What Are Sith?

[Voices of The Deep]

[member="Tirdarius"]
@N'Goo the Ancient
[member="Darth Vitium"]
[member="Matsu Xiangu"]
[member="Darth Abyss"]

I'd like to thank you all for your insight and opinions on this matter. Now that i hear what the Sith are from those of you who know a lot about them and actually can explain it in a simpler form i must admit i like the idea of Sith a lot more now. Originally i always thought of them as just...bad guys for the good guys to fight. But seeing them in this light reveals to me the Sith are actually similar to a lot of my favorite kinds of characters and such. Even a couple that i have written before.

So i have an idea for a character i want to make...if anyone wants to try to help me out let me know. I am currently reading those guides which are extremely well done. Kudos to you Tirdarius ^^

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="Scheherazade Roshanara"]

The Sith are the good guys. Just the ones willing to do whatever needs to be done to see things through. The Jedi are the wannabes: they talk about being a force for good, but aren't willing to take the necessary steps. They won't sacrifice others if they must - they'll sacrifice themselves, but only because they delude themselves into thinking that this is a noble action. It's far harder to make a sacrifice and have to live with the pain of it. To die in righteous action simply alleviates any sensation of pain at all. In this respect, the Jedi are cowards.

 

[Darth Abyss]

[member="Tirdarius"] I think we simply disagree here, no harm in that. I certainly see the point you have but I remember that the holocron of darth bane refused to help Kryat with his vong infection due to his believe in the rule of one.

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="Darth Abyss"] Yup, but Bane felt that unification among the Sith was the wrong path: he felt it diluted rather than strengthened. Having read the books on Bane, I honestly saw a petulant child who wanted all the power for himself, and was too impatient to seek it through merit, so destroyed the others of his kind to ensure he had no competition. That was a selfish act, certainly not one that had the Sith in mind: he wanted to be top of the pyramid, and sought immortality to maintain that position. He's held up as a model Sith, but I honestly see him as a coward and a heretic.

So, yes, we definitely disagree on this. I don't mind it, though: we have many interpretations of Sith around here, and I don't see that as a negative. Provided it's handled properly

 

[Darth Carnifex]

Darth Krayt 4 life

 

[Grrwunhoooll Agaburry]

[member="Tirdarius"]

Whole concept of good and bad is... rudimentary. A microscopic Label in a unimaginable Universe far far away.

[member="Darth Abyss"]

I've accepted the fact that we cant really fully grasp whats good and evil in an absolute final judgement.

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="N'Goo the Ancient"]

Well, DUH

 

[Darth Carnifex]

Sith are the best around, and no one's ever gonna bring them down.

 

[Jsc]

[member="Scheherazade Roshanara"] - on a fansite RP they're whatever you want them to be.

Every one a special special snowflake.

 

[Ellie Mors]

I personally feel that a modification of the Rule of One with aspects of the Rule of Two would be a more perfect version, better than the fated-to-fail Rule of One and the boring rule of two at any rate.

I think the mistake most Sith make is when they try to become megalomaniacal despotic rulers and lead Empire-esque factions to dominate the galaxy as a political power. Same mistake Darth Krayt made, same mistake the Dark Lord in the One Sith made.

A smaller scale variation of the way the Sith Empire of the Golden Age of the Sith (See: Marka Ragnos and before) would be how I see it being done. A Dark Lord of the Sith as the leader of the Sith Order and numerous other Sith and Sith Lords under him/her. I dislike the aspect of teaching blind obedience rather than competitive growth and conflict, however, which is where my ideal Sith Order would be different from the Rule of One. And of course a One Apprentice and One Master pairing makes sense in order to ensure that each apprentice is only capable of defeating their master and killing them if they've outgrown them - not by taking the coward's way out and teaming up against them while remaining weak. Power and purpose are both equally important, emphasising either results in either Sidious's selfish narcissism or Darth Krayt's failure by consolidating too much power in one person.

