complacency deteriorate the Jedi in a similar way that it has eaten away at American law enforcement through power trip alone.
This is because American police have been given a very similar treatment in regards to how the powers of the Jedi allow them sanction in how they keep the peace.
In most cities across the states, the police are constantly overfunded by the American government versus most public institutions of learning and even transportation. ESPECIALLY learning and transportation.
And thanks to the aspects of mental and emotional ableism and favoritism allowing those with views that can be rooted in bigotry and misogyny to enter, these aspects aren’t given the red flag treatment like one would initially think they would.
Because of this allowance of corruption coupled with the established brotherhood it delivers all while under the protective arms of government funding, it enforces the constantly despicable behavior and practices of those who operate within it all over the country.
/And thanks to their connection with that of the Republic, the Jedi as a result suffer the same fate./
While true that anyone and they mamma can become a cop, and the order only allows those young and force sensitive enough to train as a Jedi, the personalities of who they find to potentially join the order have shown that they are just as susceptible to the station of privilege provided in becoming a Jedi Knight.
And just like the alluring power of becoming a police officer does, those who become knights are capable of becoming one their whole personality.
/Jedi Knights like Yord Fandar./
Yord’s personality as we get to know him over the course of Acolyte reflects that of what you’d imagine a Jedi Sentinel to have.
Sentinels are Jedi who prefer to work with and help preserve the peace of common everyday people, and what solidified a lot of fans realizing this aspect about Yord is thanks to the color of his lightsaber being yellow.
However, as we’ve seen with how certain police officers enforce the law, this position isn’t immune to those who are willing to manipulate and use their station to establish dominance in its name.
/After all, it says a lot that in our first meeting of his character, Yord was immediately down to use the Force on the separatist in order to confirm Osha’s presence on the ship. And it’s over the course of the show that we see Yord throw his weight around as a yellow-sabered Jedi Knight, not being able to see where doing the right thing ends and taking advantage of the power at your station begins./
(You’re gonna need to hand that blaster over. No, it’s mine now. Well, it’s actually the property of the Jedi Order. So I’m afraid I’m going to have to insist that you hand it over)
In this way, Yord represents two aspects of individuals who join the police force thanks to the roots of its creation being in patriarchy and colonization.
They are either the doughy-eyed individuals who join the force hoping to actually do some good only to learn that the police are more the protectors of property and privileged people who slowly allow the power that position grants morph them into something foul..
/Or they are the ones that always wanted a taste of said power for whatever reason, all while using the desire to enact law and order as a scapegoat for their true want of using their station to satisfy the ego they developed over those who are suddenly so much smaller than them./
To quote the only line that has ever come out of Bill Maher’s mouth that I actually agree with, /“The Police Department CANNOT be revenge for High School.”/
But this isn’t the only portion of The Acolyte that properly depicts the Jedi being just as capable of losing the plot as the police.
After all, like I said earlier, the main roots responsible for the creation of police are that of patriarchy and colonization. And while the same can’t necessarily be said about the creation of the Jedi order, even it has been exposed to these elements during the influential high point of its position in the Old Republic.
Especially on Brendok.
The tragedy of Osha and Mae speaks volumes regarding the parallels of the Jedi and the police.
For a lot of us, this was the first time peeps saw the Jedi act this way when it comes to non-Sith Force-sensitive cultures and civilizations.
/Seeing them force themselves on the Nightsisters’ ascension ritual and use their position in the Republic to convince the coven to let them test the twins for force sensitivity -- as if they are the first and final say in the galaxy regarding how the Force is used and who is allowed to use it -- is very reminiscent of how policing was first invented by the British in order to keep the control of the Irish when they first colonized there./
However, it was mainly through the Jedi wishing to have a permanent say in how the Force should be wielded and who it should be wielded by that caused their persecution in the first place.
/This is because the Nightsisters are able to wield the Force not only in ways resembling what we’ve been taught about it in various movies and tv shows thanks to only being exposed to the Jedi and the Sith, but also in ways that resemble more arcane and mystical performances you’d usually only find in full-fledged fantasy stories./
/True, their use of the Force is more aligned to the dark than the light. But that’s only thanks to things being shown through the point of view of those who only have a binary understanding of the Force; those who can only see it in black and white./
It’s no different than various European colonizers arriving in North America, labeling the various practices, cultures and customs of Native Americans as savage and barbaric according to them, and aiming to reduce said culture to nothing in order to force them into controllable assimilation while they claim ownership -- appropriation -- over this use of the Force.
