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For starters, check out Mike Wong's rebuttal to Brin's previous horseshit on the hate mail page. Brin keeps attacking George Lucas and Star Wars, pretending he wants nothing to do with it, it sucks, it's fascist, Lucas is a hack, the usual litany so popular among know-nothings. Brin even pretends to have boycotted the movies, yet can't stop talking about them.

What A Schmuck!
Star Wars on Trial : Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers Debate the Most Popular Science Fiction Films of All Time

Book Description wrote: Debates on the authenticity of the Star Wars franchise and the hero-or-villain status of George Lucas are at the heart of these essays by bestselling science-fiction authors. The incredible popularity of the movies has led to the formation of strong emotions within the science fiction community on the strengths and flaws of the films, exemplified here by David Brin's attacks and Matthew Woodring Stover's defense of the movies. This intense examination of the epic works addresses a broad range of issues—from politics, religion, and the saga's overall logic to the impact of the series on bookshelf space as well as science-fiction film. The question Is George Lucas a hero for bringing science fiction to a mass audience or a villain who doesn't understand the genre he's working for? is discussed before a final "Judge's Verdict" on the greatness—or weakness—of the franchise is reached.

This reminds me of Amadeus with Brin as a bitter Salieri to Lucas' Mozart.

Back when David Brin wrote his infamous pieces in Salon.com that all but called Lucas a fascist, he rambled on and on about what he thought was the stupidity of someone under pressure, anger and duress switching allegiance in such a radical manner as going from Jedi hero to Sith villain.

David Brin wrote:But then, in "Return of the Jedi," Lucas takes this basic wisdom and perverts it, saying -- "If you get angry -- even at injustice and murder -- it will automatically and immediately transform you into an unalloyedly evil person! All of your opinions and political beliefs will suddenly and magically reverse. Every loyalty will be forsaken and your friends won't be able to draw you back. You will instantly join your sworn enemy as his close pal or apprentice. All because you let yourself get angry at his crimes."

Uh, say what? Could you repeat that again, slowly?

In other words, getting angry at Adolf Hitler will cause you to rush right out and join the Nazi Party? Excuse me, George. Could you come up with a single example of that happening? Ever?

A few years ago, I e-mailed Brin my response to this particular bit of smug stupidity. I wish I hadn't erased the e-mails, but I remember how it went. I pointed out a rather famous example of Marshall Petain in France, a hero of the Great War who saved France from being conquered by Germany. He was bitterly anti-German his entire adult life. But when the Germans rolled into Paris, Petain became a Nazi stooge -a stooge who was spared the guillotine or firing squad by DeGaulle, who remained loyal to France and gave mercy. Now one could argue DeGaulle shouldn't have spared Petain, but to argue that the decision made DeGaulle a closet Nazi is an obscene slander.

I also pointed out that any decent book about the Spanish Civil War offers examples of revolutionaries (anarchists, Trotskyists, anarcho-syndicalists) who were so upset that the Republic did not immediately collectivize all agriculture in Spain that they threw in with Franco. It's a strange thing about politics, but people on the far Left seldom change into regular leftists or liberals. Instead, they usually become far rightists. From Mussolini to Lyndon LaRouche to Whittaker Chambers to David Horowitz, it's a good rule of thumb. The same goes for those few who switch from the far Right to the far left. Garry Wills, Edmund Wilson and Gore Vidal didn't become run-of-the-mill Republicans when they quit the far Right in disgust.

To which Brin responded that Yoda was a fascist muppet or some such. At this point I realized Brin wasn't just a dishonest twerp out to ride Lucas' tailwind, nor was he just a jealous, mendacious putz attacking someone who has enjoyed more success. He is in addition to those things, a mentally unbalanced weenie with an unhealthy obsession with George Lucas. He's also a total wanker.

Screw David Brin.

His idiotic original essay already proved without a doubt he was a spectacular moron (hence his absurd idea that the Rebellion planned to install Luke and Leia as monarchs over all ).

The question Is George Lucas a hero for bringing science fiction to a mass audience or a villain who doesn't understand the genre he's working for

Would this be tied in with Brin's idiotic fuckwit definition of what science fiction is?

