"The Moral Landscape of the STAR WARS Saga" - Introduction

[ladylavinia]

Comments

[arkan2]

We like to pretend that the majority of all human societies have basic rules when it comes to morality. But I suspect that is nothing more than an illusion. I believe that each individual . . . or each group has his/her or its own moral compass.
I know this just me being an enormous pedant, but I'm going to take issue with this. That is, I agree with you, but at the same time, I disagree.

To explain. I think that at core, everybody (probably even certifiable murderous psychopaths) has pretty much the same understanding of morality. I have approximated this viewpoint to "all people deserve to live more or less as I myself would like to live." It's a gross oversimplification of course, but as a generalized statement of morality I think it works well enough.

Or, to quote the Dalai Lama: "All human beings want the same things: to be loved and happy."

The individual moral compasses come into play with the infinite directions human beings take this fundamental view of morality, up to and including different takes on what actually constitutes a "person," and even attempting to assign degrees of personhood. (And even within groups which have a set moral compass, each of the specific individuals making up that group will still differ vastly in what they are or are not prepared to tolerate.)

In my view, morality is one beginning, but a limitless number of directions to go from there.

If there weren't those limitless directions, then morality would be a non-issue, because everybody would pretty much agree on right and wrong in all cases.

But, I argue, if there were not a central core to morality that pretty much everyone could agree on, it would be meaningless. The only way we can communicate morality at all is by speaking to some fundamental point that both sides can agree to. All movements, good or bad or otherwise, justify themselves in essentially the same terms: "What we do is in the best interests of the people." Again, they differ wildly on what constitutes a person, and many deal in degrees of personhood, but at their hearts, each message is practically identical. Individual human beings justify themselves and their actions in the same way.

That's the way I look at it.

... Er, anyway, all that aside, I'm giddily anticipating these essays. I'm sure they'll be most interesting and insightful.

One thing though, I'm confused by your discussion of character flaws in the penultimate paragraph. What I think you meant to say was that while the characters in the Original Trilogy had their flaws, Lucas did an inferior job portraying their flaws compared to his depiction of the Prequel Trilogy's character's flaws (there's probably a less confusing way to say that). I think that's what you meant to say, but that's not quite how it came out.