Purple wrote:Also notice that in a very short span of time after that the Empire is gone. This along with the rest of ANH (such as the existence of a senate) implies that behavior of this type was not in fact the norm.
Perhaps.
But I've read that Rebels refers to multiple Base Delta Zeros being committed, though if one wants to get really nitpicky, Base Delta Zero could mean something else now for all I know.
Presumably because of what? What is the basis for these presumptions?
My only "presumption" here is that the capital of Empire will be subject to direct rule by the Imperial government and that it will be heavy-handed. Seems reasonable, considering that Palpatine himself will be present and that it'll have to be a high security local.
Who were these governors though? The whole thing really feels to me like a devolution of power from the senate back to the individual core worlds and their governors. It is my understanding, and I could be wrong here that the old republic was essentially a confederate structure like the UN more than anything. So devolving power to the core worlds whilst ensuring that the governor is loyal to the empire need not imply much evil.
Its pretty clear to me from what I recall of it that the intent of the scene is to show a move towards greater despotism, not greater local power.
The executing personnel thing only seems to happen in fleets directly controlled by a rather grumpy Darth Vader. And the people he kills tend to be high ranking officers who have blundered into mistakes that should not have happened to someone with their rank.
Tarkin does it (or rather orders the Inquisitor to do it) to a couple guys in Rebels.
As for the rest, it seems to me as standard MO for any counter terrorist operation. Sure it ain't nice. But like there are plenty of democratic nations right now professing to the ideals of liberty, justice and all that who do the same things.
Pretty much correct.
Don't remember that one.
I'm thinking of Alderan, Order 66/Jedi, and possibly assorted Base Delta Zeros.
Is there evidence that these are not reasonably rare occurrences though? Like they might well be the equivalent of the Branch Davidian incident. You know, the one where a whole cult compound was massacred. Bad to be sure, but rare enough not to make people feel the government is evil.
Well, this kind of thing seems to pop up frequently in the works we see.
And remember, the discussion here is not if the empire was evil at heart. Of course they were. But if the average citizen or minor official believed it to be up until the heavy hand of the enforcers of the evil space wizard came to their planet.
I don't know what percentage it was, but many citizens and officials probably believed the Empire was good. And I don't think I said otherwise, so please don't insinuate that I did.
Since when is it wrong to punish traitors who try and defect to terrorists?
I'm skeptical about calling the Rebels terrorists unless they engage in terror tactics or hit non-military targets.
And punishing is one thing. Arranging their murder and pinning it on someone else, however, is a long fucking way from due process.
God only knows. There is no reason to believe that what happens on remote outposts or where ever the cartoon is happening (I genuinely don't know) also goes for core worlds.
Rebels has mostly been in fairly remote areas thus far from what I've seen.
However, even if Imperial atrocities were confined to outlying worlds (something that is obviously false to begin with), that is hardly a defence for those actions or a society that condoned them.
My main thesis is that basically the PT shows us that the core does not much care about what happens in the outer rim.
Quite possibly a lot of people in the core didn't care, though the Imperial military clearly did.
So what might well have happened is a gradual decline into despotism as the core worlds willingly accept that a few genocides here and there are not such a big price to pay for peace and order. It's not like they are going to genocide anyone who is important after all. Only some random dirt farmers out in the outer rim.
Well, it says nothing good about the core and Imperial society as a whole if that's true.
And you see the sort of gradual decline that we see today when it comes to the same situation with our governments. Except that the whole death star incident spoiled that and acted as a wake up call. The outrage over Alredan being destroyed might well have been "You are not supposed to do that to a core world!".
I think you'd be hard pressed to find a western government that is regularly committing genocide. Killing some civilians in war, sure. Other dubious acts, sure. But the Empire took it to a whole different level.
Plus their's the Dark Side thing. If you accept the films, metaphysical evil is a fact in Star Wars.