Vympel wrote:His idiotic original essay already proved without a doubt he was a spectacular moron (hence his absurd idea that the Rebellion planned to install Luke and Leia as monarchs over all ).

Actually, I just consider that deliberate dishonesty to further his premise that Lucas is a fascist.

The question Is George Lucas a hero for bringing science fiction to a mass audience or a villain who doesn't understand the genre he's working for

Would this be tied in with Brin's idiotic fuckwit definition of what science fiction is?

When in doubt, change the meanings of the terms.

Who is David Brin and why should I care?

Wicked Pilot wrote:Who is David Brin and why should I care?

He's a science fiction writer, best known for his "Uplift" series and "The Postman."

As for why you should care I can't help you with that, because I don't.

Imperial Overlord wrote:

Wicked Pilot wrote:Who is David Brin and why should I care?

He's a science fiction writer, best known for his "Uplift" series and "The Postman."

As for why you should care I can't help you with that, because I don't.

Postman's actually fairly good writing (much better than the movie, IMO), but the Uplift series is just so damn boring I've only been able to finish one of the books out of the half dozen or so I've tried reading.

Is the Uplift series the one where humanity, for no apparent reason, desides to give sentience to Dolphins and Chimpanzees?

David Brin's essay is total crap, not only is what he writes blatant lying and misrepresentation, the writing itself sucks. I've read some creationist and intelligent design bullshit that sounds reasonable, Mr. Brin can't even manage that in his ridiculous essay.

One day Mr Brin will have to admit The Postman with K.Costner sucked donkey balls. And that attacking Star Wars won't change that.

I actually kind of liked The Postman, although the plot is a little stretched over a slightly too-long runtime: it's about a half-hour too long.

Other than that, Brin is a shameless shallow human being.

One thing I found disturbing in Brin's Salon piece was his constant likening of Darth Vader to Adolf Hitler. He likened grade school-age Anakin Skywalker to the young Hitler and wondered if it wouldn't have been a good idea to kill him before he could grow up into a monster. I'm pretty turned off by that kind of thinking, since killing children out of fear of what they'll grow into is what the Nazis were all about. It's also reminiscent of Chivington's "Nits grow into lice" remark when his men balked at murdering Sioux children at Sand Creek. And this guy has the gall to smear George Lucas as a fascist?

What about the same fucktard who's always wanking about dolphin intelligence turning around and slagging Star Wars for "genetic determinism" because you can inherit Force powers?

It's pretty obvious that Brin can't form a logically consistent argument to save his life; his various screeds against Star Wars are nothing more than the jealous ravings of a writer who toils in relative obscurity and wishes people would notice him.

Wicked Pilot wrote:Who is David Brin and why should I care?

He's a pestilential dickhead who thinks he can make a name for himself and get free advertising for his novels by smearing George Lucas and Star Wars. For some reason his horseshit has caught on in certain quarters, so you'll end up hearing his lies mynha birded by assholes in other forums when the subject of Star Wars comes up.

Elfdart wrote:One thing I found disturbing in Brin's Salon piece was his constant likening of Darth Vader to Adolf Hitler. He likened grade school-age Anakin Skywalker to the young Hitler and wondered if it wouldn't have been a good idea to kill him before he could grow up into a monster.

That really is idiotic. The only real similarity between Anakin and Hitler was that they both had a strong attachment to their mother. Anakin didn't have an abusive father. Hitler's mother wasn't murdered. Anakin was never an artist. Anakin never spent time in jail, nor was he ever an enlisted man in the military.

His ranting about similarities between Vader and Hitler are basically nothing more than "OMG THEY KILL PPLZ!!!1!!!one!!1!"

First off their was no way to tell they would turn evil....also Hitler didn`t have soeone to guide him down the path to evil like Anakin did with Palpatine.

Which brings up an interesting question...would Anakin have become Vader if Palpatine hadn`t influenced him?

Civil War Man wrote:His ranting about similarities between Vader and Hitler are basically nothing more than "OMG THEY KILL PPLZ!!!1!!!one!!1!"