 

[Alkor Centaris]

There are many interpretations of the Sith code, and Sith come in myriad varieties- you can see that in this conversation, in fact. I see a lot of "pragmatism, Evil is a point of view" cross talk- that's certainly a Sith perspective. On a moral compass, you'd be wise to reconize that a Sith does not always, if ever, point north. We call this a "gray" area, most aligning with Kant's Categorical Imperative- that is, moral relativism. What may be wrong to one, might be acceptable to another. That's an important note to make.

That said, morality is not the crux of the choice between Jedi and Sith. You can argue those semantics til you're blue in the face and never get one side over the other for "who's got the better way of doing things." My take on the Sith path is this:

Freedom is an anecdotal concept. When they say "the Force will set me free," it's not necessarily a be all and end all freedom. We're all slaves to something- wealth, sex, happiness, duty, honor, family, love, hate, and even the Force itself. You can't escape some aspects of life. Through power and victory- fleeting instances of superiority over weakness and failure- you can achieve freedom on a situational basis. The Code is not a means by which to gain true freedom, and indeed, in following it you become a slave to its way of life. It just has that incentive going for it, where you get to feel a little gratification. One could argue that the path of the Sith is wholly self absorbed in that way- they seek strength through their passions for reasons of their own design, whereas the Jedi generally dispossess themselves of those things and act selflessly in pursuit of their duties.

Generally. There are some bad Jedi out there who deviate from the generaization.

 

[Grrwunhoooll Agaburry]

Dark Jedi are best

 

[Veino Garn]

Sith are the ones that build something called the Death Starto blow up a planet, blow up a planet, and then after its destruction decide to build a bigger one, calling it the second Death Star. Also take power by manipulating the existence of a civil war to bend the galaxy to their will and then enforce that power via overwhelming military force, enslavement of those viewed as inferior.

May be trying to do what's best for the galaxy, but only when what's best for the galaxy is to be under their rule regardless of how many sentients are killed in the process or what is all lost in order to accomplish some semblance of best.

In the original movies, the Empire had strong parallels to Nazi philosophy, which seems to hold true through the franchise, especially in regards to their own perceived superiority and the importance of the removal of those seen to be weak.

Or to quote George Lucas after Episode 3:

The Sith are people who are very self-centred and selfish. There used to be many Sith, but because they were corrupted by power and ambition, they killed each other off, so now there are only two - a master and an apprentice.

Sith rely on their passion to get things done. They use their raw emotion, their hatred, their anger, their bitterness - which is the dark side of the Force. The Force is what binds the galaxy together, and it has a good side and a bad side.

The Sith learned how to manipulate both sides of the Force, and then they fell into the trap of being corrupted by the dark side. The Jedi Knights are like marshals in the Wild West. It's their job to make sure everyone is protected, to bring peace. They are the enemy of the Sith, because the Sith want to dominate the galaxy, to control everything, and for a thousand years they have had a plot against the Jedi.

So, in this movie, it is time for them to seek revenge against the Jedi for perceived injustices and to carry out that plot.

 

[Teynara Jeralyr]

[member="Veino Garn"]

Reminding us, once again, that as much as Lucas had a good idea with the SW Universe, he could be far too two-dimensional, and SW has suffered over the years for it (look at the damn prequels!). It's always struck me as ironic that most of the best SW literature has come from a non-Lucas source, from writers who recognised that the conflicts needed to exist, but that the reasons for them were never as two-dimensional as Lucas likes to play it. The Sith aren't cookie-cutter bad guys, and not nearly as moronic as he describes them.

Lucas just needed a bad guy, and picked near enough every negative stereotype to role with: dark-clothing, psychopathic behaviour, casual violence, drawing on anger and rage (and therefore supposedly lacking in discipline), lacking any sense of ethics, etc.

The writers that crafted the Expanded Universe did an excellent job of fleshing the Sith out to be something more than that, and this is work we continue to do here, thank the Force. Lucas can keep his idiocy where it belongs: in his head.

 

[Blake Morrigan]

[member="Tirdarius"]

Lots of this.