Ship of Fools: The Case for Jedi Marriage

Thread: The Case for Jedi Marriage Board: Oblivion / Ship of Fools.

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Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :

As was explored in Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith, Jedi knights are not permitted to marry (or have any kind of romantic life for that matter). A general summary of the problems arising from this policy can be found in this four panel comic [brief, slightly-NSFW language]. This traditional approach to Jedi nuptials didn't sit well with Colin (age 7), who decided to take it up with the man in charge.

quote:
Dear George Lucas

I don't like that a Jedi cannot get married. I want to get married without becoming a Sith. Please change the rule.

P.S. I want to come to Skywalker Ranch please.

Love Colin

Lucasfilm responded with a package of Star Wars promotional material and the following letter:

quote:
Hello Colin,

Thank you so much for writing to us with your question. It sounds like the Force is strong with you, and you are showing great wisdom by asking your question. To be a Jedi is to truly know the value of friendship, of compassion, and of loyalty, and these are values important in a marriage. The Sith think inward, only of themselves. When you find someone that you can connect to in a selfless way, then you are on the path of the light, and the dark side will not take hold of you. With this goodness in your heart, you can be married.

We enclosed a few gifts that we hope you enjoy. Thank you again for writing to us.

May the Force Be With You!

Sincerely,
Your Friends at Lucasfilm

So, what do you think? A much needed reform that could have saved a whole lot of trouble if it had only been enacted earlier, or a cowardly betrayal of the traditions and values handed down since the early days of the Old Republic?

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :

There is considerable historical precedent: the Zulu warriors, the Knights Templar, and so on.

A more Darwinian thought might be, if the Force is a heritable trait (as it clearly seems to be, what with the Anakin-Luke/Leia thing), then forcing the strongest wielders of the Force out of the gene pool does not seem to make a lot of sense. An allied question: do the Dark Side fanboys also hold by this? What makes them Dark, anyway -- could it be all that squidgy stuff? And if this is so they're easily going to dominate the good guys in a generation or two. Recall the fate of the Shakers, also a sect dedicated to celibacy. They dwindled down to one or two members and are now extinct.

Posted by Golden Key (# 1468) on :

Actually, the Shakers aren't quite gone. The Sabbathday Lake community in Maine is still active.

Sabbathday Lake Shaker Village--Wikipedia.

Maine Shakers (their own site).

It looks like there are maybe 3 members, 2 women and a man. IIRC, some young men joined, years ago, for the crafting life. They still can take in new members. But the community can't adopt orphans any more--religious groups can't adopt kids.

Posted by Lyda*Rose (# 4544) on :

I think that Jedi knights are like a fierce form of monastics. Surely, there are "lay" followers of the Force and that it is not all about wielding light sabers and dominating minds. However as Brenda says, if these talents are important to the spiritual life of the Republic they will tend to become diluted.

And that may be the purpose, who knows? Thinking of "Dune", perhaps the last thing they want is a ruling class with abilities so far from the ken of the main population.

Posted by Nicolemr (# 28) on :

Yeah that whole Jedi celibacy thing just doesn't make a whole lot of sense.

Posted by mousethief (# 953) on :

Either that or they were just being sweet to a little boy.

Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
A more Darwinian thought might be, if the Force is a heritable trait (as it clearly seems to be, what with the Anakin-Luke/Leia thing), then forcing the strongest wielders of the Force out of the gene pool does not seem to make a lot of sense. An allied question: do the Dark Side fanboys also hold by this?

The Sith seem to be subject to their own type of Darwinian pressure, in that we're given to understand that an apprentice Sith becomes a master when he manages to successfully assassinate his own master. There would seem to be a lot of attrition on both sides, which can make for interesting cinema but is a poor way to run a multi-generational organization.

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Lyda*Rose:
Thinking of "Dune", perhaps the last thing they want is a ruling class with abilities so far from the ken of the main population.

It does appear that a class of people with heritable mind control abilities is perhaps not compatible with long-term egalitarian traditions within society. (These are not the ballot papers you're looking for.) Jedi are supposed to reject anger, fear, and hatred, but that still allows for just plain greed.