Even that doesn't have that many similarities. As far as I know, Hitler never had people who failed him executed, they were just replaced. Furthermore, barring any people he might have killed during the Great War (which is not really the same thing), Adolf never personally killed anyone.

Here is an interesting question: Did Vader commit attempted genocide by playing a major part in exterminating the Jedi? To put it this way, if you were to kill, say... every single Army Ranger (no offense intended towards the Rangers, it's just an example), it wouldn't be genocide, they're voluntary members of a group. A Ranger can stop being a Ranger, unlike a white dude, who was born white and there's nothign he can do about it.

The Jedi are force users, and they were born that way. However, one is not born a Jedi. Being one of them is voluntary, sort of. So by the fact that being or not being a Jedi is, to certain degree, a choice. I'd say that exterminating them is not genocide.

Killing all Jedi specifically of the Jedi Order would be killing a group, not Genocide.

However, killing all Force Users (which at the time was most Jedi, barring Dathomir Witches and such) would be Genocide of a sorts, since Force Using is apparantly a genetic trait.

Did Darth Vader ever specifically go after rogue Dark Jedi and native force adepts?

MRDOD wrote:Killing all Jedi specifically of the Jedi Order would be killing a group, not Genocide.

However, killing all Force Users (which at the time was most Jedi, barring Dathomir Witches and such) would be Genocide of a sorts, since Force Using is apparantly a genetic trait.

Did Darth Vader ever specifically go after rogue Dark Jedi and native force adepts?

At least one psychopathic Cerean Dark Jedi who had previously worked for the Emperor died by Vader's hand after the Emperor grew tired of his growing number of innocent kills (the Cerean hunted for remaining Jedi, but got a little bit carried away with his mandate), as told in WotC's Dark Side Sourcebook. And it has been noted in WotC's products that ALL Force-users who did not join the Empire were on the kill list, although so far I haven't heard that Vader would have hunted them down personally.

Typhonis 1 wrote: Which brings up an interesting question...would Anakin have become Vader if Palpatine hadn`t influenced him?

He may have become a Dark side user, but a Sith, no. Basically, his problem was that Palpatine was manipulating both him and the Jedi so there was significant friction between the two; note that the Council did not allow him on before Palpatine specifically requested that they give Anakin a place.

Though, to be fair, we don't know how much of this friction was Anakin's natural stubborness conflicting with the Jedi, or how much was Palpatine's doing... without Palpatine, it's quite possible it would've been a fairly peaceful progression from Padawan to Knight, even with his lateness in joining the Jedi Order.

Civil War Man wrote:

Elfdart wrote:One thing I found disturbing in Brin's Salon piece was his constant likening of Darth Vader to Adolf Hitler. He likened grade school-age Anakin Skywalker to the young Hitler and wondered if it wouldn't have been a good idea to kill him before he could grow up into a monster.

That really is idiotic. The only real similarity between Anakin and Hitler was that they both had a strong attachment to their mother. Anakin didn't have an abusive father. Hitler's mother wasn't murdered. Anakin was never an artist. Anakin never spent time in jail, nor was he ever an enlisted man in the military.

His ranting about similarities between Vader and Hitler are basically nothing more than "OMG THEY KILL PPLZ!!!1!!!one!!1!"

To be fair...i of course dont agree with Brin but i think you got some stuff wrong here...

There are some similarities between the two, but they are changed around a bit.

Besides the strong attachment to their mother, though Anakin had no abusive father i believe Hitler's father was killed; Anakin could be considered an 'artist' in his skill with machines; while he spent no time in jail one could argue his affair with Padme and rejection by the Jedi Masters made him feel 'imprisoned' and i think he said as much; Anakin certainly was a military man, he served with the Jedi Knights in the Clone Wars and was a war hero in fact.

And while Darth Vader didnt specifically commit a holocuast on his own, he was directly responsible for the destruction of Alderan and the deaths of billions. I would call that a kind of genocide.

Of course this is all rather tenuous.

So...again i dont agree with Brin...but i can see that Lucas might have drawn similarities. Frankly though there are more similarities between Palpatine and Bush, but then again like the above, they are somewhat tenuous.

