Moral relativism and the DN/LOTF arc (yes, it's that fascinating)
All my decent fic ideas lately seem to be set around LotF, which has lead me to give in and go back to the beginning (which, for LotF, I'm counting as the Dark Nest series) to try to get some concepts straight. Which in turn leads me to the overwhelming need to unburden myself as to some of the more problematic areas in the themes the DN/LotF arc raises. Because I am a merciful soul, I will place said unburdening under a cut to spare the eyes of the unwary. :p
Ten chapters in, and I've noted so far:
a) Luke and Mara are really, really terrible at parenting. They leave Ben in the care of a droid, knowing he can and has switched the droid off whenever he feels like it. On Ben happening to come out and admit this, Luke told him not to, and being eight years old, I'm sure Ben's going to obey perfectly. *eyeroll* And, um, Ben is really quite annoyingly bratty, and Luke and Mara generally respond to his rudeness, if they do at all, as though he's an adult asking reasonable questions. He's eight.
b) The "moral relativism" of the "modern" Jedi order in DN is ludicrous, and because it plays such an important role in the LotF, I'm trying to figure out exactly why.
It's clear when you have this:
“Right and wrong from whose viewpoint?" Luke countered. "Right and wrong, good and evil, light and dark - most of the time, they are illusions that prevent us from perceiving the greater reality. The Jedi have learned to distance themselves from these illusions, to seek the truth beneath the words."
"We have heard about this new Force of yours," Raynar said. "[...]The Jedi have grown blind to the dark side."
"Not at all," Luke said. "We have learned to see it more clearly than ever, to recognise that the dark side and the light side spring from the same well - inside us.”
... in which Luke's argument is messy at best, followed closely by:
Luke: “Because he's a Jedi... And he was trained in our old tradition - to serve life and protect it, wherever he found the need.”
Han: "Yeah, well, he won't be protecting much life when that border conflict gets out of hand."
Saba: [...] "Nature is cruel for a reason, and Raynar has upset the balance."
Mara: “The law of unintended consequences. That’s why it’s better not to intervene. A modern Jedi would have held himself apart and studied the situation first.”
Leia: “Are we sure that’s a good thing? … How many beings would have died while a modern Jedi studied the situation?”
Luke: “Does it matter? A Jedi serves the Force, and if his actions interfere with the balance of the Force-”
Leia: “I know… I just miss the days when all this was simple.”
... when Luke Skywalker is arguing that it doesn't matter how many people die so long as a philosophical point is being served, something's not right. Clearly it's written that way, which is kind of intriguing in itself, because it suggests that Caedus was, in fact, something of a symptom of a wrongness that was pervading the Jedi as a whole. Come to think of it, this earlier section is interesting in that light also:
Raynar turned to Luke. "What do the Jedi seek?"
"Peace," Luke answered instantly.
... given that Jacen's ostensible motivation for becoming Caedus was a desire for galactic peace. It certainly fits Jacen's character to be vulnerable to the influence of extreme doctrine and ideology and sensitive to the state of the Order, as his struggles have reflected what's happening to the Jedi on a broader scale a few times in the past. And Luke's Jedi are incredibly arrogant in DN and LotF; in TJK, Luke himself casually invades minds for no reason other than to demonstrate that he can on several occasions, although I don't know if this is supposed to seen as troubling or if it's just Denning's typical overuse of the Force at play.
From a meta perspective, though, there are all kinds of problems with this whole concept. Not only is it handled in an extremely clumsy and hamfisted way that lambasts any hope of subtlety and makes no apology about condemning shades of grey as moral decay, but it is extraordinarily unlikely that these characters, at this stages of their lives, would be buying into such an implausibly off-kilter philosophy. Mara endorsing a belief system where there is no light and dark? Luke handwaving innocent deaths as irrelevant? Leia accepting that response? Han having no argument? I can't buy it. Now if it was Jacen and the younger generation, exposed to a hugely devastating war as adolescents, struggling pull enough normality around them to build lives as adults, who were pushing this philosophy in opposition to the older generation of Jedi -- that would have been easier to accept and might have made a believable point of conflict.
There's just something slightly off about the threads that run through the DN/LotF galaxy, which is a shame because there's a great deal there that's worthy of being told. The Solo and Skywalker families being dysfunctional, characters being flawed? Fine, but make it work. I hate being pulled out of what I'm reading constantly because the characters are behaving in ways that don't make sense. It annoys me having to ask why they would do something, or not do something, and have no answer given in the text. Why are Luke and Mara so irresponsible as parents? Are they supposed to be that way, or is an accidental consequence of the necessities of the story? If they are supposed to be, why not acknowledge it directly? Why does Mara make up a thousand excuses for Jacen's homicidal behaviour rather than whisk Ben away as fast as she can? What is up with Leia and Han? LotF made such a mess of them I don't know what's going on there, and while I haven't read Omen yet, nothing subsequent has done anything to help. I'm trying to erase all memory of Millennium Falcon, in fact, so that I still retain some fondness toward the characters.
And I kind of love the irony in Karen Traviss deciding to end her involvement with Star Wars because of canon retcons. Considering that everything of hers that I've read has involved considerable retconning to not only events but to characterisation, philosophy and the underlying ideology of the entire fictional universe, I can't say I'm sorry to see her leave. Taken in isolation, her writing itself wasn't terrible, but she was so profoundly unsuited it wasn't funny. (Unless, of course, you believe Mandos truly belong at the centre of moral uprightness in the Star Wars universe, in which case I will leave you to your mourning).
