Suppose you founded a Jedi order

[Perinquus]

Suppose you had all the powers of a high level Jedi Master such as Yoda. Moreover, you have located a number of people here on earth who are Force sensitive, and can be trained to become Jedi. You have an opportunity to train them up as Jedi, and establish a Jedi order here on present day earth, and to set whatever rules for it that you wish. Also, you have located a number of people who are Force sensitive, but whom you feel may not possess the goodness or strength of character to resist the Dark Side. How will you deal with them? To keep the Jedi with all their abilities, let's also say you have the technology to make lightsabers (as well as other items of similar technology level -- but not starships; an FTL drive is not within the scope of your knowledge). What would you do? Would you found the order, but keep its existence secret until a fairly large number of Jedi have been trained? Would you announce your existence openly? Would you offer your services, and those of the order to any government here on earth, or to the U.N.? Would you use your powers and skills to take over a nation or nations? Would you hunt down terrorists? Would you set up a fairly monastic-style order, such as the Jedi of the prequel trilogy? Would you allow Jedi to explore the Dark Side, trusting your/their ability to restrain their baser impulses? Would you ultimately seek to have your order exist as a part of any government, an arm of any government, as an independent, advisory body to any government, or as a head of any government? What would your structure, and long term goals and plans for the order be?

[Noble Ire]

I would train my Jedi by the code of the new order (retaining justice ,peace, subservient to the greater good, but allowing love and attachment.) I would have my jedi work behind the scenes for the good of the people (anyone who see X-Men knows what happens when the populace first encounters what they dont understand.) In time perhaps, I would make their presence known, but only after a positive urban mythos had been built up. As for those prone to the dark, I would keep them close at hand, hoping to keep them isolated from the darker temptaions of the world until they were ready. If some presisted towards the dark, I would either be forced to keep them confined, hoping to redeem them one day, or send them off into exile (the second option is probably a bad idea if they were ever to find their way back, but hey, then at least you get a supervillian antagonist. )

[Perinquus]

As for those prone to the dark, I would keep them close at hand, hoping to keep them isolated from the darker temptaions of the world until they were ready. If some presisted towards the dark, I would either be forced to keep them confined, hoping to redeem them one day, or send them off into exile (the second option is probably a bad idea if they were ever to find their way back, but hey, then at least you get a supervillian antagonist. )

Actually, they could be the biggest threat to a Jedi order. If a Dark Jedi broke away from the order, and then revealed himself to the world at large, especially if he used his powers to commit terrible crimes, such as, for example, making himself ruler of a country, and committing acts of genocide, and if this were the first knowledge of Force users the reast of the world ever got, think how hard this would make it for the Jedi. It would be difficult in the extreme for them to cope with the suspicion and fear engendered as a result of such a thing.

[Perinquus]

I almost forgot. One thing the Jedi could do to improve their image, in a scenario such as this, is release some of the high technology they possess. In fact, the Jedi could easily finance their operations by this means. Whether or not this would be an order allowed to keep a large share of such profits would be entirely up to you.

[Noble Ire]

Actually, they could be the biggest threat to a Jedi order. If a Dark Jedi broke away from the order, and then revealed himself to the world at large, especially if he used his powers to commit terrible crimes, such as, for example, making himself ruler of a country, and committing acts of genocide, and if this were the first knowledge of Force users the reast of the world ever got, think how hard this would make it for the Jedi. It would be difficult in the extreme for them to cope with the suspicion and fear engendered as a result of such a thing.

That is true. I suppose the choice is to either lock away the irredeemables (they might still able to escape) or to kill them. Niether choice seems like a good one, but to preserve a good image of your order, and prevent the dark one's from commiting their potential crimes, you have to do one or the other, or isolate the entire order completely. None are very good options. I guess locking them away is the most moral and resonable thing to do (although it is highly objectionable, and not a prefect fix.)

[Kazuaki Shimazaki]

Suppose you had all the powers of a high level Jedi Master such as Yoda.

I'd go for something like the NJO, but increase the proactiveness. In fact, I'd try and run down as close to the Dark Side as possible, because that allows more possibilities. Besides, if your conservatism causes a death of a loved one, your anger over that might do more to push you towards Darkness than if you just proactiveness dealt with the problem, even if that might not be a perfectly Light Side move.