18-Till-I-Die wrote:To be fair...i of course dont agree with Brin but i think you got some stuff wrong here...

There are some similarities between the two, but they are changed around a bit.

Besides the strong attachment to their mother, though Anakin had no abusive father i believe Hitler's father was killed;

No, he collapsed of a pleural hemorrhage.

18-Till-I-Die wrote: Anakin could be considered an 'artist' in his skill with machines;

Art is a creative medium often used to express ideas. Simply being good at making things isn't artistic, any more than Will Hunting being good at math would make him an artist.

18-Till-I-Die wrote: while he spent no time in jail one could argue his affair with Padme and rejection by the Jedi Masters made him feel 'imprisoned' and i think he said as much;

There's a massive difference between feeling like one is trapped by a situation and being locked away and losing all possible personal freedom. Anakin could walk away from the Jedi if he chose to, Hitler couldn't waltz out the front door if he got a little annoyed with bread and water.

18-Till-I-Die wrote: Anakin certainly was a military man, he served with the Jedi Knights in the Clone Wars and was a war hero in fact.

An enlisted man, as the original poster said. There is a profound difference between being a Jedi in command of the battle and a grunt that is being placed in harms way by orders beyond his control.

18-Till-I-Die wrote: And while Darth Vader didnt specifically commit a holocuast on his own, he was directly responsible for the destruction of Alderan and the deaths of billions. I would call that a kind of genocide.

Silly me, I thought Tarkin pulled the trigger without a word from Vader.

18-Till-I-Die wrote: Of course this is all rather tenuous.

To say the least. This stretches it beyond all possible reason, so that you could likely compare thousands of people to Hitler.

Sonnenburg wrote:

18-Till-I-Die wrote:snip

18-Till-I-Die wrote: Of course this is all rather tenuous.

To say the least. This stretches it beyond all possible reason, so that you could likely compare thousands of people to Hitler.

Yes you're right, i was reading into it more than i should have , and i got some stuff wrong myself, mea culpa. Point conceded, excuse my retardness there.

Adrian Laguna wrote:

Civil War Man wrote:His ranting about similarities between Vader and Hitler are basically nothing more than "OMG THEY KILL PPLZ!!!1!!!one!!1!"

Even that doesn't have that many similarities. As far as I know, Hitler never had people who failed him executed, they were just replaced. Furthermore, barring any people he might have killed during the Great War (which is not really the same thing), Adolf never personally killed anyone.

Here is an interesting question: Did Vader commit attempted genocide by playing a major part in exterminating the Jedi? To put it this way, if you were to kill, say... every single Army Ranger (no offense intended towards the Rangers, it's just an example), it wouldn't be genocide, they're voluntary members of a group. A Ranger can stop being a Ranger, unlike a white dude, who was born white and there's nothign he can do about it.

The Jedi are force users, and they were born that way. However, one is not born a Jedi. Being one of them is voluntary, sort of. So by the fact that being or not being a Jedi is, to certain degree, a choice. I'd say that exterminating them is not genocide.

Keep in mind - Vader was exterminating all Jedi, all Jedi-in-training (children), as well as all *retired* Jedi.

There's also the problem that 'Jedi' is not just an affiliation - it is something close to a religion, as well. Would the attempted murder of, say, all Catholics or all Buddhists be genocide?

Okay, he's the author of "Postman", but that's it. Other than that, he's a total ass.

Adrian Laguna wrote:Is the Uplift series the one where humanity, for no apparent reason, desides to give sentience to Dolphins and Chimpanzees?

Yeah, that was rather silly. But to be fair to him, there was one (I think) brilliant element to that body of work: the idea that humans are relative latecomers and small fry in an ancient and active galactic civilization (as opposed to safely dead and gone progenator races and societies). My first attempt at a sci-fi tale involved exactly that concept.

As to the execution of that idea... well that's a different matter entirely.

True most of his Uplift series is rather tedious but the novel "The Uplift War" I think is a great piece of Science Fiction. I mean he remembers that different species cannot produce offspirng. Hell the main couple of the book cant even have sex properly becuase the parts dont fit.

I also like his book of short stories and essays. Otherness some nice stuff in there.