It was that very strangeness -- that cultural divide between various use of the Force and the wish to enforce it -- that factored into one of the reasons why both Osha and Mea’s mothers ended up dead and why the Nightsisters pretty much were willing to sacrifice themselves in order to fight back against the order that would’ve brought about an end to their way of life.
/Even though Mother Aniseya was gonna allow Osha to go with them after they forced themselves into their home the night before, her using her foreign ways of using the Force in front of a Jedi that placed his desires in proving that Vergence theory is real and in wanting an apprentice of his own really badly, was enough to make him “feel threatened” and “use deadly force.”/
And that’s not even counting that power-panicked decision -- done right in front of Mea, mind you -- more than likely factoring into why Sol chose to save Osha instead of both of them.
I wanna feel confident in assuming you all can see the parallels in Sol’s behavior to that of a police officer about to be interwoven into the system’s innate corrupt behavior after entering with the intention of upholding truth and proper justice.
/Everything he did had a root of selfishness about it, even those he would later feel guilty for. It’s in that root of selfishness that a lot of cops begin their descent to truly sold out agents of the bourgeoisie, and it’s mostly through the means of trying to accomplish that desire within the parameters of the institution./
Yes, Sol was tasked in figuring out why the Force was so active on this once-thought baron planet. But he REALLY wanted a padawan of his own.
/Like, enough to grind on the barriers of how much sense of attachment and possession is allowed as a Jedi before acting on forbidden emotions./
And we’ve seen plenty of figures find legal opportunities to do what Sol did in order to satisfy said desires, whether its police or military.
/The Jedi -- assuring them that they thought nobody sentient lived there -- claimed an unregistered planet as part of the Republic, and both invaded those who were native there the longest and enacted their will on their way of life./
(You cannot deny that Jedi have the right to test potential Padawans)
Sensing Osha’s power in the Force, as well as learning she had curiosities in being something other than a witch of the Nightsisters, was what caused that desire within Sol to become his main priority.
/The entirety of he and Indara’s strategy to make sure she took the Force Sensitivity test seriously felt reminiscent of how colonizers would brainwash certain native people who lived on and claimed the land that was being invaded. The most famous American real world example would have to be the true story behind the myth of Pocahontas./
This is solidified when the events of the Brendok Massacre play out upon their involvement.
Every single adult native of Brendok -- including the death of Mother Aniseya that Mea witnessed at the hand of Sol -- had their lives taken by the Jedi while either being peaceful around them or practicing self-defense against them.
Recent history with the deaths of countless black folk and people of color at the hands of the police due to a misunderstanding or a city’s want to enact a resurgence on black land provides an excellent example of why this isn’t far fetched.
And then taking the only recorded survivor of the incident back to Coruscant so she can “gain civility” by training her in the only way to use the Force according to them, isn’t even trying to hint at the comparative subtleties.
/Not only has this trope fueled the Stockholm Syndrome romance scene before 1990’s “Pretty Woman” ran it through the Americanization Machine, but this is basically how the British, Spanish and French would handle the natives of every nation they sought to colonize./
Then to make matters worse, he used the sister that saw him kill their mother as the scapegoat for why everything happened in the first place.
/He refused to acknowledge Mea’s existence in the report he delivered to the temple after the massacre despite being quick to blame her for the mess. Then he used the event to draw sympathy from the Jedi Council so he could be allowed to train Osha./ (Her name is Mea)
Tampering with and planting false evidence. Falsifying incident reports. Gaining acclaim for exaggerated half-truths and whole-ass lies; this is the work of the police, and Sol did all of that as a Jedi.
The thing is that despite the system already being broken enough to cause men’s hearts to shift upon entering it, sometimes it’s not possible to accomplish such secondhand triumphs as discrimination, oppression and colonization in the police force on one’s own.
Most, as you can imagine from both real life instances and copaganda examples, were protected under a banner of law enforcement brotherhood that got them where they are.
And just like fellow officers protect their own even if completely corrupted and shift things around to show that they should be viewed as heroes, the aftermath of the Brendok Massacre is the evidence needed to prove that the Jedi Order will always do what it can to safeguard those part of it, but is willing to do what it takes to stay relevant in every political climate.
Especially when it matters most.
Sol wasn’t the only guilty party, but how they handled the cover-up of the Brendok Massacre and its after effects over the course of the Acolyte is on par with how we’ve seen some of the Jedi Order’s strongest and most respected members act across the canonized Star Wars timeline.
Because let’s not forget padawan Torbin’s role here. Which, by the way, was 100% seeped in privilege and self-centeredness...