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :

The other famous fantasy group that is celibate is the wizards in the Earthsea books, by Ursula LeGuin. She had set it up long ago when she wrote the first books, and then she rethought it later, quite nicely.
Since the original trilogy was written for younger readers, she did not actually have to tell the little ones that Ged was not having sex. In a later book she explained this by saying that the concept was so traumatic -- that the magic was actually sexual in nature, and if you expressed it in magic then you could not express it with squidgy --that the wizards not only didn't talk about it, they were in severe avoidance and didn't think about it either.
And therefore, when your wizard gets older and wiser, he gives up on magic and hops into bed. This seems to make Earthsea magic something like online video games, something that young men do.

Posted by Ariel (# 58) on :

Marion Zimmer Bradley's "Lythande" stories feature an adept whose power depends on a secret that must never be made public.

Incidentally, the Jedi have been around longer than you think.

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :

To this day there is a folklore about abstaining from sex before battle, or a big game. Football coaches famously advise this. And school games were originally prescribed, not for physical fitness or the development of sportsmanship, but in an effort to wear out the randy little brats and keep them from having sex.

Posted by ProgenitorDope (# 16648) on :

Well, in-universe, the reason behind it is fear of emotional attachment supplanting serenity and leading to the Dark Side.

Force sensitives are implied to be even more slaves to their emotions than most (see "Shatterpoint"--great book, basically "Heart of Darkness" in SW with Samuel L. Jackson instead of Marlowe). So the fear is Jedi who allowed themselves to get emotional would lose control that much easier and start down the Dark path, which would lead to more emotion and more Dark Side. In sum, marriage = start of a vicious cycle.

That said, there is precedent in-universe for Jedi marriage, in the Old Republic era 1k years before the movies. I think the celibacy thing might be a tradition/suggestion that became law over time, given that. And even though it isn't canon anymore, the Expanded Universe had lots of Jedi take spouses.

(And yes, I spent high school studying Star Wars instead of being normal.)

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :

If the Force is really mitichlorians, and if it is heritable, then is the Force really an STD?

Posted by Sandemaniac (# 12829) on :

Scenes not in the next movie no 28:

"You caught the Force off a toilet seat? I'm a Jedi Master and you expect me to believe that?"

AG

Posted by Tubbs (# 440) on :

Terry Pratchett's wizards were also celibate IIRC. If they married, there was the risk their children would be enchanters (super wizards) and most wizards thought enchanters were a PITA and too big a risk to have too many of them wandering about.

Maybe it's the same with jedi?!

Tubbs

Posted by Pearl B4 Swine (# 11451) on :

Yes, I think it's time for jedijudy to make an honest woman of herself, and go ahead and get married. That is what this thread is all about, isn't it? [Big Grin]

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
In a later book she explained this by saying that the concept was so traumatic

Gods I hate that. Authors rubbishing their work in a misguided attempt at relevance or explanation. Yes, Lucas, I'm including your ridiculous mitichlorians.
Authors, write something new instead of messing up something good.

Posted by Penny S (# 14768) on :

I suspect that the celibate wizard thing is simply inherited from tradition - what happened to Merlin, for example. And it was probably derived from transposing priestly habits to the practitioners of the arcane. Or else by observation of the sorts of people who were interested in the magical arts, who were probably a bit on the geeky side. Like Isaac Newton. (On the other hand, I think there was a Mrs John Dee.)

Posted by jedijudy (# 333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Pearl B4 Swine:
Yes, I think it's time for jedijudy to make an honest woman of herself, and go ahead and get married. That is what this thread is all about, isn't it?

It's OK for Luke and Corran and Leia, and all those young folks. Once a Jedi gets to be my age, it seems to be a little too much work. If they're old enough to make a lightsaber and keep care of it, I figure they're able to decide for themselves if they want to encumber themselves with emotional attachment. And cute wee Jedilets. [Biased]

For myself, I'm not the boss of them. [Snigger]

Posted by HCH (# 14313) on :

In Andre Norton's Witch World novels, the witches of Estcarp believed that if they ever lost their virginity, they would lose their magical abilities. Reinforcing this was the tendency for their enemies to rape captive witches. There is, of course, the overall problem of the witch-talent genes slowly disappearing from the population.