Must catch up with some vigs that need to be cross-posted here, but for now I think I'll get some sleep or else I'll resemble the living dead in the morning...
Ten chapters in, and I've noted so far:
a) Luke and Mara are really, really terrible at parenting. They leave Ben in the care of a droid, knowing he can and has switched the droid off whenever he feels like it. On Ben happening to come out and admit this, Luke told him not to, and being eight years old, I'm sure Ben's going to obey perfectly. *eyeroll* And, um, Ben is really quite annoyingly bratty, and Luke and Mara generally respond to his rudeness, if they do at all, as though he's an adult asking reasonable questions. He's eight.
b) The "moral relativism" of the "modern" Jedi order in DN is ludicrous, and because it plays such an important role in the LotF, I'm trying to figure out exactly why.
It's clear when you have this:
“Right and wrong from whose viewpoint?" Luke countered. "Right and wrong, good and evil, light and dark - most of the time, they are illusions that prevent us from perceiving the greater reality. The Jedi have learned to distance themselves from these illusions, to seek the truth beneath the words."
"We have heard about this new Force of yours," Raynar said. "[...]The Jedi have grown blind to the dark side."
"Not at all," Luke said. "We have learned to see it more clearly than ever, to recognise that the dark side and the light side spring from the same well - inside us.”
... in which Luke's argument is messy at best, followed closely by:
Luke: “Because he's a Jedi... And he was trained in our old tradition - to serve life and protect it, wherever he found the need.”
Han: "Yeah, well, he won't be protecting much life when that border conflict gets out of hand."
Saba: [...] "Nature is cruel for a reason, and Raynar has upset the balance."
Mara: “The law of unintended consequences. That’s why it’s better not to intervene. A modern Jedi would have held himself apart and studied the situation first.”
Leia: “Are we sure that’s a good thing? … How many beings would have died while a modern Jedi studied the situation?”
Luke: “Does it matter? A Jedi serves the Force, and if his actions interfere with the balance of the Force-”
Leia: “I know… I just miss the days when all this was simple.”
... when Luke Skywalker is arguing that it doesn't matter how many people die so long as a philosophical point is being served, something's not right. Clearly it's written that way, which is kind of intriguing in itself, because it suggests that Caedus was, in fact, something of a symptom of a wrongness that was pervading the Jedi as a whole. Come to think of it, this earlier section is interesting in that light also:
Raynar turned to Luke. "What do the Jedi seek?"
"Peace," Luke answered instantly.
... given that Jacen's ostensible motivation for becoming Caedus was a desire for galactic peace. It certainly fits Jacen's character to be vulnerable to the influence of extreme doctrine and ideology and sensitive to the state of the Order, as his struggles have reflected what's happening to the Jedi on a broader scale a few times in the past. And Luke's Jedi are incredibly arrogant in DN and LotF; in TJK, Luke himself casually invades minds for no reason other than to demonstrate that he can on several occasions, although I don't know if this is supposed to seen as troubling or if it's just Denning's typical overuse of the Force at play.
From a meta perspective, though, there are all kinds of problems with this whole concept. Not only is it handled in an extremely clumsy and hamfisted way that lambasts any hope of subtlety and makes no apology about condemning shades of grey as moral decay, but it is extraordinarily unlikely that these characters, at this stages of their lives, would be buying into such an implausibly off-kilter philosophy. Mara endorsing a belief system where there is no light and dark? Luke handwaving innocent deaths as irrelevant? Leia accepting that response? Han having no argument? I can't buy it. Now if it was Jacen and the younger generation, exposed to a hugely devastating war as adolescents, struggling pull enough normality around them to build lives as adults, who were pushing this philosophy in opposition to the older generation of Jedi -- that would have been easier to accept and might have made a believable point of conflict.
There's just something slightly off about the threads that run through the DN/LotF galaxy, which is a shame because there's a great deal there that's worthy of being told. The Solo and Skywalker families being dysfunctional, characters being flawed? Fine, but make it work. I hate being pulled out of what I'm reading constantly because the characters are behaving in ways that don't make sense. It annoys me having to ask why they would do something, or not do something, and have no answer given in the text. Why are Luke and Mara so irresponsible as parents? Are they supposed to be that way, or is an accidental consequence of the necessities of the story? If they are supposed to be, why not acknowledge it directly? Why does Mara make up a thousand excuses for Jacen's homicidal behaviour rather than whisk Ben away as fast as she can? What is up with Leia and Han? LotF made such a mess of them I don't know what's going on there, and while I haven't read Omen yet, nothing subsequent has done anything to help. I'm trying to erase all memory of Millennium Falcon, in fact, so that I still retain some fondness toward the characters.
And I kind of love the irony in Karen Traviss deciding to end her involvement with Star Wars because of canon retcons. Considering that everything of hers that I've read has involved considerable retconning to not only events but to characterisation, philosophy and the underlying ideology of the entire fictional universe, I can't say I'm sorry to see her leave. Taken in isolation, her writing itself wasn't terrible, but she was so profoundly unsuited it wasn't funny. (Unless, of course, you believe Mandos truly belong at the centre of moral uprightness in the Star Wars universe, in which case I will leave you to your mourning).
Must catch up with some vigs that need to be cross-posted here, but for now I think I'll get some sleep or else I'll resemble the living dead in the morning...