And was just as easily swept under the rug by the Jedi in order to keep the event from “unfairly” negatively altering the course of his life.
Y’know, things that would be naturally associated with the concept of whiteness if such a thing existed in the Star Wars universe.
/I say this, because Torbin being the catalyst that resulted in the death of every single Nightsister, just because he translated Sol’s Vergence theory to “the sooner we ‘liberate’ these twins the sooner I can go back home” and ACTED on it, told me a LOT of information about a lot of things in a very tight timespan./
First of all, it told me that even though Jedi train children at an early age so that such selfish thoughts don’t cloud their judgements and actions, this susceptibility shows me that at this point in the timeline, the Jedi cared more about numbers regarding their membership instead of whether or not someone should be a Jedi.
Very similarly to how the actions of a lot of police officers in how they choose to let their station have a say in how they act in public constantly shows that not everyone should have the ability to be a cop.
And not only did he receive no reprehension outside of karma taking sight away from his left eye...
/But Torbin’s guilt caused him to go into a self-reflective and self-redemption meditation when he became a Jedi Knight that lasted so long over the course of his career, that his strength in the force was ridiculously high by the time we see him on Olega. The only way Mea could break him free was to get him to realize that no amount of self-acceptance in the galaxy excused the genocide of a people, and something more valuable than what he’s been presenting must be offered to achieve it. And in the case of Torbin, it was his very life./ (We thought we were doing the right thing)
What the Acolyte does is share with us that in an era where the Jedi have grown increasingly comfortable being the major representatives for light-sided Force users with little to no dark-sided attempts to end their station, these “certain point of view” weren’t the rare candies you’d think they were and were actually as common as Poke-Balls.
/It’s in these “certain points of view” that allow corruption, misinformation and gaslighting to find its way into the home and attach itself to the foundation of the institution that is oppression and control./
For those of us who experience them regularly or have the chance to catch the power-hungry displays in real life, this -- once again -- is just the police.
It’s them shooting a black kid playing a violin dead, only to say that his life felt threatened so he can walk free without reprehension because the bourgeoisie favors the institution.
/Or, in this case, it’s the actions of Jedi Master Indara, keeping truths and half-truths of the Brendock Massacre out of the words and minds of the Order in ways that not only does Sol profit from, but also so that her padawan Torbin wouldn’t be reprimanded for his just as important role in this tragedy./
And just like the police, the Acolyte shows us that the Jedi -- in order to keep their station with the Republic -- aren’t against applying these same tactics to their very own.
One of the things I liked about the Acolyte was that it showed actual opposition to and critique of the Jedi from those within the actual universe of the story; not just us as fans seeing allegory and arguing about it on Twitter.
What made it better was that the character that provided said opposition and critique wasn’t just “an agent of the Dark Side in an umpteenth attempt to dismantle the order.” This was an individual who cared about the amount of unchecked power that the Jedi had thanks to the majority of the Republic thinking that they’re a necessity.
/One who wanted to make sure that proper regulation, observation and concentration was forced on the Jedi so that they didn’t grow to the point of becoming too large for the Republic to stop without call for its complete annihilation./
/This -- not the likes of rogue Jedi, Sith or Mandalorian -- was the danger Jedi Master Vernestra worried about when she let Sol know that Osha is the prime suspect in Indara’s murder/
(If it were to become public that a former jedi killed one of our own...our political enemies could use it against us. Discretion is important)
Worrying about losing their station in the Republic from the likes of senators who merely want to make sure the Jedi don’t grow as big and powerful as the NYPD has been a constant worry of theirs and isn’t new to The Acolyte. It’s been commonplace in the official timeline ever since The Phantom Menace came out.
Hell, George Lucas shared that despite these being movies for children, that he wanted to show that it was the Jedi growing too complacent that caused Darth Sidious to go unnoticed for so long in the first place.
/And just like this fact has been commonplace, so has the intent of certain Jedi wanting to keep things secret from certain people (Luke) or bureaucracies (senate)./
We’ve never seen it done to the extent that Indara talked Torbin, Kelnacca and Sol into before the Acolyte, but thanks to recent real life instances of police being allowed manipulation of the truth to have a spotlight of favor shine on them when it’s time to be observed by the public eye...
We finally see that it’s the stereotypes of “All Jedi are Good” or that “the Jedi are the good guys” that help them make said decisions better play in their favor.
So if we see that the Jedi are willing to go THIS far in order to protect their own from those that might limit their power, then what happens to Sol and his merit after Osha understandably ended his life should’ve been expected.