Norton's characters find, though, that this is inaccurate; some of the witches fall in love, marry and retain their magic.

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :

I am convinced that in the beginning Lucas put very few brain cells into the background of this thing. Sort of the reverse of Tolkien. He was (and is) focused on how it looks and sounds -- the movie stuff, in other words. The theory of the Force he had to fudge up later, which gets you mitichlorians. Thus there is no point in really pressing on the structure; it was never meant to stand up to any weight.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

Indeed. Lucas is a great storyteller, but his world-building sucks.

I thought it was midichlorians, but I only ever watched The Phantom Menace once and then decided to devote the rest of my life to trying to forget it. If (midi)mitochlorians have anything to do with mitochondrial DNA and Jedi knights can only be male (oink! oink!) then making them celibate has no effect on the number of Jedi in the gene pool, because (as I understand it) mitochondrial DNA is inherited from your mother, not your father. So, forbidding the women to be knights (to maximise the number of Jedi able to have children) and requiring the knights to be celibate (presumably to minimise the risk of them turning to the Dark Side, though possibly also to force Jedi women to marry non-Jedi men to avoid the dangers of inbreeding) makes perfect sense, though I doubt Lucas had any more than a vague idea of 'let's have something like the Knights Templar' when he wrote the scripts.

I can't believe this - I just proved that the no-marriage rule is logical [Ultra confused]

Posted by Eutychus (# 3081) on :

quote:
Originally posted by Crœsos:
So, what do you think? A much needed reform that could have saved a whole lot of trouble if it had only been enacted earlier, or a cowardly betrayal of the traditions and values handed down since the early days of the Old Republic?

Neither. I think it's a fudge. The statement might give the impression that Jedi can now marry, and might mollify the pro-Jedi-marriage lobby, but I can't see that anywhere in the actual text. Should Lucas be engaged by General Synod? We need orfeo the law-drafter in here.

/Saw Episode IV on its opening run at the Odeon Leicester Square. There's no way to convey to these young whipper-snappers what it was like seeing that battle cruiser fill the entire width of that huge screen in the opening shot.

Posted by Nicolemr (# 28) on :

quote:
Saw Episode IV on its opening run at the Odeon Leicester Square. There's no way to convey to these young whipper-snappers what it was like seeing that battle cruiser fill the entire width of that huge screen in the opening shot.

Oh my yes. We all just stared open-mouthed. I remember leaving the theater gaping and just going "wow".

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:

quote:
Originally posted by Brenda Clough:
In a later book she explained this by saying that the concept was so traumatic
Gods I hate that. Authors rubbishing their work in a misguided attempt at relevance or explanation. Yes, Lucas, I'm including your ridiculous mitichlorians.
Authors, write something new instead of messing up something good.

Would it help if you saw Tehanu as the older Le Guin's critique of the younger Le Guin.
If you don't like Tehanu you can just not reread it. It's not as if Le Guin's gone back and reedited the first books.
Lucas' really serious mess up of his previous work was when he released an extended edition of the first Star Wars with lots of new CGI, especially the previously scrapped sequence with the unconvincing Jabba the Hut added.

Posted by Brenda Clough (# 18061) on :

My son used to be very deeply into SW fandom, to the point where he was an admin on the Star Wars Wookkie-pedia. (He has now switched his obsessions over to politics, and alas! has joined the local Young Republicans.) He actually planned to get married, have children and carefully expose them to the six SW movies, in order. His theory was that #s 1 to 3 (the Phantom Menace etc.) were just as good as #s 4-6 (A New Hope and so forth), but that everyone was unable to see it because they had seen A New Hope first. And he would prove this upon his innocent offspring. (He is unmarried to date, wither because of this or the Young Republican thing.)

