Stargate: Why was the Jaffa rebellion popular?

[speaker-to-trolls]

This is something I've wondered about for a while. The Jaffa in Stargate are one step down the ziggurat from the gou'a'uld, which essentially makes them angels or high priests with a license to kill. They also have perfect health, a massively extended lifespan (Te'alc is something like 80) and maybe some other perks I don't know about. With all this in mind, why did so many of them join a rebellion against their benefactors? It just doesn't make sense to me.

[Darth Yoshi]

The Jaffa also can't survive past puberty without the Goa'uld, and they fight and die on a Goa'uld's whim. Unless you're First Prime, failure generally means death, especially in the service of a major System Lord.

[NecronLord]

The Jaffa also can't survive past puberty without the Goa'uld,

Wrong. That's a specific alteraion Moloch made to his and only his jaffa.

[Darth Yoshi]

Perhaps I'm confusing cause and effect, then. I know that adult Jaffa can't survive without a symbiote or tretonin boosting their immune systems, and I'm guessing that's an effect of being an incubator of larval Goa'uld.

[Starglider]

why did so many of them join a rebellion against their benefactors? It just doesn't make sense to me.

Because they wanted all the power for themselves and the existing benefits without the drawbacks. Which they more or less got. Jaffa almost certainly continued to act as the nobility in mixed Jaffa/human regions.

[Crazedwraith]

Perhaps I'm confusing cause and effect, then. I know that adult Jaffa can't survive without a symbiote or tretonin boosting their immune systems, and I'm guessing that's an effect of being an incubator of larval Goa'uld.

After implantation, a Jaffa's symbiote replaces their own immune system, making them unable to function without one. However if they're never implanted in the first place. Then they should be fine. (Though presumably a lot closer to baseline humans in resilience)

The early episode "Bloodlines" had Teal'c trying to stop the implantation of his son's first symbiote so he wouldn't be dependent on the Goa'uld.

As to Necronlord's assertion: I can't remember that being stated onscreen. (so a quote would be helpful NL) It could simply be that Teal'c was wrong when he thought he could save his son in that way. The man's hardly a biologist after all.

[NecronLord]

Perhaps I'm confusing cause and effect, then. I know that adult Jaffa can't survive without a symbiote or tretonin boosting their immune systems, and I'm guessing that's an effect of being an incubator of larval Goa'uld.

Only if they've previously carried a larva. Observe Hathor - Hathor puts a pouch in O'Neill with some magical device, making him into a jaffa. However, this doesn't destroy his immune system, it's something the symbiote does when it enters the jaffa incubator. Similarly, in Bloodlines, Teal'c wished to prevent his son, Ry'ac, from being implanted with a goa'uld larva, because it would make him dependant upon them. There was no mention of it being a cause for death.

So long as they don't get a larva in the first place (and aren't in Moloch's demented loony bin of a domain), then they will live fine without one. Once they have one, their immune system is permanantly destroyed (though the goa'uld sarcophagus can heal this damage, at least if it's recent, and remove the pouch).

[NecronLord]

As to Necronlord's assertion: I can't remember that being stated onscreen. (so a quote would be helpful NL)

TEAL'C
A Jaffa is taught it is more noble to
die than to kill another.


CARTER
Teal'c...these children have been genetically
altered to depend on symbiotes and then
had all access to them taken away. Their
guardians believe this is the only way
for them to survive.

[Crazedwraith]

Fair enough. I stand corrected.

As to the original question. The position of the Jaffa is so rosey as you make it seen. They're as much slaves as the humans and not much better off. Maybe a few are treat well by their goa'uld masters by only the best of the bests: first primes like Bra'tac or Teal'c. The rest are treated badly, executed on the whims of their masters and send to fight unwinnable battles and then executed for their failure to win said unwinnable battle.

Just because they were better off than the human slaves doesn't mean they had anyting approaching decent standards of living.

[Shroom Man 777]

They're no different from soldiers who are used by politicians as pawns. In this case, the politicians are batshit nuts with delusions of godhood and divinity. Goa'uld like Teal'c and Bra'tac and others have served for so many decades and have seen many of their comrades' lives squandered.

[CaptainChewbacca]

They're no different from soldiers who are used by politicians as pawns. In this case, the politicians are batshit nuts with delusions of godhood and divinity. Goa'uld like Teal'c and Bra'tac and others have served for so many decades and have seen many of their comrades' lives squandered.

They're a bit different than soldiers. Jaffa believe they will be rewarded in the afterlife directly by their living God. I'd say they are more like jihadist fighters than western ones.

[xerex]

you guys are forgetting the basic cuase of the rebellion. the realization that the Goauld WERENT gods. without the divine right to rule /mandate of heaven why should Jaffa prop up the goauld ?


wsnt there a jaffa who proposed that the goauld bcome thier slaves ? use the juvenile symbiotes to enhance jaffa strength but then dicard the adult symbiotes ?

[Stargate Nerd]

wsnt there a jaffa who proposed that the goauld bcome thier slaves ? use the juvenile symbiotes to enhance jaffa strength but then dicard the adult symbiotes ?

I think that was Teal'C himself trying to upset Apophis in Serpent's Song.