/And I can understand that one can look at Vernestra’s character as mildly antagonistic even before people realized that she lightsaber-whipped Qimir all the way to the Dark Side. Vibes regarding how she dealt with Sol, the other Jedi and both talk of and conversation with Senator Rayencourt BEEN off./
SO off that seeing she was willing to use Sol and his reputation as a scapegoat in order to make sure the Jedi have no outside involvement in regards to how they handle their affairs, was unsurprising for some just from character standpoint alone.
/But just like how the corruption spreads across an institution already founded on control and protecting the rich from the poor as prominent as law enforcement, think about what she -- a Jedi Knight -- was exposed to within the Order to believe this act was a necessity to preserve it in the first place./
In the case of Sol, it also shows that it doesn’t matter how good you are, how much you’ve done, how dedicated or compliant you are to the inner workings of the institution.
The moment that it realizes it can no longer benefit from you, you’ve had a change of heart, you do not match the criteria of one that will go with the flow or that you are an inconvenience, it will sacrifice you, your dignity, and your reputation in a heartbeat if it meant it will protect its brand, its position, and its station.
/But in this case, which one am I talking about? The police, or the Jedi?/
Conclusion
Readers, Mother Aniseya summed up the moral of Star Wars: The Acolyte perfectly; “It’s about power and who is allowed to use it.”
And considering the Jedi’s very fallible history was used in order to show how said allowance of power affects institutions that are said to be used for our potential...
Comparing the Jedi to the incredibly overfunded institution of the police -- whose founding pillars are rooted in oppression, colonization and the protection of investments -- is the main thing you think WOULD be the main thing on the lips of every Woke-Claiming white Star Wars hater and their POC “pick-me’s” that decided to Hate-Watch this show.
Because not only would this be the perfect opportunity for those brainless idiots to say that comparing Old Republic politics to that of modern day American politics is cringe...
But they could EASILY blame it on the fact that the show was created and show run by estrogen-haver Leslye Headland, and say she’s imputing her own leftist politics into this franchise known for having its own leftist politics.
I mean, they’d still look dumb as shit. But at least this way it’ll give off the illusion that they’re actually a fan of the franchise.
But you’d rather critique this show based on lore that you should’ve been fighting for since the Disney acquisition to canonize, the fact that the only white human Jedi is Trinity from the Matrix, and that the main character of the entire series is both female and black...
Instead of the fact that it successfully displays the Jedi in ways that remind those watching it that there’s an overall problem with policing.
That we see how it affects people going into the institution with dreams of helping both others and themselves only to use its corruption to let them find out what their ego tastes like.
We see how access to that power can cause the influence already rooted in control and colonization to come out in ways that always end in justified violence.
We see how the snake would rather eat itself and every one of its babies instead of giving them a reason to justify lessening their power because they had a reputation to uphold
Instead of challenging any of the show’s ACTUAL social discussions that were just as obvious as the ones in the prequel trilogy, YOU dumb sons of bitches constantly prove to wanna be wrong in the most racist and misogynistic ways predictable to that of humankind.
Aren’t you tired? Aren’t you tired of being the loudest bitch at the ball, and just be wrong whenever you get an opportunity to see how long you can hold a note?
Is having strep throat the new hotness? Is it really just that tasty? Somehow I doubt it. I doubt it a LOT
Because I assure you; nobody cares regardless of which point you want to argue.
Every one of y’all wants to exclaim why the police shouldn’t be without the consistently growing amount of resources they’re granted, but nobody wants their opinion of the police being the only ways to uphold law and order to be proven wrong.
/At least if you’ve actually WATCHED the Acolyte, you’d have realized that this was an accurate talking point to actually attack its character./
But at this point, considering how many of y’all use your membership to the “He-Man Women and BI POC Haters Club” the moment you get your cards, I’m starting to believe this is all you can TRULY bring to the discussion.
And if that’s the case, well... Bless your heart...
But I digress, Readers. Your homework assignment for the day:
Write in the comment section below what you thought of Star Wars: The Acolyte if you’ve seen it.
Or, if you feel like sharing with the rest of the class a show or movie you’ve watched with a strong and prominent social justice message shared throughout that idiots were too busy letting their racism and bigotry air out to actually notice.
Whichever question you decide to answer, I’d love to know your thoughts.
/A HUGE shoutout to my Patrons both big and small for helping make this channel possible.
Make sure you check out the card at the end of the video to join, or click the link to it or any of my affiliates in the description box below.
But until then, this is Readus 101. Class dismissed./
Comments
L B
I haven't watched the show but I'm definitely watching your video!