Let's cut out the lightsaber complication. It is a cool sword and it can melt doors, but that's about it. There are supposedly some Force cults that use weapons other than lightsabers. The Teepo Paladins use blasters, while another uses bare hands trained with the Force to resist even a lightsaber. If that's true, that's a path that can be taken.

Probably I'd keep them hidden for awhile, but eventually I'm gonna set up an organization.

If the Dark Siders hadn't already figured out how to use their powers by accident, they shouldn't be a problem unless you train them. Force powers seem rapidly activated with talented people (note Luke's crash course takes only months), but without a Master as some kind of catalyst, even someone like Anakin or Luke can't use the Force to any dangerous degree.

[GeneralTacticus]

Lightsabres lose a great deal of utility in an area where people don't use blasters. They'd still be handy to have around (as a mark of office, backup weapon, and the intimidation factor), but you'd want something else as a primary weapon.

Edit for spelling.

[18-Till-I-Die]

I would found the Order of the Whills...cause that sounds cool...

Basically, i'd try to use the trappings of the samurai culture to help make my Jedi, and force sensitives, more resistant to the Dark Side. Hammer it home you werent given this power to play games, this is a duty to your friends and family and your planet to protect it. A responsibility, which, if you accept my training, comes with the power of a Jedi. I'd let them have families, probably try to get them 'landed' like real knights so each group controls a territory (like the knights of the round) and protect that territory while serving the main Order. I would NOT allow any Dark side bs in my Order, i've read and seen sufficient evidence to prove that no human can resist the obvious problems with letting our emotiosn run mad. All we need is even a small group of Dark Jedi or, even worse, full-blown Sith and that would be hello world war three. Long term, the Order's goals are three fold: 1--prevent any Dark Side or Sith influences because like i said i dont trust humanity with unbridled emotion; 2--protect the common good, the people, and not one particular government; 3--assuming this is in the SW universe, try to advance humans scientifically and culturally to prepare us for eventually making contact with the galaxy-at-large.

[Robert Walper]

I'd go for world domination...or at least Canada anyhow (most likely actually, Canadian takeover would be easy). And I know I'd tap into Sith-like powers (Force lightening anyone?). But I don't think I'd have the will to use them to actually do "evil" to the world or my country. My goal would be to get into power, straighten things out with our government. I'd use my power to insure things get done, but I don't think I'd be interested in over seeing everything like an Emperor or the likes.

[Spartan]

I would edit this to remove the technology and lightsabres as its unneccesary. After all why found the order, you have tech beyond present day earth, sell it and make a profit.

Personally I would not train anyone else, unless I was dying or something. It would also be inhernetly stupid to reveal your powers to anyone who might survive the experiaence. I would get my self the position of king-maker. Know body shoots at the guy behind the head guy. I like would exercise power from the shadows.

[Knife]

Hmmm; you'd have to walk a line between the old Order and the NJO. The old Order was flawed, but really it was flawed by stagnation more than anything. The NJO was flawed by being too open. How many Luke apprentices turned Dark?

I think I would go down the 'servatude' route. Raise and train them to serve the greater good. At it's base, the no attachment rule has a point, they just took it way too far. Reimpose an attachment rule that couples with the servatude rule so that Jedi pick their attachments carefully and give them the training/life experience to be able to handle attachment and or loosing that thing they love.

With that philosophy in place, I think I would still do the Master/Padawan model. It makes for having the future Jedi loyal to their father figures and with the new philosophy in place, a better support system for the troops.

I would pick carefully those who are to be trained, including interviewing and asking them to judge their wishes and possible motivations for such a thing. Those that would be a problem, I keep tabs on. Those that would most probably become a Sith or Dark Sider, I keep tabs on.

At first, my order would be secret and really wouldn't do anything but train. When sufficient amount of Jedi are up to it, I'd probably do the Super Hero model and have Jedi roam a bit, call it their trials, and do good when and where they can. When those come back and others go out to do the same, have the more experienced target more actively evil and or bad things in the world. Big Crime, Murderers, ect. Organized Crime and the such. Maybe terrorists, depending on what we're talking about. I could see me sending out Jedi to go hunt down OBL.