Posted by To The Pain (# 12235) on :

I effectively did this to myself - I somehow hadn't seen all of any of the original SW movies (so IV-VI in the new numbering) before there was talk of making I-III, so I only had a few years to avoid them in order to watch everything 'in order' and I definitely like I-III more than people I know who saw them all in the order of release.

Of course, I then booked tickets to see One Man Star Wars and had to catch myself up with IV-VI. Empire Strikes Back works surprisingly well in 30minute episodes, if you've got a busy week before a show and have to get it watched but not miss too much sleep.

Posted by Crœsos (# 238) on :

quote:
Originally posted by To The Pain:
I effectively did this to myself - I somehow hadn't seen all of any of the original SW movies (so IV-VI in the new numbering) before there was talk of making I-III, so I only had a few years to avoid them in order to watch everything 'in order' and I definitely like I-III more than people I know who saw them all in the order of release.

I remember someone making the point that viewing the Star Wars movies in order of release date sequence presents a whole different narrative arc than viewing them in internal chronological order, changing what the story is about. For those who saw IV-VI first, Star Wars is a tale of scrappy rebel underdogs defeating a larger, more disciplined foe, mirrored by Luke Skywalker's ascent from obscure farmboy to Jedi knight. In this viewing, I-III essentially serve as a tacked-on prologue explaining how things got to where they are at the beginning of New Hope.

On the other hand, starting with Phantom Menace and watching the films in internal chronological order transforms the tale to being about the fall and redemption of Anakin Skywalker.

Posted by lilBuddha (# 14333) on :

quote:
Originally posted by To The Pain:
I definitely like I-III more than people I know who saw them all in the order of release.

First, there are only 3 Star Wars movies. (Disney is talking about making a fourth, we shall see if the actually do.)
Second, speaking of the strictly hypothetical prequels, they are so shite I wonder how your view is possible. To start, there is nothing in the portrayal of Anakin which gives the audience any sense of the potential Obi-Wan is supposed to see. There is no fall from grace, he is an emotionally-stunted sociopath with the maturity of a 10 year old. In other words, the central premise of the supposed* reason for their existence is fundamentally flawed by its realisation.
Add to that a poor story, horrible characters and the mistaken belief that special effects trump all.

ETA: NO emotion directed towards you, TTP. Lucas on the other hand...

*Actual reason might be more about dead presidents than fallen hero.

[ 23. April 2015, 17:37: Message edited by: lilBuddha ]

Posted by Jack o' the Green (# 11091) on :

Although I much prefer IV-VI than I-III, The former hardly stand up as great cinema. The sabre fight between Obi-Wan and Vader (who somehow now has the first name 'Darth'), is lackluster at best. The fight between Luke and Vader in ESB isn't much better.

I agree that Anakin in the prequels is nothing more than a grandiose, sociopathic brat. His later portrayal is so at odds with the statement that he "gives with no thought of reward", in the Phantom Menace, that there's too much of a discontinuity to be credible.

The way the Jedi can be both so insightful and yet so incredibly dumb when it comes to Anakin and Padme just beggars belief. And why did she find him attractive? C3PO should have had a better chance.

Many of the ideas and concepts in the films are very good. It's their execution which is often so awful.

Posted by Robert Armin (# 182) on :

My observation is that a lot depends on how old you are. Those of us who were blown away by the original trio were distinctly unimpressed with the prequels. The young people I know who were teens / young adults when the latter came out loved those, and thought the earlier stuff was a bit dull.

Personally I was so bored with I, I never bothered watching II or III. Have I missed much?

Posted by Jack o' the Green (# 11091) on :

No. Only stilted dialogue and acting so wooden it would put 'Thunderbirds' to shame.

Posted by Jane R (# 331) on :

And Jam Jar Binks. Don't forget Jam Jar.

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :

There are several things that can be said for II and III of the prequel trilogy: most of them boil down to at least they're not The Phantom Menace.

Posted by Palimpsest (# 16772) on :

I felt that the latter part of III started to pick up. Almost like it was getting within the gravitation field of a another film that was a story and beginning to move.

How about Hidden Fortress? It's interesting to see the story without some of the visuals and the awkwardness.

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