Star Wars, Capitalism, and The Empire May 19. 2005
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my mind continually saw the stark similarities
Hasn't Lucas gone on record saying that he was deliberately modeling the Empire after America, or at least the path to the dark side that it could easily tend towards? So definite similarities, on purpose. Specifically, he wrote it during Vietnam, but much of it stands true for Iraq as well.
Capitalism.. I think it's easy to find the symptoms of evil in it, but a far more worthy challenge to propose something better than Capitalism, or where Capitalism can/should be tweaked to be less evil. For all of it's evil, where is it worse than any of the multitude of other failed forms of society/state interaction?
Hasn't Lucas gone on record saying that he was deliberately modeling the Empire after America, or at least the path to the dark side that it could easily tend towards? So definite similarities, on purpose. Specifically, he wrote it during Vietnam, but much of it stands true for Iraq as well.
Capitalism.. I think it's easy to find the symptoms of evil in it, but a far more worthy challenge to propose something better than Capitalism, or where Capitalism can/should be tweaked to be less evil. For all of it's evil, where is it worse than any of the multitude of other failed forms of society/state interaction?
That could totally be true about Lucas. I really don't pay attention to pop entertainment news and whatnot. If it is true, he did a marvalous job at it.
Capitalism is inherently evil. It is not a thing or a being but rather it is an idea and an ethic or way of living life. Ethical modes of living can be inherntly selfish and immoral. That is not to say that moral and good things can't be tacted onto the evil ethic. For example, social security is a means of preventing the evils of capitalism from over taking the individaulistic and privitized drive found in capitalism that would render weaker people oppressed. Some would key this term as "welfare capitalism" it creates a balance between the evil of the ethic and the desire for people to live in community. Something else that has been put forth as an alternative to the Empire of Capitalism, or globalization, is Democratic Socialism.
I'm really just thinking out loud. I have no real "course of action" as the moderists would say.
Capitalism is inherently evil. It is not a thing or a being but rather it is an idea and an ethic or way of living life. Ethical modes of living can be inherntly selfish and immoral. That is not to say that moral and good things can't be tacted onto the evil ethic. For example, social security is a means of preventing the evils of capitalism from over taking the individaulistic and privitized drive found in capitalism that would render weaker people oppressed. Some would key this term as "welfare capitalism" it creates a balance between the evil of the ethic and the desire for people to live in community. Something else that has been put forth as an alternative to the Empire of Capitalism, or globalization, is Democratic Socialism.
I'm really just thinking out loud. I have no real "course of action" as the moderists would say.
Michel Foucault. Discipline & Punish: The Birth of the Prison.
Wayne A. Meeks. The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul.
Michel Foucault. The History of Sexuality Vol. 3: The Care of the Self.
Presbyterian Church (USA). Book of Common Worship.