I think taking over my own nation would probably violate my new attachment rules, so a secret organization funded by some of that tech would work. A front company, a tech company who developes cool new shit out of the tech that'll fund my operation.

[CDiehl]

About the technology, I would patent the formulas and designs for whatever advanced technology I know how to produce. I would attempt to become as wealthy as possible, using this knowledge in order to create a facility to train Force-users. Once I have such a facility, I would declare it independent of the rest of the world, and dedicated to preserving freedom and virtue without favoritism to any nation. I would then perform a demonstration of my Force abilities for the world, and call for any person who thinks he might be able to do the same to come to me so I can train them. While it will bring a lot of fakes and deluded people to me, as a Jedi Master, I should be able to ferret them out and identify the real Force-users.

Once I have found students, I would train them to use the Force in concert with more mundane skills. I would hire people to train them in as many skills as they can learn, and how to teach them to others. Their mission will be to find and defeat any person or group trying to harm or oppress others, and to find more Force-users and convince them to join us. To these ends, I will also use my money to hire non-Force-users to act as soldiers led by my students. My students would also be trained in business and employed as part of my business, using their skills to protect my organization from cheating by exposing any attempt to deceive us. My hope is that this will make us wealthy and independent enough to do our job.

[Darth Fanboy]

I'd form a pro-sports team. Then retire after a few years to a life of hedonism before cosnidering taking over a small nation with a tropical climate.

[Nephtys]

Forget making a Jedi Order. I'd recruit all the Forcies about, and breed some loyalties amongst each other, and go on a speach on how we can change the world and make it better. Then I'd train the bunch up in the standard set of skills we see in the Old Order, save that meditation and self-realization stuff. I'd make sure they're more loyal to the organization than anything else (Order is Mother! Order is Father!). After that's all set up... well. That's when the reign over the mundanes begins.

[Petrosjko]

Good god, what a nightmare scenario.

The world would not trust any such group, and with good reason. It'd be B5 and the Psi Corps all over again.

What would I do with it?

My instinct would be to stay covert, but sooner or later some asshole's gonna blow the whole show by Force-choking Pauly Shore, and even the positive publicity that would garner us couldn't overcome the fear and suspicion that would inevitably arise.

[Nephtys]

Good god, what a nightmare scenario.

The world would not trust any such group, and with good reason. It'd be B5 and the Psi Corps all over again.

What would I do with it?

My instinct would be to stay covert, but sooner or later some asshole's gonna blow the whole show by Force-choking Pauly Shore, and even the positive publicity that would garner us couldn't overcome the fear and suspicion that would inevitably arise.

Of course they wouldn't trust us. But with a force of Jedi-equivs, that's a force to be reckoned with. Why not strike first? Or let them strike first on an expendable/throwaway asset like a training group, just to show your own people that the mundanes can't be trusted.

[Petrosjko]

Of course they wouldn't trust us. But with a force of Jedi-equivs, that's a force to be reckoned with. Why not strike first? Or let them strike first on an expendable/throwaway asset like a training group, just to show your own people that the mundanes can't be trusted.

Well, I'm approaching the OP seriously. And for all my joking around about world conquest, it's too much hassle for me to seriously contemplate. I'd rather found a corporate empire.

[NecronLord]

The jedi worked for several reasons.

• They were closely allied with the Republic from, as far as we know, the get-go. With a strong and elected government giving them their orders, and presumably overseeing them, people are more likely to trust them.
• Their powers were utterly awesome. We only really see them properly in TPM. There is a reason Rune Haako was whinging "We'll not survive this," despite having thousands of soldiers on call.
• The jedi were far from common. Well under one per hundred planets.

These factors are very limited. Without a strong (even in the days of Valorum, the Republic was far stronger than the UN) Republic backing them up, the Jedi would be persecuted by governments. Can you really imagine George Bush bending over for Kofi Annan saying "We are sending the Jedi in to resolve this Iraq situation" or for that matter, the Chinese tolerating Jedi investigation of their human rights abuses? The Republic could do it, because if you really piss the Republic off, it does have a navy it can send to remind you of your place.