Taking up the ST/SW issue with a philosophical approach

[JodoForce]

What's the point of fighting alien races? The universe is big enough for all of us. Hell, it's so big that so far we haven't FOUND each other! And you would have us go at them guns blazing the first time we meet aliens? That's just like all those stupid alien invasion films in reverse. We'd have to fly for thousands of years to reach the targets and what's the point? If you want to expand there are plenty of uninhabited planets to expand into.

[Striderteen]

Straw man attack. I never said we should exterminate alien life on sight; I said that the Rebellion's support of alien rights is naive and short-sighted. While "justified xenocide" sounds like an oxymoron, it is important to remember that aliens are not humans, and as such should not be treated as humans.

To use an ecological analogy again, the top predator in a food chain doesn't wipe out all other forms of life -- just those which compete with him or are trying to take his place.

[beyond hope]

So we're supposed to take the ideals into consideration? The Federation seems to have "violence never solves anything" as one of their core ideals. They've got no standing army. Their navy is an exploratory organization: they serve as a military only when necessity requires it. They don't start wars. Their captains will avoid firing on hostile ships in some cases even after being fired upon. Starfleet academy cadets seem to spend all their time studying Shakespeare. Their standard-issue sidearm resembles a remote control more than a weapon and is typically just used to knock people out. We are told they've developed beyond the desire for revenge.

The problem, of course, is that in the real world violence does resolve things. Sometimes it's the only way to resolve things. That's why cops carry guns: force or the threat of force is sometimes necessary in their line of work. The same is true between nations. The UFP has survived for as long as it has because the writers don't utilize their adversaries the way any of us on this board know they could. The Borg are of course the most glaring example: their only tactic against the UFP seems to be innumerable repetitions of "send one and only one cube to attack them." If one cube, why not 5? Or 100? Or 1,000 if the UFP is worth sending ships from the Delta quadrant to attack in the first place? Take the Klingons as exhibit B: the mighty warrior race favors a "drop your modern energy weapon and charge them with knives" school of warfare that would get them massacred in a battle against 20th century infantry. One has to wonder why the Romulans, who are supposed to be so cunning and dangerous, have never thought of building some damn tanks and occupying Feddie worlds. With a good ground force and transporter inhibitors to prevent Starfleet ships from beaming invaders off, any Federation world should be easy prey for such tactics. What will Starfleet do, fire photon torpedoes at their own people? The fact of the matter is that the UFP's dominant place in the Alpha Quadrant is due more to benevolent writers than any real strength.

Is the Star Wars black-and-white view of good and evil any more realistic? Of course not. The fact remains however that when you take the Federation out of it's little playground and pit them against an opponent like the Empire which has all those nasty military toys and the willingness to use them, that they'll lose. They'd lose against the New Republic as well: the NR has a standing army, armored vehicles, artillery support, and a massive technological edge. Why they'd fight is anyone's guess, but if they did the result is a no-brainer.

[Lord of the Farce]

Is the Star Wars black-and-white view of good and evil any more realistic? Of course not.

This is evident from the numerous disputes that generations of the OR's Jedi couldn't resolve, but was ended by the Empire, and only started again after over a decade of NR rule. And we know from Nom Anor that had Empire be in it's full strength, it would have easily crushed the Yuuzhan Vong invasion (the fact that the first appearance of the Yuuzhan Vong was well before the Clone Wars makes you wonder...).

[Kerneth]

I don't have a copy of the Complete Guide to Aliens, or whatever, but here's a quote from Face in X-Wing: Iron Fist

"More importantly, I lived several years on Lorrd, where my family is originally from. The Lorrdians practically invented the art of conscious communication through body language."

This quote *could* indicate that Face is a member of a human subspecies or a near-human species. On the other hand, it could just mean that his family is from a human colony world called Lorrd, and that a cultural peculiarity of this colony world is that, over the thousands of years it's been occupied, the human citizens consciously developed body language as a form of nonverbal communication. The same way Coruscant nobility used hand signals in social settings--Lara Notsil/Gara Petothel used a hand signal to suggest to Myn Donos that he should kiss her, but he didn't catch it because he wasn't a Coruscant native, but a Corellian.

It could also indicate that the alien natives of Lorrd are experts at conscious communication through body language, and that there is a sizeable human population on the planet that has, over the years, picked up some of the Lorrdian's tricks.

Does the Complete Guide to Aliens come right out and say that Lorrdians are a near-human species? If it doesn't, then claiming that Face is a near-human alien or human subspecies alien is the same as claiming that Corellians or Nabooians or Alderaanians are all human subspecies because they're from different planets.

[beyond hope]

Is the Star Wars black-and-white view of good and evil any more realistic? Of course not.

This is evident from the numerous disputes that generations of the OR's Jedi couldn't resolve, but was ended by the Empire, and only started again after over a decade of NR rule. And we know from Nom Anor that had Empire be in it's full strength, it would have easily crushed the Yuuzhan Vong invasion (the fact that the first appearance of the Yuuzhan Vong was well before the Clone Wars makes you wonder...).

Well, really the Empire didn't end them, it suppressed them. I remember a comment to that effect from the Hand of Thrawn novels... one of the characters speculating on how much of the Empire's might had been tied up suppressing cross-species rivalries IIRC. In that regard the novels have tried to go back and fill in the shades of grey: you see that the Empire wasn't entirely evil, nor is the New Republic a perfect replacement.

[Lord of the Farce]

Does the Complete Guide to Aliens come right out and say that Lorrdians are a near-human species? If it doesn't, then claiming that Face is a near-human alien or human subspecies alien is the same as claiming that Corellians or Nabooians or Alderaanians are all human subspecies because they're from different planets.

No, it does not say that they are a near-human or human subspecies alien, in fact it explicitly says that they are actually a genetically human race. But that isn't what I said about them, I said that they are a sub-species of humans (and not that they are separate species), so that's kind of a moot point.

... Though I should mention that being as good vocal and physical mimics as the Lorrdians are (from a mere child, a boy mimicking a girl's voice, being good enough to fool an experienced shapeshifter easily) makes it kind of hard to consider being "Lorrdian" as being not much different from being "Corellian".

[JodoForce]

Straw man attack. I never said we should exterminate alien life on sight; I said that the Rebellion's support of alien rights is naive and short-sighted. While "justified xenocide" sounds like an oxymoron, it is important to remember that aliens are not humans, and as such should not be treated as humans.

To use an ecological analogy again, the top predator in a food chain doesn't wipe out all other forms of life -- just those which compete with him or are trying to take his place.

And the aliens in SW would compete with humans how? The blacks and Asians in this world are competing with the whites for resources, should you exterminate us all? Your putting the boundary for xenocide at the inter-species level is unjustified--just because they can breed with you doesn't mean they aren't competing with you.

That any war with aliens capable of competing with you for resources would just increase suffering on both sides is just icing on the cake.

And who cares about propagating some stupid white human DNA instead of alien DNA anyway?